Japan had made clear overtures to peace, but cultural differences made this nearly impossible (the shame of unconditional surrender goes against their code of honour). The determination to use an expensive bomb instead of letting it rust away; the desire to find out how devastating it was and the opportunity to use the bomb as a strong showcase of US supremacy, made Japan the ideal target. Obviously, the USSR would eventually succeed in creating the a-bomb. Therefore, making Hiroshima & Nagasaki the example of the tremendous power of the bombs would make it clear to the USSR that they too needed such weapons to defend themselves. Moreover, other countries claimed the right of nuclear weapons to defend their citizens.
(Document 6) As written in The Origins of the Second World War, by A.J.P. Taylor, if more countries kept getting involved with the issue of the Munich Agreement, Czechoslovakia would have been safe. Taylor also thought that German people were the only ones in the world who can “turn Hitler out” This was to be thought because the Germans were the ones who put him into power in the first place. “The appeasers” feared that the loss of Germany would result in the domination of Europe” (Doc
Germany at the time was the most powerful single country in Europe, but it’s weak allies required Germany’s support on their various fronts. Italy refused to enter WW1 and remained neutral. The lure of territorial gains convinced Italy to side with the Allies in May 1915. Russia had an alliance with Serbia and that brought the military efforts of both nations together to fight against the Central Powers. The core of the Allies was the treaty between France and Russia.
The desire of the Russians to press west and south put them on a collision with German speaking peoples in Germany and the Balkans, leading to those nations fighting in both world wars. Japan, being a small island nation with few natural resources, desired national security too. They sought to gain this by control of surrounding territories such as Korea, Philippines, north China, and Southeast Asia. Being isolated for centuries prior to 1870, these goals were fairly recent in the national philosophy, contrasted with the various European goals which had been around for centuries. They were thus rather easily discarded by the populace following the defeat of 1945.
Ernst Roehm had a different view of a successful Germany and Hitler was on different path (A3). Apparently Roehm and Hitler have butted heads before and Hitler came on top (A3). Hitler was growing very afraid of the Brownshirts, so he felt the only way to keep power was to put the S.A on leave. Hitler was thinking that another revolution could have happened with the S.A in power (D2). Hitler paid attention to what happened with Russia and was able to not make the same mistake.
First, President Roosevelt was pushing the United States hard into a war with Germany. Roosevelt and Marshall were uneasy about the Pacific, partly since they feared that the United States might be drawn into a war with Japan and kept farther away from war with Germany. Churchill did write in his diary that he was happy that Japan attacked the U.S., since it would bring the U.S. into the war. Churchill was a great Prime Minister for his leadership, his grand vision, his oratory, and his determination. He frequently did not have a firm grasp on how things would turn out.
The U.S. Navy was already attacking German boats. Hitler despised President Roosevelt because he had attacked his Nazi ideology in the past. Hitler believed that Japan was a strong power and that once they took over the United States, it would help Germany take over Russia. Because of these ideas from Hitler, Germany declared war against the United States. Hitler argued that the failure of the New Deal was the cause of the war.
When Hitler became the chancellor of Germany, he issued conscription and also began to rearm his army and build up his army capacity in order to invade both countries such as Czechoslovakia and Poland. In conclusion , even though increased militarism was one of the reasons why the second world war started , it was not the main cause of it. I believed that Britain and France hadn’t followed the policy of Appeasement, Hitler would not have the confidence to implement his plans to take over Eastern Europe. By allowing Hitler to reoccupy the Rhineland (which was against the Treaty of Versailles) Britain and France gave the impression that they were weak, and this allow Hitler to rebuild his army to invade other countries. (Note: the title is from a gcse paper but the essay is
The mistakes that occurred by the Germans assisted the axis empire to be defeated, some examples of these errors are attempting to fight the war on multiple fronts, deciding to attack Russia as well as being at war with the USA as both of these countries could easily outnumber and surround the Nazis although Germany may have had little choice in fighting the USA as Britain was their closest ally and they would have got involved to defend their friend and Russia was planning to enter the war a few months after she was attacked anyway. Germany had made poor choices with allies; the alliance with Italy was a noose around the neck of the Nazis, Japan would’ve only made sense as an ally if it had attacked the Far East. Hitler chose his allies on ideology and not from shared interests or goals, the less powerful members of the axis only really wanted one thing, to gain territory. Hitler was the ultimate commander of Germany throughout the war so it seems inevitable that his decisions must be responsible for Germany having victory torn from their grasps in the Second World War. He refused to listen to anyone else’s advice,even his own
This is implying of course that the decision by Nicholas II to go to war against Germany and it’s allies in 1914 was wrong, but this is not the case. Russia actually had many reasons to risk war again; the war was weighed heavily in the allies favour as the combined forces of Great Britain, France and Russia were far stronger than that of Germany, Austria and Hungary. Russia was aware of it’s major failing though, it’s slow modernisation had left it trailing behind that of the other countries, and Russia would have to be prepared for the rapid social and economic change that a war brings. This was Russia’s best chance to modernise and not be left behind. Russia’s early hopes were soon dashed however.