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German Americans As Well As Globe Nation Of War I

 Fears of High German American subversion surfaced many times inward the USA inward the twent High German Americans as well as World War I
German Americans as well as World War I

Fears of High German American subversion surfaced many times inward the USA inward the twentieth century. The publication of the Zimmerman telegram as well as the sinking of Lusitania, ii yet controversial events that contributed to the USA entering World War I, were non the entirely causes for U.S. warning inward the aspect upwards of growing High German aggression.

Beginning good earlier the nation’s entry into the state of war as well as lasting beyond the war’s end, many Americans shared a conspiracy-minded fearfulness of espionage as well as sabotage past times what Henry Landau 1 time called “the Enemy Within,” a contingent of High German Americans suspected of beingness to a greater extent than loyal to the Fatherland than to their novel homeland.

Posters as well as pamphlets produced past times the Committee on Public Information during the years of U.S. interest inward World War I clit High German armed services aggression equally an external threat, geographically distant but never completely removed from the North American continent.

 Fears of High German American subversion surfaced many times inward the USA inward the twent High German Americans as well as World War I Fears of High German American subversion surfaced many times inward the USA inward the twent High German Americans as well as World War I

In 1 such poster the High German soldier is a fell giant belongings a rifle as well as bayonet as well as stomping around a war-torn Europe; Europe as well as the rampaging Hun are separated from the Statue of Liberty, as well as the field it represents, past times entirely a sparse strip of water.

Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 minute poster presents the U.S. infantry marching off to bring together the battle equally the modern equivalent to medieval knights riding off to struggle inward a holy state of war against the infidel. World War I was hence regularly presented inward the USA equally a necessary as well as only state of war against an external threat.

However, in that location was besides an emerging feel of a threat from within, a fearfulness of espionage as well as sabotage that grew out of the large reveal of unassimilated, politically organized High German Americans living inward the USA inward the early on decades of the twentieth century. Many of these High German Americans continued to purpose their native natural language inward daily life as well as to define themselves as well as their communities against mainstream U.S. culture.

German American Culture

In the nineteenth century, a pluralistic Germanlanguage civilization had existed inward the United States; equally slow equally 1910, an estimated nine 1 grand m people inward the USA yet spoke High German equally their native tongue.

They formed the wide footing for readership of a large diverseness of German-language newspapers as well as publications as well as supplied membership for German-language clubs as well as parishes equally good equally the National German-American Alliance (1901–1918), an arrangement that actively opposed U.S. entry into World War I. These many speakers of High German were besides the strength behind attempts at offering High German equally a linguistic communication of instruction, or at to the lowest degree equally a unusual linguistic communication elective, inward populace schools.

Although past times 1910 the High German linguistic communication was already beingness displaced past times English linguistic communication amid the younger generation, World War I drew a abrupt cutoff trouble for High German linguistic communication didactics inward the entire country. In 1919, High German linguistic communication didactics was forbidden inward several states, including Indiana as well as Nebraska. In Nebraska v. Meyer, the Supreme Court conclusion inward 1923, this ban was overturned.

The activity of the origin one-half of Willa Cather’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel of 1922, One of Ours, is laid close the urban centre of Frankfort, Nebraska, as well as dramatizes the novel distrust toward High German Americans growing out of the tensions that peaked alongside the nation’s entry into war. In mass 3 of Cather’s novel, a accuse of disloyalty is brought against ii established High German immigrant farmers.

The show presented past times the neighbors against the ii men is “confused as well as most humorous,” yet the justice decides the instance against them as well as assigns a fine. In after sections of the novel, Cather continues to present her sympathy for High German Americans inward her depiction of ii older women persecuted past times their to a greater extent than thoroughly assimilated neighbors.

Suspected Acts of Sabotage

Even earlier the USA officially entered the war, in that location were suspicious fires as well as explosions at a reveal of U.S. plants as well as furnish terminals. In Jan 1915, as well as so 1 time to a greater extent than inward Nov of the same year, burn consumed the Roebling works life inward Trenton, New Jersey, where armaments as well as antisubmarine netting for the Allied powers were manufactured.

Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 laid of explosions, likewise attributed past times many to High German saboteurs, occurred inward early on Jan 1917 inward munitions plants inward Kingsland, New Jersey. The most spectacular of such explosions was the “Black Tom” incident of thirty July 1916.

More than 2 1 grand m pounds of munitions stored on Black Tom Island inward New York Harbor exploded; the explosion as well as the resulting burn caused enormous harm as well as killed 3 men as well as a child. These munitions were awaiting shipment to the Allies for purpose against Germany. The incident has hence been viewed past times many equally an human activity of sabotage past times High German agents.

With Congress’s proclamation of state of war against Federal Republic of Federal Republic of Germany on half-dozen Apr 1917 came stringent controls to forestall farther acts of sabotage. These included the issuing of ii “Alien Enemy Presidential Proclamations” as well as the establishing of internment camps for people of High German nascency residing inward the USA who had non completed the naturalization process.

Suspicions of an violet High German conspiracy bring largely faded from populace consciousness along alongside the to a greater extent than full general cultural retention of World War I, but related conspiracy theories—particularly those involving the Lusitania as well as the Zimmerman telegram—are yet inward circulation.

The Black Tom explosion is mayhap the exception, equally it has been the champaign of written report of several recent, highly speculative studies as well as has gained novel relevance alongside the September xi assault on the World Trade Center, which sent the USA scrambling anew to uncover networks of saboteurs as well as those who fund them.

Within ii weeks of the World Trade Center’s destruction, a invitee columnist at ABQjournal reminded his readers that September 11 may non bring been the origin fourth dimension the urban centre was bombed past times agents of a unusual power: “N.Y. Was Attacked past times Terrorists inward 1916.”

Treaty of San Francisco


The Treaty of San Francisco, signed on November 8, 1951, and implemented on April 28, 1952, restored full sovereignty to Japan after its unconditional surrender at the end of World War II and ended the U.S. occupation.

The negotiations over the treaty revealed differing notions of what had caused World War II and of what Japan’s role in the world should be. Engineered primarily by the United States, the treaty quickly became caught up in the cold war rivalries.

In March 1947 U.S. general Douglas MacArthur, who headed the Allied Occupation Authority in Japan, ignited a heated debate about the proper terms of Japan’s rehabilitation when he publicly stated his preference for a relatively short U.S. occupation, believing that Japan had been democratized and demilitarized and that a long occupation would only create resentment.

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This view was countered by those who pushed for massive reparations from Japan as well as its complete demilitarization. This group believed that the lax enforcement of the Versailles Treaty, which had ended World War I and established terms for the German reparations and demilitarization, had created the conditions for World War II.

A different assessment of the Versailles Treaty emerged among those who advocated a "soft" approach to the peace treaty. This group, which eventually included U.S. secretary of state Dean Acheson as well as MacArthur, argued that it was the harsh conditions of Versailles that had, by humiliating and isolating Germany, contributed to the rise of Nazism. This group also worried that the United States should be careful not to overextend its military presence in Japan.

The negotiations were complicated by cold war diplomacy. The United States worried about granting Soviet Russia and the newly established communist People’s Republic of China a significant role.

It also wanted to guarantee that Japan would become a U.S.- friendly bulwark against communism in East Asia. In particular, the U.S. military wanted to retain control over Japan for an extended period to guarantee access to its military bases in the area.

The United States eventually adopted a "piecemeal strategy" of granting Japan full sovereignty and disregarding the calls for a longer occupation. It met the concerns of the British Commonwealth of Nations with a U.S.-backed security network that would include Australia and New Zealand.

It satisfied the concerns of the Philippines with promises of aid and security. The United States also decided that neither the Chinese Communist nor the Chinese Nationalist governments would be invited to the treaty conference. This formula won significant bipartisan support in the United States.

The official treaty conference took place in San Francisco in 1951. Fifty-one nations were represented (India chose not to attend). The United States engineered the simpulan result, causing delegates from the Soviet Union, Poland, and Czechoslovakia to walk out. Eventually 48 nations signed the treaty.

The simpulan terms of the treaty reflected a victory for the pragmatists who had worried that overly harsh conditions would push Japan away from the West. Although it stripped Japan of all territory gained since 1895 and rejected the pardoning of war criminals, the treaty established immediate sovereignty for Japan and limited reparations it owed to its World War II victim nations. The United States–Japan Security Treaty, signed two hours after the peace treaty, guaranteed a U.S. military presence.

Not all Japanese were happy with the treaty. Many Japanese wanted to see the process of democratization and demilitarization continued. They were surprised by the number of bases the United States maintained in Japan as well as the ban on diplomatic relations and trade with communist China.

In retrospect, the relatively generous terms of the treaty reformed Japan as an important member of the Western camp during the cold war. Japan never again threatened the security interests of the West or of other East Asian nations.

United Nations

The United Nations, already six decades old, has traversed a long, strife-formed cold war. Not a superstate above the states, it collectively approaches issues of war, peace, development, and justice, and has sufficient transforming potentials to create a new, better world order.

Since the end of the cold war, it has acquired new dynamism, but at the same time it has to be restructured to cope with an emerging complex world of nation-states, various movements, and unforeseen challenges like terrorism.

The United Nations, founded in the aftermath of World War II, was established at the San Francisco Conference in 1945 on the principle of collective security. It was the successor to the League of Nations, which had been established after World War I but failed to organize world order on the principles of universality.

The United Nations, therefore, took care to avoid the mistakes of its predecessor, and five major powers were given special power and responsibility through the mechanism of "veto" power in the most important organ of the United Nations—the Security Council.

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The goals of the United Nations were enshrined in the Charter: to maintain international peace and security, to develop friendly relations among nations, to achieve international cooperation, and to work as a harmonizer among nations. Security was the principal goal of the United Nations.

Unlike in the league, however, security was not narrowly conceived in the United Nations but was broadened to include socioeconomic justice, human rights, and development. Like the league, the United Nations was based on the principles of collective security.

The new principle on which the league and the United Nations were based does not consider security as the individual affair of states or regions but as a collective affair of all states, and aggression against one state is considered aggression against all others. All states are obliged to take collective action against the aggressor.

From The League

The UN Charter provided for six major organs, four of which evolved out of the League of Nations. The General Assembly was based on the democratic principle of "one country, one vote", irrespective of size and power, and was essentially a deliberative organ.

The countries of the Third World used the body for organizing themselves and took up issues of colonialism and racialism. The Charter provided for some supervisory functions of the General Assembly. The council and assembly had joint functions as well.

The Security Council, the most important organ of the United Nations, reflected the reality of power. The United States, the Soviet Union, France, Great Britain, and China were the five permanent members with veto power and had special responsibility to maintain world peace and security.

However, veto became a mechanism of obstruction, and the Soviet Union frequently used it; while the United States did not use it in earlier years, the frequency of veto increased after 1970. The Security Council was based on the assumption that the major powers would agree on issues of war and peace, but the onset of the cold war around 1945 made the United Nations a helpless spectator.

The Charter provided for a mechanism of maintaining peace, whereby the council may call upon members states to apply sanctions against the aggressor and may form a Military Staff Committee consisting of the chief of staff of permanent members of the Security Council.

The enforcement of peace was possible in the Korean War, and a united command was formed under the United States. It placed an embargo on the export of strategic materials to China and North Korea. Subsequently the provision could not be replicated for a long time.

It was only after the closing stages of the cold war that the Security Council became effective again; consultations and coordination among the major powers in the council have been frequent, as in the Persian Gulf crisis and more recently over Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

For about five decades of the cold war, the United Nations never appeared to play the role envisaged at San Francisco in the realm of peace and security; it was bypassed in major flash points across the globe, such as the Panama Canal crisis, Hungary, the Berlin blockade, the Cuban missile crisis, Arab-Israeli conflicts, the India-China border war, Vietnam and Indochina, and the Sino-Soviet border war.

The United Nations was a passive bystander as major powers professed to settle scores outside the United Nations. When the United Nations was hamstrung due to the use of veto, the General Assembly sought a way out through the Uniting for Peace Resolution to consider measures in a situation of breach of peace.

After the end of the cold war, the United Nations became more active again, although in the process it acquired new functions, in line with but not envisaged in the Charter. During the turn of the 21st century this function, known as peacekeeping—traditionally denoting acting as a buffer between contending parties or monitoring ceasefire agreements—expanded to other areas.

Now peacekeeping also means the provision of humanitarian relief, removal of mines, repatriation of refugees, and reconstruction of national infrastructure in devasted areas, such as Afghanistan.

The costs of all of these functions have been enormous, especially in recent peacekeeping operations: South Africa, Rwanda, Iraq-Kuwait, Mozambique, Somalia, Haiti, and Liberia. Sometimes the United Nations has drawn flak; the UN troops have also been targeted, as in Somalia and Bosnia.

Cooperation

Unlike during the cold war years, however, the United Nations finds cooperation among major powers to repulse aggression. In the First Gulf War, Moscow supported U.S. efforts to impose sanctions against Iraq, which had annexed Kuwait.

The machinery of the United Nations was used. Other major powers contributed troops, particularly France and Britain. Japan and Germany too accepted new security roles.

Besides war and peace, the United Nations has been instrumental in various humanitarian efforts. A large amount of credit must go to the United Nations for ending apartheid in South Africa, improving life expectancy in Africa, helping children suffering from malnutrition, and fighting diseases. It has not been as successful in the removal of global poverty, but it has launched efforts in that direction.

Now the United Nations finds itself playing a new role against international terrorism. It has not been as successful, and the United States acted unilaterally in 1998 when al-Qaeda attacked U.S. embassies in East Africa.

Subsequently, following September 11, 2001, the United States took drastic steps, and the United Nations was more involved than before; terrorism became a key issue of international and United Nations concern.

The United Nations has been moving into new, uncharted areas. In a world where millions of children die days after they are born, the issue of human rights has become a major arena of international attention.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948, has been enshrined in constitutions of states. Now the United Nations has also been a force in expanding the frontiers of democracy worldwide, believing that democracy fosters world peace.

While the United Nations is engaged in redefining issues of war, peace, development, and freedom, reforming the world body has become a burning issue since the end of the cold war, and more particularly since 1998, when 185 states met to celebrate 50 years of the United Nations.

There is also demand to restructure the Security Council and to add new permanent members—with or without veto power. Brazil, Germany, India, Japan, and some African countries are key candidates demanding permanent places on the Security Council.

The major powers with vetos—the United States, Russia, China, Britain, and France—themselves differ about who should be permanent members in a reformed council. Reforms are, however, necessary to make the United Nations more in tune with the changes of the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century.

Zimmermann Telegram

 the the States was nonetheless officially neutral inwards Europe Zimmermann Telegram
Zimmermann Telegram

In the wintertime of 1916–1917 the the States was nonetheless officially neutral inwards Europe’s Great War, exactly the province of affairs was changing. The High German unusual minister, Arthur Zimmermann, sent a telegram effectively proposing an alliance alongside United Mexican States inwards representative the the States entered World War I.

The turning over of the Zimmermann telegram to the U.S. regime past times the British regime inwards Feb dramatically changed the course of education of World War I. The telegram would hold upwards 1 of the final factors leading the the States to move inwards the war.

Since its expose to the U.S. regime the document has on occasion been the acre of report of questions equally to how it came into the British government’s possession, as well as why officials took so long afterward receiving it to plough it over to the United States. The pop suspicion is that the Zimmermann telegram was deliberately forged, as well as was business office of a conspiracy to strength the the States to move inwards the war.

 the the States was nonetheless officially neutral inwards Europe Zimmermann Telegram the the States was nonetheless officially neutral inwards Europe Zimmermann Telegram

Barbara Tuchman seat out what has conk the traditional interpretation inwards her mass on the subject. High German concerns over the powerfulness to hold the neutral condition of the the States as well as a belief that Great Britain would hold upwards forced out of the state of war speedily if restrictions were lifted on its submarine commanders’ powerfulness to sink ships led the High German regal regime to produce upwards one's heed to accept a gamble. It chose to provide to unrestricted submarine warfare from 1 Feb 1917, fifty-fifty though it mightiness convey the the States into the war.

In corporation to bargain alongside the potential U.S. involvement inwards the state of war the High German regime convinced itself that potential High German allies to the due south as well as due west could divert U.S. attending from the continent. The consider would hold upwards to convince Mexico, as well as hopefully Japan, to conk to state of war alongside the the States as well as conk along it occupied inwards its ain backyard.

The history of U.S.–Mexican relations at the fourth dimension gave the Germans ground to hope. In 1836 Texas gained its independence from United Mexican States as well as was as well as so annexed past times the the States inwards 1845.

Then inwards 1848 the the States gained possession of California as well as the western the States due south of Oregon as well as due west of Texas afterward defeating United Mexican States inwards the Mexican American War (1846–1848). More lately the the States had sent troops into United Mexican States inwards 1914 to occupy Vera Cruz as well as and so 1 time to a greater extent than inwards 1916 to bargain alongside bandits.

The High German unusual minister, Arthur Zimmermann, sent a telegram on xvi Jan 1917 to the High German ambassador to the the States for forwarding to the High German ambassador inwards Mexico.

It explained the High German position; although the message espoused a High German want to hold U.S. neutrality during the Great War, if this failed it proposed equally an option that United Mexican States seat on the the States alongside High German assistance.

In telephone substitution for Mexican cooperation they would have High German fiscal assistance as well as the provide of territories of the American southwest that had been lost: “Mexico is to re-conquer the lost territory inwards Texas, New Mexico, as well as Arizona” (Tuchman, 146).

The telegram was intercepted past times the British as well as decoded over the side past times side few weeks. When the document was finished the British had a tool to purpose to convince the the States of its ask to move inwards the war, exactly they get-go had to enshroud the bear witness of how they came into possession of the document, causing a delay inwards its transmission to the U.S. government.

The British ask for safety of their code-breaking operations led to a want to detect a mo source; that root was a re-create of the telegram sent from Washington to Mexico, which contained subtle exactly pregnant differences from the 1 to Washington the British were already working on.

On 24 Feb Walter Page, the U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom, telegraphed the contents of the telegram to Washington. He also sent along an explanation of the British delay inwards turning over the data to the United States, namely their want to protect their sources (Hendrick, 334).

The document became world on 1 March, afterward which a world uproar ensued alongside unopen to Americans claiming the document was a fraud. They were convinced that the Allies, as well as peculiarly the British government, lied to the the States inwards corporation to convince the Americans to back upwards them during the Great War.

This was a reply to a traditional U.S. trouble almost the British dating dorsum to the American Revolution, an consider that would afterward World War I hold upwards replaced past times the “special relationship.” The pop suspicion was that the telegram was non sent past times the Germans exactly was the creation of British word who used it to convince Americans of the immediate High German threat to the United States.

This theory withered away speedily on two March when Zimmermann admitted having sent the telegram. Even alongside this, America’s entrance into the state of war was non immediate, equally Wilson did non enquire Congress for a annunciation of state of war against FRG until two Apr as well as it was non passed past times Congress until vi April.

More lately it has been proposed that the Zimmermann telegram as well as the Balfour annunciation were tied together. In a alphabetic quality of two Nov 1917 British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour stated the government’s back upwards for the institution of a “national domicile for the Jewish people” inwards Palestine; this has since come upwards to hold upwards known equally the Balfour declaration. John Cornelius has argued that the annunciation was the toll for the un-encoded text of the Zimmermann telegram.

He argued that it was unlikely that the British were capable of breaking the High German diplomatic code (or else the Germans would non take away hold used it), as well as thence the data almost the contents must take away hold come upwards from unopen to other source. He argued that Zionists inwards FRG worked alongside Zionists inwards Great Britain to brand a bargain inwards which the British would larn the text of the telegram inwards telephone substitution for the acknowledgment of their rights inwards Palestine.

This theory assumes that since the Germans used a code they believed unbroken, it must take away hold been unbroken, as well as thence the British needed assist from High German Zionists to larn the contents of the telegram. British success inwards breaking the High German Enigma code inwards World War II suggests the weakness of this logic. It is also based on a timetable of events that though interwoven, does non demonstrate whatever instantly connector betwixt the actions.

The ultimate acquit on of the Zimmermann telegram is unknown. As Tuchman noted, it was probable that at unopen to betoken FRG would force the the States into the war. And piece the theory of a human relationship betwixt the Zimmermann telegram as well as the Balfour annunciation is potentially interesting for its acquit on inwards the Middle East, the theory does non respond equally many of the questions almost either document equally the proponents believe.

Japanese Americans

 The Japanese American population became the target of a paranoid displace inwards the United southward Japanese Americans
Japanese Americans

The Japanese American population became the target of a paranoid displace inwards the USA after the surprise Japanese laid on on Pearl Harbor on seven Dec 1941. Thousands of West-Coast Japanese Americans were incarcerated inwards concentration camps inwards 1942.

While white America believed these Japanese Americans were potential saboteurs too a “fifth column” inside the United States, the belief inwards a Japanese “conspiracy” was non a novel phenomenon—it built on a lengthy history of suspicion too racism toward Japanese Americans since their arrival inwards the USA inwards the belatedly nineteenth century.

Japanese began arriving inwards the United States, principally on the West Coast, from the 1880s too were rapidly confronted past times racist opposition. Labor too trade unions inwards item led the way, seeking to forestall Japanese settling too working inwards the United States.

 The Japanese American population became the target of a paranoid displace inwards the United southward Japanese Americans The Japanese American population became the target of a paranoid displace inwards the United southward Japanese Americans

Such attitudes emerged from a history of anti-Chinese sentiment; the Japanese were likewise disadvantaged due to laws that prevented them from becoming citizens (only “white” immigrants could teach citizens, dating dorsum to a 1770 law). Only the second generation (known equally Nisei), those born inwards the United States, could last citizens.

In the early on twentieth century the newspapers of William Randolph Hearst, along amongst a let on of anti-Japanese organizations, joined inwards the anti-Japanese crusade, trumpeting the “Yellow Peril.” They predicted that the Japanese would “crowd out the white race” on the West Coast.

The Japanese victory over Russia inwards the Russo-Japanese War made Nihon appear a threatening Pacific power. Further, diverse Japanese American community organizations were viewed equally sinister, too were fifty-fifty sometimes perceived equally purpose of an eventual plot to bring over the United States.

Such paranoia had existent results inwards pressuring politicians to bring stronger measures against the Japanese. An alien Earth law enacted inwards California inwards 1913 was a response to agitation that Japanese were taking over farmland too crowding out white farmers.

It was inwards practise largely ineffective, too so led to increased, rather than diminished, tensions too fears of Japanese conspiracies. The Immigration Act of 1924 hitting the Japanese especially strongly, reducing the let on of immigrants to a negligible number.

Thus, when Pearl Harbor was attacked, revealing the vulnerability of the USA too pitching it into a tearing Pacific war, in that location was already an atmosphere of mistrust too paranoia toward Japanese Americans that was arrive at to last heightened to hysteria.

There was likewise a history of racist authorities policies that, when added to the “exigencies of war” past times which too so much has frequently been justified, made the violation of commutation civil liberties acceptable. In the days next Pearl Harbor, “enemy aliens” became the target of federal too Earth authorities security measures.

The 8 Dec 1941 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle recorded the get-go roundup of “suspicious characters” too noted that the San Francisco police pull were mobilized to come across the threat of “sabotage.”

Despite protestations of loyalty from the Japanese American community, belief that they were all potential saboteurs, spies, too 5th columnists arrive at to aid a Japanese laid on on mainland America was pervasive.

By Feb 1942, many areas were barred to enemy aliens, which, the San Francisco Chronicle argued, would guard against “sabotage too other 5th column activities”; on iii Feb the paper likewise quoted California Attorney General Earl Warren, who declared “every alien Japanese should last considered inwards the calorie-free of a potential 5th columnist.”

Newspapers fomented this anti-Japanese hysteria, too along amongst a armed forces neat to utilization strong internal security measures too politicians acutely aware of the ask to response to the demands of their constituents, it was peradventure inevitable that simply about activity would last taken.

Military leaders spoke of the threat of the “fifth column”; they were likewise neat to apportion at to the lowest degree purpose of the blame for the disaster of Pearl Harbor on a Hawaiian–Japanese American 5th column.

At the same time, people similar Walter Lippmann, 1 of America’s almost respected journalists too social commentators, talked of the imminent danger of laid on from both without too inside the West Coast.

Lieutenant General John L. DeWitt, caput of the Western Defense Command, sanctioned bulk searches of Japanese homes, too a system past times which Japanese Americans were forced to register too were prevented from traveling. Slowly rights were stripped from Japanese Americans.

On xiii February, a Pacific Coast congressional delegation sent President Franklin D. Roosevelt a unanimous recommendation urging “immediate evacuation of all persons of Japanese lineage,” too half-dozen days later on Roosevelt signed Exceutive Order 9066 past times which over 120,000 people, a bulk of whom were U.S. citizens, were pose into concentration camps.

There were legal appeals disceptation the unconstitutionality of these actions but petty was done. Over the remaining years of World War II, simply about groups were released too resettled inwards the East too Midwest; others were pressured to renounce their citizenship too simply about of these, along amongst simply about noncitizens, were repatriated to Japan.

The state of war years saw the culmination of a deepseated racist mistrust of Japanese Americans; the years next the state of war saw movements to terminate legal discrimination against Asian Americans, including the Japanese.

But recognition of what was done inwards World War II was slow. Ultimately, inwards Feb 1976, Gerald Ford signed Proclamation 4417, formally recognizing the events of the state of war years equally a “national mistake.”

In the 1980s, a Commission on the Wartime Relocation too Internment of Civilians reported on the events too opened the agency for redress, financial too otherwise, for the survivors.

The handling of Japanese Americans from their arrival inwards the USA until the terminate of World War II reveals how racial paranoia too fearfulness toward an ethnic grouping tin last exaggerated into a belief inwards conspiracies to undermine republic too threaten safety, too given the correct circumstances tin teach a footing for unjust actions too a threat to the really republic inwards whose bring upward these actions are invoked.

Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988)

The Algiers Treaty of March 6, 1975, signed by Iran’s Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and then vice president of Iraq Saddam Hussein, was intended to solve long-standing border and waterway disputes between the two neighboring countries.
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Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988)

However, with the overthrow of the shah in 1979, which put Iran in the hands of Islamic fundamentalists, the political dynamics changed. By 1980 Iran’s new leaders started to hint that they did not feel obligated by the shah’s earlier commitments, and Iraqi leaders were complaining that Iran still had not returned certain border areas promised under the 1975 treaty.

In September 1980 Iraqi armed forces moved to reclaim those lands, and on September 22 they crossed the border into Iran. The invasion had consequences that Iraqi president Hussein had not expected.


In launching the attack on Iran, Hussein thought the war would be brief and would lead to the downfall of Iran’s religious leader, the Ayatollah Khomeini, whom Hussein disliked. Instead, the power of Khomeini and other Islamic revolutionaries increased as Iranians united and rallied to support the war.

Few had expected Iraq to win the war outright. Although Iraq had better technology, more weapons, and a stronger air force, Iran had three times the population and about four times the geographic area of Iraq. Thus the Iran-Iraq War seesawed back and forth for eight grueling years.

Some methods of World War I were employed; Iran, for example, often conducted useless infantry attacks, using “human assault waves” made up in part by young, untrained conscripts, as in the Kerbala offensives, which were repulsed by the superior air- and firepower of the Iraqis.

Iraq, concerned with the war’s trench warfare and stalemate, had its overtures for a peace agreement undercut when its reputation was tainted by United Nations reports that it had used deadly (and illegal) chemical weapons against Iranian troops in 1984.

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Military volunteer of Iran army

Although both Iran and Iraq attacked each other’s oil-tanker shipping in the Persian Gulf, Iran’s attacks on Kuwait’s and other gulf states’ tankers caused the United States and several Western European nations to station battleships in the gulf to protect those tankers.

This in turn led, on July 3, 1988, to the accidental shooting down of an Iranian civil airliner by the U.S. cruiser Vincennes, which killed all 290 crew members and passengers aboard.

As many as 1 million people died in the Iran-Iraq War, approximately 1.7 million were wounded, about 1.5 million were forced to flee as refugees, and major cities were destroyed on both sides. The oil industries of both countries also suffered extensive damage due to the fighting; oil exports, and earnings from those exports, naturally dropped.

More important, the large oil reserves of Iran and Iraq represented the potential for significant international economic power, but both nations had together largely wasted $400 billion on the war and along with that the chance to build up their societies.

The effects of the war clearly reached beyond the two combatants. Iran’s need for additional weapons led to a compromising relationship for the administration of U.S. president Ronald Reagan in 1985. In the secret Iran-contra affair, Iran was able to obtain weapons from the United States (the country that Khomeini had called “the great Satan”) in exchange for the release of hostages in Lebanon.

At about the same time U.S. aid of all types began to appear in Iraq, whereas the Soviet Union supplied about two-thirds of Iraq’s weapons. The Iran-Iraq War also ended Khomeini’s attempts to spread his fundamentalist Islamic revolution abroad.

Although stymied in his ambitions to make Iraq the leading power in the Persian Gulf (and the Arab world), Iraqi president Hussein learned new fighting strategies that he would later use against another neighboring country, Kuwait, which had been his ally during the conflict.

By the time a cease-fire finally arrived on August 20, 1988, the Iran-Iraq War had been the longest and most destructive conflict in the post–World War II era, and none of the basic friction points between Iran and Iraq had been settled.

However, in August–September 1990, while Iraq was busy with its invasion of Kuwait, Iraq and Iran quietly restored diplomatic relations, and Iraq agreed to Iranian terms for the settlement of the war: the removal of Iraqi troops from Iranian territory, division of sovereignty over the Shatt al Arab waterway, and an exchange of prisoners of war.

Council On Unusual Relations

 is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations
Council on Foreign Relations

Founded at the closed of World War I, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy. Ever since 1952, when Emmanuel Josephson’s John Birch Society (JBS) inwards particular—have viewed the CFR equally a conspiratorial cabal amongst designs on global power.

Although the autumn of the Iron Curtain is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations necessitated alteration to the theory of a CFR-Communist conspiracy, the JBS silent argues that the Council is genuinely a grouping of “establishment Insiders” intent on creating a socialist “One World Government.”

CFR members are good positioned for this coup, equally they tin live on found inwards the highest positions of the authorities (Henry Kissinger, George Bush, together with Bill Clinton); finance (the Rockefellers together with innumerable New York bankers); the legal Blue Planet (Supreme Court Justices O’Connor, Ginsburg, together with Breyer); together with the media (editors of the New York Times together with network tidings anchors); non to cite inwards other clandestine cabals such equally the Trilateral Commission together with the Bohemian Grove group is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations.

 is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations

According to the conspiracy theorists, contemporary political developments such equally the liberalization of global merchandise (e.g., NAFTA, GATT) together with the ascension of the United Nations are the outset steps toward the CFR’s ultimate goals: the halt of national sovereignty together with the enslavement of the entire Blue Planet nether the banner of their centralized, all-powerful “world government.” In this “New World Order,” U.S. armed forces forces volition live on employed equally oppressive agents of the global supergovernment—UN “peace-keeping” missions are simply the tip of this iceberg.

To live on fair, at that spot are a non bad many “charges” that members of the CFR would non assist to dispute, but the Council’s outlook on the New World Order is radically dissimilar from that of the JBS because of the historical context out of which the whole thought developed.

When the CFR was founded inwards 1919, Woodrow Wilson’s bespeak for a utopian international community constituted the starting betoken for many CFR members’ views on U.S. unusual policy. If World War I was to live on the “war to halt all wars,” it was essential to arrive at a novel international community that could repose the tensions betwixt nationstates earlier serious conflicts erupted.

What was needed, argued the Wilsonians, was less jingoistic nationalism together with to a greater extent than international cooperation; a displace toward creating “One World” from the divided, fractured Blue Planet of 1919 (and, indeed, since this was prior to the rabid anticommunism of the mutual coldness war, or then members thought inwards price of a “socialist” Blue Planet order, which was to locomote immensely unpopular 3 decades on).

Of course, for a multifariousness of reasons, lack of amount U.S. participation beingness one, the League of Nations never fulfilled this role, together with within a decade Europe was speedily descending into or then other era of bloodshed. The Council’s investigations into the causes of World War II exclusively reinforced the Wilsonian ideals of many members. The sectionalization of the world’s non bad powers combined amongst rampant nationalism had produced the preconditions for fascism, genocide, together with the almost amount devastation of Europe.

 is an influential organization devoted to the report of unusual policy Council on Foreign Relations
Council on Foreign Relations

Supporters of the CFR today would debate that the Council’s advocacy for a New World Order must live on understood inwards this context, together with that the displace toward international cooperation nether the aegis of the United Nations heralds an era of increasing peace together with prosperity rather than an Orwellian nightmare.

“Mainstream” critics together with historians of the CFR similar Robert Schulzinger (who genuinely suggests that much of the Council’s locomote is cliché-ridden together with ineffectual) debate that the Council’s ideas simply mirror the transformations brought on past times globalization, together with that to read the similarity betwixt the CFR’s ideas together with global developments equally involving a causal link is simply a mistake.

Thus, equally far equally the New World Order goes, it seems equally though ane man’s secular utopia is or then other man’s apocalypse; the sectionalization betwixt the 2 perspectives is completely unbridgeable, together with the apocalyptic side of the split is inevitably dismissed past times mainstream civilization equally “extreme.”

The accuse of elitism, however—the claim that the CFR is a network of “insiders” that shape an allpowerful East Coast “establishment”—is less easily dispelled, since the CFR is quite self-consciously elitist. The CFR argues that international relations should live on studied past times serious, dispassionate minds costless from the taint of impurities such equally nationalism.

At the outset of the mutual coldness war, for instance, George Kennan published his forthwith infamous “X” article inwards the CFR’s journal, Foreign Affairs, together with raised then much world hysteria surrounding the Soviet menace that the Council began to fearfulness that the number of U.S-Soviet relations would live on hijacked past times demagogues (and, inwards stance of what loomed on the horizon inwards McCarthyism, perchance this fearfulness was non misplaced). If the CFR is “secretive,” debate its proponents, it is because sometimes heightened world consciousness genuinely plant against the proper ends of international politics.

Even mainstream academics, however—people who would themselves no uncertainty live on designated “insiders” past times the JBS—might good debate that spell the CFR’s tillage of its status equally an elite organization may non accurately live on termed conspiratorial, it is non at all clear that it represents a positive evolution inwards U.S. political culture.

Marshal Tito (Josip Broz)

Josip Broz was born on May 7, 1892, and died on May 4, 1980. His life was caught up in some of the most momentous events of the 20th century. He fought in World War I, took part in the Russian Revolution, became a leader of guerrilla resistance to the German occupation of Yugoslavia, and after World War II until his death he was the leader of the country.

During this period, he defied Joseph Stalin over the communist consolidation of power in Yugoslavia. "Tito" was a pseudonym that he adopted during his underground activities, and it was with this name that he became well known during World War II.

Tito was born in the village of Kumroves, some 50 kilometers northwest of Zagreb in what was then Austria-Hungary. His native village is located in the valley of the river Sutla, which served as a boundary between Croatia and Slovenia. Tito’s father was a Croatian peasant, and his mother was Slovenian from a village across the river.

In 1907, at the age of 15, he left home and went to the town of Sisak (Croatia), where he became an apprentice to a locksmith. Tito completed his apprenticeship in 1910 and began a series of mechanic jobs, which took him to factories across central Europe.

HisHis

In the autumn of 1913 Tito was called up for his military service, which he did with the 25th Croatian Territorial Infantry Regiment based in Zagreb. When Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia in July 1914, Tito, already a sergeant, was sent to fight on the Serbian front.

In January 1915 his regiment was transferred to Galicia in anticipation of a Russian offensive. There Tito was put in charge of a reconnoitering section operating behind enemy lines. However, during a Russian attack in April 1915, he was seriously wounded and taken as a prisoner of war (POW).

It was during this time that Tito began sympathizing with the ideas of Bolshevism. In June 1917 he escaped from the POW camp and made his way to Petrograd in search of work, but the suppression of Bolshevik demonstrations forced him to flee to Finland.

While attempting to cross the border he was captured and sent back to the POW camp, but he escaped on the way and arrived in Bolshevik-controlled Omsk in Siberia in autumn 1917. He enrolled in the Red Guard and applied for membership in the Communist Party.

His
Marshal Tito and Winston Churchill in 1944 in Naples, Italy

When the Bolsheviks retook Omsk in 1919, he started making his way back to Croatia. Tito returned to Kumrovec in October 1920, where he found that his village had become part of the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (changed to Yugoslavia in 1929).

Upon his return he joined the newly founded Communist Party in Zagreb and became active in the union movement. During the 1920s he worked as a mechanic in factories across Yugoslavia. In 1927 he became secretary of the Metalworkers’ Union of Croatia.

His activities brought him to the attention of the police, and in August 1928 he was arrested. Upon his release from prison in 1934 Tito resumed full-time clandestine activities for the Yugoslav Communist Party.

In February 1935 he was sent to Moscow for training with the Balkan Department of the Comintern. He stayed there until September 1936, when he was sent back to consolidate the Yugoslav party and recruit volunteers to fight in the Spanish civil war.

During 1937 the factionalism within the Yugoslav Communist Party increased, and in the atmosphere of uncertainty Tito asserted his authority by setting up an interim secretariat under his leadership. Moscow offered him provisional approval in the beginning of 1939, and Tito was officially confirmed as a secretary at a party congress in October 1940.

In April of 1941 the Axis powers invaded, occupied, and partitioned Yugoslavia, which triggered a civil war in the country. Tito formed the Partisan Army of National Liberation, which waged guerrilla war against the occupying forces. In the process Tito’s partisans also turned against rival guerrilla organizations, in particular the internationally recognized "Chetniks" of Draža Mihailovic´.

Tito and his partisans emerged victorious from the war, and, despite his promises to form a government of national unity, he immediately began consolidating his authority and establishing communist rule over the territory of Yugoslavia.

At the same time Tito was entertaining ideas of leading a Balkan federation involving Albania, Bulgaria, and potentially Greece. The prospect of a regional federation under Tito’s leadership seemed likely during 1947 and brought Tito into a direct confrontation with Stalin.

In 1948 the Yugoslav Communist Party was excluded from the Cominform (the postwar name for the Comintern), and this turned Tito into the first communist leader to break with the Soviet Union. This gave him both new international prominence and domestic appeal, which helped him consolidate his position in Yugoslavia.

In domestic affairs Tito promoted the principles of brotherhood and workers’ self-management (a form of market-oriented socialism), in parallel with his ongoing suppression of internal dissent.

His death in 1980 was a shock for the country, and the seeming stability of Yugoslavia began to crack under the strains of national factionalism. Many commentators trace the origins of the 1990s Yugoslav dissolution to Tito’s authoritarian rule.

Marshal Tito (Josip Broz)

Josip Broz was born on May 7, 1892, and died on May 4, 1980. His life was caught up in some of the most momentous events of the 20th century. He fought in World War I, took part in the Russian Revolution, became a leader of guerrilla resistance to the German occupation of Yugoslavia, and after World War II until his death he was the leader of the country.

During this period, he defied Joseph Stalin over the communist consolidation of power in Yugoslavia. "Tito" was a pseudonym that he adopted during his underground activities, and it was with this name that he became well known during World War II.

Tito was born in the village of Kumroves, some 50 kilometers northwest of Zagreb in what was then Austria-Hungary. His native village is located in the valley of the river Sutla, which served as a boundary between Croatia and Slovenia. Tito’s father was a Croatian peasant, and his mother was Slovenian from a village across the river.

In 1907, at the age of 15, he left home and went to the town of Sisak (Croatia), where he became an apprentice to a locksmith. Tito completed his apprenticeship in 1910 and began a series of mechanic jobs, which took him to factories across central Europe.

In the autumn of 1913 Tito was called up for his military service, which he did with the 25th Croatian Territorial Infantry Regiment based in Zagreb. When Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia in July 1914, Tito, already a sergeant, was sent to fight on the Serbian front.

In January 1915 his regiment was transferred to Galicia in anticipation of a Russian offensive. There Tito was put in charge of a reconnoitering section operating behind enemy lines. However, during a Russian attack in April 1915, he was seriously wounded and taken as a prisoner of war (POW).

It was during this time that Tito began sympathizing with the ideas of Bolshevism. In June 1917 he escaped from the POW camp and made his way to Petrograd in search of work, but the suppression of Bolshevik demonstrations forced him to flee to Finland.

While attempting to cross the border he was captured and sent back to the POW camp, but he escaped on the way and arrived in Bolshevik-controlled Omsk in Siberia in autumn 1917. He enrolled in the Red Guard and applied for membership in the Communist Party.

His
Marshal Tito and Winston Churchill in 1944 in Naples, Italy

When the Bolsheviks retook Omsk in 1919, he started making his way back to Croatia. Tito returned to Kumrovec in October 1920, where he found that his village had become part of the new Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (changed to Yugoslavia in 1929).

Upon his return he joined the newly founded Communist Party in Zagreb and became active in the union movement. During the 1920s he worked as a mechanic in factories across Yugoslavia. In 1927 he became secretary of the Metalworkers’ Union of Croatia.

His activities brought him to the attention of the police, and in August 1928 he was arrested. Upon his release from prison in 1934 Tito resumed full-time clandestine activities for the Yugoslav Communist Party.

In February 1935 he was sent to Moscow for training with the Balkan Department of the Comintern. He stayed there until September 1936, when he was sent back to consolidate the Yugoslav party and recruit volunteers to fight in the Spanish civil war.

During 1937 the factionalism within the Yugoslav Communist Party increased, and in the atmosphere of uncertainty Tito asserted his authority by setting up an interim secretariat under his leadership. Moscow offered him provisional approval in the beginning of 1939, and Tito was officially confirmed as a secretary at a party congress in October 1940.

In April of 1941 the Axis powers invaded, occupied, and partitioned Yugoslavia, which triggered a civil war in the country. Tito formed the Partisan Army of National Liberation, which waged guerrilla war against the occupying forces. In the process Tito’s partisans also turned against rival guerrilla organizations, in particular the internationally recognized "Chetniks" of Draža Mihailovic´.

Tito and his partisans emerged victorious from the war, and, despite his promises to form a government of national unity, he immediately began consolidating his authority and establishing communist rule over the territory of Yugoslavia.

At the same time Tito was entertaining ideas of leading a Balkan federation involving Albania, Bulgaria, and potentially Greece. The prospect of a regional federation under Tito’s leadership seemed likely during 1947 and brought Tito into a direct confrontation with Stalin.

In 1948 the Yugoslav Communist Party was excluded from the Cominform (the postwar name for the Comintern), and this turned Tito into the first communist leader to break with the Soviet Union. This gave him both new international prominence and domestic appeal, which helped him consolidate his position in Yugoslavia.

In domestic affairs Tito promoted the principles of brotherhood and workers’ self-management (a form of market-oriented socialism), in parallel with his ongoing suppression of internal dissent.

His death in 1980 was a shock for the country, and the seeming stability of Yugoslavia began to crack under the strains of national factionalism. Many commentators trace the origins of the 1990s Yugoslav dissolution to Tito’s authoritarian rule.

Spain

Post–World War II Spain was still affected strongly by the results of the Spanish civil war of 1936–39. Francisco Franco’s authoritarian regime continued to censor the press and did not abide by a constitution.

After the defeat of fascist governments in World War II, Franco did mitigate some fascist tendencies within his government, stressing instead the Roman Catholic Church, the monarchy, and society as the corporatist pillars of Spain, but not enough to prevent economic isolation by other international actors.

However, at the same time industrialization and economic development contributed to a contrary force of secularization. The corporatism of the state thus began to depend more and more on Franco.

Spain’s colonial influence would not succeed Franco, either. The Spanish ended their rule over Spanish Morocco in 1956, and over the rest of their African colonies over the next two decades. In 1968 Spanish Guinea gained independence and renamed itself Equatorial Guinea.

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Right before Franco died, Morocco’s King Hassan II took advantage of Spain’s weakness and took over Spain’s only remaining colony—Western Sahara—in the Green March. However, despite these colonial losses, Franco did pass on to his successor, King Juan Carlos, the beginnings of an economic and political liberalization that would reap the "Spanish Miracle".

Indeed, the hierarchical nature of the state did not persist after Franco’s death in 1975. Juan Carlos appointed Prime Minister Adolfo Suárez to rush in an kala of democratization through legislation sometimes referred to as the "new Bourbon restoration". Suárez was elected in 1977 under the Unión de Centro Democrático party.

After the elections, the Spanish constitution was drafted in 1978 by a committee made up of the deputies of most of the main political groups. It was signed by the king in 1979. Suárez’s power weakened, however, and he resigned as president and party leader on January 29, 1981.

Finding a successor was difficult in what became a very tense political and economic climate due to economic struggle, difficulty creating a new territorial organization of Spain, Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (or ETA, a Basque separatist organization) terrorist attacks, and the army’s lukewarm support of democratic institutions.

In this political atmosphere, democratic governance in Spain was tested by a 1981 coup that was called 23-F and El Tejerazo. Antonio Tejero, with 200 armed officers from the Guardia Civil, stormed the Spanish Congress of Deputies as it was electing Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo the new Spanish president.

Tejero and the officers held the cabinet and parliament hostage. No one was harmed and the coup ended largely because the king called upon the army to abide by the orders of the democratically elected civilian authorities.

Social democratic rule began in 1982 with Felipe González’s Socialist Party winning the elections. Spain’s democratic rule was fairly stable from that point until 1996. Domestic reforms under González’s administration included the legalization of abortion, education reforms, and increased personal freedoms.

Also during this era, Spain made many advances in integrating back into the international economic and political community. It joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Economic Community in 1986. With integration came some important changes for the Spanish economy.

Technological and industrial investment in the country increased, despite its persistently high unemployment rate. Ironically, although Spain was able to make progress in international integration, it still suffered from regional separatism and regional groups seeking autonomy from Spain.

In 1996 González was defeated, in part due to government corruption, and José María Aznar’s Popular Party (PP) took over. During the PP’s term, Spain’s economy benefited from high domestic demand and export-led growth.

It continued down the path of European integration, joining the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and adopting the euro in 1999. Yet again Spain suffered from internal divisions. ETA attacked tourists and Spanish officials again in 1999. Nevertheless, the PP won the 2000 elections.

The attacks continued. In 2001 army Lieutenant Colonel Pedro Antonio Blanco García was assassinated. An enormous street demonstration of over 1 million Spaniards protesting the assassination occurred the next day. Unfortunately, the killings continued.

After some ETA members were killed in a car bomb that August, the ETA retaliated with a series of the bloodiest attacks since 1992, which included the assassination of Supreme Court justice José Francisco Querol Lombardero, his driver, bodyguard, and a bystander, and injuries to 60 others.


In 2003 Aznar supported the U.S. "War on Terror" in the Iraq War, possibly resulting in the March 11, 2004, train bombings in Madrid. Nearly 200 people were killed and over 1,500 injured. Although the government blamed ETA, al-Qaeda operatives carried out the attacks.

In the elections that followed, the PP lost to the Socialist Party. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero took over as prime minister. Aznar, however, had decided not to run, despite not being barred from running for a third term.

Zapatero immediately withdrew Spanish troops from Iraq. Under his administration, Spain approved a same-sex marriage law with the support of a majority of the population. In contrast to Aznar, Zapatero’s relations with the United States were strained. However, he maintained good relations with the United Nations and the European Union.

Portugal

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Portugal flag

Portugal has been a land of paradoxes. For much of the 20th century, it was simultaneously a weak, agrarian, poverty-stricken, isolated state on the periphery of Europe and the seat of a vast colonial empire. It had used an alliance with Britain to sustain this paradox for a long time.

Portugal relied on Britain to keep Spain at bay and to secure its claim to its colonial holdings. In return, the Royal Navy enjoyed access to a far-flung network of colonial ports to be used as coaling stations.

Modern nationalism in Portugal dates from the popular reaction to the British ultimatum of 1890, which foiled a Portuguese scheme to connect Angola and Mozambique by seizing the intervening territory.

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For half of the 20th century, the country was governed by Western Europe’s most enduring authoritarian regime. Then, in 1974–76, it became the only North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) country to experience a full-fledged social revolution. After approaching the precipice of civil war, Portuguese society backed down and built a working democracy.

Portugal overthrew its monarchy in 1910. The country established a new constitution the following year and became Europe’s third republic, after Switzerland and France. There were several coups over a 16-year period. In reaction to labor unrest in the early 1920s, extra-parliamentary right-wing organizations arose. These groups lent their support to a bloodless military coup in 1926.

Two years later, in the wake of financial crisis, the military regime brought an economics professor out of the obscurity of the University of Coimbra and named him minister of finance.

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António de Oliveira Salazar

António de Oliveira Salazar had a limited set of priorities in that office: to generate a budget surplus and to stockpile gold. He proved to be quite effective at what he set out to do. He quickly overshadowed a succession of military prime ministers and won supporters among officers, clergy, businessmen, bankers, and landowners.

The New State

The military regime was a little more stable than its predecessor. Salazar, whose star was already rising within the regime, founded a new party in 1930, the National Union (União Nacional), to unify the regime’s supporters. In 1932, as the Great Depression advanced, he was appointed prime minister, a position he would hold for the next 36 years.

Salazar promulgated a new constitution in 1933, establishing the New State (Estado Novo). The National Assembly, consisting of the Chamber of Deputies and the Corporatist Chamber, had severely limited powers. Salazar selected nearly all candidates personally.

Rights and liberties proclaimed by the constitution were nullified by government regulation. Various sectors of society were organized from above in corporatist fashion. The political police maintained surveillance over potential opponents, many of whom fled into exile. Censors erased any hint of dissent.

From 1936 to 1944 Salazar was also minister of war. In that position he found he could shrink the size of the army and control officers’ salaries, transfers, retirements, and even marriages.

Officers were encouraged to marry wealthy women so that their salaries could be kept low. A politicized government-run militia, the Portuguese Legion (Legião Portuguesa), partially offset the army’s influence.

Thus it was Salazar, not the military, who consolidated the authoritarian regime. His was a conservative, corporatist police state, but it was not a true fascist state. It did not seek to overthrow traditional elites or mobilize society around its goals.

Rather, Salazar sought to demobilize—or even freeze—society and to reject modernity. Rather than exalting war, Salazar strove for a kind of neutrality. In any event, his austere policies left the armed forces with a very low level of effectiveness.

Spain and World War II

Salazar viewed Spain’s leftist Popular Front government as a threat. When General Francisco Franco rebelled against it in 1936, launching the Spanish civil war, Portugal officially followed the lead of Britain and France by promising nonintervention, but surreptitiously funneled aid to Franco.

Franco’s agents were allowed to operate on Portuguese territory. Thousands of volunteers went to Spain to fight against the Republican cause. At the end of the war, in March 1939, Salazar and Franco signed a treaty of friendship and nonaggression, known informally as the Iberian Pact.

Salazar declared Portugal’s neutrality in World War II on September 1, 1939, the very day Poland was invaded. He also sought to keep the war as far away as possible by bolstering Spain’s neutrality. In the wake of its civil war, Spain was in no condition to take an active role in World War II, but Portugal’s position highlighted the potential costs of even a passive role, as in allowing the Germans to pass through to take the British stronghold of Gibraltar.

The strategic situation changed for the Iberian Peninsula as the Germans became tied down in the Soviet Union and the Allies moved into North Africa and Italy. It was now highly unlikely that Spain would intervene on Germany’s side. Salazar allowed himself to be persuaded to join the Allied cause, albeit passively. From the Allied perspective, the Azores were the key objective.

Situated in the mid-Atlantic, these Portuguese islands would be useful bases both for antisubmarine warfare and for refueling transatlantic flights in the buildup prior to the great invasion of France. First Britain, and then the United States, acquired access to facilities there, and Portugal ceased selling tungsten to Germany while still claiming to be neutral.

Postwar Portugal

Portugal’s shift put it on the winning side, improving its bargaining position in postwar Europe and increasing its chances of getting back East Timor and Macao, which had been occupied by the Japanese.

Still, the semifascist state was in an ambiguous position after the war. It began to describe itself as an "organic democracy" rather than a "civilian police dictatorship", an expression that had been used in the 1930s.

Portugal was not invited to the San Francisco conference, which established the United Nations, and was denied UN membership until 1955. Portugal was, however, a founding member of NATO chiefly because the United States still wanted access to bases in the Azores.

Portugal’s relations with the United States and NATO replaced its traditional alliance with Britain. Unlike Britain’s earlier guarantee of Portugal’s overseas territories, however, NATO’s area of responsibility was expressly restricted to Europe to avoid its being drawn into colonial wars.

A certain "softening" marked the Salazar regime in the postwar era. There was no real institutional change, but some of the more fascistlike institutions were allowed to erode. On the other hand, after a dissident general managed to win 25 percent of the vote in presidential elections in 1958, the direct election of the president was discontinued.

A degree of economic liberalization led to the growth of the service sector and a larger middle class in the 1960s. Industry, previously limited to textile production, added electrical, metallurgical, chemical, and petroleum sectors.

A stroke immobilized the dictator in 1968, although he lingered for two more years. His successor was Marcello José das Neves Caetano, who, not coincidentally, had also succeeded him in his chair at the University of Coimbra.

Caetano brought technocrats into the regime, retired some of Salazar’s old-school hangers-on, and favored economic development over cultivated stagnation, but again the basic system remained.

Africa

War was spreading in the African colonies of Portuguese Guinea (Guinea-Bissau), Angola, and Mozambique. The policy of the New State had been to instill pride among the Portuguese in their empire, a legacy of Portugal’s glory in the age of discovery. The state also reasserted national control over the colonies, where foreign corporations had conducted much of the economic activity.

African farmers were compelled to shift from subsistence crops to cotton for the Portuguese market in the 1930s, and more so as World War II disrupted other trade sources. Portuguese investment in Africa began to take off in the years after the war. Portuguese emigration tripled the white population of Mozambique and quadrupled that of Angola between 1940 and 1960.

Initially, even the outbreak of the wars of national liberation spurred economic growth, as the state responded by boosting civil and military investments. All of these changes disrupted the lives of the Africans, and many of them also undermined the few existing bases of support for Portuguese rule.

In 1961 a revolt against forced cotton cultivation broke out in Angola. Fighting escalated with retributions and counter-retributions; it spread to Guinea in 1963 and Mozambique in 1964. The government quickly repealed forced cultivation and forced labor. It also mobilized troops and dispatched them to Africa.

Large numbers of Africans were concentrated in strategic villages (aldeamentos) where their actions could be controlled. In 1961 the United States called on Portugal to decolonize. The insurgents sought and received military aid from the Soviet bloc and China.

In order to fight the leftist insurgency most effectively, the military high command assigned anabawang officers to read the political tracts of African revolutionary leaders, such as Amílcar Cabral of Guinea-Bissau.

To their ultimate surprise, a sizable number of anabawang officers were convinced that the insurgents were right. Some of them also concluded that Portugal itself was an underdeveloped Third World country in need of "national liberation".

Revolution of The Carnation

A diverse group of disgruntled anabawang officers in 1973 formed a clandestine political organization, the Armed Forces Movement (Movimento das Forças Armadas, MFA). On April 25, 1974, the MFA deposed Caetano. The New State collapsed without resistance. Holding red carnations, demonstrators had persuaded other military units not to resist.

The MFA then stepped back, but this proved only temporary. The young officers would soon be in the midst of a political free-for-all to determine the direction of the revolution. They too coalesced into a number of factions built around competing political orientations and personalities.

Captain Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho became the focal point of one radical faction, once styling himself as the Fidel Castro of Europe. Colonel Vasco Gonçalves began as a moderate, but moved to a position close to the Portuguese Communist Party. A moderate faction, later dubbed the Group of Nine, formed around Lieutenant Colonel Melo Antunes.

Finally, further behind the scenes until the last stages of the revolution were the "operationals", a group of officers largely concerned with professional military matters and associated with Lieutenant Colonel António Ramalho Eanes.

The Junta of National Salvation (Junta de Salvação Nacional) was formed from moderate senior officers. General António de Spínola, a former military governor of Guinea-Bissau, was invited to lead the junta as provisional president of the republic.

Palma Carlos, a liberal law professor, was named provisional prime minister. Political parties of all stripes were legalized, and political prisoners were released. Political exiles streamed back into the country.

Cease-fires were arranged in Africa. In one of the most fateful decisions of the new regime, the leaders promised elections for a constituent assembly within a year, the first real elections in over half a century, and with universal suffrage and proportional representation.

The revolution had released popular tensions that had been building up for decades. Turmoil spread quickly in the newfound freedom, and rival power centers competed to control the situation. Spurred on by the newly legalized Portuguese Communist Party, Maoists and other leftist groups and workers staged strikes and seized factories, shops, and offices.

Students took over schools and denounced teachers for "fascist sympathies". Services broke down, and shortages became common. Right-wing groups, especially in the conservative rural north, began to mobilize and arm themselves.

In July the Palma Carlos government collapsed amid the turmoil, and prominent members of the MFA moved into key positions. Carvalho was promoted to brigadier general and put in charge of the army’s new Continental Operational Command (Comando Operacional do Continente, COPCON), which became the principal arbiter of order as the police disintegrated.

Colonel Vasco Gonçalves was appointed to the position of prime minister. The MFA radicals regularly overruled Spínola’s decisions and also forced him to accept the independence of the colonies.

In September a major demonstration planned by Spínola to bolster his position forced a confrontation with COPCON, which resulted in Spínola’s resignation. General Francisco da Costa Gomes, who was more sympathetic to the left, assumed the presidency.

The most radical phase of the revolution began in March 1975. Spínola launched an unsuccessful coup attempt on March 11. In response, the radical wing of the MFA abolished the Junta of National Salvation and formed the Revolutionary Council (Conselho da Revolução), some 20 officers responsible only to the MFA Delegates’ Assembly.

The council nationalized the banking system, press, utilities, and insurance companies. With elections for the Constituent Assembly scheduled for April 25, the anniversary of the revolution, the MFA pressed a "constitutional pact" on the six largest parties, which recognized the permanent supervisory role of the MFA in a "guided" democracy.

Turnout was high for the elections, in which 12 parties competed, but the outcome shocked the radicals. The moderate Socialist Party came in first with 37.9 percent, followed by the right-of-center Social Democrats (originally called the Popular Democrats) with 26.4 percent. The Communists, the electoral ally of the MFA radicals, garnered only 12.5 percent.

Talk of Civil War

The MFA responded during the "hot summer" (verão quente) of 1975 by styling itself as a national-liberation movement. In the south, landless agricultural laborers seized large estates and declared them collective farms. Moderate Socialists and Social Democrats resigned from the government. Small freehold farmers formed armed groups, held counterrevolutionary demonstrations, and bombed the offices of leftist parties.

Plans were drawn up for a possible alternative government in the north. COPCON was beginning to disintegrate, and individual army units were under pressure to declare their political orientation. Both society and the MFA itself were becoming increasingly polarized, and there was talk of civil war.

As a consequence of the growing tension, Gonçalves and his government were pressed to resign at the end of August, and they did so. A new, more moderate provisional government was installed.

Dissatisfied with this outcome and determined not to "lose" the revolution, radical paratroopers attempted to organize a coup in November 1975. Like Spínola’s coup attempt, however, this backfired. Lieutenant Colonel António Ramalho Eanes, of the MFA’s professional military faction, led a purge of the MFA radicals. COPCON was disbanded and Otelo, its commander, placed under house arrest.

Eanes was named army chief of staff and made a member of the Revolutionary Council. The "constitutional pact" was renegotiated in February 1976. Elections were held for the new Assembly of the Republic in April, and Eanes was elected president in June with 61.5 percent of the vote in the first round.

The Constituent Assembly sought to avoid both the weak, unstable governments of the 1911 constitution and also the authoritarianism of the 1933 constitution. Based on the French model, the new system called for both an elected president with real powers and an executive prime minister chosen by a majority party or coalition in a freely elected parliament.

The renegotiated constitutional pact still called for socialism as the goal of government and society and institutionalized the legacy of the revolution. Moreover, it retained the Revolutionary Council, still a self-appointed and purely military institution, and gave it the power to safeguard the legacy of the revolution and judge the constitutionality of legislation passed by the civilian government.

The first elected government was led by Mário Soares of the moderately leftist Socialist Party. In 1979 however, a center-right government of Social Democrats and Christian Democrats was elected. The inherent tension between the elected government and the essentially undemocratic council became evident as the cabinet sought to privatize portions of the economy.

After a standoff that lasted roughly from 1979 to 1982, a process of normalization set in and the undemocratic vestiges of the revolution were gradually excised. In particular, a constitutional reform in 1982 abolished the Revolutionary Council and sent the army back to the barracks.

In the elections of 1986 Soares became Portugal’s first civilian president in 60 years, replacing Eanes. Another constitutional reform, in 1989, eliminated the requirement to keep the nationalized sector of the economy.

The moderate Socialist and Social Democratic parties had increasingly come to dominate the political system, reducing the need for multiparty coalitions and increasing the stability of government. Portugal had become a far less hierarchical and far more pluralistic, democratic, and dynamic society than it had been before 1974.

In 1986 the European Economic Community (now the European Union) accepted Portugal and Spain simultaneously as members. The opening to trade, the inflow of European investments for infrastructure and other purposes, and the constitutional changes of 1989 spurred growth and helped transform the economy.

Economic growth surpassed the European average in the 1990s and until 2002. While, like any country, Portugal was not without its scandals, controversies, and disagreements, by the end of the century it had become integrated as a solidly democratic, stable, and respected member of the European community.