After learning that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, thus ensuring that the United States would enter World War II, Prime Minister Winston Churchill breathed a sigh of relief. "Hitler's fate was sealed," he would later recall. "Mussolini's fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder. All the rest was merely the proper application of overwhelming force."

Churchill's sentiment was easy to understand. In terms of raw materials and industrial capacity the United States alone was far superior to Germany, Italy, and Japan combined. Now that America had joined Great Britain and the Soviet Union in the fight against the Axis, victory seemed assured.

Yet it was neither raw materials nor industrial capacity alone that was able to overcome the Axis Powers. No doubt the Allies had tremendous advantages in terms of technology and productive capacity, but ultimately World War II was won by members of the armed forces—real, flesh-and-blood men (and sometimes women) who risked death and dismemberment in the name of freedom. They fought everywhere from the steppes of Russia to the jungles of Southeast Asia, from the icy waters of the North Atlantic to the sun-drenched deserts of North Africa. And after nearly four long years they achieved victory.

In this unit, students will examine the role that the United States played in bringing about this victory. They will learn about the strategies that were developed, and how they played out in reality. They will become familiar with the two major theaters of the war—Pacific and European—and how developments in one affected the course of the fighting in the other. Finally, they will learn how the various military campaigns—on land and sea, and in the air—all contributed to the war's successful conclusion.

• How did the Allies manage to turn back the Japanese offensive of 1941-42?
• How did the United States contribute to the turning of the tide against the Axis Powers in Europe in World War II?
• How did the Allies manage to defeat and occupy Germany in 1944 and 1945?
• How did the Allies manage to defeat Japan?

• Articulate the various strategies developed by Anglo-American military planners, as well as the reasons behind them.
• Evaluate the strategies used, in terms of how successful they were in meeting their objectives.
• Discuss anti-Japanese sentiment in the United States, and how it affected the way the Pacific War was fought.
• Explain the magnitude of the U-Boat threat in the Atlantic in 1942 and early 1943, and how it was overcome.
• Assess the effectiveness of the strategic bombing campaign against German cities.
• Explain the reasons behind the dropping of the atomic bombs, and why the use of these weapons was controversial.
• Articulate the reasons behind the Japanese surrender, and the role the atomic bomb played in that decision.
• Identify on a map locations of importance to the war, both in Europe and the Pacific.
• Identify the most important military engagements and explain their significance.

Review each lesson plan. Locate and bookmark suggested materials and links from EDSITEment-reviewed websites. Download and print out selected documents and duplicate copies as necessary for student viewing. Alternatively, excerpted versions of these documents are available as part of the downloadable PDF, such as this one for Lesson Plan One (see sidebar under "Additional Student/Teacher Resources" for full list of files).

Download the blackline masters for each lesson, available as a PDFs, such as this one for Lesson Plan One. This file contains excerpted versions of the documents used in the first and second activities, as well as questions for students to answer. Print out and make an appropriate number of copies of the handouts you plan to use in class.

Perhaps most importantly, you should become familiar with the interactive maps which accompany this unit, and which show the locations of important events in both the European and Pacific theaters:

• Pacific Theater: Lessons 1 & 4
• European Theater: Lesson 2
• Normandy Invasion and Campaign: Lesson 3

Clicking on these locations will bring up pop-ups that include a paragraph or two of basic information about what happened there, as well as links to pages with more in-depth coverage, plus relevant campaign maps, photographs, and/or personal accounts by those who were there.

Working with Primary Sources

If your students lack experience in dealing with primary sources, you might use one or more preliminary exercises to help them develop these skills. The Learning Page at the American Memory Project of the Library of Congress includes a set of such activities. Another useful resource is the Digital Classroom of the National Archives, which features a set of Document Analysis Worksheets. Finally, History Matters offers pages on "Making Sense of Maps" and "Making Sense of Oral History" which give helpful advice to teachers in getting their students to use such sources effectively.

The most terrible war in human history, World War II was fought by the United States to achieve objectives that would not only protect the American nation from aggression but also would permanently better the lot of humankind. Sixty years after its end, the world still lives with the unfolding of its consequences—the rise and decline of the Soviet Union, the end of German aspirations to European dominance, the demise of Western colonialism, a 45-year East-West Cold War and its aftermath, the rebirth of Imperial Japan as a bastion of liberal capitalism, the rise of China as East Asia's dominant power. Whether in the continued tension between Japan and China or in the turbulence of the Middle East, the war's legacies loom large in all our lives.

This four-lesson curriculum unit will examine the nature of what Winston Churchill called the "Grand Alliance" between the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union in opposition to the aggression of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

The first lesson deals with the formation of the alliance, surveying the breakdown of the German-Soviet pact and the developing accord between the Soviet Union (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) and the emerging alliance between the United States (officially neutral until December 1941) and Great Britain (at war with Germany since September, 1939). It effectively culminates with the "Declaration of the United Nations" (January 1, 1942) and subsequent aid agreements in the emergent allied front against the German-Italian-Japanese axis.

The second lesson covers the uncertain period from early 1942 through much of 1943. During much of this period the Grand Alliance was on the defensive. Even after the Soviet Union began to advance after its victory at Stalingrad, the Western powers were unable to establish a major second front in Western Europe. Whether the alliance could hold together, or whether the Soviet Union might make a separate peace, was uncertain. This lesson plan examines the tensions and the sources of ultimate cohesion within the Grand Alliance during the period that eventual victory seemed uncertain.

Lesson three covers issues concerning the future of Europe during the final phase of the wartime alliance. Among the salient questions were the fate of the Eastern European nations, the future of Germany, and the establishment of a new international organization to replace the League of Nations. Behind them all was the problem of whether the liberal, democratic West and the Marxist, totalitarian Soviet Union could continue to coexist as allies.

Lesson four focuses on two major postwar issues in Asia. The first was the American hope of establishing China as a great power despite its grave internal divisions and the insistence of the Soviet Union on dominance in Manchuria. The second was the American policy of ending Western imperialism in Southeast Asia. In both cases, American diplomacy had to grapple with the differing objectives of other important partners in the Grand Alliance. Teachers with limited time may wish to select only one of these problems for class exercises and discussions. The documents relating to each have been grouped together in order to facilitate such an option.

Throughout modern history, former Grand Alliances—including the ones that defeated Germany in World War I, Napoleon's France in the early nineteenth century, and Britain in the age of the American Revolution—had come apart once they had served their purpose. President Roosevelt and large numbers of the American people believed that the World War II Grand Alliance would have a different future. This unit invites students to think in general terms about the nature of military and diplomatic alliances. Are they generally matters of convenience and historical circumstance, or more lasting arrangements based on common basic principles?

Documents from the Yale Avalon project, TeachingAmericanHistory.com, and other online resources will serve as primary sources for this lesson.

• To what extent was the alliance against the Axis powers unified in values and postwar goals?
• What were the major allied differences on wartime strategy and goals and how were they resolved?
• Why and how did the United States attempt to preserve the Grand Alliance as American diplomats addressed European issues?
• Was the American vision for postwar East and Southeast Asia flawed? If so, in what ways?

• Lay out the outlooks and objectives of the United States, Great Britain and the USSR, at the beginning of World War II with some sense of areas of convergence and disagreement.
• Evaluate the Atlantic Charter and the Four Freedoms as alliance goals and weigh them against the experience of the Nazi-Soviet agreements of 1939.
• Explain the ways in which the USSR, the United States, and Britain differed on their approach to winning the war
• Explain why the methods used to obtain the surrender of the French North African government were controversial in Britain and the United States and also disruptive of alliance unity
• Explain the Anglo-American decision to require "unconditional surrender" from the Axis powers
• Explain the ways in which the evolving military progress of the war affected diplomatic decision-making
• Explain the ways in which the USSR, the United States, and Britain differed on the future of Germany.
• Explain the differences between the three allies over the future of Eastern Europe, with particular attention to the problem of Poland.
• Explain the role played by the establishment of the United Nations in inter-allied diplomacy.
• Explain the ways in which the evolving military progress of the war affected diplomatic decision-making.
• Draw on the online documentation to explain the American approach to the shaping of the peace.
• Explain the differing viewpoints with which the USSR, the United States, and Britain approached the issue of European imperialism.
• Explain the ways in which the USSR, the United States, and Britain approached the issue of the future of China and define the postwar goals of each nation.
• Evaluate whether in these cases American policy was "realistic," i.e., in the best interests of the United States and/or likely to be achieved in the postwar world.

Review each lesson plan. Locate and bookmark suggested materials and links from EDSITEment-reviewed websites used in this lesson. Download and print out selected documents and duplicate copies as necessary for student viewing. Alternatively, excerpted versions of these documents are available as part of the downloadable Text Document.

Download the Text Document for this lesson, available here as a PDF file. This file contains excerpted versions of the documents used in the various activities, as well as questions for students to answer. Print out and make an appropriate number of copies of the handouts you plan to use in class.

Analyzing primary sources:

If your students lack experience in dealing with primary sources, you might use one or more preliminary exercises to help them develop these skills. The Learning Page at the American Memory Project of the Library of Congress includes a set of such activities. Another useful resource is the Digital Classroom of the National Archives, which features a set of Document Analysis Worksheets.

Each lesson is designed to stand alone, occupying three to four class periods. Taken together they provide a fairly comprehensive survey of American diplomacy during World War II. If there is insufficient time for all four, teachers should choose whichever plans best fit their particular course. Since some teachers may find the reading assignments too ambitious, the authors have attempted to identify with asterisks (*) the most fundamental documents in each lesson. We encourage all who make use of this unit to think of it as a collection of resources rather than as a plan of readings and exercises to be followed to the last detail.

In the years after World War I Americans quickly reached the conclusion that their country's participation in that war had been a disastrous mistake, one which should never be repeated again. During the 1920s and 1930s, therefore, they pursued a number of strategies aimed at preventing war.

At first the major players in this effort were American peace societies, many of which were part of larger international movements. Their agenda called for large-scale disarmament and an international treaty to abolish war. Their efforts bore fruit, as 1922 saw the signing of a major agreement among the great powers to reduce their numbers of battleships. Six years later most of the world's nations signed the Kellogg-Briand Pact, in which the signatories pledged never again to go to war with one another.

However, events in the early- to mid-1930s led many Americans to believe that such agreements were insufficient. After all, they did not deter Japan from occupying Manchuria in 1931, nor four years later did they stop the German government from authorizing a huge new arms buildup, or Italy from invading Ethiopia. The U.S. Congress responded by passing the Neutrality Acts, a series of laws banning arms sales and loans to countries at war, in the hope that this would remove any potential reason that the United States might have for entering a European conflict.

When in 1939 war did break out between Germany on the one hand, and Britain and France on the other, President Franklin D. Roosevelt dutifully invoked the Neutrality Acts. However, he believed that this was a fundamentally different war from World War I. Germany, he believed (and most Americans agreed with him) was in this case a clear aggressor. Roosevelt therefore sought to provide assistance for the Allies, while still keeping the United States out of the war. He began by asking Congress to amend the neutrality laws to allow arms sales to the Allies. Later on, after German forces overran France, the president asked Congress for a massive program of direct military aid to Great Britain—an initiative that Roosevelt dubbed "Lend-Lease." In both cases the legislature agreed to FDR's proposals, but only after intense debate.

The question of how involved the United States should become in the European war deeply divided the country. On the one hand, Roosevelt and the so-called "internationalists" claimed that a program of aid to Great Britain and other countries fighting against Germany would make actual U.S. participation in the war unnecessary. On the other side stood those who were called "isolationists," who believed that the president's policies were making it increasingly likely that the country would end up in another disastrous foreign war. This debate was still raging when Japanese aircraft attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. At this point it was clear that, like it or not, the United States would be a full participant in the Second World War.

• How did Americans' disillusionment with World War I help to shape U.S. foreign policy during the 1920s?
• Did the neutrality laws of the 1930s represent an effective U.S. response to world affairs?
• How did the American conception of "neutrality" change during the first fifteen months of World War II in Europe? Was this change a positive or a negative development?
• Which side offered the better approach to U.S. foreign relations—the "internationalists" or the "isolationists"?

• List the main reasons for the growth of antiwar sentiment after World War I.
• Identify the U.S. foreign policy initiatives of the 1920s that aimed toward the prevention of war.
• Assess the strengths and weaknesses of the Five-Power Treaty and the Kellogg-Briand Pact as means of preventing war.
• Explain the "Merchants of Death" thesis and how it shaped the U.S. approach to neutrality.
• List the main terms of the neutrality laws passed during the 1930s.
• Identify the major events of European history between 1935 and 1941, and how they shaped the debate over U.S. neutrality.
• Assess the overall effectiveness of U.S. neutrality policy during this period.
• Explain Roosevelt's concept of neutrality in the context of the European war.
• Articulate how Roosevelt sought to revise the neutrality laws in line with this understanding.
• Explain the arguments both for and against Roosevelt's decision in late 1940 to extend military aid to Great Britain.
• Articulate the main arguments used in 1941 for and against greater U.S. involvement in the European war.
• List the Roosevelt administration's major foreign policy initiatives regarding the war in Europe, and explain the significance of each.
• Assess the strengths and weaknesses of the "internationalist" and "isolationist" positions, and advance an argument as to which was the better approach.
• Identify on a blank map the locations of the major events in Europe from 1935 to 1941.

• Review the lesson plans in the unit. Locate and bookmark suggested materials and links from EDSITEment-reviewed websites used in these lessons. Download and print out selected documents and duplicate copies as necessary for student viewing. Alternatively, excerpted versions of these documents are available as part of the downloadable PDFs.
• Download the Text Documents for the lessons, available as PDFs. These files contain excerpted versions of the documents used in all each lesson, as well as questions for students to answer. Print out and make an appropriate number of copies of the handouts you plan to use in class.
• Finally, familiarize yourself with the interactive timeline "America on the Sidelines: The United States and World Affairs, 1931-1941" that accompanies this lesson. This timeline will, through text and maps, guide students through the major events in Europe from 1933 to 1941, and will ask students for each event to identify (choosing from among a menu of options) how the United States responded to it.

Analyzing primary sources

If your students lack experience in dealing with primary sources, you might use one or more preliminary exercises to help them develop these skills. The Learning Page at the American Memory Project of the Library of Congress includes a set of such activities. Another useful resource is the Digital Classroom of the National Archives, which features a set of Document Analysis Worksheets.

Although most Americans were shocked by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the outbreak of war between the two countries came as no surprise to most observers of international affairs. Indeed, the war could be seen as the culmination of tensions between the two countries that can be traced back to 1915, when Japan issued its so-called "Twenty-One Demands" on China. These demands, presented as an ultimatum to the Chinese government, would have amounted to giving Japan a privileged status in certain parts of the country. This was in direct conflict with the stated policy of the United States toward China—the famous "Open Door," in which all countries were to respect Chinese sovereignty and enjoy equal access to Chinese trade.

Exacerbating the situation were the economic problems of Japan in the late 1920s, made worse by the Great Depression which swept the industrialized world in the early 1930s. As an island country with few natural resources, Japan was dependent on international trade, which was disrupted by the economic crisis. Moreover, Japan was overpopulated, but other countries—most importantly the United States—closed the door to Japanese emigrants. Increasingly Japan's military leaders became convinced that only through domination of China could they solve their country's problems. Japan's excess population could be settled in the largely undeveloped Chinese province of Manchuria, while Japanese industry could be revitalized through control of China's import market.

Therefore the 1930s saw a steadily increasing campaign of Japanese aggression in China, beginning with the invasion of Manchuria in 1931 and culminating in the outbreak of full-scale war between the two powers in 1937. Each instance of aggression resulted in denunciations from the United States, but the administrations of the time—that of Herbert Hoover until 1933, and of Franklin D. Roosevelt thereafter-understood that there was no will on the part of the American public to fight a war in East Asia. Therefore U.S. policy by the late 1930s consisted of nothing more than a refusal to recognize Japanese conquests, limited economic sanctions against Japan, and equally limited military and economic assistance for China.

Nevertheless, the Japanese bitterly resented even these halfway measures, and when their war against China bogged down in 1939 they blamed outside interference for the stubborn refusal of the Chinese to submit to their terms. They sought a way to prevent foreign aid from reaching China, and to replace the foreign resources that they could no longer acquire due to American economic sanctions.

In Germany's lightning victories of April–June 1940 Tokyo believed it had found the answer to both problems. In Southeast Asia and the South Pacific lay a number of territories controlled by France, the Netherlands, and Great Britain, which none of those countries appeared capable of defending. If they were to fall into Japanese hands Tokyo's strategic dilemma, it seemed, could be solved. After concluding an alliance with Germany in July 1940, Japan pressured the French government into allowing Japanese troops to occupy the northern part of French Indochina. In the following year Japanese forces occupied the entire country.

The U.S. government met this latest series of aggressive moves with a steadily escalating campaign of economic sanctions, so that by late summer of 1941 Japan was no longer able to purchase any materials from the United States. This was a tremendous blow for many reasons, but particularly because Japan was almost completely dependent upon U.S. imports for its supply of oil. Without oil, of course, Tokyo would have to abandon its war against China—a humiliation that no Japanese leader would accept.

The result was a frenzy of diplomatic maneuvering between Japan and the United States throughout the second half of 1941. However, Tokyo knew that time was running out; if the United States failed to drop its trade sanctions Japan would run out of oil within months. Therefore Japan's leaders made a fateful decision-if no settlement could be reached with Washington by the end of November there would be war. Moreover, the Japanese naval command concluded that this war must begin with the most devastating attack possible against the United States—an air strike, using carrier-based planes, against the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The result, of course, would be a four-year conflict that, in the end, would prove disastrous for Japan.

In this four-lesson curriculum unit, students begin by exploring through contemporary documents the rise of animosity between the United States and Japan beginning in World War I and continuing over the next two decades . They consider next through primary source documents and an interactive timeline the overall principles which underlay both Japanese and American foreign policy in the mid- to late-1930. Students turn then to examine through primary documents and maps why Japan embarked on its policy of aggression against China, also considering the U.S. response to this new policy, and how it contributed to war between the United States and Japan. Finally they are asked to put themselves in the shoes of U.S. and Japanese diplomats in the final months of 1941, desperately trying to reach a settlement that will avoid war. Through the use of primary documents and an interactive map and timeline, they will consider whether there was any reasonable chance of preventing the outbreak of World War II in the Pacific.

• What accounts for the growing hostility that had developed between the United States and Japan by the early 1930s?
• In its approach to the Sino-Japanese conflict of the 1930s, did the United States place itself on a path to war?
• Was the "southern advance" a reasonable attempt to address to Japan's international dilemma, or was it a reckless step toward war?
• Was war between the United States and Japan inevitable after September 1941?

• Explain how Japan's ambitions in China conflicted with the American concept of the "Open Door."
• Discuss the means by which the United States and Japan sought peaceful means of resolving their differences.
• Articulate why U.S. trade and immigration policies angered the Japanese.
• Explain the importance of the Manchurian Incident of 1931, and the American response to it, for the deterioration in U.S.-Japanese relations.
• Explain why Japan went to war against China during the 1930s.
• Articulate the reasons why the United States believed that its interests were at stake in East Asia.
• Discuss how the United States responded to developments in the Sino-Japanese War.
• Assess the effectiveness of U.S. foreign policy in East Asia in the 1930s.
• Define what Japanese leaders meant by the "southern advance," and explain why they opted to pursue it.
• Articulate the U.S. response to the "southern advance," and assess whether it was a reasonable one.
• Explain why Tokyo decided in September 1941 to prepare for war against the United States.
• List and explain the issues that divided the United States and Japan in the fall of 1941.
• Articulate the reasons why Japan chose to go to war against the United States.
• Assess the overall effectiveness of U.S. foreign policy during this period.

• Review the lesson plans in the unit. Locate and bookmark suggested materials and links from EDSITEment-reviewed websites used in this lesson. Download and print out selected documents and duplicate copies as necessary for student viewing. Alternatively, excerpted versions of these documents are available as part of the downloadable PDFs.
• Download the Text Documents for the lessons, available as PDFs. They are listed under "Resources" on the tab bar of each unit lesson plan. These files contain excerpted versions of the documents used in each lesson, as well as questions for students to answer. Print out and make an appropriate number of copies of the handouts you plan to use in class.
• Finally, familiarize yourself with the interactive timeline "America on the Sidelines: The United States and World Affairs, 1931–1941" that accompanies this lesson. This timeline will, through text and maps, guide students through the major events in Asia in late 1941, and will ask students for each event to identify (choosing from among a menu of options) how the United States responded to it.