-
Period: to
Benito Mussolini
Rose to power in the wake of World War I as a leading proponent of Fascism. Originally a revolutionary Socialist, he forged the paramilitary Fascist movement in 1919 and became prime minister in 1922. Mussolini’s military expenditures in Libya, Somalia, Ethiopia and Albania made Italy predominant in the Mediterranean region, though they exhausted his armed forces by the late 1930s. Mussolini allied himself with Hitler, relying on the German dictator to prop up his leadership during World War II. -
Harry Truman
Harry Truman (1884-1972), the 33rd U.S. president, assumed office following the death of President Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945). In the White House from 1945 to 1953, Truman made the decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan, helped rebuild postwar Europe, worked to contain communism and led the United States into the Korean War (1950-1953). -
Hideki Tojo
Wartime leader of Japan’s government, General Tôjô Hideki (1884-1948), with his close-cropped hair, mustache, and round spectacles, became for Allied propagandists one of the most commonly caricatured members of Japan’s military dictatorship throughout the Pacific war. Shrewd at bureaucratic infighting and fiercely partisan in presenting the army’s perspective while army minister, he was surprisingly indecisive as national leader. -
Period: to
George S. Patton
The first officer assigned to the new U.S. Army Tank Corps during World War I. During World War II he led the U.S. 7th Army in its invasion of Sicily and swept across northern France at the head of the 3rd Army in the summer of 1944. Defeated the German counterattack in the Battle of the Bulge, after which he led them across the Rhine River and into Germany, capturing 10,000 miles of territory and liberating the country from the Nazi regime.2 -
Period: to
Adolf Hitler
Austrian-born German politician, one of the most powerful and infamous dictators of the 20th century. After World War I, he rose to power in the National Socialist German Workers Party, taking control of the German government in 1933. His establishment of concentration camps to put Jews and other groups he believed to be a threat to Aryan supremacy resulted in the death of more than 6 million people in the Holocaust. His attack on Poland in 1939 started World War II. -
Dwight D. Eisenhower
As supreme commander of Allied forces in Western Europe during World War II, Dwight D. Eisenhower led the massive invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe that began on D-Day (June 6, 1944). In 1952, leading Republicans convinced Eisenhower (then in command of NATO forces in Europe) to run for president; he won a convincing victory over Democrat Adlai Stevenson and would serve two terms in the White House (1953-1961). -
Omar Bradley
Omar Nelson Bradley (1893-1981) was one of the towering American military leaders of the first half of the 20th century. After serving as an infantry school instructor, the West Point graduate took charge of the Eighty-second and Twenty-eighth Divisions during World War II. He commanded the Second Corps in the Tunisian and Sicilian campaigns, and as commander of the First Army he was instrumental to the success of the Normandy campaign. -
Vernon Baker
In 1941, Vernon Baker was assigned to the segregated 270th Regiment of the 92nd Infantry Division, the first black unit to go into combat in WWII. Baker, one of the most decorated black soldiers in the Mediterranean Theater, earned a Purple Heart, Bronze Star and Distinguished Service Cross. In 1996, he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. -
Merchant Marines
The fleet of ships which carries imports and exports during peacetime and becomes a naval auxiliary during wartime to deliver troops and war materiel. -
Period: to
The Holocaust
The mass murder of some 6 million European Jews (as well as members of some other persecuted groups, such as Gypsies and homosexuals) by the German Nazi regime during the Second World War. Mass killing centers constructed in the concentration camps of occupied Poland. HItler blamed the Jews for the country’s defeat in 1918. -
Flying Tigers
In the summer of 1941, months before America was drawn into World War II by the attack on Pearl Harbor, a small group of American military pilots was secretly being recruited to augment China's Air Force. Flying Tigers were significant because it disbanded and replaced by the US military seven months later on July 4, 1942, but during the intervening seven month period, they racked up one of the finest air combat records in history. -
Executive Order 9066
Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066, dated February 19, 1942, gave the military broad powers to ban any citizen from a fifty- to sixty-mile-wide coastal area stretching from Washington state to California and extending inland into southern Arizona. It is significant because the order authorized transporting these citizens to assembly centers hastily set up and governed by the military in California, Arizona, Washington state, and Oregon. -
Battle of Midway
On June 4,U.S discovered the Japanese fleet northeast of Midway. An air battle quickly developed. The turning point came at mid-morning. The Japanese fighters were drawn down to sea level by attacking American torpedo bombers, the vast majority of which were destroyed. Their sacrifice cleared the skies above for the American dive-bombers. Within minutes three Japanese carriers were ablaze. Hiryu, the fourth Japanese carrier retaliated with an air attack sinking the Yorktown. -
Office of War Information
The office of war information was created to control the content and imagery of war messages. It was significant because the government sought to review and approve the design and content of government posters -
Navajo Code Talkers
The navajo code talkers in United States history of Native Americans is predominantly tragic. Settlers took their land, misunderstood their customs, and killed them in the thousands. Then, during World War II, the U.S. government needed the Navajos' help. -
D-day invasion
The D-Day Invasion was during World War II, the Battle of Normandy, which lasted from June 1944 to August 1944, resulted in the Allied liberation of Western Europe from Nazi Germany’s control. It was significant because all of northern France had been liberated, and by the following spring the Allies had defeated the Germans. -
Period: to
Korematsu vs. U.S.
During World War II, Presidential Executive Order 9066 and congressional statutes gave the military authority to exclude citizens of Japanese ancestry from areas deemed critical to national defense and potentially vulnerable to espionage. Korematsu remained in San Leandro, California and violated Civilian Exclusion Order No. 34 of the U.S. Army. -
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development project that produced the first atomic bombs during World War II. It was significant because it was lled by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada -
Potsdam Conference
The Potsdam Conference was the last of the World War II meetings held by the “Big Three” heads of state. It was significant because American President Harry S. Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, the talks established a Council of Foreign Ministers and a central Allied Control Council for administration of Germany -
Atomic Bomb
US B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, instantly killing around 80,000 people. Three days later, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, causing the deaths of 40,000 more. In the months following the attack, roughly 100,000 more people died slow, horrendous deaths as a result of radiation poisoning.The only nuclear attack in history. -
Hiroshima/Nagasaki
during World War II, an American B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more would later die of radiation exposure. Three days later, a second B-29 dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. Japan’s Emperor Hirohito announced his country’s unconditional surrender in World War II. -
Nuremburg Trials
Held for the purpose of bringing Nazi war criminals to justice, the Nuremberg trials were a series of 13 trials carried out in Nuremberg, Germany, between 1945 and 1949. The defendants, who included Nazi Party officials and high-ranking military officers along with German industrialists, lawyers and doctors, were indicted on such charges as crimes against peace and crimes against humanity. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) committed suicide and was never brought to trial.