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The Bataan Death March
After the Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor, Japan had decided to attack the Philippines of which belonged to the United States. The American forces number 70,000, with 10,000 being American. However, the Japanese forces overwhelmed the Americans and in February of 1942 the Americans surrendered. From then the Japanese forced the Americans to march 63 miles for 5 days and nights. All in all around 10,000 soldiers died on the way to prison camps. -
D-Day
To divert Hitler's attention from the Soviet Union, the U.S. and Great Britain decided to invade mainland Europe. To do this they planned a massive invasion on the beaches of Normandy, after planning for a few years. The allies invaded with a force of about 160,000 and suffered around 10,000 casualties, 6,600 of which were Americans. The force landed on the beaches of Normandy each one codenamed differently: Utah, Omaha, Juno, Gold, and Sword with Omaha having the bloodiest fighting. -
Auschwitz Liberation
For years before WWII, Germany had been rounding up and exterminating Jews which was anyone who was not Aryan. One of these camps in which Jews were sent to be exterminated was called Auschwitz. In this camp it acted like both a concentration camp and a death camp and ended up killing 1.1 million Jews. However as Hitler's armies continued to fall back into Germany the Soviet army continued to liberate camps as they found them. In this camp only 7,000 were liberated. -
Executive Order 9066
After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the American government expected an attack on the west coast. During this brief hysteria, President Rossevelt enacted an order that stated that if you were of Japanese decent then you were to be relocated to an enternment camp. In these camps the Japanese were fed and forced to work. Around two thirds of the Japanese people sent were American citizens. -
Raising the flag on Mount Suribachi
American forces had driven back the Japanese to their own colonies, one of which was Iwo Jima. On this volcanic island there was a large hill or mountain called Mount Suribachi. Over the month long battle the US lost around 7,000 while the Japanese lost 22,000 out of 22,060. It was on the fourth day of fighting that 6 Americans raised the flag and hoped that it would signal an end to the fighting on Iwo Jima. -
The Bombing of Hiroshima
After fighting in the Pacific Ocean for many months the Americans had seen time and time again that the Japanese would fight to the death instead of surrendering. This lead American leaders to estimate it would take 200,000 American casualties to take one island in the islands of Japan. However, a successful test of the newly constructed atomic bomb persuaded American leaders to give Japan an ultimadium, surrender or die. Japan refused and the U.S. dropped the bomb killing 166,00 people.
