Total War
Once again the war became total war. To different extents governments mobilized their entire populations, adapted their economies, and used propaganda to help the war effort and demonize enemies. In both wars civilians were targeted resulting in mass atrocities perpetrated by both Allies and Axis powers.
USA
Mobilize the entire population
In the United States women became a vital workforce with the men away at war. More than six million women took wartime jobs in factories, three million volunteered with the Red Cross, and over 200,000 served in the military as clerks, and nurses as well as other jobs. Economy Focused on the War Effort The home front in the United States was quite different from that of the other major powers. The United States was not fighting on its own territory. Eventually, the United States became the arsenal of the Allied Powers; it produced much of the military equipment the Allies needed. The height of war production came in November 1943. At that point, the country was building 6 ships a day and 96,000 planes per year. Over 85 million Americans bought war bonds during World War II. The US raised $185.7 million from selling war bonds during World War II. People were also encourage to ration. Supplies such as gasoline, butter, sugar and canned milk were rationed because they were needed for the war. Because of these shortages, the US government’s Office of Price Administration established a system of rationing that would more fairly distribute foods that were in short supply. Every American was issued a series of ration books during the war. The ration books contained removable stamps good for certain rationed items, like sugar, meat, cooking oil, and canned goods. Propaganda to Advance the War Effort Posters were created and distributed to help mobilize people in the war effort. Some of the posters encouraged people to ration while other posters tried to convince people to join the armed forces. |
Propaganda to demonize/dehumanize
Unfortunately, WWII was also a time when Japanese-American citizens were forced to move into camps losing their businesses, homes and farms because the US government believed they were a threat to America during this time of war. |
Russia
Mobilize the entire population
Soviet women played a major role in the war effort. Women and girls worked in industries, mines, and railroads. Overall, the number of women working in industry increased almost 60 percent. Soviet women were also expected to dig anti tank ditches and to work as air-raid wardens. Also, the Soviet Union was the only country in World War H to use women in battle. Soviet women served as snipers and in aircrews of bomber squadrons. Economy Focused on the War Effort Stalin called the widespread military and industrial mobilization of the nation a "battle of machines." The Soviets won, producing 78,000 tanks and 98,000 artillery pieces. In 1943, 55 percent of the Soviet national income went for war materials, compared with 15 percent in 1940. As a result of the emphasis on military goods, Soviet citizens experienced severe shortages of both food and housing. Propaganda to Advance the War Effort VP Serov created the propaganda poster (pictured right) "We Build Together." Translated it reads "Defend Leningrad. We will restore it" |
Germany
Mobilize the Entire Population
To maintain the morale of the home front during the first two years of the war, Hitler refused to cut consumer goods production or to increase the production of armaments. Blitzkrieg gave the Germans quick victories and enabled them to plunder the food and raw materials of conquered countries. In this way, they could avoid taking away resources from the civilian economy. After German defeats on the Russian front and the American entry into the war, however, the economic situation in Germany changed. A total mobilization of the economy was put into effect in July 1944. Schools, theaters, and cafés were closed. Nazi attitudes toward women changed over the course of the war. Before the war, the Nazis had worked to keep women out of the job market. As the war progressed and more and more men were called up for military service. Women then began to take the jobs men left behind. By that time, though, total war mobilization was too late to save Germany from defeat. Propaganda to Advance the War Effort German propaganda focused on racial superiority but towards the middle and end of the war it also focused on making sacrifices including sending children to "Come Join the "Kindlandverschickung" [this untranslatable word combines "child", "countryside" and "send." It sounds like a vacation program, but describes the voluntary evacuation of urban children to lower-density, country side locations. Propaganda to dehumanize the enemy Below we can also see the propaganda used to justify the genocide of the Jews and other people not deemed fit such as communists and Gypsies |
Japan
"Luxury is Our Enemy" Banner advocating for wartime sacrifice
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Wartime Japan was a highly mobilized society. To guarantee its control over all national resources, the government created a planning board to control prices, wages, labor, and resources. Traditional habits of obedience and hierarchy were used to encourage citizens to sacrifice their resources, and sometimes their lives, for the national cause.
The calls for sacrifice reached a high point in the final years of the war. Young Japanese were encouraged to volunteer to serve as pilots in suicide missions against U.S. fighting ships at sea. These pilots were known as kamikaze or "divine wind." Japanese government propaganda instilled fierce, suicidal nationalism in the Japanese population. Japan was reluctant to mobilize women on behalf of Japan's war effort. General Hideki Tojo, prime minister from 1941 to 1944, opposed female employment. He argued in October 1943: " The weakening of the family system would be the weakening of the nation.... [W]e are able to do our duties ... only because we have wives and mothers at home. " — quoted in Valley of Darkness: The Japanese People and World War Two, 1978 Female employment increased during the war but only in areas such as the textile industry and farming, in which women had traditionally worked. Instead of using women to meet labor shortages, the Japanese government brought in Korean and Chinese laborers. shown left: Translated "Electric Power is Military Power" propaganda poster
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