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Course: World History Project AP® > Unit 7
Lesson 1: 7.0—Shifting Power after 1900WATCH: Unit 7 Overview – Global Conflict
The first half of the twentieth century featured a 30-year period of global conflict, including two world wars, from 1914 to 1918 and from 1939 to 1945. Nations around the world battled each other and dragged their citizens, colonies, and economies into two total wars. How did this happen and what did governments do to try and stop these conflicts from happening again? How did the failures of internationalism after the First World War result in a second, more devastating world war? Those are the big questions that we seek to answer in this video. Like what you see? This video is part of a comprehensive social studies curriculum from OER Project, a family of free, online social studies courses. OER Project aims to empower teachers by offering free and fully supported social studies courses for middle- and high-school students. Your account is the key to accessing our standards-aligned courses that are designed with built-in supports like leveled readings, audio recordings of texts, video transcripts, and more. Register today at oerproject.com!
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Website: https://www.oerproject.com/AP-World-History
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OERProject
Twitter: https://twitter.com/oerproject. Created by World History Project.
Video transcript
Do me a favor. Close your eyes and imagine World
War I and World War II. What comes to mind? Tanks, planes, bombs, soldiers in green and grey shooting
at each other in the name of democracy or fascism? Two all-out wars in which the whole world
dedicated itself to the task of destruction? You're not wrong. But there's more to this story.
Militant ideologies like nationalism and fascism get a lot of attention and narratives about the
world wars, and rightly so. These were history's first "total wars"—wars in which the entire engine
of society is devoted to the task of making war. But there is another ideology that we rarely
associate with this period from 1914 to 1945: Pacifism. Certainly, Pacifism didn't win the day.
However, people on all sides of these conflicts argued against war, and their stories can also
tell us about historical trends in this era of violent conflict. So, while this unit will
highlight war leader figures like Kaiser Wilhelm and Winston Churchill, for this video, we're
going to focus on a woman named Janette Rankin. Unless you're from Rankin's home state of
Montana, that name might not ring a bell. But this local hero has great national
significance, so let's ring that bell now. Jeanette Rankin was the first woman to serve in
the United States Congress and the only woman Montana has ever elected to congress. In fact, she
was elected in 1916, four years before women even won the right to vote in national elections. And
finally, she was the only U.S. congressperson to vote against American entry into both world wars. Her
very first vote in Congress, on April 6, 1917, was her vote against U.S. involvement in World War I.
Along with about 50 other congressional members, Rankin refused to give her consent. She said, "I want
to support my country, but I cannot vote for war." Faithful to her principles, she insisted, "We cannot
settle disputes by eliminating human beings." Most leaders of the 20th century seem
to have been of a very different mind. But, as Jeannette Rankin and predicted, the two world
wars would raise as many questions as they solved. Hi, I'm Rachel Hansen, and this is Unit
7: Global Conflict 1900 to the Present. In the summer of 1914, the great
industrialized empires of the world began a mighty struggle on a global scale
in what some called "the war to end all wars." Pacifists like Jeanette Rankin doubted that
claim. And sure enough, 20 years after the end of the first war, a second, even more devastating
conflict erupted. In this unit, we'll ask: Why did the nations of the world engage in these global
conflicts? Our story starts in May 1914, a month in which the transformations of the long 19th century
still seemed to offer a world of promise for some. Political revolutions had created new nations and
democratic governments in some parts of the world. The Industrial Revolution promised efficient
production, cheaper goods, and faster communication and travel. Yet, not everyone shared in these
promises, and from 1914 to 1918, all the promise of the long 19th century collapsed into
global conflict. This war lasted four long years and cost millions of lives. It revealed a broken
global system. And even its conclusion in 1918 didn't solve the problems of that system. Instead,
by the 1930s, these tensions would send the sons and grandsons of those who had fought in the
First World War into the battles of the Second. And you didn't have to be a soldier to lose your life.
Both wars witnessed horrific atrocities against civilian populations. In this unit, you'll
seek out the causes of global conflicts. How did the long 19th century set the
stage for the First World War? And how did the failures of the interwar years lead
the world back into war? And finally, you'll ask: did these two wars solve anything? And
what problems did they leave unsolved? Let's look at these questions through
our themes. In the last unit, you explored how the dual revolutions in politics and
industrialization created the new imperialism. In this unit, you'll see how competition among
empires helped produce an era of global war. You see, there's only so much land on Earth. And as
imperialist nations began expanding to new regions of Africa, Asia, and the Pacific, they eventually
came into competition over colonies and resources. Militant nationalism helped motivate
support for imperial competition. Soon, complicated alliance systems emerged, meant to
balance nations against each other and ensure each country's security. Sadly, this careful balancing
act collapsed like a house of cards in 1914. Meanwhile, the industrialization of the long
19th century produced incredibly deadly weaponry that left the generation of men dead.
Advances in communications and transportation allowed the rapid deployment of huge numbers of
soldiers and weapons all around the globe. These technological trends only intensified during the
Second World War. New technologies, unfortunately, made mass murder possible on a new scale. World War
I killed over 20 million soldiers and civilians. World War II killed over 70 million humans. Many
of these were victims of social trends like racism, anti-semitism, and eugenics that were used to
justify atrocities by one group against others. These were also "total" wars. That meant that
the entire economic engines of the warring nations were turned to the war effort—and often
to atrocities against civilians. It also meant that factories, workers, infrastructure, and
civilians became valid targets for bombs. As a result, the world wars devastated the
economies of major world powers and their colonies, as well as many neutral nations. After
the First World War, governments were eager to avoid repeating the death and destruction. But
in the interwar period between 1919 and 1939, these efforts failed. The internationalism of
the League of Nations faltered in the face of extreme nationalist ideologies like fascism.
After 1945 and the end of the Second World War, governments once again looked for ways
to prevent conflict. The victorious powers created the United Nations and attempted to
succeed where the League of Nations had failed. Where does Jeanette Rankin fit into
this? After voting against American entry into the First World War, she lost
her congressional seat in the next election. But as fate would have it, she won another
term in Congress in the 1940 election, just as the United States was debating
whether it should enter the Second World War. In 1941, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor united
the nation and ended almost all opposition to war. But Rankin held firm in her belief that "There can
be no compromise with war; it cannot be reformed or controlled; cannot be disciplined into decency
or codified into common sense; for war is the slaughter of human beings, temporarily regarded
as enemies, on as large a scale as possible." This time she was the only member of congress
to vote against war. You can see her here, in a phone booth, taking shelter from
a mob of angry reporters after casting her vote. It ended her political career—as
she knew it would. She was widely condemned. However, many also praised Rankin—if not for her
vote, than for the courage of her convictions. Asked years later if she ever regretted her
decision, Rankin responded: "Never. If you're against war, you're against war regardless of what happens.
It's a wrong method of trying to settle a dispute." Congresswoman Rankin insisted that victory
in war is impossible. She claimed that, "You can no more win a war than win an earthquake." And
she protested war for the rest of her long life. But many people still see the Second World War
at least as a just war—one that the United States did not ask for, and one that pitted democracies
against authoritarian, and even murderous states. What do you think? Do you agree with Rankin?
Or are there conditions that justify war? The Allied powers were victorious
at the end of both wars. And they imposed their will on their defeated
foes. But did their victory bring peace? Did it stop future atrocities? You'll consider those
questions in this unit and the two that follow.