USII Unit

Guide
America during the Second World War

Unit Essential Questions:

○ Why did the United States enter World War II?
○ What were the political, social, and economic situations in Europe and
Asia that convinced the United States to shift from being an
isolationist power to being an allied force in World War II?

Unit Goals/Objectives:
• Understand the U.S. response to Japanese expansion and imperialism in
Asia during the 1930’s
• Understand the expansionist policies of Axis Powers in Europe and Africa
and how the U.S. tried to cope with them through the Neutrality Acts.
• Analyze the United States’ appeasement policies toward Italian and German
aggressions.
• Distinguish the reasons for America’s general isolationist stance in the
1930’s
• Discuss the reasons for American failure to anticipate the Japanese attack
on Pearl Harbor
• Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the wartime policy of
unconditional surrender
• Discuss the reasons behind President Truman’s decision to use the atomic
bomb against Japan
• Trace the course of Allied Victory in Europe—what were air, naval and
ground contributions?
• Describe the course of events in the Pacific war from Pearl Harbor to the
Japanese surrender

Unit Outline:
I. The Road to War: Aggression and Response
a. The rise of Aggressor States
b. U.S. Neutrality
c. The Mounting Crisis
d. The Outbreak of War in Europe
e. America’s response to war in Europe
f. Pearl Harbor

II. Fighting the War in Europe

a. Campaigns in North Africa in Italy
b. Operation Overlord (Normandy—the ground invasion of Europe).

III. The Pacific Theatre

a. Offense in the Pacific
b. U.S. Strategy
c. A New President-the A bomb, and Japan’s surrender

IV: The War at Home

a. the economy
b. social issues; gender, race, etc.

V: Shaping the Peace

a. the United Nations
 b. Justice & Tribunals (Nuremberg, etc).

Terms:

Isolationism
Kellogg Briand Pact
Washington Conference
Kristallnacht
Axis Powers
Allied Powers
Appeasement
Non-aggression pact
Munich conference
Lend-Lease Act
Blitzkrieg
Maignot Line
Atlantic Charter
Pearl Harbor
Baatan Death March
Battle of Coral Sea
Guadalcanal
Stalingrad
Committee of War Information
Japanese Internment
Operation Overlord
D-Day
The Battle of the Bulge
Yalta
Island-hopping
Okinawa
Kamikaze
Manhattan Project
Enola Gay
United Nations
Nuremberg Trials

People:
Hitler
Stalin
Churchill
Mussolini
Franco
MacArthur
Selective Service & Training Act
Rommel
Henry Morganthau, Jr.
Eisenhower
Patton
Truman
Hirohito