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40 Cards in this Set

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War Production Board (WPB)
The War Production Board (WPB) was established as a government agency on January 16, 1942 by executive order of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The purpose of the board was to regulate the production and allocation of materials and fuel during World War II in the United States. The WPB converted and expanded peacetime industries to meet war needs, allocated scarce materials vital to war production, established priorities in the distribution of materials and services, and prohibited nonessential production. It rationed such things as gasoline, heating oil, metals, rubber, paper[1] and plastics. It was dissolved shortly after the defeat of Japan in 1945, and was replaced by the Civilian Production Administration in late 1945.

The first chairman of the Board was Donald M. Nelson from 1942 to 1944 followed by Julius A. Krug from 1944 until the Board was dissolved.

Established by Executive Order 9024 on January 16, 1942, the WPB replaced the Supply Priorities and Allocation Board as well as the Office of Production Management. The national WPB constituted the chair, the secretaries of war, navy, and agriculture, the federal loan administrator, lieutenant general in charge of war department production, administrator of the office of price administration, chair of the board of economic warfare, and special assistant to the president who supervised the defense aid program. The board created advisory, policy-making, and progress-reporting divisions.

The WPB managed twelve regional offices, and operated one hundred twenty field offices throughout the nation. They worked alongside state war production boards, which maintained records on state war production facilities as well as helped state businesses obtain war contracts and loans.

The national WPB's primary task was converting civilian industry to war production. The board assigned priorities and allocated scarce materials such as steel, aluminum, and rubber, prohibited nonessential industrial activities such as producing nylons and refrigerators, controlled wages and prices, and mobilized the people through patriotic propaganda such as "give your scrap metal and help Oklahoma boys save our way of life."[2] It initiated events such as scrap metal drives, which were carried out locally to great success. For example, a national scrap metal drive in October 1942 resulted in an average of almost eighty-two pounds of scrap per American.[3]
Office of War Mobilization (OWM)
The Office of War Mobilization (OWM) was an independent agency of the United States government headed by Former Supreme Court Justice James F. Byrnes that coordinated all government agencies involved in the war effort during World War II. This office took over from the earlier War Production Board to shift the country from a peacetime to a wartime economy, sometimes loaning smaller factories the money needed to convert to war production. Soon outproducing the Axis powers, U.S. manufacturers soon split their time between making consumer goods and war supplies. Unemployment, the scourge of ten years earlier, had all but vanished, as Americans went to work to fuel the war machine.
Selective Training and Service Act
The Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, also known as the Burk-Wadsworth Act, 54 Stat. 885 was passed by the Congress of the United States on September 25, 1940,[1] becoming the first peacetime conscription in United States history when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it into law two days later. This Selective Service Act required that men between the ages of 21 and 35 register with local draft boards. Later, when the U.S. entered World War II, all men aged 18 to 45 were made liable for military service, and all men aged 18 to 65 were required to register. [2] The Selective Service System created by the Act was terminated by the Act of March 31, 1947, and a similar but distinct Selective Service System was introduced by the Selective Service Act of 1948.[3]
Douglas MacArthur
MacArthur, Douglas (1880–1964), U.S. general. Commander of U.S. (later Allied) forces in the southwestern Pacific during World War II, he accepted Japan's surrender in 1945 and administered the ensuing Allied occupation. He was in charge of UN forces in Korea 1950–51, before being forced to relinquish command by President Truman.
Bataan Death March
The Bataan Death March (also known as The Death March of Bataan) took place in the Philippines in 1942 and was later accounted as a Japanese war crime. The 60 mi (97 km) march occurred after the three-month Battle of Bataan, part of the Battle of the Philippines (1941–42), during World War II. In Japanese, it is known as Batān Shi no Kōshin (バターン死の行進), with the same meaning.

The "march", or forcible transfer of 75,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war,[1] was characterized by wide-ranging physical abuse and murder, and resulted in very high fatalities inflicted upon prisoners and civilians alike by the armed forces of the Empire of Japan.[2] Beheading, throat-cutting, and shooting were common causes of death, in addition to death by bayonet, rape, disembowelment, rifle-butt beating, and deliberate starvation or dehydration on the week-long continual march in the tropical heat.[citation needed] Falling down or inability to continue moving was tantamount to a death sentence, as was any degree of protest.



Route of the death march. Section from San Fernando to Capas was by rail.
The treatment of the American prisoners was characterized by its dehumanization, as the Imperial soldiery "felt they were dealing with subhumans and animals."[3] Prisoners were attacked for assisting someone falling due to weakness[citation needed], or for no reason whatsoever. Trucks were known to drive over those who fell or succumbed to fatigue,[4] and "cleanup crews" put to death those too weak to continue. Marchers were harassed with random bayonet stabs and beatings.[5] Accounts of being forcibly marched for five to six days with no food and a single sip of water are in postwar archives including filmed reports.[6]

[hide]
Philippines Campaign (1941–1942)
Bataan – Death march – Corregidor – Mindanao
The exact death count is impossible to determine, but some historians have placed the minimum death toll between 6,000 and 11,000 men; other postwar Allied reports have tabulated that only 54,000 of the 72,000 prisoners reached their destination — taken together, the figures document a rate of death from one in four up to two in seven of those on the death march. The number of deaths that took place in the internment camps from the delayed effects of the march is considerably more.[6]

On May 30, 2009, at the 64th and final reunion of Bataan Death March survivors in San Antonio, Texas, the Japanese ambassador to the United States apologized to an assembly of survivors for Imperial Japan's treatment of Allied prisoners of war, on behalf of the Japanese government.[7]
Chester Nimitz
The Bataan Death March (also known as The Death March of Bataan) took place in the Philippines in 1942 and was later accounted as a Japanese war crime. The 60 mi (97 km) march occurred after the three-month Battle of Bataan, part of the Battle of the Philippines (1941–42), during World War II. In Japanese, it is known as Batān Shi no Kōshin (バターン死の行進), with the same meaning.

The "march", or forcible transfer of 75,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war,[1] was characterized by wide-ranging physical abuse and murder, and resulted in very high fatalities inflicted upon prisoners and civilians alike by the armed forces of the Empire of Japan.[2] Beheading, throat-cutting, and shooting were common causes of death, in addition to death by bayonet, rape, disembowelment, rifle-butt beating, and deliberate starvation or dehydration on the week-long continual march in the tropical heat.[citation needed] Falling down or inability to continue moving was tantamount to a death sentence, as was any degree of protest.



Route of the death march. Section from San Fernando to Capas was by rail.
The treatment of the American prisoners was characterized by its dehumanization, as the Imperial soldiery "felt they were dealing with subhumans and animals."[3] Prisoners were attacked for assisting someone falling due to weakness[citation needed], or for no reason whatsoever. Trucks were known to drive over those who fell or succumbed to fatigue,[4] and "cleanup crews" put to death those too weak to continue. Marchers were harassed with random bayonet stabs and beatings.[5] Accounts of being forcibly marched for five to six days with no food and a single sip of water are in postwar archives including filmed reports.[6]

[hide]
Philippines Campaign (1941–1942)
Bataan – Death march – Corregidor – Mindanao
The exact death count is impossible to determine, but some historians have placed the minimum death toll between 6,000 and 11,000 men; other postwar Allied reports have tabulated that only 54,000 of the 72,000 prisoners reached their destination — taken together, the figures document a rate of death from one in four up to two in seven of those on the death march. The number of deaths that took place in the internment camps from the delayed effects of the march is considerably more.[6]

On May 30, 2009, at the 64th and final reunion of Bataan Death March survivors in San Antonio, Texas, the Japanese ambassador to the United States apologized to an assembly of survivors for Imperial Japan's treatment of Allied prisoners of war, on behalf of the Japanese government.[7]
Battle of the Coral Sea
The Battle of the Coral Sea, fought during May 4–8, 1942, was a major naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Allied naval and air forces from the United States and Australia. The battle was the first fleet action in which aircraft carriers engaged each other. It was also the first naval battle in history in which neither side's ships sighted or fired directly upon the other.

In an attempt to strengthen their defensive positioning for their empire in the South Pacific, Imperial Japanese forces decided to invade and occupy Port Moresby in New Guinea and Tulagi in the southeastern Solomon Islands. The plan to accomplish this, called Operation MO, involved several major units of Japan's Combined Fleet, including two fleet carriers and a light carrier to provide air cover for the invasion fleets, under the overall command of Shigeyoshi Inoue. The U.S. learned of the Japanese plan through signals intelligence and sent two United States Navy carrier task forces and a joint Australian-American cruiser force, under the overall command of American Admiral Frank J. Fletcher, to oppose the Japanese offensive.

On 3 and 4 May, Japanese forces successfully invaded and occupied Tulagi, although several of their supporting warships were surprised and sunk or damaged by aircraft from the U.S. fleet carrier Yorktown. Now aware of the presence of U.S. carriers in the area, the Japanese fleet carriers entered the Coral Sea with the intention of finding and destroying the Allied naval forces.

Beginning 7 May, the carrier forces from the two sides exchanged airstrikes over two consecutive days. The first day, the U.S. sank the Japanese light carrier Shōhō, while the Japanese sank a U.S. destroyer and heavily damaged a fleet oiler (which was later scuttled). The next day, the Japanese fleet carrier Shōkaku was heavily damaged, the U.S. fleet carrier Lexington was scuttled as a result of critical damage, and the Yorktown was damaged. With both sides having suffered heavy losses in aircraft and carriers damaged or sunk, the two fleets disengaged and retired from the battle area. Because of the loss of carrier air cover, Inoue recalled the Port Moresby invasion fleet, intending to try again later.

Although a tactical victory for the Japanese in terms of ships sunk, the battle would prove to be a strategic victory for the Allies for several reasons. Japanese expansion, seemingly unstoppable until then, had been turned back for the first time. More importantly, the Japanese fleet carriers Shōkaku and Zuikaku—one damaged and the other with a depleted aircraft complement—were unable to participate in the Battle of Midway, which took place the following month, ensuring a rough parity in aircraft between the two adversaries and contributing significantly to the U.S. victory in that battle. The severe losses in carriers at Midway prevented the Japanese from reattempting to invade Port Moresby from the ocean. Two months later, the Allies took advantage of Japan's resulting strategic vulnerability in the South Pacific and launched the Guadalcanal Campaign that, along with the New Guinea Campaign, eventually broke Japanese defenses in the South Pacific and was a significant contributing factor to Japan's ultimate defeat in World War II.
Battle of Midway
The Battle of Midway (Japanese: ミッドウェー海戦) is widely regarded as the most important naval battle of the Pacific Campaign of World War II.[5][6][7] Between 4 and 7 June 1942, approximately one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea and six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States Navy decisively defeated an Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) attack against Midway Atoll, inflicting irreparable damage on the Japanese fleet.[8] Military historian John Keegan has called it "the most stunning and decisive blow in the history of naval warfare."[9]

The Japanese operation, like the earlier attack on Pearl Harbor, aimed to eliminate the United States as a strategic power in the Pacific, thereby giving Japan a free hand in establishing its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. The Japanese hoped that another demoralizing defeat would force the U.S. to capitulate in the Pacific War.[10]

The Japanese plan was to lure the United States' few remaining aircraft carriers into a trap.[11] The Japanese also intended to occupy Midway Atoll as part of an overall plan to extend their defensive perimeter in response to the Doolittle Raid. This operation was considered preparatory for further attacks against Fiji and Samoa.

The plan was handicapped by faulty Japanese assumptions of American reaction and poor initial dispositions.[12] Most significantly, American codebreakers were able to determine the date and location of the attack, enabling the forewarned U.S. Navy to set up an ambush of its own. Four Japanese aircraft carriers and a heavy cruiser were sunk in exchange for one American aircraft carrier and a destroyer. After Midway, and the exhausting attrition of the Solomon Islands campaign, Japan's shipbuilding and pilot training programs were unable to keep pace in replacing their losses while the U.S. steadily increased output in both areas.[13]
Erwin Rommel
Rommel, Erwin (1891–1944), German field marshal; known as the Desert Fox. As commander of the Afrika Korps, he captured Tobruk in 1942, but he was defeated by Montgomery at El Alamein later that year. Implicated in the officers' conspiracy against Hitler in 1944, he committed suicide.
Bernard Montgomery
Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, KG, GCB, DSO, PC (pronounced /məntˈɡʌmərɪ əv ˈæləmeɪn/; 17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976), often referred to as "Monty", was a British Army officer. He saw action in World War I, when he was seriously wounded, and during World War II he commanded the 8th Army from August 1942 in the Western Desert until the final Allied victory in Tunisia. This command included the Battle of El Alamein, a major turning point in the Western Desert Campaign. He was later a prominent commander in Italy and North-West Europe, where he was in command of all Allied ground forces during Operation Overlord until after the Battle of Normandy when he continued command of the 21st Army Group. As such he was the the principal field commander for the failed airborne attempt to bridge the Rhine at Arnhem and the Allied Rhine crossing. On 4 May 1945 he took the German surrender at Luneburg Heath in northern Germany. After the War he became Commander-in-Chief of the British Forces of Occupation in Germany and then Chief of the Imperial General Staff.
Office of War Information
The United States Office of War Information (OWI) was a U.S. government agency created during World War II to consolidate government information services. It operated from June 1942 until September 1945. It coordinated the release of war news for domestic use, and, using posters and radio broadcasts, worked to promote patriotism, warned about foreign spies and attempted to recruit women into war work. The office also established an overseas branch which launched a large scale information and propaganda campaign abroad.
Rosie the Riveter
Rosie the Riveter is a cultural icon of the United States, representing the American women who worked in factories during World War II,[1][2] many of whom worked in the manufacturing plants that produced munitions and war supplies. These women sometimes took entirely new jobs replacing the male workers who were in the military.[3] The character is considered a feminist icon in the US.[2]
A. Philip Randolph
Asa Philip Randolph (April 15, 1889 – May 16, 1979) was a prominent twentieth-century African-American civil rights leader and the founder of both the March on Washington Movement and the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, a landmark for labor and particularly for African-American labor organizing.
Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC)
Executive Order 8802 (also known as the Fair Employment Act) was signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 25, 1941 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.

The executive order was issued in response to pressure from civil rights activists Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, and A. J. Muste who had planned a march on Washington, D.C. to protest racial discrimination. The march was suspended after Executive Order 8802 was issued.

The order required all federal agencies and departments involved with defense production to ensure that vocational and training programs were administered without discrimination as to "race, creed, color, or national origin." All defense contracts were to include provisions that barred private contractors from discrimination as well.

The Committee on Fair Employment Practice was established by Executive Order 8802 within the Office of Production Management to investigate alleged violations and "to take appropriate steps to redress grievances which it finds to be valid." The Committee was also supposed to make recommendations to federal agencies and to the president on how Executive Order 8802 could be made the most effective.

Executive Order 8802 was followed by Executive Order 9981 in 1948 and years later, by Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and Executive Order 11246 in 1965.[1]
Carlos E. Castaneda
Carlos (César Salvador Arana) Castaneda[1] (anglicized from Castañeda; 25 December 1925 – 27 April 1998) was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author. Starting with The Teachings of Don Juan in 1968, Castaneda wrote a series of books that describe his training in Sorcery. His 12 books have sold more than 8 million copies in 17 languages (and are still reprinted and sold world wide). The books and Castaneda, who rarely spoke in public about his work, have been controversial for many years. Supporters claim the books are either true or at least valuable works of philosophy and descriptions of practices which enable an increased awareness.
Braceros
A Mexican laborer allowed into the U.S. for a limited time as a seasonal agricultural worker.
Zoot-Suit Riots
The Zoot Suit Riots were a series of riots in 1943 during World War II that erupted in Los Angeles, California between European-American sailors and Marines stationed throughout the city and Latino youths, who were recognizable by the zoot suits they favored. While Mexican Americans were the primary targets of military servicemen, African American and Filipino/Filipino American youth were also targeted.[1] The Zoot Suit Riots were in part the effect of the infamous Sleepy Lagoon murder which involved the death of a young Latino man in a barrio near Los Angeles.

The incident triggered similar attacks against Latinos in Beaumont, Chicago, San Diego, Detroit, Evansville, Philadelphia, and New York.[2]
Interment
the burial of a corpse in a grave or tomb, typically with funeral rites : the day of interment | interments took place in the churchyard.
Norman Mineta
Norman Yoshio Mineta, (born November 12, 1931) is a United States politician of the Democratic Party. Mineta most recently served in President George W. Bush's Cabinet as the United States Secretary of Transportation, the only Democratic Cabinet Secretary in the Bush administration. On June 23, 2006, Mineta announced his resignation after more than five years as Secretary of Transportation, effective July 7, 2006, making him the longest-serving Transportation Secretary in the Department's history. On July 10, 2006, Hill & Knowlton, a public relations firm, announced that Mineta would join it as a partner.

Mineta also served as President Bill Clinton's Secretary of Commerce for the last six months of his term (July 2000–January 2001). Save for a span of five days between the end of Clinton's term and Bush's appointments, Mineta spent nearly six full years as a Cabinet member.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (pronounced /ˈaɪzənhaʊər/ EYE-zən-how-ər; born October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was a five-star general in the United States Army and the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961, and the last to be born in the 19th century. During World War II, he served as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe, with responsibility for planning and supervising the successful invasion of France and Germany in 1944–45, from the Western Front. In 1951, he became the first supreme commander of NATO.[2]

A Republican, Eisenhower entered the 1952 presidential race to counter the non-interventionism of Sen. Robert A. Taft, and to crusade against "Communism, Korea and corruption". He won by a landslide, defeating Democrat Adlai Stevenson and ending two decades of the New Deal Coalition holding the White House. As President, Eisenhower concluded negotiations with China to end the Korean War. He maintained pressure on the Soviet Union during the Cold War, gave priority to inexpensive nuclear weapons and reduced the other forces to save money. He had to play catch-up in the Space Race after the Soviets launched the Sputnik satellite in 1957. On the domestic front, he helped remove Joseph McCarthy from power but otherwise left most political actions to his Vice President, Richard Nixon. Eisenhower did not end New Deal policies, and in fact enlarged the scope of Social Security, and signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. He was the first term-limited president in accordance with the 22nd Amendment. His two terms were mainly peaceful, and generally prosperous except for a sharp economic recession in 1958–59. Historians typically rank Eisenhower among the ten greatest U.S. presidents.
George S. Patton
George Smith Patton, Jr. (November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945) was a United States Army officer best known for his leadership while commanding corps and armies as a general during World War II. He was also well known for his controversial outspokenness.

Patton was commissioned in the U.S. Army after his graduation from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1909. In 1916-17, he participated in the unsuccessful Pancho Villa Expedition, a U.S. operation that attempted to capture the Mexican revolutionary. In World War I, he was the first officer assigned to the new United States Tank Corps and saw action in France.[1][2] After the war, he was a strong advocate of armored warfare; however, in the interwar period, budget cuts to the U.S. Army caused by the Great Depression saw Patton abandon his advocacy of the tank in favor of the cheaper and politically more popular maintenance of horse cavalry. This abandonment of the tank came at a time when Patton's longtime friend Dwight D. Eisenhower was actively seeking his support for the U.S. Army to adopt the revolutionary Christie tank (which was subsequently developed into the famed T-34 in Russia). Eisenhower felt this was a betrayal of principles for political expediency and was the start of the decline of the friendship between the two men (source: De Este and Farago biographies).

In World War II, he commanded corps and armies in North Africa, Sicily, and the European Theater of Operations. Near the end of the Sicilian campaign, he jeopardized his career by slapping a soldier (whom he regarded as a coward) while the soldier was recuperating from battle fatigue at a hospital. Relieved of his command by Allied Supreme Commander General Dwight D. Eisenhower over the well-publicized incident, Patton was relegated to acting as a decoy in Operation Quicksilver instead of playing a major part in the Normandy Landings and Operation Overlord; however, he was later given command of the U.S. Third Army and ably led it in breaking out of the hedgerows of Normandy and across France. A surprise German offensive at the Battle of the Bulge resulted in American units being surrounded at Bastogne, but Patton rapidly disengaged his army from fighting in another sector and moved it over 100 miles in 48 hours to help relieve the siege.
Battle of the Atlantic
A succession of sea operations during World War II in which Axis naval and air forces attempted to destroy shipping carrying supplies from North America to the UK.
Sonar
A system for the detection of objects under water and for measuring the water’s depth by emitting sound pulses and detecting or measuring their return after being reflected.
• an apparatus used in this system.
• the method of echolocation used in air or water by animals such as whales and bats.
George C. Marshall
Marshall, George C. (1880–1959), U.S. general and statesman; full name George Catlett Marshall. A career army officer, he served as chief of staff 1939–45 during World War II. As secretary of state 1947–49, he initiated the program of economic aid to European countries known as the Marshall Plan. Nobel Peace Prize (1953).
D-Day
The day (June 6, 1944) in World War II on which Allied forces invaded northern France by means of beach landings in Normandy.
• the day on which an important operation is to begin or a change to take effect : it's D-day at the Websters', as Sally gives Kevin an ultimatum.
Omar Bradley
Omar Nelson Bradley (February 12, 1893 – April 8, 1981) was one of the main U.S. Army field commanders in North Africa and Europe during World War II, and a General of the Army in the United States Army. He was the last surviving five-star commissioned officer of the United States and the first Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Holocaust
Destruction or slaughter on a mass scale, esp. caused by fire or nuclear war : a nuclear holocaust | the threat of imminent holocaust.
• ( the Holocaust) the mass murder of Jews under the German Nazi regime during the period 1941–45. More than 6 million European Jews, as well as members of other persecuted groups, such as gypsies and homosexuals, were murdered at concentration camps such as Auschwitz.
2 historical a Jewish sacrificial offering that is burned completely on an altar.
Genocide
The deliberate killing of a large group of people, esp. those of a particular ethnic group or nation.
Elie Wiesel
Wiesel, Elie (1928–), U.S. human rights campaigner, novelist, and academic, born in Romania; full name Eliezer Wiesel. A survivor of the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps, he became an authority on the Holocaust, documenting and publicizing Nazi war crimes. Nobel Peace Prize (1986).
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge (also known as the Ardennes Offensive and the Von Rundstedt Offensive) (16 December 1944 – 25 January 1945) was a major German offensive (die Ardennenoffensive), launched toward the end of World War II through the densely forested Ardennes Mountains region of Wallonia in Belgium, hence its French name (Bataille des Ardennes), and France and Luxembourg on the Western Front. The Wehrmacht's code name for the offensive was Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein ("Operation Watch on the Rhine"), after the German patriotic hymn Die Wacht am Rhein. This German offensive was officially named the Ardennes-Alsace campaign[3] by the U.S. Army,[16] but it is known to the English-speaking general public simply as the Battle of the Bulge, the "bulge" being the initial incursion the Germans put into the Allies' line of advance, as seen in maps presented in contemporary newspapers.

The German offensive was supported by several subordinate operations known as Unternehmen Bodenplatte, Greif, and Währung. Germany's goal for these operations was to split the British and American Allied line in half, capturing Antwerp, Belgium, and then proceed to encircle and destroy four Allied armies, forcing the Western Allies to negotiate a peace treaty in the Axis Powers' favor.[17] Once accomplished, Hitler could return his attention and the bulk of his forces to the Soviet armies in the east.

The offensive was planned with the utmost secrecy, minimizing radio traffic and moving troops and equipment under cover of darkness. Although ULTRA suggested a possible attack and the Third U.S. Army's intelligence staff predicted a major German offensive, the Allies were still caught by surprise. This was achieved by a combination of Allied overconfidence, preoccupation with their own offensive plans, and poor aerial reconnaissance.

Near-complete surprise against a weakly defended section of the Allied line was achieved during heavy overcast weather, which grounded the Allies' overwhelmingly superior air forces. Fierce resistance, particularly around the key town of Bastogne, and terrain favoring the defenders threw the German timetable behind schedule. Allied reinforcements, including General George Patton's Third Army, and improving weather conditions, which permitted air attacks on German forces and supply lines, sealed the failure of the offensive.

In the wake of the defeat, many experienced German units were left severely depleted of men and equipment as survivors retreated to the defenses of the Siegfried Line. For the Americans, with about 500,000 to 840,000 men[1] committed and some 70,000 to 89,000 casualties, including 19,000 killed,[7][10] the Battle of the Bulge was the largest and bloodiest battle that they fought in World War II.
Yalta Conference
A meeting between the Allied leaders Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin in February 1945 at Yalta, a Crimean port on the Black Sea. The leaders planned the final stages of World War II and agreed on the subsequent territorial division of Europe.
Island-Hopping
Island hopping is a term that has several different definitions as it is applied in various fields. Generally, The term refers to the means of crossing an ocean by a series of shorter journeys between islands, as opposed to a single journey directly across the ocean to the destination.
Battle of Leyte Gulf
The Battle of Leyte Gulf, also called the "Battles for Leyte Gulf", and formerly known as the "Second Battle of the Philippine Sea", is generally considered to be the largest naval battle of World War II and, by some criteria, possibly the largest naval battle in history.[2]

It was fought in waters near the Philippine islands of Leyte, Samar, and Luzon, from 23 to 26 October 1944, between combined American and Australian forces and the Japanese Imperial Navy. On 20 October, United States troops invaded the island of Leyte as part of a strategy aimed at isolating Japan from the countries it had occupied in South East Asia, and in particular depriving its forces and industry of vital oil supplies. The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) mobilized nearly all of its remaining major naval vessels in an attempt to defeat the Allied invasion, but was repulsed by the US Navy's 3rd and 7th Fleets. The IJN failed to achieve its objective, suffered very heavy losses, and never afterwards sailed to battle in comparable force. The majority of its surviving heavy ships, deprived of fuel, remained in their bases for the rest of the Pacific War.[3][4]

The Battle of Leyte Gulf included four major naval battles: the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea, the Battle of Surigao Strait, the Battle off Cape Engaño and the Battle off Samar, as well as other actions.

The Battle of Leyte Gulf is also notable as the first battle in which Japanese aircraft carried out organized kamikaze attacks.[3][4] Also worth noting is the fact that Japan at this battle had fewer aircraft than the Allied Forces had sea vessels, a clear demonstration of the difference in power of the two sides at this point of the war.
Battle of Iwo Jima
The Battle of Iwo Jima (February 19 – March 26, 1945), or Operation Detachment, was a battle in which the United States fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Empire of Japan. The U.S. invasion, charged with the mission of capturing the three airfields on Iwo Jima,[2] resulted in some of the fiercest fighting in the Pacific Campaign of World War II.

The Imperial Japanese Army positions on the island were heavily fortified, with a vast network of bunkers, hidden artillery, and 18 km (11 mi) of underground tunnels.[3][4] The Americans were covered by extensive naval and air support, capable of putting an enormous amount of firepower onto the Japanese positions. The battle was the first American attack on the Japanese Home Islands, and the Imperial soldiers defended their positions tenaciously. Iwo Jima was also the only U.S. Marine battle where the American overall casualties exceeded the Japanese,[5] although Japanese combat deaths numbered three times that of Americans. Of the more than 18,000 Japanese soldiers present at the beginning of the battle, only 216 were taken prisoner.[1] The rest were killed or missing and assumed dead.[1] Despite heavy fighting and casualties on both sides, Japanese defeat was assured from the start. The Americans possessed an overwhelming superiority in arms and numbers—this, coupled with the impossibility of Japanese retreat or reinforcement, ensured that there was no plausible scenario in which the United States could have lost the battle.[6]

The battle was immortalized by Joe Rosenthal's photograph of the raising of the U.S. flag on top of the 166 m (545 ft) Mount Suribachi by five Marines and one Navy Corpsman. The photograph records the second flag-raising on the mountain, which took place on the fifth day of the 35-day battle. The picture became the iconic image of the battle and has been heavily reproduced.
Kamikaze
(In World War II) A Japanese aircraft loaded with explosives and making a deliberate suicidal crash on an enemy target.
• the pilot of such an aircraft.
adjective [ attrib. ]
of or relating to such an attack or pilot.
• reckless or potentially self-destructive : he made a kamikaze run across three lanes of traffic.
Battle of Okinawa
The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg,[3] was fought on the Ryukyu Islands of Okinawa and was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific War.[4][5] The 82-day-long battle lasted from early April until mid-June, 1945. After a long campaign of island hopping, the Allies were approaching Japan, and planned to use Okinawa, a large island only 340 miles away from mainland Japan, as a base for air operations on the planned invasion of Japanese mainland (coded Operation Downfall). Five divisions of the U.S. Tenth Army, the 7th, 27th, 77th, 81st, and 96th, and two Marine Divisions, the 1st and 6th, fought on the island while the 2nd Marine Division remained as an amphibious reserve and was never brought ashore. The invasion was supported by naval, amphibious, and tactical air forces.

The battle has been referred to as the "Typhoon of Steel" in English, and tetsu no ame ("rain of steel") or tetsu no bōfū ("violent wind of steel") in Japanese. The nicknames refer to the ferocity of the fighting, the intensity of Kamikaze suicide attacks from the Japanese defenders, and to the sheer numbers of Allied ships and armored vehicles that assaulted the island. The battle resulted in one of the highest number of casualties of any World War II engagement. Japan lost over 100,000 troops killed or captured, and the Allies suffered more than 50,000 casualties of all kinds. Simultaneously, tens of thousands of local civilians were killed, wounded, or committed suicide. The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki caused Japan to surrender just weeks after the end of the fighting at Okinawa.
Harry S. Truman
Truman, Harry S. (1884–1972), 33rd president of the U.S. 1945–53. A Democrat, he served in the U.S. Senate 1934–45. As vice president 1945, he succeeded to the presidency upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II. He authorized the use of the atom bomb against Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, initiated the Truman Doctrine in 1947, introduced the Marshall Plan in 1948, and helped to establish NATO the following year. The U.S. became involved in the Korean War in 1950. Truman's victory over Thomas E. Dewey in the 1948 presidential election was one of the closest in U.S. history.
Manhattan Project
The code name for the American project set up in 1942 to develop an atom bomb. The project culminated in 1945 with the detonation of the first nuclear weapon, at White Sands in New Mexico.
Albert Einstein
Einstein, Albert (1879–1955), U.S. theoretical physicist; born in Germany; founder of the theory of relativity in 1905. Often regarded as the greatest scientist of the 20th century, he was influential in the decision to build an atomic bomb. After World War II, however, he spoke out against nuclear weapons.
• [as n. ] ( an Einstein) a genius.
Enola Gay
Enola Gay is a Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber, named after Enola Gay Tibbets, mother of pilot Paul Tibbets.[2] On 6 August 1945, during the final stages of World War II, it became the first aircraft to drop an atomic bomb as a weapon of war. The bomb, code-named "Little Boy", was targeted at the city of Hiroshima, Japan, and caused extensive destruction.

The Enola Gay gained additional attention in 1995 when the cockpit and nose section of the aircraft was exhibited at the National Air and Space Museum (NASM) of the Smithsonian Institution in downtown Washington, D.C. The exhibit was changed due to a controversy over original historical script displayed with the aircraft. Since 2003 the entire restored B-29 has been on display at NASM's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.