World War 2 Project

The Military Role of the USA During WW2

Ben Levin, Stephen Lee, Ryuuji Arimoto, Jashan Kishore, Ryan Goniwiecha, Max Wehner, Noah Debrowski, Rohon Roychoudhury Ms. Zwolinksi American History A2

Chapter 1 The War in Europe The United States reluctantly declared war on the Axis Powers in December of 1941. The Axis Powers were Germany, Italy and Japan countries with authoritarian, sometimes Fascist governments. When Germany declared war on the U.S. in return, the United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, or FDR, met up with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. A Prime Minister is the name for a head of state, similar to a president. The two agreed that Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany posed the greatest threat to the world. Japan, they decided, was just a regional threat.

They also created a Combined Chiefs of Staff, which allowed the top British and American military experts could work together to defeat the Axis powers. At first, the United States Army was not prepared for war, so the American government gave mainly air, naval and financial support. They sent war materiel to Allied forces in Europe.

This meant sending aid - planes, armored vehicles, tanks and naval vehicles - to the USSR, which tightened ties between the countries and helped make up for the production lost because of German occupation.

This was all on the Eastern Front, the area between Russia and Germany.

Remember, kids - USSR stands for the United Soviet States of Russia.

In the West, the British wanted to attack Germany in North Africa but the Americans wanted to attack them in France. The UK’s choice prevailed - at least for the moment. The attack in North Africa including on Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian, Libyan, and Egyptian soil was called Operation Torch and was quickly found success. The Allied

forces then invaded the Italian island of Sicily. The subsequent attack on the mainland was less successful. Some people think it cost more than it gained, since many Allied soldiers were lost.

Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt agreed to open a Second Front in France during 1944.

Stalin, the dictator of Communist Russia, wanted to open the Second Front. Germany had been focusing its military might on the Eastern Front, and the casualties were very lopsided among the Allied nations. A lot of Russians were dying while fewer Americans, British and French were.

The U.S. General Eisenhower (who later became president) led the troops in Operation Overlord, the invasion of France. This invasion employed secrecy and deception tactics so that Germany would be unprepared.

This secret campaign was called Operation Fortitude.

Allied spies convinced the Germans that the attack would have to focus points, at Normandy and Calais, and that the more forceful attack would be at Calais.

The spies figured out what the enemies thought would happen by decoding German messages.

After months of preparation, thousands of Allied soldiers landed in France. Some came in planes, some in boats. Some landed with gliders.

Thousands of Allied forces were now in France. This day was called DDay. Hitler thought the landing was a diversion and more troops would land to the south in Calais, so Allied troops were able to push inward towards the German heartland. This was possible despite some setbacks, like the Battle of the Bulge. American aircraft devastated Germans and civilians were targeted. By spring the Allied forces had reached the capital, Berlin, and people in Allied capitals celebrated V-E Day for Victory in Europe. Hitler killed himself with a gun. The U.S. military, along with those of the Allied nations, had used brutal military force to win the war in Europe.

Chapter 2 The Story of the Pacific War On December 7, 1941, according to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt it is a “Day which will live in infamy� (Roosevelt).The country of Japan flew to the military base of Pearl Harbor and destroyed it. Pearl Harbor is an American base that is located off the Hawaiian Island of Oahu. It served as a naval base but also stored naval, military, and aircraft resources.

The Japanese used their air force and navy to demolish the American base. The attack crippled the Pacific fleet. In the battle 2,403 died and 1,178 were wounded, three battleships sunk, one capsized, and four more were damaged. Several other, smaller warships also sank, and many others were seriously impaired. Almost all combat aircraft were damaged or destroyed. The three carriers that were spared were not at

the harbor that day.

The reason why the U.S. lost the battle is because of the state the soldiers were in and also the decisions that their general had made.

Earlier that day, Pearl Harbor received a message from the U.S. Air Corps saying that they saw about 360 airplanes on their radar. General Short believed them to be American planes and thought that Japan would not attack them. His assumptions are one of the reasons why Pearl Harbor was such a tragedy.

The attack enraged the citizens of the United States and fueled the fire for war, and on December 8th, 1941, the next day, President Roosevelt appeared before the congress in order to ask permission to declare war on Japan. Declarations of war from Germany and Italy quickly followed.

After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Japan continued its conquest on Asian nations. The Japanese military attacked Hong Kong, French Indochina, Malaya, Burma, Thailand and much of China. However Japan spread its power to more than the mainland of Asia and took over Dutch East Indies, Guam, Wake Island, the Solomon Islands, countless other outposts in the Pacific. In the Philippines, 80,000 U.S. and Filipino troops tried to defend the country from the Japanese invasion. However, the Japanese forces were too strong and the Philippines were eventually taken over by Japan and its military.

Realizing how dangerous Japan was, The United States declared war on Japan and started its battle. General MacArthur was in charge of

the Allied forces in the Pacific the Allied forces were countries that were on the same side as the United States during World War II. Many major battles took place in the Pacific during World War II and Doolittle’s raid was one of them. Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle led 16 bombers to the capital city of Japan, Tokyo. This raid lifted the spirits of many Americans while lowering the Japanese confidence. Another major battle was the Battle of the Coral Sea. This battle was very important because it decided whether or not the Japanese military would take control of Australia. The battle lasted a total of five days and the U.S. forces successfully defended Australia.

After many more battles and tens of thousands of casualties, the United States decided to end the war once and for all. Under the Manhattan Project, the United States created the first atomic bomb. The U.S. military dropped two atomic bombs, one in Hiroshima and another in Nagasaki.

Japan immediately surrendered after the bombings and the War in the Pacific ended September 2, 1945.

Chapter 3 The War at Sea The American Navy was growing larger and larger throughout the 1940s. The navy is the part of the nation's army that conducts military operations at sea. The American Navy consisted of big attack ships called battleships. Throughout the entire navy, American had over 18 aircraft carriers and 8 battleships. The navy was very powerful and by the end of the war, the United States navy had added hundreds of new ships to its fleet.

However, on December 7th in the year 1941, the country of Japan flew to the navy base of Pearl Harbor and destroyed it. In the bad battle, many people died. Several other, smaller warships also sank, and many others were seriously weakened. Despite this big setback in the war, by 1943, the Navy's size was larger than the combined fleets of all the other fighting nations in World War II The American navy helped the United States win a lot of battles such as the battle in Iceland, the battle in Guadalcanal, or the battle of the Philippine Sea. In the battle at Iceland, the United States sent over 20 warships and over 3000 men to stay stationed in Iceland until the end of the war. In the battle at Guadalcanal, the United States sent a lot of its navy to control the Solomon Islands. Another battle that the United States navy was deeply

involved in was the battle in the Philippine Sea where the United States sent well over 500 attack ships to take on Japan. This was the largest naval base in history and the United States defeated Japan.

Throughout the course of the war, the United States not only had the biggest navy but it was also one of the most advanced. The Technology behind the battleships and the industrial power of the United States at the time proved to be the very effective. New technology such as new weapon systems helped the United States. The US navy could carry tanks thousands of miles across an ocean to drop them off in the heart of a battle.

Even before World War 2 had even begun, the United States navy had one carrier that was capable of holding over 500 plane and 900 pilots. This ship alone could do a lot of destruction but by the end of the war the United States navy had several of these.

Technology and industrial power changed the war. Japan failed to use its early successes before the great power of the Allies could be used.

In 1941 the Japanese

Airplane had a longer range and worked better than rival American warplanes, and the pilots had more experience in the air. But Japan never improved the plane and by 1944 the Allied navies were far ahead of Japan and ahead of Germany in numbers and in putting technology to good use. High tech inventions arrived very rapidly. Entirely new weapons were invented like the landing ships, such as the 3,000 ton tank moving ship that carried 25 tanks thousands of miles and landed them right on the assault beaches. In addition, older weapons systems were constantly made better. Weaker or slower airplanes, for example, received more powerful engines and more sensitive radar sets. One problem with progress was that admirals who had grown up with great battleships and fast cruisers had a hard time adjusting their war-fighting doctrines to incorporate the rapidly evolving new weapons systems. This meant that they were not easily able to get used to the new tactics and technologies being used in the war.

The ships of the American and Japanese forces were closely matched at the beginning of the war. By 1943 the improved American quality in ships was winning battles; by 1944 the American advantage made the Japanese position hopeless. The German Navy, unhappy with its Japanese ally, ignored Hitler's orders to cooperate and failed to share its skill in radar and radio. Therefore the Imperial Navy was further weakened in the technological race with the Allies (who did help each other). The United States economic base was ten times larger than Japan's, and its capabilities also significantly greater, and it used engineering skills much more effectively than Japan, so that technological advances came faster and were applied more to weapons.

Above all, American admirals adjusted knowledge naval warfare to use the advantages. The quality and performance of the warships of Japan were comparable to that of the US in the beginning, but the US was able to take this advantage away. Although admirals on both sides of the war dreamed of having a ship on ship fight, Americans used Aircraft carriers with planes that were much cheaper than battleships, to destroy hostile battleships out in the ocean. They did this because it was much easier to do and did not risk damaging any of the battleships.

Chapter 4 The Air War The United States’ Army Air Forces (USAAF) played a significant role in World War II. The Air Forces served as a dangerous threat, used to intimidate and cause destruction throughout the Axis Powers.

Towards the beginning of the war, the United States sent Air Force Number 8 to Europe, as allies of the Royal Air Force of Great Britain.

They needed support while fighting against Germany, so the U.S. came in to help. With these two combined Air Forces and another Force stationed in Italy, strategic bombings slowly weakened Germany’s economy. These bombings gave the Allied Forces an advantage that would be useful throughout the war. Lieutenant Colonel Eddie Deerfield, a WWII Veteran, recalled “We flew bombing missions in 1943 and 1944 against targets in Nazi Germany and Occupied Europe, facing down the Luftwaffe and anti-aircraft artillery barrages.”

Later on into the war, the U.S. Air Forces supported troops along the Mediterranean and other ground level areas. The enemy found this constant allied air support annoying, and dangerous.

Finally, in the most important Air Force event of the war, the United States decided to drop its newly developed atomic bombs on Japan. Japan had already been weakened, and the bombs would not be completely necessary, but they ensured supremacy and showed other nations of the United States’ true power. In 1945 the atomic bombs were dropped upon the islands of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, obliterating them and their people.

Types of Aircraft Used B17 Flying Fortress- The most popular bomber of WW2. Of the 1.5m metric tons of bombs dropped on Germany, 640,000 tons were from B-17s. This is a B-17.

B-24 Liberator- This was the most produced bomber of WW2, but was not nearly as popular due to the way it was built. It had higher top

speed, greater range, and more bomb capacity, but was more vulnerable to attack and in general was much less sturdy.

P-47 Thunderbolt- One of the main fighter bombers used in WW2. It was extremely powerful (which also made it expensive). It was typically armed with 8 .50 caliber machine guns, in addition to 5 inch rockets or 2500 pounds of bombs.

P-51 Mustang- A powerful fighter/bomber, in WW2 it was popular as an escort for heavy bombers. It was typically armed with 6 .50 cal machine guns. Throughout WW2 Mustangs claimed about 5000 enemy planes shot

down. P-51 Mustangs.

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