U.S. History Chapter 11 Test

Hebrew for Holocaust

The Hebrew term for the Holocaust is Shoah, meaning "catastrophe," but it is often used specifically to refer to the Nazi campaign to exterminate the Jews during World War II.

Nye Committee

The Nye Committee report documented the huge profits that arms factories had made during the war and created the impression that these businesses influenced the decision to go to war, causing even more Americans to turn toward isolationism.

Two major causes of dictatorships

The Treaty of Versailles, along with the economic depression that followed, contributed to the rise of antidemocratic governments in both Europe and Asia.

Anschuless

The annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany. The Anschluss, or unification, of Austria and Germany.

Embargo

an official ban on trade or other commercial activity with a particular country. President Roosevelt restricted the sale of strategic materials—items important for fighting a war. Roosevelt then blocked the sale of airplane fuel and scrap iron to Japan. Roosevelt also froze all Japanese assets in the United States, reduced the oil shipments to Japan

America First Committee

A committee organized by isolationists before WWII, who wished to spare American lives. They wanted to protect America before we went to war in another country. Charles A. Lindbergh (the aviator) was its most effective speaker. Also. The America First Committee opposed any intervention to help the Allies.

Internationalism

A national policy of actively trading with foreign countries to foster peace and prosperity. Was supported by President Roosevelt.

Isolationism

A national policy of avoiding involvement in world affairs. Many Americans once again began supporting isolationism and trying to avoid involvement in international conflicts because of the Rise of Dictators and because European nations stopped paying their war debts.

Hitler

Adolf Hitler was a fervent nationalist who hated both the victorious Allies and the German government that had accepted their peace terms ending World War I. He became the leader of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, or Nazi Party. The Nazis were one of many political parties that arose out of postwar Germany's political and economic chaos. The party called for Germany to expand its territory and to reject the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. It also was anti-Semitic. In November 1923, the Nazis tried to seize power by marching on city hall in Munich, Germany. The plan failed, the Nazi Party was banned for a time, and Hitler was arrested. He wrote Mein Kampf (My Struggle) and believed in a perfect Aryan Race.

Munich Conference

At the Munich Conference, on September 29, 1938, Britain and France agreed to Hitler's demands, a policy that came to be known as appeasement. In other words, they made concessions and believed that if they gave Hitler what he wanted, they could avoid war. Czechoslovakia had to give up the Sudetenland or fight Germany on its own. A month after the Munich Conference, Hitler demanded that the city of Danzig be returned to German control. Danzig was more than 90 percent German, and it had been part of Poland since World War I. Hitler also requested a highway and railroad across the Polish Corridor.

Mussolini

Benito Mussolini founded Italy's Fascist movement. Mussolini's fascism was also strongly anticommunist. He pledged to return Italy to the glories of the Roman Empire.

Chamberlain

British Prime Minister who made the Munich Agreement with Hitler. He pledged Britain's support to France, its ally. He stated, "My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honor. I believe it is 'peace for our time.' Go home and get a nice quiet sleep."

Lend-Lease Act

By December 1940, Great Britain had run out of funds to fight the war. Roosevelt proposed the Lend-Lease Act, which allowed the United States to lend or lease arms to any country considered "vital to the defense of the United States." Britain could receive weapons, then return them or pay rent for them after the war. Congress passed the Lend-Lease Act by a wide margin. Lend-lease aid eventually went to the Soviet Union as well, when in June 1941, Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. Roosevelt followed Britain's lead in supporting any state fighting the Nazis.

Kristallnacht

Hitler ordered his minister of propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, to stage attacks against the Jews that would seem like a spontaneous popular reaction to news of the murder. On the night of November 9, this plan played out in a spree of destruction. The anti-Jewish violence that erupted throughout Germany and Austria that night came to be called Kristallnacht, or "night of broken glass," because broken glass littered the streets afterward. By the following morning, more than ninety Jews were dead, hundreds were badly injured, and thousands more were terrorized.

Aushwitz

Largest concentration camp; located in poland; work camp, administrative center, an extermination camp.

1939 Immigration

Limits on Jewish Immigration By 1938, one U.S. consulate in Germany had a backlog of more than 100,000 visa applications from Jews trying to leave for the United States. Following the Nazi Anschluss, some 3,000 Austrian Jews applied for U.S. visas each day. Most never received visas to the United States or to the other countries where they applied. As a result, millions of Jews remained trapped in Nazi-dominated Europe. This was because immigration quotas were to low and because The U.S. couldn't let people who were "likely to become a public charge".

Cash and Carry

Policy adopted by the United States in 1939 to preserve neutrality while aiding the Allies. Britain and France could buy goods from the United States if they paid in full and transported them. Countries had to send their own ships to pick up goods and had to pay in cash. Loans were not allowed.

Hemispheric Defense Zone

President Roosevelt developed the idea of a hemispheric defense zone, declaring that the entire western half of the Atlantic was part of the Western Hemisphere and therefore neutral. He then ordered the U.S. Navy to patrol the western Atlantic and reveal the location of German submarines to the British.

Atlantic Charter

Roosevelt and Churchill met and developed the Atlantic Charter, which committed both nations to a postwar world of democracy, nonaggression, free trade, economic advancement, and freedom of the seas.