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Japan Invades Manchuria
The Kwantung Army invaded Manchuria immediately after the Mukden Incident. Afterwards, the Japenese established the puppet state of Manchukuo. -
Munich Pact
This was an agreement by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom, the French Third Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy. It provided cession to Germany of the Sudeten German territory of Czechoslovakia. -
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Kristallnacht
This was important because it was a 'turning point', in which discrimination against Jews was characterized for the first time by government-led violence. -
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Germany Invades Poland
Germany invaded to regain lost territory and rule their neighbor. This marked the beginning of World War II. After heavy bombing, Warsaw surrendered to the Germans. -
Neutrality Acts of 1939
The Neutrality Acts were a series of acts passed by the United States Congress in the 1930s in response to the growing threats and wars that led to World War II. -
Executive Order 8022
To prohibit ethnic or racial discrimination in the nation's defense industry. It also set up the Fair Employment Practice Committee. -
Atlantic Charter
A pivotal policy that defined the Allied goals for the post-war world, including self-determination for nations and economic and social cooperation among nations. -
Atlantic Conference
This was the Atlantic Charter, and it established an agenda of preventing global war through free trade, mutual disarmament, increased sovereignty amongst colonial nations, etc. -
Lend-Lease Act
Lend-Lease Act made it so that the U.S. government could lend or lease war supplies to any nation deemed vital to the defense of the United States. -
Attack on Pearl Harbor
Japan attacked the US naval base in Pearl Harbor decimating the US Pacific Fleet. -
Executive Order 9066
This order authorized the evacuation of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to relocation centers further inland. -
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Battle of Midway
The U.S. Navy's decisive victory in the air-sea battle and its successful defense of the major base located at Midway Island. It dashed Japan's hopes of neutralizing the United States as a naval power and effectively turned the tide of World War II in the Pacific. -
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Operation Torch
The largest American campaign to date in the Atlantic theater and the first major operation carried out jointly and combined by the USand the United Kingdom during World War II. -
D-Day (Invasion of Norway)
The Allied Forces of Britain, America, Canada, and France attacked German forces on the coast of Normandy, France. -
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Battle of Bulge
The last major German offensive on the Western Front during World War II. It was an unsuccessful attempt to push the Allies back from German home territory -
Korematsu v. United States
The Supreme Court held that the wartime internment of American citizens of Japanese descent was constitutional. -
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Yalta Conference
The meeting was intended mainly to discuss the re-establishment of the nations of war-torn Europe. -
Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
The first atomic bomb, codenamed 'Little Boy', was dropped on Hiroshima. Three days later a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki.The creation and use of the atomic bomb was truly a turning point in warfare. -
United Nations is created
This is an international organization committed to maintaining international peace and security, developing friendly relations among nations, and promoting social progress, better living standards, and human rights. -
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Nuremberg Trials
The Nuremberg trials were a series of military tribunals held after World War II by the Allied forces under international law and the laws of war. -
Truman Doctrine
The doctrine asked Congress for $400 million in military and economic assistance for Turkey and Greece. -
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was a U.S.-sponsored program implemented following World War II to aid European countries that had been destroyed as a result of the war. -
Israel is established
On this day David Ben-Gurion, the head of the Jewish Agency, proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel. U.S. President Harry S. Truman recognized the new nation on the same day. -
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Berlin Airlift
Soviet forces blockaded all road, rail, and water routes into Berlin's Allied-controlled areas, stifling the vital flow of food, coal, and other supplies. -
US establishes NATO
NATO was the first peacetime military alliance the United States entered into outside of the Western Hemisphere. -
Soviet Union Test Atomic Bomb
The Soviet Union conducted its first nuclear test, code-named 'RDS-1', at the Semipalatinsk test site in modern-day Kazakhstan. The device had a yield of 22 kilotons. -
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Korean War
The Korean War was an important development in the Cold War because it was the first time that the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, had fought a 'proxy war ' in a third country. -
Soviet Union Launches Sputnik
This was the earth's first artificial satellite, Sputnik I. The successful launch came as a shock to experts and citizens in the United States, who had hoped that the United States would accomplish this scientific advancement first -
National Defense Education Act
This became one of the most successful legislative initiatives in higher education. It established the legitimacy of federal funding of higher education and made substantial funds available for low-cost student loans, boosting public and private colleges and universities. -
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Rise of the Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was built to stop people from the eastern, communist part of Germany to the west. -
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Soviet Invasion Of Afghanistan
Soviets organized a massive military airlift into Kabul, involving an estimated 280 transport aircraft and three divisions of almost 8,500 men each. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
The fall of the Berlin Wall served as a symbol of the country's unification and, for many, the end of communism in Eastern Europe and the Cold War.