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Selective Services Act
Authorized the United States federal government to raise a national army for service in World War I through conscription. -
Manchukuo
Before World War II, the Japanese colonized Manchukuo and used it as a base from which to invade China. -
Holocaust
Systematic murder of about two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe and other unwanted groups. -
Nuremberg Laws
Laws which institutionalized many of the racial theories prevalent in Nazi ideology. -
Spanish Civil War
Republicans fought against Nationalists. Democracy vs Fascism. -
Rape of Nanjing
Mass killing and ravaging of Chinese citizens and capitulated soldiers by soldiers of the Japanese Imperial Army after its seizure of Nanjing, China. -
Quarantine Speech
Calling for an international "quarantine" against the "epidemic of world lawlessness" by aggressive nations. -
Kindertransport
An organised rescue effort for German/Jewish children that took place during the nine months prior to the outbreak of the Second World War. -
Anschluss
Refers to the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany. -
Munich Pact
Agreement between France, Italy, Nazi Germany and Britain to get Hitler to agree not to use his military in the future in return for the land he had taken. -
Kristallnacht
Thousands of Jews were subject to terror and violence by the Nazis. -
Blitzkrieg
A German term for “lightning war,” blitzkrieg is a military tactic designed to create disorganization among enemy forces through the use of mobile forces and locally concentrated firepower. -
Neutrality Act of 1939
This Act lifted the arms embargo and put all trade with belligerent nations under the terms of “cash-and-carry.” The ban on loans remained in effect, and American ships were barred from transporting goods to belligerent ports. -
Non-Agression Pact
Soviet Union signed the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, in which the two countries agreed to take no military action against each other for the next 10 years. -
Battle of Britain
A military campaign in which the Royal Air Force defended the United Kingdom against large-scale attacks by the German Air Force. -
Tripartite Pact
The culmination of a series of agreements between Germany, Japan, and Italy. -
Lend Lease Act
Provided for military aid to any country whose defense was vital to the security of the United States. -
Tuskegee Airmen
The first black military aviators in the U.S. Army Air Corps (AAC), a precursor of the U.S. Air Force. Trained at the Tuskegee Army Air Field in Alabama, they flew more than 15,000 individual sorties in Europe and North Africa during World War II. -
Four Freedoms Speech
Roosevelt insisted that people in all nations of the world shared Americans' entitlement to four freedoms: the freedom of speech and expression, the freedom to worship God in his own way, freedom from want and freedom from fear. -
Executive Order 8802
Signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to prohibit racial discrimination in the national defense industry. It was the first federal action, though not a law, to promote equal opportunity and prohibit employment discrimination in the United States. -
Atlantic Charter
A pivotal policy statement which defined the Allied goals for the post-war world. -
Pearl Harbor
A surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Territory. -
War Production Board
An agency of the United States government that supervised war production during World War II. -
Congress of Racial Equality
An African-American civil rights organization in the United States that played a pivotal role for African Americans in the Civil Rights Movement. -
Office of War Information
A United States government agency created during World War II. Through radio broadcasts, newspapers, posters, photographs, films and other forms of media, the OWI was the connection between the battlefront and civilian communities. -
Battle at the Kasserine Pass
The site of the United States' first major battle defeat of the war. General Erwin Rommel was dispatched to North Africa in February 1942, along with the new Afrika Korps, to prevent his Italian Axis partner from losing its territorial gains in the region to the British. -
Executive Order 9066
This order authorized the Secretary of War to prescribe certain areas as military zones, clearing the way for the incarceration of Japanese Americans, German Americans, and Italian Americans in U.S. concentration camps. -
Bataan Death March
The forcible transfer by the Imperial Japanese Army of 60,000–80,000 Filipino and American prisoners of war. -
Doolittle Raid
Also known as the Tokyo Raid, an air raid by the United States on the Japanese capital Tokyo and other places on the island of Honshu. -
Battle of Coral Sea
A major naval battle between the Imperial Japanese Navy and naval and air forces from the United States and Australia, taking place in the Pacific Theatre. -
Women's Army Corps
The women's branch of the United States Army. It was created as an auxiliary unit, the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps by Public Law 554. -
Bracero Program
A series of laws and diplomatic agreements, initiated on August 4, 1942, when the United States signed the Mexican Farm Labor Agreement with Mexico. -
Battle of El Alamein
The Second Battle of El Alamein was a battle of the Second World War that took place near the Egyptian railway halt of El Alamein. Allies were victorious. -
Casablanca Conference
Held at the Anfa Hotel in Casablanca, French Morocco, from January 14 to 24, 1943, to plan the Allied European strategy for the next phase of World War II. -
Nazi Surrender at Stalingrad
Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in Southern Russia. Obvious Soviet victory. -
Tehran Conference
A strategy meeting of Joseph Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill from 28 November to 1 December 1943, after the Anglo-Soviet Invasion of Iran. -
Korematsu v. United States
A case in which the Court held that compulsory exclusion of citizens during times of war is justified in order to reduce the risk of espionage. Specifically those of Asian descent, result of Pearl Harbor attack. -
Operation Fortitude
The code name for a World War II military deception employed by the Allied nations as part of an overall deception strategy (code named Bodyguard) during the build-up to the 1944 Normandy landings. -
Operation Overlord
The United States and allied troops invaded at Normandy. This was the largest air, land, and sea invasion in history. -
G.I. Bill
Signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, this act provided veterans of the Second World War funds for college education, unemployment insurance, and housing. -
442nd Regimental
An infantry regiment of the United States Army and is the only infantry formation in the Army Reserve. -
Battle of the Bulge
The last major German offensive campaign on the Western Front during World War II. -
Battle of Iwo Jima
A major battle in which the United States Marine Corps landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army. -
Battle of Okinawa
A major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by United States Marine and Army forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. -
V-E Day
the day marking the Allied victory in Europe in 1945. -
Potsdam Conference
The last of the Big Three meetings during World War II. It was attended by Premier Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union, the new American president, Harry S. -
Hiroshima
An American B-29 bomber dropped the world's first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more would later die of radiation exposure. -
Nagasaki
A second atom bomb is dropped on Japan by the United States, at Nagasaki, resulting finally in Japan’s unconditional surrender. -
V-J Day
On August 15, 1945, news of the surrender was announced to the world. This sparked spontaneous celebrations over the final ending of World War II. On September 2, 1945, a formal surrender ceremony was held in Tokyo Bay aboard the USS Missouri. At the time, President Truman declared September 2 to be VJ Day. -
Manhattan Project
A research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons.
