After completing this lesson, you should be able to:

• discover how the government and the economy of the Soviet Union changed under the rule of Joseph Stalin;
• describe the goals of Italy’s fascist government;
• tell how Adolf Hitler rose to power in Germany in the 1930s;
• relate the cause of the war with Britain and France;
• discuss the victories and setbacks Germany experienced in the war in Western Europe;
• explain why the Battle of Britain was an important victory for Britain;
• detail the causes and effects of Japan’s growing military power in the Pacific;
• explain the outcome of Japan’s actions in Manchuria;
• analyze why the United States attempted to stay neutral in the 1930s;
• evaluate why the Japanese actions at Pearl Harbor led to U.S. involvement in WWII;
• identify ways President Roosevelt mobilized the economy and the armed forces of the United States for war;
• discuss ways that the war affected lives on the American home front;
• discover ways in which Allied air power played an important role in the war effort;
• summarize Nazi treatment of Jews and other non-desirables in conquered lands in Europe;
• discuss Allied victories which began to turn the tide of war in the Pacific;
• outline U.S. strategies in the Pacific to regain Pacific Islands from the Japanese;
• discover why the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa were important;
• understand how the Manhattan Project brought an end to the war in the Pacific;
• discuss how minorities fared during the war years in the United States;
• give examples of changing roles women experienced during the war years.