5. The Road to War

Today we will examine the path that the world took in leading into the World's second Great War...known to most as World War 2.

Let's review. In the United States, the economy has collapsed, work is hard to find, the food supply has been messed with as a result of the Dust Bowl, and many have lost most of their life's savings. The thing about it is, this isn't isolated to just the United States. Much of the world is in the same recession that the United States is deal with. Remember the story of the German's needing wheelbarrows of money in order to purchase basic supplies.

The world needed strong leaders to bring each country out of the deep economic depression that had fallen across the nation. In the United States it was Franklin Roosevelt, who brought his New Deal ideas and programs.

In Germany, it was a young leader who had fought in World War 1, had been imprisoned, wrote a book called Mein Kampf, and became the leader of a new political party known as the Nazis. His name, as you now probably know, is Adolf Hitler. Though he used his power and leadership for evil things, he was a very strong leader. He brought a country to the depths of economic despair, all the way back to the top of the economic world. His method? Why blame the Jews of course. More on that later.

In Italy, Benito Mussolini took power. He lead a Fascist state. Fascism is a political system based on militarism, extreme nationalism, and blind loyalty to the state and its leader. Mussolini wanted to bring Italy, and Rome in general, back to the days where the Roman Empire ruled much of Europe. This was essentially the same thing that Hitler wanted to do, so as you can imagine, they eventually joined forces. Mussolini ended the freedom of the press and banned all political parties except his own.

In Russia, Josef Stalin had risen to power within the Communist party. Though he didn't see eye to eye with the United States and other western countries, he also didn't trust Hitler. Though he attempted to appease Hitler, and in fact, at one point had agreed to an alliance with Hitler, Stalin chose to rescind (go back on) that alliance as Hitler obviously had his eyes on taking over Russia too.

Optional Link. Info on Nazism, Facism, and Communism

Define the following words:

Aggression-

Appeasement-

Invade-

Propaganda-