Chapter 29

Results of World War II

The Holocaust

• Jan. 1942, top Nazi officials met in Wannsee to plan systematic and efficient extermination of Jews

• “a final solution to the Jewish question”Organized a system of: • Concentration Camps where Jews from around

Europe were gathered• Extermination Camps were Jews and other

“undesirables” were killed- Roma (gypsies), homosexuals, Jehovah’s

Witnesses, Russian P.O.W’s, Communists, Poles, Magyars

The Holocaust“Our strength consists in our speed and in our brutality. Genghis Khan led millions of women and children to slaughter—with premeditation and a happy heart. History sees in him solely the founder of a state. It’s a matter of indifference to me what a weak western European civilization will say about me. I have issued the command—and I’ll have anybody who utters but one word of criticism executed by a firing squad—that our war aim does not consist in reaching certain lines, but in the physical destruction of the enemy. Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formation in readiness—for the present only in the East—with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after all, speaks to-day of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

-Adolf Hitler

The Holocaust

• Upon arrival to the camps, S.S. doctors selected who would be sent to work camps,

- and who would be sent immediately to the gas chambers

• Forced labor at concentration camps supported the German war effort

• Some underwent grotesque medical experimentation

The Holocaust

Signs at the gates read “work makes free”

Working and Living in the Camps

Medical Experiments

Holocaust

Death Camps

Gas Chamber Crematorium

The Holocaust

• 7 million Jews killed

• 6 million “undesirables” killed

Who is responsible for the Holocaust?

45,000,000-55,000,000 casualties

The Devastation of the War

• Industrial capacity in 1945 was half of the 1939 level

• Many major cities destroyed

• Communication and transportation networks destroyed

The Devastation of the War

Refugees

• 60 million displaced people

• Prisoners of war

• German slave laborers

• People who had moved to avoid fighting

Potsdam Meeting June 1945

Potsdam Meeting June 1945

• Harry Truman replace FDR, who had died

• Clement Attlee replaced Churchill, who had been defeated in elections

• Josef Stalin

Potsdam Meeting June 1945

Potsdam Meeting June 1945

• All Nazi institutions abolished

• German arms production limited, industry controlled

• Democracy and Free Speech restored

• Germany divided into 4 zones of occupation, as was Berlin

War Crimes Trials

Nuremburg Trials Nuremburg Trials 1945-1946

• International tribunal

• Punish Hitler’s closest associates for “Crimes Against Humanity”

• Exposed the horrors of the Nazi regime

International Agencies

United Nations

International Agencies

Bretton Woods Conference 1944

• International Monetary Fund

• World Bank

Created to help reconstruction, capital investment and creation of stable currencies