War's Backgroad

Background to War

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T

he Second World War was fought from 1939 to 1945. In
those six years, more soldiers were killed than in any war
that had ever been fought. More civilians died because of the
war than ever before in history. In no other war did so many
people lose their homes, their possessions, their whole way of
life. The total number of deaths from World War II has beenestimated at 50 million, which is about 1 out of every 5 people
in the United States today.

The most terrible war
World War II was the first time a war was fought all
over the world. By the time it ended, there had been fighting
on every continent except South America and Antarctica, and
in almost all the oceans. Armies had battled one another on
jungle islands in the Pacific Ocean, and inthe deserts of North
Africa. Planes had bombed Australia and Hawaii, London and
Moscow, Norway and Egypt. Large parts of Europe and eastern
Asia were in ruins. Two cities in Japan, Hiroshima and
Nagasaki, had been utterly destroyed by atomic bombs.
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Almost 6 million Jews, including 1.5 million children, had
been murdered in Europe simply because they were Jews.

Nazi Germany and thespecial nature
of World War II
From 1933 until 1945 Germany was ruled by Adolf
Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (the
Nazis). This was a harsh and brutal government. Any opponent of the Nazis was arrested and sent—without a trial—to a
concentration camp. Concentration camps were brutal prison
camps run by Nazi soldiers. The Nazis controlled what could
be published innewspapers and magazines, what was reported
on radio broadcasts, and what books people could read. The
Nazis’ main political goal—to make Germany the ruler of
Europe—and their theories about race contributed greatly to
the brutality of World War II. Hitler believed that Germany
needed Lebensraum or “room to live” if it was to survive. The
Nazis also believed that Germans were a master race,superior
to all others, and that the superior race had a right to attack,
conquer, and enslave weaker ones. Based on these beliefs the
Nazis justified the murder and enslavement of the citizens of
countries it conquered. Eventually, the Nazis instituted an official policy of mass murder that led to the systematic murder of
6 million Jews.

Two theaters of war
This terrible destruction began astwo separate wars, one
in Europe and one in eastern Asia. The background and causes
of these two wars were different. In Asia and the Pacific, the war
was fought between Japan and several countries, but mainly
with China, Great Britain, and the United States. The background to that war was Japan’s attempt to control much of Asia.
Japan invaded Manchuria, a region of China, in 1931.
At thetime China was in the middle of a civil war (different
factions of the government were fighting each other for control of the country), and did not immediately resist this invasion. War finally broke out between Japan and China in 1937,
as Japan moved to take over the rest of China. Japan also began
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World War II: Almanac

expanding its empire to the Pacific islands off the coast of theAsian continent. Much of this territory was controlled by such
countries as the United States, Great Britain, and the Netherlands. Japan prepared to go to war with these countries over
the territory. In December 1941, Japan bombed the U.S. port of
Pearl Harbor on the Hawaiian Islands and America declared
war on Japan.
The other war began as a European war. Although
almost every nation inEurope was soon involved, a few countries played more prominent roles. It began in September 1939
when Germany launched an attack on Poland and found itself
facing Great Britain and France, who had sworn to defend
Poland should the Germans attack it. Great Britain, France,
and the countries that would eventually join them against
Germany were called the Allied powers. Germany was joined
by...