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Over this semester we have talked about many things. From before the war and the causes to after the war and the aftermath. We have gone into so much detail about our topics. The best way i can really talk about all that we learned about is using the other module reflections, otherwise id be all over the place trying to type everything on here. I remember the first Article Review and how someone was talking about how they found an article that Hitler might of been gay. To me it was just super interesting, with all of his anti gay policies and everything he did to those people. He made laws and even put them in camps. Something else that really interested me was that there was speculation that Ernst Rohm, the leader of the Brown Shirts was also gay. In the article it had actually confirmed that Hitler and Rohm did have multiple affairs. Around 1925 Rohm had a falling out with Hitler and the party. A few months later and Hitler had made all of those anti gay laws. Coincidence.. I think not. Not many people knew about their affairs in fact most of the Brown Shirt leadership was also gay. If you think about it, it all kinds of folds together. Only for the fact that Hitler had ordered that the Brown Shirts to be killed. This was known to be the Night of The Long Knives. Most History books say that the reason he did this was because he didn't want them to be more powerful than he was. But it makes you wonder? Was Hitler afraid that Rohm was going to spill the beans? It's just so interesting to think about, all Hitler wanted was pure German people. So did him and Rohm have a thing? In the Article it did confirm that they did. I might have talked a lot about this but not everything in history is true. I just wonder if it was to keep Rohm from getting power or if it was to silence him, it could have been a mixture of both. So like any horrible maniac he has to have an upbringing and a story. We talked a lot about Hitler and how he gained power. We talked about the book that he wrote, Mein Kampf, or My Struggle. We had also talked about the Beer Hall Putsch. We spent a lot of time talking about the Holocaust. We talked about the Final solution a lot. We talked about the labor and death camps and even the people who ran them. I still remember us talking about the Witch of Buchenwald. She was the camp directors wife or something like that. She would skin the tattoos of the Jewish people and make lampshades.She had couches made out of human skin. Their was over 6 million Jewish people that died over the duration. That's at least what we think. We also talked about how the hair from the Jewish had been used for bed stuffing and how the ashes were used as fertilizer. This just goes to show what one madman can do with all of his power. One thing he was smart about was manipulating other people. He used the Spanish civil war as a training ground for his new tactics. He used the Blitzkrieg tactic and also tested new equipment their. Here is where we get to the meat and cheese of this horrible shitty sandwich they called the Third Reich. Hitler was dumb but very smart at the same time. He decided to grow his empire. In less than 42 days he took over all of Europe using his Blitzkrieg tactic. He decided to attack Great Britain Also known as Operation Sea Lion. His original plan was to bomb Britain and hoped they would give up or he would take out their air force. He would then send in an amphibious assault and take over the mainland. As you can guess it, it didn't work. He failed to do everything when it came to Britain, he couldn't take out their airforce or send a naval assault. So it angered him. And this is where he made one of the biggest mistakes ever and pretty much costed him the war. He attacked Russia. Operation Barbarossa actually could have gone good. He attacked in a 3 prong approach and ended up really close to Moscow, the capital of Russia. Here is where he went wrong. He actually pulled back from Moscow, he didn't keep on going. If he would have wiped out Moscow all of Russia would have went to him. But he also made another dumb mistake. After the main German ground troops left the area the Einsatzgruppen came in and started slaughtering, raping, and pillaging the civilians. When the Germans first attacked the Russian people were actually happy, they knew Stalin was bad and they thought that Hitler would of been as bad. They wanted to be under Hitler and help him. They supported him. If he would of took over Moscow and not sent in the SS he could have easily won the war. He could have gained control of Russia, used their resources and manpower, mass produced weapons, tanks, and ammo. He could of easily won the entire war. But he didn't, his mistakes cost him thousands of his own people and even half of his own country, but we won't get into that right now. When he first attacked Russia Stalin was shocked, and he didn't even put up a fight for a while. This will forever be a major mistake for him. It costed him the entire war. Next we start talking about how we entered the war. I have talked a lot about the Germans so i guess it's time to talk about the Japanese and give them their spotlight now. Around this time we were neutral. We had the lend-lease act which enabled us to support Britain, but we were not in the war yet, until December 7th, 1941. In the early hours of December 7th the Japanese launched a surprise attack on Pearl harbor. This was also known as ¨The Day That Will in Infamy¨ Sending hundreds of bombers and fighters they hoped to destroy our fleet that we had stationed their. They hit us with dive bombers, and when they ran out of ammo they would fly into our ships. The attack only lasted about 30 minutes. When the smoke cleared many ships had been sunk and damaged. The USS Arizona had sunk when a bomb hit the ammunitions. When the Arizona sunk it still had men their. depot Over 2000 Americans gave their lives that day. The day after that Germany and Japan declared war on the US. With the US being in a depression we had to flip our entire economy. Soon after the surprise attack, we did a little surprise attack too. The Doolittle Raid was put into place. The mission was to bomb Tokyo. Even though it did little damage, it boosted morale immensely and shown the world that we were not out of the fight yet. One thing that really interested me was learning about the different minority groups that fought in the war. We talked about the Tuskegee Airmen, the 761st tank battalion, the Navajo Wind talkers, and many more. To me it was good to see how different ethnicities pushed through the racism and the hardships and showed that even through adversity you can still be one. In a way it showed that America, if faced with evil, it can rise up and kick ass. We also talked about the Island hopping campaign led by Mcarthur. We went from Island to Island. We forced the Japanese from islands that held great strategic points. Next we talked about the invasion of Italy. Operation Husky was the attack on Sicily. It was led by my guy George Patton who was a US general and by the British. The commander leading the British (Montgomery) and Patton did not see eye to eye. This caused miscommunication as well as no communication at all. When they attacked they let thousands of men escape into mainland Italy. Before all of this we juked the Germans and the Italians with Operation Mincemeat. We dropped a dead body that had on a British officer uniform on in the ocean around Spain. We had hoped that this would take some men away from Sicily as we hoped to make them think we were invading elsewhere. Next comes Operation Overlord. The biggest Amphibious assault ever in history, D-Day. We attacked at many beachheads hoping to over run our enemy. We were hit with morters, machine guns, snipers and mines. We didn't really have plans once we got onto the beaches. All our men were told was to take the beach. This was the first attack and first push to take back France and Europe from the Nazis. Next we talked about the homefront. What it was like for the people here at home. We had to conserve everything. Rubber, steel, gas, and even our food. Many people grew victory gardens to help with the war effort. Women banded together and started to work in the factories and filled in spaces in the workforce. People were given ration books to help conserve. In some places we even lowered the speed limit to 45 to help save gas. Here is where we get to the end of the war. Germany's almost out of the fight. They were surrounded on both sides. They had no men left really. On April 30th 1945 Hitler committed suicide. He shot himself while and used a cyanide capsule. Germany eventually surrendered. All that we had left to to do was kick Japan's ass. We knew that we couldn't invade, we would lose too many men. Our president at the time Harry S Truman had to make the biggest decision of the war yet… do we use the newly founded atomic weapons? To end the war with Japan it was decided to drop two bombs on 2 cities. We gave them warnings and even gave them the option to quit. We ultimately had no choice but to drop them. On August 6th, 1945 we dropped the atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, over 90 percent of the city was gone along with 800,000 dead in a blink of an eye. Three days later we dropped the second bomb on Nagasaki and ultimately ended the war with Japan. I have to say that this class was one of my favorites all year long. From Ancient Civ to WW2 i have loved your class. Your one hell of a teacher and it's been fun to be into your class. You've taught all of us a great deal of things, from history, to lessons about life, you have been one of the most influential teachers i've had. Thank you for everything you have done for each and every single one of us.

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Module reflection
We learned a lot of things in this module. From Pearl harbor to North Africa, to the black experience. We also talked about the home front and the invasion of Europe. We talked about the surprise attack on December 7th 1941. The ¨Day That Will Live in Infamy¨. In the early hours of December 7th Japan dive bombers and fighters attacked our ships. It was a total surprise attack and we lost a lot of men, over 2000. When the Japanese ran out of ammo they would ram themselves into ships. The attack took only about 30 minutes. When the smoke cleared many ships had been damaged or sunk. The USS Arizona was had sunk with her own men inside of her. After FDR had released a press conference, we were at war. With Germany and Japan declaring war on us we had to turn our economy upside down and focus on war. Soon after pearl we launched the Doolittle raid. We had bombed Tokyo and tried to damage their factories. The attack did very little to their factories but boosted morale back home. Next we had talked about the black experience of the war. Most African Americans were either cooks or janitors. Few actually fought for a while. Their were some segregated units like the Tuskegee Airmen or the 761st tank battalion. The Tuskegee airmen were very put down and were given some of the worst and broken down equipment. Even ill equipped they fought in many battle, 1578 missions. We then talked about the assault on Europe. We talked about Operation Husky and how we invaded Sicily. It was a success but a failure at the same time. The reason for success is that we took sicily over but let a lot of Axis troops out. The generals at the time, Patton and Montgomery did not like each other and had a lack of communication. Therefore the many troops had fled. Before that we totally juked the Italians and Germans. Operation Mincemeat was a plan to fool the Axis and make them think that we were invading in another place. We took a dead body and dressed him up as a British officer and dumped him near Spain which was neutral. Spain took the information and gave it to the Axis. They took troops out of Italy and prepared for invasion elsewhere. We talked about D-Day and how we actually entered France. We attacked at many beachheads and tried to take them. We lost countless men and we didn't really have a plan once we entered the beach. Under heavy mortar and machine gun fire we took the beach. Next we learned about the homefront and how people reacted here at home. With almost all of the men gone women had to step up and take the factory jobs. Even though they faced hardships, they still worked in the factories and proved everyone wrong that doubted them. Many women and people back home grew victory gardens and supported themselves back home. We conserved everything from gas to rubber to food. We gave out coupon books to help ration. We even came out with new forms of propaganda. In some places we lowered the speed limit down to 45 to conserve.

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module reflection
In this module we talked a lot about different things. From Great Britain to Finland and Russia. There are many things i enjoyed and some just completely surprised me. We talked a lot about Hitler's tactics and how he tried to pushed for more land for his people. Through war we tend to see an uprising of people that could be considered heros. Like Simo Häyhä Häyhä, A Finnish soldier who got 505 confirmed kills Russian with a bolt action rifle with open sights.  I think the most interesting thing we learned about in this module was how Hitler really screwed up. To me Hitler could have very easily won the war with a very few key decisions. With winning Europe in less than 42 days he began to get Power hungary it seems. He began to attack Britain by air. He called the attack Operation Sea Lion. The plan was to destroy the RAF and other military targets to pave the way for a ground assault. He sent the Luftwaffe in to bomb them. Instead of just bombing a specific target they bombed different areas of Britain. Some days the Luftwaffe would bomb strategic military targets, the next they would target random civilian targets. After a month of fighting Hitler turned his focus to Russia. Losing Britain infuriated him so much he decided to invade Russia. He then started Operation Barbarossa which led to the invasion of Russia. When German troops started to invade Russia they met little to no resistance. At this time the current leader of Russia, Joseph Stalin was so shocked that it took him a while to actually fight back. Now Invading Russia is a huge mistake for any country, But Hitler could have won. German forces pushed the Russians all the back to Moscow. If they would have kept going they could have taken the Kremlin witch is where their government resided. But Hitler showed a moment of hesitation and took the heat off of them. In the occupied parts of Russia, the Civilians actually wanted to be under Hitler's rule. At first they thought that he couldn't be as a bad as Stalin, killing 20 million of your own people can get you a bad rep. Another Mistake that Hitler made was sending in the SS (einsgroupen) to kill Russian civilians. Hitler sent them in to exterminate anyone that was not Aryan. The Russian people saw the atrocities that the SS. The SS raped, murdered, stole and pillaged. Now one thing we can take from history, and use today in the modern world is to not invade Russia. When Hitler did this he set himself up for failure. I wonder what would have happened if he would have taken over Russia. Would we have won the war? Their are a ton of things that could have changed the war and possibly changed history.This Module to me was the most interesting. I love learning History. I think by learning the mistakes from the past can help us not make the same mistakes again.

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Module reflection
To be completely honest the most interesting thing to me even though it was an article that we did not discuss, was that Hitler was homosexual. With all of his policies it's hard to believe that he was actually gay. He made laws against gay people and actually put them in concentration camps. Something else that interested me, is their was reports that his right hand man Ernst Rohm, leader of the brown shirts was also gay. In the article that i had read it confirmed that he multiple affairs with Rohm as he came into power. In 1925 i think Rohm fell out of the Nazi party for some odd reason. Few months after that he released laws against the gay community. No one really knew about Hitler and Rohm. It turns out that most of the SA or Brown Shirts were actually gay. I think the biggest thing that interested me was the fall of the Brown Shirts. Hitler ordered them to executed, it was the night of long knives. Most history books say that Hitler feared that they were getting too powerful and he wanted them to be put down. I wonder if Rohm had threatened to tell people about his relationship with Hitler? Adolf wanted pure straight German people in his country so it makes sense why he would kill Rohm. I might be putting a lot of emphasis on this but not everything in history is true and not everything is written down. I just wonder if that's why he took out Rohm, was it to keep himself in power? Or was it to just deny everything. It's just interesting to think what might of actually happened. I think all this connects to the modern world because it shows us what not to become and what to look for. Someone that passes laws against a certain group of people are probably not the best for our country. Also it's just good to educate others about the past. Very few care anymore and i think it's important to teach as many people as possible. I've learned so many things from this module.  One thing that i did not know was that Hitler used the Spanish civil war as a testing ground. They tried out new tactics and new equipment their. We learned a lot about the holocaust and how over 6 million Jews died. One thing i wish i could study is the psychology of Hitler. I would love to go deeper into the mind of Hitler. What made him go in the direction that he did. I would like to know what really set him off and what didn't. He was a very sick and twisted man but very smart. His tactics in the beginning were sort of smart. But something clicked and he went crazy, he took out some of his own leadership, killed millions of people and even tried getting with his niece. Maybe it was Rohm and the SA, this to me had to be one of the biggest questions that i still have.