# data[].attributes.body
British Prime Minister

# data[].attributes.body
1. He led Great Britain through the Battle of Britain.
2. He was outspoken about Hitler before the war

# data[].attributes.body
He was chosen to be prime minister of an all party coalition government.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
History of Sir Winston Churchill - GOV.UK

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Education Act 1944: raised the school leavers age to 14; introduction of the 11+.

# data[].attributes.body
President of the USA.

# data[].attributes.body
1. He didn't enter the way until after the pearl harbor bombing.
2. He enacted the lend lease act

# data[].attributes.body
He was elected by the citizens of the USA

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of the most influential presidents in American history. He was elected to four terms in office, and his policies helped to shape the country for generations. FDR's rise to power began in the early 1920s, when he was elected to the New York State Senate. He quickly made a name for himself as an effective legislator, and he soon caught the attention of national political leaders.

In 1928, he was nominated as the Democratic Party's candidate for president. His campaign was built around the promise of "a New Deal for the American people." This message resonated with voters, and FDR went on to win a landslide victory in the election. During his time in office, FDR enacted a series of sweeping reforms that helped to end the Great Depression and rebuild the American economy. He also played a key role in leading the United States through World War II. FDR's legacy continues to be felt today, and he is widely considered to be one of the greatest presidents in American history.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FDR's Rise To Power - The FD Roosevelt Suite

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of the most influential presidents in American history. He was elected to four terms in office, and his policies helped to shape the country for generations. FDR's rise to power began in the early 1920s, when he was elected to the New York State Senate.

# data[].attributes.body
Leader of communist Russia during WWII

# data[].attributes.body
1. Started fighting on the side with Hitler
2. Switched sides mid way through after Hitler attacked Russia

# data[].attributes.body
He assumed leadership after Lenin's death

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Young Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin was born Josef Vissarionovich Djugashvili on December 18, 1878, or December 6, 1878, according to the Old Style Julian calendar (although he later invented a new birth date for himself: December 21, 1879). He grew up in the small town of Gori, Georgia, then part of the Russian empire. When he was in his 30s, he took the name Stalin, from the Russian for "man of steel."

Did you know? In 1925, the Russian city of Tsaritsyn was renamed Stalingrad. In 1961, as part of the de-Stalinization process, the city, located along Europe's longest river, the Volga, became known as Volgograd. Today, it is one of Russia's largest cities and a key industrial center.

Stalin grew up poor and an only child. His father was a shoemaker and an alcoholic who beat his son, and his mother was a laundress. As a boy, Stalin contracted smallpox, which left him with lifelong facial scars. As a teen, he earned a scholarship to attend a seminary in the nearby city of Tblisi and study for the priesthood in the Georgian Orthodox Church.

While there he began secretly reading the work of German social philosopher and Communist Manifesto author Karl Marx, becoming interested in the revolutionary movement against the Russian monarchy. In 1899, Stalin was expelled from the seminary for missing exams, although he claimed it was for Marxist propaganda.

After leaving school, Stalin became an underground political agitator, taking part in labor demonstrations and strikes. He adopted the name Koba, after a fictional Georgian outlaw-hero, and joined the more militant wing of the Marxist Social Democratic movement, the Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin.

Stalin also became involved in various criminal activities, including bank heists, the proceeds from which were used to help fund the Bolshevik Party. He was arrested multiple times between 1902 and 1913, and subjected to imprisonment and exile in Siberia.

Children

In 1906, Stalin married Ekaterina "Kato" Svanidze, a seamstress. The couple had one son, Yakov, who died as a prisoner in Germany during World War II. Ekaterina perished from typhus when her son was an infant.

In 1918 (some sources cite 1919), Stalin married his second wife, Nadezhda "Nadya" Alliluyeva, the daughter of a Russian revolutionary. They had two children, a boy and a girl (Stalin's only daughter, Svetlana Alliluyeva, caused an international scandal when she defected to the United States in 1967). Nadezhda committed suicide in her early 30s. Stalin also fathered several children out of wedlock.

Rise to Power

In 1912, Lenin, who was then in exile in Switzerland, appointed Stalin to serve on the first Central Committee of the Bolshevik Party. Three years later, in November 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power during the Russian Revolution. The Soviet Union was founded in 1922, with Lenin as its first leader.

During these years, Stalin had continued to move up the party ladder, and in 1922 he became secretary general of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, a role that enabled him to appoint his allies to government jobs and grow a base of political support.

After Lenin died in 1924, Stalin eventually outmaneuvered his rivals and won the power struggle for control of the Communist Party. By the late 1920s, he had become dictator of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union Under Stalin

Starting in the late 1920s, Joseph Stalin launched a series of five-year plans intended to transform the Soviet Union from a peasant society into an industrial superpower. His development plan was centered on government control of the economy and included the forced collectivization of Soviet agriculture, in which the government took control of farms.

Millions of farmers refused to cooperate with Stalin's orders and were shot or exiled as punishment, particularly the kulaks, the more-prosperous farmers who owned land and hired paid workers. The forced collectivization soon led to widespread famine across the Soviet Union that killed millions.

Stalin ruled by terror, with a totalitarian grip in order to eliminate anyone who might oppose him. He expanded the powers of the secret police, encouraged citizens to spy on one another and had millions of people killed or sent to the Gulag system of forced labor camps.

During the second half of the 1930s, Stalin instituted the Great Purge, a series of campaigns designed to rid the Communist Party, the military and other parts of Soviet society from those he considered a threat.

Additionally, Stalin built a cult of personality around himself in the Soviet Union. Cities were renamed in his honor. Soviet history books were rewritten to give him a more prominent role in the revolution and mythologize other aspects of his life.

Stalin was the subject of flattering artwork, literature and music, and his name became part of the Soviet national anthem. He censored photographs in an attempt to rewrite history, removing former associates executed during his many purges. His government also controlled the Soviet media.

Joseph Stalin and World War II

In 1939, on the eve of World War II, Joseph Stalin and Germany's Nazi Party dictator Adolf Hitler signed the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact. Stalin then proceeded to annex parts of Poland and Romania, as well as the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. He also launched an invasion of Finland.

Then, in June 1941, Germany broke the Nazi-Soviet pact and invaded the USSR, making significant early inroads. (Stalin had ignored warnings from the Americans and the British, as well as his own intelligence agents, about a potential invasion, and the Soviets were not prepared for war.)

As German troops approached the Soviet capital of Moscow, Stalin remained there and directed a scorched earth defensive policy, destroying any supplies or infrastructure that might benefit the enemy. The tide turned for the Soviets with the Battle of Stalingrad from August 1942 to February 1943, during which the Red Army defeated the Germans and eventually drove them from Russia.

As the war progressed, Stalin participated in the major Allied conferences, including the Tehran Conference (1943) and the Yalta Conference (1945). His iron will and deft political skills enabled him to play the loyal ally while never abandoning his vision of an expanded postwar Soviet empire.

Later Years

Joseph Stalin did not mellow with age: He initiated a reign of terror, purges, executions, exiles to labor camps and persecution in the postwar USSR, suppressing all dissent and anything that smacked of foreign-especially Western-influence.

He established communist governments throughout Eastern Europe, and in 1949 led the Soviets into the nuclear age by exploding an atomic bomb. In 1950, he gave North Korea's communist leader Kim Il Sung permission to invade United States-supported South Korea, an event that triggered the Korean War.

How Did Joseph Stalin Die?

Stalin, who grew increasingly paranoid in his later years, died on March 5, 1953, at age 74, after suffering a stroke. His body was embalmed and preserved in Lenin's mausoleum in Moscow's Red Square until 1961, when it was removed and buried near the Kremlin walls as part of the de-Stalinization process initiated by Stalin's successor Nikita Khrushchev (1894-1971).

How Many People Did Joseph Stalin Kill?

By some estimates, Joseph Stalin was responsible for the deaths of 6 million to 20 million people during his brutal rule, either though political executions or indirectly as a result of Stalin's policies. The killings first began in the 1930s, as a wave of executions swept the Soviet Union during Stalin's Great Purge.

"In some cases, a quota was established for the number to be executed, the number to be arrested," said Stanford University history professor Norman Naimark in a 2010 interview. "Some officials overfulfilled as a way of showing their exuberance."

Millions more were killed in the horrific famine that struck Ukraine in 1932-1933 and the Kazakh region from 1930 to 1933, as a of Stalin's cruel efforts to impose collectivism of agriculture and tamp down Ukrainian nationalism. Estimates vary, but about 4 million men, women and children are believed to have starved to death during the Holodomor (a combination of the Ukrainian words for "starvation" and "to inflict death").

Sources

Joseph Stalin (1879-1953). PBS.
Joseph Stalin: National hero or cold-blooded murderer? BBC.
Stalin killed millions. A Stanford historian answers the question, was it genocide? Stanford News.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Joseph Stalin: Death, Quotes & Facts - HISTORY

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Joseph Stalin was the dictator of the Soviet Union from 1929 to 1953. Through terror, murder, brutality and mass imprisonment, he modernized the Soviet economy.

# data[].attributes.body
Fascist Dictator of Italy

# data[].attributes.body
Leader of Nazi Germany

# data[].attributes.body
General of Japanese military

# data[].attributes.body
1. He was friends with Nazi Germany and Hitler
2. He was removed fro power and killed by his own citizens.

# data[].attributes.body
He was appointed Prime Minister

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Learn about Benito Mussolini, his rise to power, and role in World War II Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Transcript

Benito Mussolini

How did Benito Mussolini rise to power?

Mussolini amassed a large following as an editor of a popular socialist magazine. During World War I his politics took a hard right turn as he stopped decrying the war and instead started advocating for it. After the war, he organized groups to wage campaigns of terrorism and intimidation against Italy's leftist institutions.

In 1922 Mussolini led a coalition of fascist leaders to Rome and forced the king to yield the government. Mussolini was appointed prime minister. By 1925 he had dismantled Italy's democratic government and, acting as a dictator, declared himself Il Duce ("The Leader").

What were Benito Mussolini's political beliefs?

Mussolini was a Fascist dictator. However, initially his work was primarily socialist, organizing with trade unions and writing for leftist publications. During World War I, his politics shifted right and were characterized by themes of racial superiority, xenophobia, and imperialism.

Where did the word fascism come from?

Mussolini's paramilitary groups were called fasci di combattimento, from which his movement derived its own name, fascismo. This came from the Latin word fasces, a bundle of wooden sticks topped with an ax-head that ancient Roman authority figures' attendants would carry to distinguish their rank.

What was Benito Mussolini's role in World War II?

In 1939 the Pact of Steel was formalized between Mussolini and Hitler. Later that year, at the onset of World War II, Mussolini was hesitant to join the fighting. However, he entered the war in 1940. Due to preexisting resource scarcity and economic constraint, Italy fared poorly. When the Allies invaded Sicily in 1943, Mussolini's own government arrested him.

What was Benito Mussolini's personal life like?

Mussolini was born poor, to working-class parents in northern Italy. He had two wives and many mistresses. He abandoned his first wife and their child and had five children with his second wife. He was executed in 1943 alongside his mistress Clara Petacci while attempting to flee to Switzerland. Their bodies were hung upside down in Milan.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Benito Mussolini How did Benito Mussolini rise to power? Mussolini amassed a large following as an editor of a popular socialist magazine. During World War I his politics took a hard right turn as he stopped decrying the war and instead started advocating for it.

# data[].attributes.body
1. Ordered a mass execution of over 6 million Jewish women men and children.
2. He was the leader of Nazi Germany

# data[].attributes.body
He merged chancellorship with the Presidency and became the Führer of Germany

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Discharged from the hospital amid the social chaos that followed Germany's defeat, Hitler took up political work in Munich in May-June 1919. As an army political agent, he joined the small German Workers' Party in Munich (September 1919). In 1920 he was put in charge of the party's propaganda and left the army to devote himself to improving his position within the party, which in that year was renamed the National-sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei ( Nazi). Conditions were ripe for the development of such a party. Resentment at the loss of the war and the severity of the peace terms added to the economic woes and brought widespread discontent. This was especially sharp in Bavaria, due to its traditional separatism and the region's popular dislike of the republican government in Berlin. In March 1920 a coup d'état by a few army officers attempted in vain to establish a right-wing government.

Munich was a gathering place for dissatisfied former servicemen and members of the Freikorps, which had been organized in 1918-19 from units of the German army that were unwilling to return to civilian life, and for political plotters against the republic. Many of these joined the Nazi Party. Foremost among them was Ernst Röhm, a staff member of the district army command, who had joined the German Workers' Party before Hitler and who was of great help in furthering Hitler's rise within the party. It was he who recruited the "strong arm" squads used by Hitler to protect party meetings, to attack socialists and communists, and to exploit violence for the impression of strength it gave. In 1921 these squads were formally organized under Röhm into a private party army, the SA (Sturmabteilung). Röhm was also able to secure protection from the Bavarian government, which depended on the local army command for the maintenance of order and which tacitly accepted some of his terrorist tactics.

Conditions were favourable for the growth of the small party, and Hitler was sufficiently astute to take full advantage of them. When he joined the party, he found it ineffective, committed to a program of nationalist and socialist ideas but uncertain of its aims and divided in its leadership. He accepted its program but regarded it as a means to an end. His propaganda and his personal ambition caused friction with the other leaders of the party. Hitler countered their attempts to curb him by threatening resignation, and because the future of the party depended on his power to organize publicity and to acquire funds, his opponents relented. In July 1921 he became their leader with almost unlimited powers. From the first he set out to create a mass movement, whose mystique and power would be sufficient to bind its members in loyalty to him. He engaged in unrelenting propaganda through the party newspaper, the Völkischer Beobachter ("Popular Observer," acquired in 1920), and through meetings whose audiences soon grew from a handful to thousands. With his charismatic personality and dynamic leadership, he attracted a devoted cadre of Nazi leaders, men whose names today live in infamy-Johann Dietrich Eckart (who acted as a mentor for Hitler), Alfred Rosenberg, Rudolf Hess, Hermann Göring, and Julius Streicher.

The climax of this rapid growth of the Nazi Party in Bavaria came in an attempt to seize power in the Munich (Beer Hall) Putsch of November 1923, when Hitler and General Erich Ludendorff tried to take advantage of the prevailing confusion and opposition to the Weimar Republic to force the leaders of the Bavarian government and the local army commander to proclaim a national revolution. In the melee that resulted, the police and the army fired at the advancing marchers, killing a few of them. Hitler was injured, and four policemen were killed. Placed on trial for treason, he characteristically took advantage of the immense publicity afforded to him. He also drew a vital lesson from the Putsch-that the movement must achieve power by legal means. He was sentenced to prison for five years but served only nine months, and those in relative comfort at Landsberg castle. Hitler used the time to dictate the first volume of , his political autobiography as well as a compendium of his multitudinous ideas.

Hitler's ideas included inequality among races, nations, and individuals as part of an unchangeable natural order that exalted the " Aryan race" as the creative element of mankind. According to Hitler, the natural unit of mankind was the Volk ("the people"), of which the German people was the greatest. Moreover, he believed that the state existed to serve the Volk-a mission that to him the Weimar German Republic betrayed. All morality and truth were judged by this criterion: whether it was in accordance with the interest and preservation of the Volk. Parliamentary democratic government stood doubly condemned. It assumed the equality of individuals that for Hitler did not exist and supposed that what was in the interests of the Volk could be decided by parliamentary procedures. Instead, Hitler argued that the unity of the Volk would find its incarnation in the Führer, endowed with perfect authority. Below the Führer the party was drawn from the Volk and was in turn its safeguard.

The greatest enemy of Nazism was not, in Hitler's view, liberal democracy in Germany, which was already on the verge of collapse. It was the rival Weltanschauung, Marxism (which for him embraced social democracy as well as communism), with its insistence on internationalism and economic conflict. Beyond Marxism he believed the greatest enemy of all to be the Jew, who was for Hitler the incarnation of evil. There is debate among historians as to when anti-Semitism became Hitler's deepest and strongest conviction. As early as 1919 he wrote, "Rational anti-Semitism must lead to systematic legal opposition. Its final objective must be the removal of the Jews altogether." In Mein Kampf, he described the Jew as the "destroyer of culture," "a parasite within the nation," and "a menace."

During Hitler's absence in prison, the Nazi Party languished as the result of internal dissension. After his release, Hitler faced difficulties that had not existed before 1923. Economic stability had been achieved by a currency reform and the Dawes Plan had scaled back Germany's World War I reparations. The republic seemed to have become more respectable. Hitler was forbidden to make speeches, first in Bavaria, then in many other German states (these prohibitions remained in force until 1927-28). Nevertheless, the party grew slowly in numbers, and in 1926 Hitler successfully established his position within it against Gregor Strasser, whose followers were primarily in northern Germany.

The advent of the Depression in 1929, however, led to a new period of political instability. In 1930 Hitler made an alliance with the Nationalist Alfred Hugenberg in a campaign against the Young Plan, a second renegotiation of Germany's war reparation payments. With the help of Hugenberg's newspapers, Hitler was able for the first time to reach a nationwide audience. The alliance also enabled him to seek support from many of the magnates of business and industry who controlled political funds and were anxious to use them to establish a strong right-wing, antisocialist government. The subsidies Hitler received from the industrialists placed his party on a secure financial footing and enabled him to make effective his emotional appeal to the lower middle class and the unemployed, based on the proclamation of his faith that Germany would awaken from its sufferings to reassert its natural greatness. Hitler's dealings with Hugenberg and the industrialists exemplify his skill in using those who sought to use him. But his most important achievement was the establishment of a truly national party (with its voters and followers drawn from different classes and religious groups), unique in Germany at the time.

Unremitting propaganda, set against the failure of the government to improve conditions during the Depression, produced a steadily mounting electoral strength for the Nazis. The party became the second largest in the country, rising from 2.6 percent of the vote in the national election of 1928 to more than 18 percent in September 1930. In 1932 Hitler opposed Hindenburg in the presidential election, capturing 36.8 percent of the votes on the second ballot. Finding himself in a strong position by virtue of his unprecedented mass following, he entered into a series of intrigues with conservatives such as Franz von Papen, Otto Meissner, and President Hindenburg's son, Oskar. The fear of communism and the rejection of the Social Democrats bound them together. In spite of a decline in the Nazi Party's votes in November 1932, Hitler insisted that the chancellorship was the only office he would accept. On January 30, 1933, Hindenburg offered him the chancellorship of Germany. His cabinet included few Nazis at that point.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Adolf Hitler - Nazi Leader, WW2, Germany

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Adolf Hitler - Adolf Hitler - Nazi Leader, WW2, Germany: Discharged from the hospital amid the social chaos that followed Germany's defeat, Hitler took up political work in Munich in May-June 1919. As an army political agent, he joined the small German Workers' Party in Munich (September 1919).

# data[].attributes.body
1. General of Japanese military
2. Ordered the attack on Pearl Harbor

# data[].attributes.body
He was chosen to be Prime Minister due to his expression of loyalty

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.provider_name
HISTORY CRUNCH - History Articles, Biographies, Infographics, Resources and More

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Hideki Tojo was the head of Japan's government during most of World War II. This position made him the general of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) and the Prime Minister of Japan. As such, historians refer to Hideki Tojo as the 'Military Leader' of Japan during World War II. This is because some authority in Japan also rested with Emperor Hirohito. For instance, the Emperor of Japan was the official head of state of the country and viewed as a living god. Despite this, Hideki Tojo was responsible for the military actions carried out by Japan. For instance, Hideki Tojo was responsible for one of the most significant events of World War II - the Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor.
​

Hideki Tojo was born on December 30th 1884 in Tokyo, Japan. His father, Hidenori Tojo, was a lieutenant general in the Imperial Japanese Army. As a child, Hideki Tojo received an education that focused heavily on military training. This was common in Japan at the time, as the country promoted the importance of warriors who were loyal to the Emperor. In fact, Japanese boys were always taught to fight for the honor of the Emperor. As stated above, the Emperor was viewed as a living god, and Japanese soldiers were expected to die for the honor of the Emperor.​

Historians have noted that Tojo was known to be stubborn as a child and worked tirelessly towards goals that he hoped to achieve. As such, he was known to be very competitive and work extremely hard. For instance, Tojo has been quoted as saying "I am just an ordinary man possessing no shining talents. Anything I have achieved I owe to my capacity for hard work and never giving up".​

​Tojo furthered his military training in 1899 when he began training at the Army Cadet School. He graduated from the school six years later in 1905 and immediately was positioned as a second lieutenant in the infantry of the Imperial Japanese Army.

​Tojo married Katsuko Ito in 1909 and the couple had three children (all boys) together. His role in the Imperial Japanese Army allowed him to travel, including trips to Germany and the United States. Tojo travelled to Germany in the 1920s, where he was impressed by Germany military advances. Japan had modelled its own military after the German military since the 19th century. Around the same time, Tojo took a trip to the United States where he witnessed American society. This was important, because based on this trip Tojo formed an opinion that Americans were weak and undisciplined. This was likely due to Tojo's own tremendous work ethic, which was an important part of his personality. This attention to detail and strong work ethic proved positive for Tojo as he advanced in his military career.

​Throughout the 1930s, Tojo worked his way up in the Imperial Japanese Army. For instance, he was promoted to the position of major general in 1934. With this position he was also given command of the 24th Infantry Brigade of the Imperial Japanese Army. As well, Tojo was known for being a supporter of strong expression of nationalism for Japan. This was common among Japanese military leaders at the time. Furthermore, Tojo supported a militaristic viewpoint, in which Japan could obtain its goals and expand its territory through militaristic expansion.

​Tojo furthered his rise to power in 1935 when he was given command over the Kwantung Army in Manchuria, which was a region in northeastern China. This position allowed him to use his militaristic insights to expand Japanese influence in China. He was later promoted to the position of Chief of Staff of the Kwantung Army in 1937. He returned to Japan in 1938 and continued to gain influence in the Japanese military.

​In July of 1940, Tojo was appointed as Army Minister for Japanese Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe. This was significant because Tojo's military successes had also gained him political influence in the Japanese government. Konoe had chosen Tojo because he believed that Tojo was a strong-minded commander who would promote honor and devotion to the Emperor. Furthermore, Tojo was known to be a strong ultranationalist, which aligned with Konoe's own personal views. Ultranationalism is an extreme form of nationalism that promotes total loyalty to the nation, even if it means promoting hatred and violence against others.

​Under Tojo's guidance as Army Minister, Japan aligned itself militarily with Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. For instance, the three countries agreed to a defensive military alliance in September of 1940, referred to as the Tripartite Pact. At the same time, Tojo was tasked with seeking a form of peace with the Allied Powers of World War II and the United States. However, the growing tensions from the start of World War II made this unlikely. This proved important, as Prime Minister Konoe came under increased pressure due to the growing likelihood of a war with the Allied Powers. As a result, Konoe resigned as Prime Minister in October of 1940 and was replaced by Hideki Tojo after he was chosen by Emperor Hirohito.

​Hideki Tojo ruled Japan as a militaristic dictator. Tojo's leadership over Japan was based on several key principles. First, Tojo expressed, and demanded, extreme loyalty to Emperor Hirohito. For Tojo, as with most Japanese people at the time, the Emperor was a living god and deserved the utmost respect. For instance, Tojo would have expected his soldiers to die before being captured as a sign of respect for the Emperor. Tojo, and other government officials, promoted this to the Japanese soldiers through powerful propaganda. Tojo also supported the long-held belief of 'bushido'. In short, 'bushido' translates to 'the way of the warrior' and refers to a set of expectations for Japanese soldiers. For instance, it was expected that soldiers would die before dishonoring their Emperor.

​As such, the Japanese bushido code of honor, coupled with effective propaganda which portrayed American soldiers as ruthless animals, prevented surrender for many Japanese soldiers. Instead of surrendering, many Japanese soldiers would kill themselves. For example, Japanese soldiers were known to charge at the American defensive lines even when they were outnumbered and lacked weapons. They were essentially running to their deaths as the American soldiers shot and killed them. Also, Japanese soldiers were known to kill themselves by ritual suicide. This would involve them either carrying out seppuku (which involved them thrusting a samurai sword into their own abdomen) or they would kill themselves by pulling the pin of a grenade and holding it until it exploded. This extreme loyalty can also be viewed as a form of ultranationalism, since the Japanese soldiers were expressing extreme loyalty to their nation.

​Tojo's leadership was also centered on his own control over several aspects of Japanese society. For instance, while he was Prime Minister, Tojo also served as his own minister in several different ministries, including: Foreign Affairs, Education and Commerce. This displays Tojo's controlling nature since he preferred to hold power over the society than have it shared with other influential members of his government.

​Another example of his nationalistic nature can be seen in how he organized the education of Japanese youth during his years as Prime Minister. For example, Tojo carried out indoctrination in the education system by promoting Japanese militaristic values. He did this as a measure of gaining widespread support for the war on the home front and as a means of preparing young people for war.

​Finally, Tojo was also known to support the policies of eugenics, which were famously practised by Nazi Germany. In short, eugenics is the practise of promoting certain genetic traits in a society by preventing some people from reproducing. The Nazi's promoted eugenics in their society with the events of the Holocaust. For his part, Tojo supported the sterilization of people he deemed to be 'mentally unfit'. As such, Tojo was hoping to produce a stronger country by not allowing some people to reproduce and have children. The practise of eugenics has been widely denounced across the world as a prejudice and cruel action. However, it highlights Tojo's nationalistic and totalitarian rule.

​Hideki Tojo was chosen to be the next Prime Minister due to his expressions of loyalty to the Emperor and because of his pro-war stance against the United States. As a result, when Tojo became the Prime Minister he began preparations for Japan's entrance into World War II. For instance, Japan entered the fighting of World War II on December 7th, 1941 with the Attack on Pearl Harbor. Tojo oversaw the operations of the attack due to his role as Prime Minister. The Attack on Pearl Harbor was a vitally important event as it set the stage for the war in the Pacific Theatre while also causing the United States to enter World war II on the side of the Allies. With that said, while Japan had achieved the element of surprise at Pearl Harbor, it failed to knock out the American Pacific Fleet.

​Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese enjoyed a series of victories. For instance, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) famously sank two British Royal Navy ships on December 10th of 1941 - the HMS Prince of Wales and the HMS Repulse. Furthermore, in 1942, the Imperial Japanese Navy carried out a series of successful attacks against Australian targets, including the Sydney Harbor. These victories created a feeling within Tojo's government that Japan was undefeatable. However, 1942 also proved to be a difficult year for Japan, as it suffered a major defeat at the Battle of Midway. The Battle of Midway was a terrible loss for Japan, as it was never able to recover following it. As such, historians often refer to the Battle of Midway as a 'turning point' in the Pacific Theatre, because it shifted the power of the war from Japan to the United States.

​The loss at the Battle of Midway in June of 1942 was not only a massive loss militarily for Japan but it was also a difficult loss for Tojo and his leadership over the country. Several influential people in Tojo's government began to question his authority and his ability to deal with the growing uncertainty about the war. This caused Tojo to push harder for what he believed was necessary for Japan to win the war. Regardless, throughout the remaining years of the war (1943 to 1945) Japan suffered a series of major losses. For instance, at its height Japan had controlled large areas of the South Pacific, but the United States successfully pushed through these regions and forced Japan back to its home islands. The United States famously used a strategy called 'island-hopping', which saw its forces only capture main islands on its way to the Japanese homeland. In response to these losses, Tojo ordered his forces back to guard the homeland and protect the Emperor. In fact, he ordered home millions of Japanese soldiers who were stationed in China to help in the defense. Tojo had hoped that these returning soldiers would help the Japanese forces push back the Americans and force their retreat. However, following a series of major losses, Tojo realized that Japan was all but lost the war. For instance, the Battle of Saipan took place from June 15th to July 9th in 1944 and was a major loss for Japan. This loss proved to be too much for Tojo's continued leadership and just days later on July 18th Emperor Hirohito forced him to resign as Prime Minister. Admiral Mitsumasa Yonai replaced Tojo as Prime Minister.

​Japan finally surrendered to the United States in 1945 following the atomic bombing of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Following the end of the war, Hideki Tojo was arrested by American forces on the orders of United States General Douglas MacArthur. Tojo actually tried to commit suicide when he was arrested by shooting himself in the chest, but he survived.

​Tojo had been arrested for war crimes. The term 'war crimes' is when a person or group of people commit extreme acts during a time of war that are considered to be beyond what is acceptable. For his part, Tojo was tried and convicted of several different war crimes, including: starting a war of aggression, unprovoked war against other nations, and ordering the inhumane treatment of prisoners of war. He was tried before the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, which had been set up to hold Japanese war criminals accountable. In fact, historians estimate that millions of people died as a result of Hideki Tojo's decisions.

​Ultimately, Tojo accepted responsibility for his actions in the war and asked the Americans to help Japan recover following the two atomic bombings in the country. For instance, he famously stated the following:

​ "It is natural that I should bear entire responsibility for the war in general, and, needless to say, I am prepared to do so. Consequently, now that the war has been lost, it is presumably necessary that I be judged so that the circumstances of the time can be clarified and the future peace of the world be assured. Therefore, with respect to my trial, it is my intention to speak frankly, according to my recollection, even though when the vanquished stands before the victor, who has over him the power of life and death, he may be apt to toady and flatter. I mean to pay considerable attention to this in my actions, and say to the end that what is true is true and what is false is false. To shade one's words in flattery to the point of untruthfulness would falsify the trial and do incalculable harm to the nation, and great care must be taken to avoid this."

​In the end, Hideki Tojo was sentenced to death for his role in war crimes and was executed on December 23rd in 1948 by hanging. Today, Tojo is remembered as an ultranationalist who ruled over Japan with a devout loyalty to the Emperor. However, he also led Japan into a major conflict that they ultimately could not win.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Hideki Tojo was the head of Japan's government during most of World War II. This position made him the general of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) and the Prime Minister of Japan. As such, historians refer to Hideki Tojo as the 'Military Leader' of Japan during World War II.