Why Did the Allies Win World War II?

There are many factors which contributed to an Allied victory in World War II: the cooperation of the Allies with each other, the mass amounts of supplies the Allies got from America, and the “colossal sacrifices by the people of the Soviet Union.” Individually, the countries that made up the allied forces could never had defeated Germany’s massive military power; however, the three were able to join together with a common cause—desire to defeat Hitler—and work to succeed. The major powers against the Allies, Germany and Japan, did not work together to defeat their adversaries. During WWII, the United States turned nearly all of its factories into ones that could produce war effort products. This enabled the Allies to defeat Germany because of the sheer amount of mechanical power they had. Finally, the Allies could not have won WWII if the Soviet Union had not “stopped the seemingly unstoppable advance” of Germany’s military. The fighting in the east made Germany divide its manpower between the two fronts of the war (US and Britain in the west and USSR in the east) and the massive effort of the USSR eventually defeated the east half of the German army.

How might WWII have ended differently if the US had devoted more than 15 percent of its war effort against Japan?

What factors made President Roosevelt’s military advisors believe the Soviet Union would surrender to Germany in 1941?

"To Expose a Fool" -H.L. Mencken

In “To Expose a Fool,” Henry L. Mencken is arguing many things at once in this “savage obituary”: evolution over creationism, the danger of the spread of Fundamentalism, and even the necessity of a secular presidency. Most of all, Mencken is arguing that William Jennings Bryan is a fool. Mencken’s fiery hatred of that “charlatan, mountebank, zany without sense or dignity” is evident in this article.

While this “obituary” is not the respectful type normally seen in newspapers, it does still follow the basic idea of an obituary. Mencken describes who Bryan was: “the most sedulous flycatcher in American history…his quarry Homo neandertalensis;” what he enjoyed: “people who sweated freely, and were not debauched by the refinements of the toilet;” and what his legacy was: the mass increase of Fundamentalists, to the point where “heave an egg out of a Pullman window, and you will hit a Fundamentalist almost anywhere in the US.”

Mencken starts his article out in a different tone than he ends it in; it goes from irritated but amused to livid. It’s as if Mencken tried to write this article in a detached way but could not hold in his true outrage. He lets his angry words flow until the last paragraph when he seems to gain control over his emotions and again writes in an indifferent tone. Mencken starts the article out in a way that, while degrading to Bryan, does not contain the venom of the insults in the last paragraphs. He is very detached when he first asks “Has it been duly marked by historians that William Jennings Bryan's last secular act on this globe of sin was to catch flies?”

Mencken uses references to Christianity in his article in order to make fun of Bryan and even religion itself. When talking about Bryan’s near success in the presidential polls, which Mencken calls a narrow escape for the people of the US, Mencken uses a religious reference to emphasize the necessary secularity of government: “the President of the United States doesn’t believe… that witches should be put to death, and that Jonah swallowed the whale. The Golden Text is not painted weekly on the White House wall.” His statement that “Jonah swallowed the whale” is a deliberate misinterpretation of the bible story in which a whale swallows a man. This slight mix-up resulting in an impossible, but humorous, act shows Mencken’s belief that the bible has ridiculous, impossible stories and that Christian beliefs are impossible, too. Also, Mencken makes a reference to the medieval Christian practice of keeping relics, and the preposterous belief that they possessed magical restorative powers when he says “if the village barber saved any of [Bryan’s] hair, then it is curing gall-stones down there today.”

He also alludes to the evolution of humans from primates with a few carefully, but seemingly innocuous, phrases. When talking about Bryan speaking to country people about religion, Mencken describes the scene as Bryan being “surrounded by gaping primates.” Later in that same paragraph, Mencken mentions that Bryan was more comfortable around rural folk, that “the simian gabble of a country town was not gabble to him.” This shows Mencken’s belief that the evidence of evolution is obvious and numerous.

Based on what Mencken says in second section of this article, his hatred of Bryan seems to stem not just from a difference in religious beliefs but also because of Bryan’s insincerity. Mencken asks questions which show Bryan’s opposing attitudes and feelings towards one event to highlight Bryan’s indecision and two-facedness. As Mencken says “if [Bryan] was sincere, then so was P.T. Barnum,” ─P.T. Barnum being a famous scam artist in the 1800s. However, Mencken does sometimes seem to grudgingly respect Bryan when he says Bryan prepared for “a jacquerie that should floor all his enemies at one blow. He did the job competently.”

 ­           This article shows the intense debate of evolution versus intelligent design as the creation of the existence. It was written soon after the Scope’s trial, where a teacher was on trial for teaching evolution instead of religion’s beliefs in his classroom. William Jennings Bryan was on the prosecution and Mencken’s friend, Clarence Darrow, was on the defense. When Bryan died a few days after the trial, Mencken felt that it was necessary to write this article to express his feelings toward Bryan in this obituary of sorts. I don't think Mencken was particularly persuasive because he was not trying to be persuasive. He wanted to express his feelings toward Bryan and show that Bryan's death was not a hardship to him, not try to convince his readers of anything. He does make his beliefs toward religion and evolution clear but I don't get the impression that he is trying very hard to convince anyone that he is right. He believes what he believes whether or not anyone else agrees with him.

Defense of the League of Nations, Woodrow Wilson, September 1919

In his speech, Woodrow Wilson is arguing in favor of the creation of a League of Nations. This league would promote world peace by acting as the final say in whether or not two countries should go to war. The league would decide which country was in the wrong and that country would either have to back down or give advanced warning to the other country if they decided to go to war.

In his address to the citizens of Pueblo, Colorado, Wilson starts out by creating a sense of union in his audience; he states "[the people of the United States] come from many origins, but they are all shot through with the same principles, and desire the same righteous and honest things." He goes on to say he is "privilege[d]" to be in the United States at that time. Basically, he warms the audience up with compliments so they are more receptive of his plan.

Next, Wilson introduces the treaty of peace with Germany and the Covenant of the League of Nations, which is "at the front of this great treaty." He continues by explaining two of the articles in his Covenant of the League of Nations, Articles X and XI, and how they would work to ensure world peace. In Article X, the members of the league promise “to respect and preserve the territorial integrity and existing political independence of every other member of the league as against external aggression.” Article XI “makes it the right of any member of the League at any time to call attention to anything, anywhere, that is likely to disturb the peace of the world or the good understanding between nations upon which the peace of the world depends.” Wilson then gives an example of how an event in the past, Germany’s acquisition of Shantung in China, might have ended differently, and for the better, if these articles had been in effect during that event.

Wilson doesn’t just leave the interpretation of the articles up to his listeners, he makes sure they understand what the purpose of the articles, and the whole League of Nations, is. He uses examples that reflect well on his idea and make it seem like the only logical action in response to World War I.

Near the end of his speech, he talks about the lives of young men that were lost in World War I. He pleads with the people to make their sacrifice worth something; to prove that the mothers are right in their belief “that their sons saved the liberty of the world.” This mention of the lives lost would have resonated with the listeners because of how recent the war was. By telling his listeners that the mothers of the men lost did not blame him, and even “call[ed] down the blessings of God upon him”, he made the creation of the League of Nations seem even more like the right choice. If the women who should hate him most thanked him, then he must have a brilliant idea, right? He would have tried to raise this question in the minds of the American citizens, almost making it seem like his idea was the listeners’ idea. He wanted the creation of the league to seem like the commonsense thing to do.

Eventually, Wilson’s idea saw its creation. Many of the large, powerful nations realized the sense in having a League of Nations to help ensure world peace. Although, there was one country was conspicuously absent from among its members: the United States. Despite his impassioned speech, Wilson did not manage to convince his country to accept the league as he had planned it. However, his speech shows the beginnings of the idea still around today in the form of the United Nations: the existence of an association of countries that protects the rights of every country.

            Personally, I found Wilson’s argument convincing. He managed to use both logic and emotion to present his idea, an idea which was planned with care. His proposal is unselfish but would still increase the international importance of the United States as a world power. This eloquent speech would have definitely convinced me of the importance of a League of Nations if I had been among the audience members.