World War II

WORLD WAR IIBeating the Germans

THE CASABLANCA CONFERENCE From January 14 to January 24, 1943, the first war

conference between the Allied Powers, was held in Casablanca, Morocco. (Africa)

The purpose of the conference was relatively vague. It took steps toward planning the allied strategy and the end of the war.

Initially, it was to be a Big Three meeting between Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin.

It became a Big Two meeting when Stalin declined the invitation.

With his country besieged by both Hitler and the harsh winter, Stalin didn't feel that he could leave.

Even without Stalin, or perhaps due to his absence, the Casablanca Conference was successful.

No sitting President had ever been to Africa, nor had a U.S. President ever left the country during a time of war. But in the middle of January 1943, FDR became the first President to do both.

How and when Roosevelt left the U.S. and arrived in Morocco was kept secret. The President's trip itself wasn't disclosed to the public until he was already safely back in Washington.

NEW BOMBING CAMPAIGN At the Casablanca Conference, FDR &

Churchill agreed to step up the bombing of Germany - the goal of this new campaign was “the progressive destruction of the German military, industrial, and economic system, and the undermining of the morale of the German people.”

INVADING SICILY The Allies agreed to

attack the Axis of the island of Sicily – Churchill called Italy the “soft underbelly” of Europe and was convinced that the Italians would quit the war if the Allies invaded their homeland.

INVADING THE SOFT UNDERBELLY Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower was placed in

overall command of the invasion The invasion began before dawn on July 10,

1943 – despite bad weather, the Allied troops made it ashore with few casualties thanks to the new vehicle, the DUKW (an amphibious truck)

8 days after troops came ashore, US tanks smashed through enemy lines & captured the western half of the island

• By August 18, Germans had evacuated the island

GENERAL DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

DUKW

ITALY SURRENDERS The attack of Sicily created a crisis within the

Italian government. Victor Emmanuel, the Italian king & a group

of Italian Generals decided it was time to get rid of Mussolini

On July 25, 1943, the king invited Mussolini to his palace & placed him under arrest & the new Italian government began secretly negotiating with the Allies for Italy’s surrender

On September 8, 1943, Italy publicly announced its surrender

Hitler was not about to loose Italy German troops went into action at once & seized

control of northern Italy, including Rome, attacked the Americans at Salerno, and put Mussolini back in power.

THE ITALIAN CAMPAIGN To stop the Allied

advance, the German army took up positions neat the heavily fortified town of Cassino with steep, barren, & rocky terrain.

Instead of attacking such difficult terrain, the Allies chose to land at Anzio behind German lines hoping to force them to retreat.

Instead of retreating, the Germans surrounded the Allied troops near Anzio

It took the Allies 5 months to break through the German lines at Cassino & Anzio

Finally in May 1944, the Germans were forced to retreat

The Italian campaign was one of the bloodiest in the war – it cost the Allies more than 300,000 casualties

MUSSOLINIS FATE On September 12, 1943, two months after he

was stripped of power, Mussolini was rescued by the Germans in Operation Oak.

The Germans relocated Mussolini to northern Italy.

After yielding to pressures from Hitler and the remaining loyal fascists, Mussolini helped orchestrate a series of executions of some of the fascist leaders who had betrayed him at the last meeting of the Fascist Grand Council.

One of those executed included his son-in-law

Mussolini and his mistress were stopped by communist partisans and identified as they headed for Switzerland to board a plane to escape to German-controlled Austria.

Mussolini had been traveling with retreating German forces and was apprehended while attempting to escape recognition by wearing a German military uniform

The next day, Mussolini and his mistress were both shot by a firing squad, along with most of the members of their 15-man train, primarily ministers and officials of the Italian Social Republic.

On April 29, the bodies of Mussolini and his mistress were taken to the Piazzale Loreto and hung upside down on meat hooks.

This was both to discourage any fascists to continue the fight and an act of revenge for the hanging of many partisans in the same place by Axis authorities.

The corpse of the deposed leader became subject to ridicule and abuse.

MEETING AT TEHRAN FDR & Churchill wanted to meet with Stalin

before the Allies launched the invasion of France – the 3 met in Tehran, Iran & reached several agreements:Stalin promised to launch a full-scale

offensive against the Germans when the Allies invaded France

FDR & Stalin agreed to break up Germany after the war so that it would never again threaten world peace

Stalin also promised that once Germany was beaten, the Soviet Union would help the US defeat Japan

OPERATION OVERLORD FDR selected General Eisenhower to command

the planned invasion of France – Operation Overlord

Knowing that the Allies would invade France, Hitler had fortified the coast

The Allies had one advantage – the element of surprise – the Germans did not know when or where the Allies would land

Pas-de-Calais

Normandy

OPERATION FORTITUDE The Germans believed the Allies would land

in Pas-de-Calais – the area closet to Britain To convince the Germans they were right, the

Allies placed inflated rubber tanks, empty tents, and dummy landing craft along the coast across from Calais

To German spy planes, the decoys looked real & succeeded in fooling Germany - the real target was Normandy

INFLATABLE DECOY TROOP CARRIER

By the spring of 1944, everything was ready – over 1.5 million American soldiers, 12,000 airplanes, and more than 5 million tons of equipment had been sent to England – only one thing left to do – pick the date & give the command to go!

The invasion had to begin at night to hide the ships crossing the English Channel, the ships had to arrive at low tide so they could see the beach obstacles, the low tide had to come at dawn so that gunners bombarding the coast could see their targets.

Before the main landing, paratroopers would be dropped behind enemy lines which required a moonlit night in order to see where to land.

Most important of all – the weather had to be good – a storm would ground the airplanes & high waves would swamp the landing craft.

Given all these conditions, there were only a few days each month when the invasion could begin

The 1st opportunity would last from June 5-7, 1944.

Eisenhower's planning staff referred to the day any operation began by the letter D, the date for the invasion therefore came to be known as D-Day.

Heavy cloud cover, strong winds & high waves made it impossible to land on June 5th

A day later the weather briefly improved but the Channel was still rough

After looking at the weather forecasts one last time, shortly after midnight on June 6th, 1944, Eisenhower gave the final order: “Ok, we’ll go!”

THE LONGEST DAY Nearly 7,000 ships carrying more than 100,000

soldiers set sail for the coast of Normandy , France on June 6th.

At the same time 23,000 paratroopers were dropped inland, east & west of the beaches.

Allied fighter-bombers raced up & down the coast hitting bridges, bunkers, & radar sites.

As dawn broke, the warships in the Allied fleet let loose with a tremendous barrage of fire – thousands of shells rained down on the beaches.

The beaches were code named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Sword, & Juno

On the eastern flank, the British & Canadian landings also went well – by the end of the day the forces were several miles inland

SWORD BEACH (BRITISH TROOPS)

JUNO BEACH (CANADIAN TROOPS)

GOLD BEACH (BRITISH TROOPS)

UTAH BEACH (US TROOPS) The American landing at Utah Beach went very

well - The German defenses were weak & in less than 3 hours US troops had captured the beach & moved inland suffering less than 200 casualties in the process

OMAHA BEACH (US TROOPS) Omaha Beach was a different story – under

intense German fire, the US assault almost disintegrated.

As General Omar Bradley (commander of US forces at Utah & Omaha) watched the carnage, he began making plans to evacuate Omaha.

Slowly the US troops began to knock out the German defenses.

Nearly 2,500 US soldiers were either killed or wounded on Omaha.

By the end of the day, nearly 35,000 US troops had landed at Omaha & another 23,000 at Utah.

Over 75,000 British & Canadian troops were on shore as well – The invasion had succeeded!

DESTROYING THE NAZIS Well before the war ended Allied leaders

were aware that the Nazis were committing atrocities.

In 1943 the Allied officially declared that they would punish the Nazis for the crimes after the war.

Meanwhile, they were convinced the best way to put an end to the concentration camps was to destroy the Nazi regime – to do that, the Allies had to dedicate their resources to breaking out of Normandy, liberating France, and conquering Germany.

THE BATTLE OF THE HEDGEROWS Although D-Day had been a success, it was

only the beginning – many fields in Normandy were surrounded with hedgerows – dirt walls, several feet thick, covered in shrubbery, built to fence in cattle & crops – but they also enabled the Germans to fiercely defend their positions.

Technical innovations helped turn the tide in Normandy. A Sherman tank is equipped with a hedgerow cutter constructed of materials from German beach obstacles. The “rhino” device was a huge benefit to our tanks in hedgerow combat.

The battle of the hedgerows ended in July, 1944 when 2,500 US bombers blew a hole in the German lines enabling tanks to race through the gap.

THE FRENCH RESISTANCE As the Allied broke out of Normandy, the French

Resistance – French civilians who had secretly organized to resist the German occupation of their country – staged a rebellion in Paris.

When the Allied forces liberated Paris on August 25th, they found the streets filled with French citizens celebrating their victory.

3 weeks later, US troops were within 20 miles of the German border.

THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE As the Allies close in on Germany, Hitler decided

to stage one last desperate offensive (in Belgium): To cut of the Allies supplies through Antwerp To capture Bastogne (several important roads

connect) December 16, 1944 - The attack on Antwerp

began before dawn, bitterly cold, snow covered ground - Allied troops caught by surprise

As Germans rushed west, lines bulged out = attack known as Battle of the Bulge

Allies raced to hold Bastogne & delay German advance

Germans surrounded the town & demanded the Americans surrender

American commander sent back 1 word reply – “Nuts!”

Eisenhower ordered Patton to rescue them – 3 days later (faster than expected in snowstorm) Patton troops slammed into German lines

Weather cleared & airplanes began bombing German fuel depots – on Christmas Eve, German troops were forced to halt because they were out of fuel and weakened by heavy losses

2 days later, Patton's troops broke through

Although the fighting continued for 3 more weeks, the US had one the Battle of the Bulge.

On January 8th, the Germans began to withdraw. Having lost 100,000 troops & many tanks &

aircraft, the were not able to prevent the Allies from entering Germany.

EASTERN FRONT While US & British forces were liberating

France, the Soviets began a massive attack on German troop in Russia –by the time the Battle of the Bulge ended, the Soviets had driven the Germans out of Russia, back across Poland & 35 miles from Berlin

As Soviets crossed Germanys eastern border, US forces attacked the western border – closing within 70 miles of Berlin.

As the Soviets reached the outskirts of Berlin, Hitler knew the end was near – on April 30th, 1934 – he put a pistol in his mouth & pulled the trigger.

His secretary carried his body outside, doused it with gasoline, and set it on fire as he had wished.

GRAND ADMIRAL KARL DOENITZ

Before Hitler died, he chose Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz to succeed him.

Doenitz tried to surrender to the US & British while continuing to fight the Soviets – but Eisenhower insisted on unconditional surrender.

“VICTORY IN EUROPE”

On May 7, 1945, Germany surrenders unconditionally – The next day, May 8th, 1945 was proclaimed V-E Day for Victory in Europe

FAREWELL ROOSEVELT

Unfortunately, President Roosevelt did not live to see the defeat of Germany.

On April 12, 1945, while vacationing in Warm Springs, Georgia, he suffered a stroke and died.

ROOSEVELT'S LITTLE WHITE HOUSE

BY ELIZABETH SHOUMATOFF

This is the original portrait that was being painted of FDR on the day he passed away. In the middle of painting the portrait he complained of a horrible headache and went to lay down for a bit. He suffered a massive stroke in his bed in the Little White House and the portrait was put away and never finished. It now hangs in a building on the grounds.

PRESIDENT TRUMAN His vice president, Harry

S. Truman, became president during this difficult time.

Despite feeling overwhelmed, Truman began at once to make decisions about the war – although Germany surrendered a few weeks later, the war with Japan continued to intensify.

25-5 BOOK QUESTIONS Read What if..Operation Overload Had

Failed? On page 758-759 and answer the 2 Questions.

Read A Day for Heroes on page 763 and answer the 2 Questions.

Pg 761 – 3, 5 Pg 774 – 21