The causes and effects of World War II - Term Paper Example

The causes and effects of World War II World War II gets considered as the largest war known to the human race. Thiswar started in 1939 and ended in 1945. World War II, usually abbreviated as WW II, was a global phenomenon that split the world powers into two large feuding sides. Though many countries got involved in the war, the superpowers present then spearheaded the war. This led to the creation of the Allies forces on one side and the Axis forces on the other. The Allies group got made up of the United States of America, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, China and France. The Axis group, on the other hand, got made up of Germany, Japan and Italy (Torrin 32). Statistics claim that this war had the largest number of military personnel directly involved in the war, with over 100 million people serving in active combat out in the war front. In a bid to prove their supremacy and superiority over other powers, many nations involved in the war gave it their all in as far as their industrial, innovative, scientific and more importantly, economic abilities got concerned. This would later prove to be a lousy choice for many countries that had to build their countries from scratch after the war ended (Hamilton 77). This war became defined by an arms race which involves the use of sophisticated weapons and relatively new technologies of combat. Nuclear weapons became largely used by the feuding states and this led to the demise of more than 75 million people. This could explain why the Second World War gets viewed as the most brutal of combats in history (Senker 85). The occurrence of the war could almost be viewed as spontaneous. Though the world had been volatile since 1918 when the First World War ended, no one had the slightest idea that a war of such magnitude was going to erupt. This war, which dates back seventy three years ago, begun on the 1st of September, 1939 by the unexpected German invasion of Polish territory with no warning whatsoever. Within the next two days, that is, by the third day of September, Great Britain begun feuding with Germany (Vandome 61). A week hardly went by before the war became a bare knuckle fight, involving nations that included Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. The battle ground involved in this war was far reaching. From the Normandy Hedgerows to the Stalingrad streets, from the Pacific Islands to the wild jungle of Burma, from the dusty Libyan deserts to the Norwegian Ice Mountains, war was evident. The Germany raised their mighty hand against the Polish people. Italians fought against the Americans, and the Japanese rose against the Australians. The dynamics of this war got complicated. Historians say that this war got finally decided by the nuclear weapons race that later took center stage between these world powers (Senker 132). World War II had many different causes. One of the causes of World War II was the instability and the economic depression that affected many of the European and world super powers. The economic depression was a substantial causative factor of the war especially around 1929. It led to a state of disarray in Germany leading to massive unemployment and lack of income. The US refrained from lending money to Germany for reparations and began to demand their money back. America then went into isolation in a bid to protect its own economy and to avoid involvement in another European war that promised to be costly to its taxpayers. As a result, economic crisis griped the world and distrust began forming again (McBrewster 66). The German economy, which was a world leader, suffered severely. The economic meltdown created the perfect opportunity for the rise of dictators like Stalin, Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler, who were all prominent and revered in as far as the war gets concerned. The depression led a large number of the unemployed population to support these dictatorships as they got rewarded with adequate food supplies and a means of livelihood. In Germany especially, the depression that caused massive unemployment, resulted in the prominence of the Nazi Party with many people becoming active members. This was Hitler’s vantage point in Germany. It led to the quick rise of Hitler and his ideologies in Germany (Miller 12). Expansionist ideologies also led to the spark of World War II. This got mostly driven by the desires of dictators such as Mussolini and Hitler. Japanese and Italian imperialist were also perpetrators of expansionist motives. The idea here was to gain new territories through whichever means possible, including the killing of the native inhabitants. Military aggression got used to push expansionist theories with the super powers preying on the weak nations by making them part of their territory. Benito Mussolini of Italy wanted to form a Roman Empire around the Mediterranean region. He took Albania under siege in 1939. The League of Nations did not respond adequately to this, and this created the wrong precedence that the world was okay with this (Torrin 127). The Germans, under Nazi rule, were most notorious for expansionism. This they explained in justification was all in a bid to get back what lawfully belonged to them. They wanted to restore the boundaries as they were prior to the First World War The invasion of Rhine land and the Polish Corridor was the highlight of German expansionism. The Nazis wanted to form a more united and strong Germany through the amalgamation of all territories where Germans lived after military conquest. The Soviet Union, on the other hand, was seeking to gain back territories lost as a result of the First World War. This included some parts of Finland, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Romania and Latvia. These expansionism interests led to the occurrence of the war. In Asia, Japan advanced most of the expansionism. The 1931 invasion of Manchuria in China in a quest to take over the mineral rich region drove Japans expansionism (Hamilton 99). The failure of appeasement also led to the occurrence of war. Many scholars hold the view that had appeasement worked, the war would not have occurred. People in Britain and France felt that the terms agreed on in the Treaty of Versailles were unfair to Germany. They were of the opinion that the actions of Hitler were indeed justifiable. When Germany began arming itself in 1934, some politicians held the view that Germany had the right to protect itself against any threats to the state. They also believed that a powerful Germany would buffer the ever increasing Communism from the West. Hitler argued that, with the newly formed alliance between France and Russia, Germany faced enormous threats. The only remedial action that could be taken was for Germany to send its troops to Rhine land. France could not go to war without Britains helping hand, since it was not strong enough to counter German insurgence. Britain was not particularly interested in war with Germany (Vandome 73). Many people viewed Rhineland as part of Germany hence having troops there was okay. Neville Chamberlain became The British Premier in 1937. He argued that in order to avoid another war, the grievances put forward by Hitler and the German state ought to be addressed. He was of the opinion that Germany got shortchanged in the treaty of Versailles. This policy that got fronted by the British government defined the policy of appeasement as we know it today. The Munich Agreement signed in September 1938 by the Italian, French, British and German leaders, agreed that German would get back Sudetenland and that Germany would not make further claims for territory. The Czech government, on the other hand, felt aggrieved by the turn of events that handed over Sudetenland, which they considered their territory, back to Germany. Hitler broke this agreement when he invaded Czechoslovakia territory in March 1939. This marked the failure of the policy of appeasement (Torrin 39). The League of Nations, whose main mandate was to uphold world peace, failed in its duties and responsibilities. The intent behind its 1919 formation was that all nations would join it and hence disagreements between nations would be solved through negotiation rather than through military action. The capabilities of the League of Nation got put to the test when Japan invaded the mineral rich region of Manchuria of China in China. The Chinese government appealed for help from the League of Nations. Even after the Japanese army received orders to leave Manchuria, they opted to pitch tent there. It intensified its conquest of Manchuria. The League of Nations called upon other countries to stop Japan from its expansionist tendencies in China, but due to the economic depression, many countries ignored this plea (Baker 47). In the end, Japan left the League of Nations but stayed put in China. When Italy invaded the weakly Abyssinia in October 1935, Abyssinia asked for help from the League of Nations. The League called for trade sanctions against Italy. However, non member states like the United States still traded with Italy. Other member states like France and Britain did not cut trade ties because they did not want to face any military confrontation with Italy. The League failed to prevent war from occurring. This got attributed to the fact that the League of Nations lacked the backing of all countries. Strong nations such as the United States, Russia and Germany were not part of the group. The League had to rely on member states’ armies to implement its directives due to the lack of a military wing. Member states were reluctant to undertake the orders given by the League. The League lacked power and authority. It was also unable to intervene in urgent matters concerning its member countries. Its response was slow and mostly irrelevant (Vandome 56). The actions of Adolf Hitler directly fueled World War II. As soon he ascended to power as Chancellor of Germany, Hitler started building weapons and strengthening the army. In 1934, a year after taking over German rule, Hitler started building warships and put up a German air force. He also made military service compulsory for all German people. Britain and France did not get amused by Hitler’s action. However, they were reluctant to act because they knew that a stronger Germany would help stop communism from spreading. Hitler invaded Rhine land in 1936. He made two pacts in 1936 which would later prove to be crucial in shaping the war. These were the Anti-Comitern Pact with Japan, and the Rome-Berlin Axis Pact with Italy. He embarked on a mission to repossess portions of land got taken away from the German people. In March 1938, Hitler led his army into Austria, forcing the Austrian government to carry out a referendum on whether they wanted to be part of Germany. An overwhelming 99% of the population was pro union with Germany. The Austrian government sought help from Britain, Italy and France. These countries did nothing to help after Hitler promised that this would be his last expansionist move. They did this to avoid the occurrence of war. Soon after, Hitler began advancing into the Sudetenland part of Czechoslovakia (Baker 95). The Munich agreement handed Sudetenland over to Germany with the promise of no further invasions into Czechoslovakia. Hitler never kept his promises. In March 1939, he took the rest of Czechoslovakia under his siege. Both France and Britain kept their hand off German in order to avoid war. These countries promised to take action if Germany made any invasion attempt in Poland. This, they thought, would act as deterrent factor against more German invasion. In September 1939, Hitler moved into Poland with an aim of territorial gain. All of Hitler’s actions as spelled out above provoked war with other nations. This led to the occurrence of World War II (Senker 45). World War II led to massive loss of lives. This got occasioned with the death of more civilians than the military. Over 30 million soldiers lost their lives in active combat, while more than 50 million civilians died in the crossfire. This was because civilians got deliberately targeted. This war gets termed the most gruesome combat that there has ever been. The war led to a reduced influence of Western Europe in the world. As a result of World War II, powerful Western Europe nations such as Germany, Britain, France and Italy, got exhausted both in their military and economy. These nations had previously dominated trade markets in the world (Senker 44). This occasioned the downfall of Western Europe dominance over the rest of the world. This became occasioned with the downfall of the once powerful dictators such as Adolf Hitler and Mussolini. The two counties that had the least damage from the war took their places. There was a birth of a bipolar equilibrium, with the Soviet Union and the United States emerging as Superpowers. The United States never fought any battle in their home soil, and so America was totally unharmed. The Soviet Union got damaged on the western side, with its eastern side largely unharmed. The war boosted the United States economy, leading to the end of the Great depression, and elevated America to superpower status in the global markets (Miller 110). The territorial borders of many European and Asian nations got re structured. The Soviet Union became the greatest beneficiary of this border restructuring. The territorial expansion of the Soviet Union annexed some parts of Poland, Finland, Germany and Japan. Germany, on the other hand, became the greatest loser after the border redrawing got done. It got divided into four different parts. The United States, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union each took a piece of Germany. However, this plan got abandoned after the realization that revival of Europe was going to be impossible without the resurrection of the industrial base in Germany (McBrewster 64). The United Nations got formed on October, 1945, in a bid to restore tranquility in the world. The Allies were behind the formation of the United Nation just like they had formed the League of Nations after the First World War. The Allies improved the structure of the United Nations by sharing power between five key countries that included France, China, Great Britain, Russia and the United States. The United Nations came up with the Universal Human Rights declaration in 1948 which fronted for an equal measure of achievement for all countries and their people. The cold war was also as a result of World War II. The cold war that occurred between the Soviet Union plus the United States went on for a period of 44 years between 1947 and 1991. This got characterized by no trade relations between the two sides and heightened tensions. Works Cited Baker, Nicholson. Human Smoke. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2008. Print. Frederic P. Miller, John McBrewster and Agnes F. Vandome,. Effects of World War II. Atlanta: Alphascript Publishing, 2010. Print. Hamilton, John. World War II: The Final Years. New York: APDO, 2012. Print. Senker, Cath. Why Did World War II Happen? New York: Rosen Publishing Group, 2010. Print. Torrin, Ken. The Global Impact of World War II: A Guide to the Aftermath and Effects of the Second World War,. Houston: Webster's Digital Services, 2012. Print. Read More