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Advanced Placement

AP US History

Topic 7.13: World War II: Military

Updated · For the May 2027 AP exam

AP US History Topic 7.13, World War II: Military, covers how the United States and its allies defeated the Axis powers between 1941 and 1945. After Pearl Harbor the Allies chose to defeat Germany first, with the Soviet Union carrying the heaviest burden on the ground and American industry supplying the Allies. The D-Day invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944 opened the way to Germany's surrender in May 1945, while in the Pacific the Navy won at Midway and American forces advanced by island hopping. Atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 hastened Japan's surrender and began a debate about their morality.

Trinity How the Allies Won World War II and America Came Out on Top · 1942–1945

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World War II: Military in two minutes

  • Americans saw the war as a fight for freedom against fascism and militarism, a view that later revelations of Nazi camps, the Holocaust and Japanese atrocities reinforced.
  • The Allies adopted a Europe-first strategy; Lend-Lease sent American supplies to Britain and the Soviet Union, whose armies fought most of Germany's forces, while radar, codebreaking and mass production helped the Allies.
  • On June 6, 1944, forces under General Dwight Eisenhower landed in Normandy in history's largest amphibious invasion; the Allies freed Paris in August, and Germany surrendered in May 1945.
  • In the Pacific, codebreaking helped American carrier aircraft win at Midway in June 1942, and island hopping, under Admiral Chester Nimitz and General Douglas MacArthur, bypassed strong Japanese garrisons.
  • Women joined the WACs and WAVES; Navajo code talkers, the Tuskegee Airmen and the Japanese American 442nd served with distinction, though the military kept Black and Japanese American units segregated.
  • The Manhattan Project tested the first atomic bomb at Trinity on July 16, 1945; bombs hit Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki (August 9), Japan surrendered, and historians still debate the decision.
  • On the exam: Topic 7.13 tests argumentation about why the Allies won, how women and minorities served, and the atomic bomb debate; connect it to home-front mobilization and the Cold War.

Transcript

The transcript appears here once this topic is finished.

Unit 7 review 1890–1945

  1. 7.1 Contextualizing Period 7 A Splendid Little War
  2. 7.2 Imperialism: Debates A Splendid Little War
  3. 7.3 The Spanish–American War A Splendid Little War
  4. 7.4 The Progressives The Other Half
  5. 7.5 World War I: Military and Diplomacy He Kept Us Out of War
  6. 7.6 World War I: Home Front Safe for Democracy
  7. 7.7 1920s: Innovations in Communication and Technology Static
  8. 7.8 1920s: Cultural and Political Controversies Static
  9. 7.9 The Great Depression Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
  10. 7.10 The New Deal Fear Itself
  11. 7.11 Interwar Foreign Policy Outlawing War
  12. 7.12 World War II: Mobilization Double V
  13. 7.13 World War II: Military Trinity
  14. 7.14 Postwar Diplomacy Trinity
  15. 7.15 Comparison in Period 7 The American Century

All of AP US History