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“Road to Conflict – Classic War Documentary Film” explores the events and tensions that led to one of the most significant global conflicts in history. This powerful documentary presents historical footage and insightful narration, revealing the political, social, and military factors that shaped the path toward war.
A must-watch for history enthusiasts, this classic film offers a deep look into the early warnings, rising tensions, and critical decisions that changed the course of the world forever.
A must-watch for history enthusiasts, this classic film offers a deep look into the early warnings, rising tensions, and critical decisions that changed the course of the world forever.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00The End
00:33The End
01:06The End
01:41Causes and events leading up to our entry into the war.
01:46Well, what are the causes?
01:48Why are we Americans on the march?
01:52Is it because of...
01:59Pearl Harbor?
02:03Is that why we are fighting?
02:05Or is it because of...
02:08Britain?
02:21France!
02:39China!
02:47Czechoslovakia!
02:48Czechoslovakia!
02:53Norway!
03:02Poland!
03:16Poland!
03:20Greece!
03:27Belgium!
03:31Albania!
03:32Yugoslavia!
03:35Or Russia!
03:38Or Russia!
03:39Hello, you king!
04:02Just what was it made us change our way of living overnight?
04:05What turned our resources, our machines, our whole nation into one vast arsenal, producing
04:13more and more weapons of war instead of the old materials of peace?
04:26What put us into uniform, ready to engage the enemy on every continent and every ocean?
04:41What are these two worlds of which Mr. Wallace spoke, the free and the slave?
04:50Let's take the free world first, our world.
04:53How did it become free?
04:55Only through a long and unceasing struggle inspired by men of vision.
05:01Moses.
05:05Muhammad.
05:09Confucius.
05:15Christ.
05:19All believed that in the sight of God, all men were created equal.
05:23And from that there developed a spirit among men and nations, which is best expressed in
05:29our own declaration of freedom.
05:31We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.
05:37It is the cornerstone upon which our nation was built and the ideal of all the great liberators.
05:43United States.
05:45Jefferson.
05:47Garibaldi.
05:49Lafayette.
05:51Kershuzka.
05:52Bolivar.
05:54Lincoln.
05:56Lighthouses.
05:57Lighting up a dark and foggy world.
06:00That government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
06:11Fighting, living, dying.
06:13For what?
06:15For freedom.
06:16That for which men have fought since time began.
06:19To be free.
06:27Is life so dear or peace so sweet
06:30as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?
06:35Forbid it, almighty God.
06:37I know not what course others may take
06:40but as for me
06:42give me liberty
06:45or give me death.
06:49But what of this other world?
06:53Here men insisted that progress lay in killing freedom.
06:57Here they were putting out the lighthouses
07:00one by one.
07:02Here the march of history was reversing itself.
07:06In Italy, it began
07:07when an ambitious rabble-rouser
07:09set his followers marching on road.
07:14The country, like every other country
07:17after the last war,
07:18was torn by political unrest,
07:21hard times,
07:22unemployment.
07:27Two courses were available to the Italian people.
07:30They could solve their problems
07:31in a free, democratic way
07:33or they could let someone else
07:35do the solving for them.
07:36They made the tragic mistake
07:38of choosing the second course.
07:40They put their trust and faith
07:42in this one man.
07:43They believed he represented them.
07:45Actually, he planned to betray them
07:47for the selfish interests of himself
07:49and the group back of him,
07:52just as he had earlier betrayed
07:54those who first supported him.
07:56In Germany, another and even more
07:58forceful demigod
07:59set his followers marching
08:01from the Munich Beer Hall.
08:03He, too, had the sinister opportunity
08:05to take advantage of post-war chaos.
08:17But he also had certain
08:19distinctive German characteristics
08:20to play on.
08:22To start with,
08:23the Germans have an inborn national love
08:26of regimentation
08:27and a harsh discipline.
08:28He could give them that.
08:38The German army
08:39and through them,
08:40the people had never acknowledged
08:41German defeat in the last war
08:43and were anxious for revenge.
08:46That, too, he promised them.
08:48The wealthy and powerful industrialists
08:50were fearful of losing
08:51any of their wealth and power
08:53and were ready to back anyone
08:54who would retain it for them.
08:56He promised to take care of them, too.
08:58This man cunningly played
09:01all these ends against the middle
09:03and ruthlessly set out
09:04to murder the newborn German Republic.
09:09In Japan, you'd expect things
09:11to be done a little differently.
09:13They were.
09:15Here, not one man, but a gang
09:17disguised their little schemes
09:19as the will of the emperor.
09:20And to the Japanese people,
09:22the emperor is God.
09:25Taking advantage of their fanatical
09:27worship of the god-emperor,
09:29it was no great trick
09:30to take away
09:31what little freedom
09:31they had ever known.
09:34Yes, in these lands,
09:35the people surrendered
09:36their liberties
09:37and threw away
09:37their human dignity.
09:41And on!
09:44And on!
09:47They gave up their rights
09:49as individual human beings.
09:55They became a part of a mass,
09:58a human herd.
10:06Although these countries
10:07were far apart
10:08and different in custom
10:09and in language,
10:10the same poison
10:11made them much alike.
10:13Each got a new uniform.
10:15In Italy,
10:16the new bosses wore black shirts.
10:17In Germany,
10:19the shirts were brown.
10:21In Japan,
10:21they hid behind
10:22the uniform of the army.
10:24But really,
10:25they belonged
10:25to a sinister,
10:26secret society.
10:28Their symbol
10:29was a black dragon.
10:30The other fellows
10:32had to have a symbol too.
10:33In Germany,
10:34a swastika.
10:36In Italy,
10:37the old Roman symbol
10:38of the past.
10:40In Germany,
10:41they called the new order
10:42National Socialism
10:45or Nazism.
10:49In Italy,
10:51they had a shorter word,
10:53Fascism.
10:55In Japan,
10:56they had lots of names for it.
10:58The new era
10:59of enlightenment.
11:00The new order
11:02in Asia.
11:03The co-prosperity sphere.
11:05But no matter
11:06how you slice it,
11:07it was just plain
11:09old-fashioned
11:09militaristic imperialism.
11:11The Japs
11:12would get the prosperity
11:13and the others
11:15would get the cold.
11:17They say trouble
11:18always comes
11:19in threes.
11:20Take a good,
11:22close look
11:22at this trio.
11:24Remember
11:25these faces.
11:27Remember them well.
11:29If you ever meet them,
11:31don't hesitate.
11:40stop thinking
11:40and follow me,
11:41cried Hitler.
11:42I will make you
11:43masters of the world.
11:45And the people answered,
11:46hire me.
11:47Hire me.
11:49Hire me.
11:50Hire me.
11:51Hire me.
11:51Hire me.
11:51Hire me.
11:52Hire me.
11:52Hire me.
11:52Stop thinking
11:53and believe in me,
11:54bellowed Mussolini.
11:55And I will restore
11:56the glory that was wrong.
11:58And the people answered,
12:00Duce.
12:00Duce.
12:04Stop thinking
12:05and follow your god emperor,
12:06cried the Japanese warlords.
12:08And Japan
12:09will rule the world.
12:11And the people answered,
12:13Banzai,
12:13Banzai.
12:16Each system
12:17was alike
12:17in that the
12:18constitutional lawmaking
12:19bodies
12:20gave up their power.
12:21The Reichstag
12:22in Berlin.
12:24The House of Deputies
12:25in Rome.
12:26The Diet
12:27in Tokyo.
12:29And these
12:30elected representatives
12:31became collections
12:32of stooges,
12:33rubber stamp
12:34organizations.
12:39Applauding on cue
12:41the words
12:41of the leaders.
12:42Each system
12:44did away
12:44with free speech
12:45and free assembly.
12:47Each system
12:48did away
12:49with a free press
12:50and substituted
12:51a press controlled
12:52by the party.
12:53Through their
12:54ministries of propaganda,
12:55each took complete
12:56control of the theater,
12:57the movie, the radio, every cultural activity and every channel of information was controlled
13:04by the most important members of the party.
13:07Each did away with three courts and trial by jury, and substituted courts and judges
13:13run by the party.
13:15Each abolished labor unions and the rights of bargaining for wages.
13:38And under the pretext of patriotism established a system of forced labor.
13:44Each enforced its decrees by an army of secret police who held the power of
13:48life and death over every individual.
13:51And for the few who still believed in freedom and said so, there was a ready answer.
14:09A greatest intellect in the world can be silenced with this.
14:13That is an exact translation of the words these black shirts cheer so lustily.
14:19I say so much.
14:21If I hear the word culture, then I will get after my revoyer.
14:25Whenever I hear anyone mention the word culture, the first thing I do is reach for my gun.
14:32Yes, they had the answer.
14:34The blackjack.
14:35And the gun.
14:58In Italy, they did it different.
15:12While in Japan...
15:14While in Japan...
15:25To their names can be added those of hundreds and thousands of others who stood in the way
15:31of the new order.
15:33Finally, there is only one obstacle left.
15:59The word of God and the word of curers cannot be reconciled.
16:03Then God must go.
16:12I am absolutely clear in my own mind, and I think I can speak for the furor as well,
16:17that both the Catholic and Protestant churches must vanish from the life of our people.
16:22Thus spoke Dr. Alfred Rosenberg.
16:25And if you have any doubt that he spoke for his furor, here's what happened.
16:29All the way of curers cannot be written in the way, in the temple of the people.
16:47Through my love, blackjack.
16:51For thank you we are GOD F444, here's what happened.
16:51You have to activate it on Earthquake.
16:53In that kind of lazım ни on Earthquake.
16:54To the Hughes and immerzeit's music that you flows in the way.
16:56And in the universe, there is a better choice between all of us
16:57but quiet until your 600 hours are joined by.
17:13Thousands of other men of God, Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, were persecuted, arrested,
17:21confined in concentration camps.
17:25Our Führer is the intermediary between his people and the throne of God.
17:29Everything the Führer utters is religion in the highest sense.
17:33It is only on one or two exceptional points that Christ and Hitler stand comparison,
17:38for Hitler is far too big a man to be compared with one so petty.
17:47Every day in all German classrooms...
17:50Adolf Hitler ist unser Rester, unser Herr, der edelste Führer auf der ganzen, ganzen Welt.
18:22Yes, take children from the faith of their fathers and teach them the state is the only church.
18:27And the head of the state is the voice of God.
18:33¡Hombrey! ¡Hombrey!
22:29That was the way of life, or better, the way of death, in that other world.
22:34Now, what of our world, the democratic world?
22:38What did we want?
22:39What did we do about it?
22:41First of all, we wanted peace and security.
22:43And to prove our truth, and to prove our sincerity, in 1921, we initiated the Washington disarmament
22:50conference.
22:50This resulted in the fairly broad and United States of America, the United States, residential and
22:56English, and the American fleet.
23:01And the other, the Nine-Power Treaty which guaranteed the integrity of China.
23:05And incidentally, one of the powers signing this was Japan.
23:09Later on, in 1929, we signed the Kellogg-Brient Pact,
23:14which was supposed to abolish war as a means of settling international disputes.
23:19This pact was signed by 47 nations, including Germany and Japan.
23:24President, I have the honor of handing you the London Naval Treaty.
23:30Faithful to our treaty obligations.
23:41We scrapped more than 60% of our naval tonnage.
23:45And our army was reduced to a standing force of 136,000 men,
23:50smaller than that maintained by the little state of Romania.
23:54We let our hopes for peace become so strong
23:57that they grew into a determination not to fight unless directly attacked.
24:02We let ourselves be influenced by those who said that we could find security through isolation.
24:08The confusion in our way of thinking is apparent in the slice of public opinion
24:13as it appeared in Pathé News in 1939.
24:24Another war, not for me.
24:26This time America should keep out, and I know I will.
24:29If war breaks out in Europe,
24:31I think that this country should heed the advice of its first president
24:35and avoid all foreign entanglements.
24:38I haven't the slightest idea of European affairs.
24:42In the event of war in Europe,
24:44I think we should stay out of it entirely.
24:47And all our efforts should be made
24:49to keep out of the fight.
24:51Let you have to fight our own battles.
24:52They mean nothing to us.
24:54We should mind our own business.
24:55By all means, no.
24:56Yes, fight.
24:58No.
24:58No.
24:59Yes.
24:59If my country calls, yes.
25:01No.
25:03No.
25:05We simply did not want to understand
25:07that our individual and national problems were
25:10and always will be
25:12dependent upon the problems of the whole world.
25:15And we had individual and national problems to worry about.
25:19Plenty of them.
25:20Just as Germany, Italy, and Japan had.
25:23But we faced them in a democratic way.
25:26We passed laws to give working men a chance to improve their love.
25:32We established an insurance program for those without jobs.
25:40We began to give old folks protection against want and hunger.
25:44We organized the CCC to provide our young men with healthy and useful employment.
25:53A federal works program came into being.
25:56It changed the face of our nation with new roads, bridges, schools.
26:06We built great new dams, which brought the miracle of electricity to millions of our people.
26:13These were some of our accomplishments, but there were others not so creditable.
26:18We turned our backs on the League of Nations.
26:21We passed the tariff act to set a higher wall of isolation around us.
26:25We encouraged lawlessness with the farce of prohibition.
26:29But in spite of these mistakes, we never had a thought of losing our free institutions.
26:35John Q. Public still ran the country.
26:37He had his choice of voting for Dewey, Wilkie, Roosevelt, or anybody else.
26:42In Germany, they had the choice of voting for Hitler, Hitler, or Hitler.
26:54Over here, John Q. still read what he pleased.
26:58And although he heard of books being burned in other countries,
27:00he would have laughed if anyone had told him his books would ever be burned.
27:19And on Sunday, if you felt like it, John Q. went to any church he pleased.
27:25dónde was a good Roman ellen.
27:29Not a good闘, should we have done that bomb by the road?
27:47One moon is a tuer of transactional Turtle,
27:51Next day, he suffered.
27:51Now the words didn't pour this earth.
27:51But a good plan here, we looked like it, you justamente
28:16Most of all, he got a kick out of seeing his kids grow up.
28:42Come on, Jerry.
28:45Come on, Jerry.
28:46Come on, Jerry.
28:59The average American was quite unconscious of the fact
29:01that some people had this in mind for the little John Keynes.
29:37Yes, while their children were being trained to kill,
29:40John Keynes' kids were giving their pennies to help them have life.
29:56And when we saw these men in the newsreels, quite often we laughed.
30:00To us, they looked like characters in a musical comedy.
30:10But they weren't comic. They weren't funny.
30:13They were deadly serious.
30:15They were out for world conquest.
30:18And what made it doubly serious was that there were 70 million Japanese,
30:2345 million Italians, and 80 million Germans,
30:27all hopped up to the same idea.
30:35Their leaders told them that they were supermen.
30:38Heron Falk, the Nazis called it.
30:40The master race, destined to rule all other peoples on earth.
30:47Take a good look at these humorless men.
30:50These were to be the rulers of the ruling race.
30:54Bear us blindly, and you will attain your rightful place in the world.
31:04All the people will be your slaves.
31:07That's what they promised them.
31:09That Americans, Chinese, Russian, South Americans,
31:14all free peoples would work for them and make them rich.
31:17And how they ate it up.
31:18And how they ate it up.
31:26We shall restore the glory that was Rome.
31:32Today, we rule Germany.
31:34Tomorrow, the world.
31:38The Pacific is ours.
31:40It was inevitable that these countries should gang up on us.
31:46The little fellow is our pal, Curacao,
31:48who smiled his way into our hearts in December 1941.
31:52Here, he and his friends are busy carving up the world in advance,
31:56staking out their claims.
31:58Take a good look at these claims.
32:01Here was the Italy that Mussolini took over in 1922.
32:04And almost his first act was to tell the Italians
32:07they were the rightful owners of Corsica,
32:10Nice,
32:12Savoia,
32:13Albania,
32:15Tunisia,
32:16Ethiopia,
32:18and a land corridor linking it with Libya.
32:21Later on, he had an even bigger dream.
32:23The old Roman Empire had existed nearly 2,000 years ago.
32:28To dominate all the lands adjoining the Mediterranean.
32:33Mare Nostra,
32:35our sea, they called it,
32:36just as the ancient Romans did.
32:38As for the Japanese,
32:40they had some ambitions, too.
32:42By 1920,
32:43they had grabbed off Formosa,
32:45Korea,
32:46and the southern half of the island of Sakhalin.
32:49Then Baron Gishi Tanaka,
32:51the prime minister,
32:52carefully set down Japanese aims in a document called the Tanaka Memorial.
32:57It was presented to the emperor July 25th, 1927.
33:08Here was their dream.
33:10Manchuria for raw materials.
33:13China for manpower.
33:15Then a triumphant march through Indochina,
33:18Siam,
33:18Burma,
33:19India,
33:20the East Indies,
33:22and on through Australia and New Zealand.
33:24And in the north,
33:25all they claimed was that part of Russia,
33:27east of Lake Baikal.
33:29That was to be the new order in Asia.
33:35Then the Japs would move eastward to crush the United States
33:38and really start their co-prosperity sphere.
33:41Now take a look at the bike the Nazis reserved for themselves.
33:45Here's the Germany Hitler walked into.
33:48And here's what he wanted.
33:50First, Europe under his complete political or economic control,
33:54leaving Mussolini a share of the loot if he behaved himself.
34:00Then the drive to the east,
34:02through the rich oil lands of Iran and Iraq,
34:05into India.
34:07Another pushed south through Africa.
34:11Then from Dakar,
34:13jump off to meet the honorary Aryans
34:16who were to move in on South America through the Pacific.
34:19At the same time,
34:21start across from the Scandinavian country
34:23to hook up with his buck-toothed pals
34:25coming over from Siberia
34:27to join in the conquest of the United States.
34:31There it is, gents.
34:32All they left us was Shangri-La.
34:35And they'd claim that, too, if they knew where it was.
34:39And did they think they had a chance?
34:41Listen.
34:47When war comes between Japan and the United States,
34:51I shall not be content merely to occupy Guam,
34:54the Philippines, Hawaii, and San Francisco.
34:57I look forward to dictating the peace to the United States
35:00in the White House at Washington.
35:02Yamamoto wrote those words on January of 1941.
35:07Yes, the conquering Jap army down Pennsylvania Avenue.
35:11That was the final goal.
35:13You will see what they did to the men and women of Nanking,
35:17Hong Kong, and Manila.
35:18Imagine the field day they'd enjoy
35:20if they'd marched through the streets of Washington.
35:23But before striking,
35:25a preliminary step was necessary.
35:27From Berlin,
35:29from Rome,
35:31from Tokyo,
35:33the campaign started.
35:35Propaganda
35:35to confuse,
35:38divide,
35:39soften up their intended victim.
35:41Put them on the defensive.
35:43Scream you're abused.
35:45Shout you're oppressed.
35:46The world's wrong.
35:48You're right.
35:48If you shriek it loud enough and often enough,
35:51they'll believe you.
35:52Above all,
35:54use their free press
35:55and their free speech
35:56to destroy them.
36:00Laban's wrong, they demanded.
36:02Living room.
36:06Our lands are overcrowded.
36:08But at the same time,
36:10they gave prizes to mothers
36:11who bore the most sons.
36:18They brought together
36:19large groups of young men
36:21and young girls
36:22for human breeding.
36:25Read what one of their leaders wrote.
36:45Of course,
36:46the children from this assembly line
36:47belong to the state
36:48to be scientifically trained
36:50for conquest.
37:08Another howl was the lack
37:10of raw material.
37:11They claimed
37:12they were the have-nots
37:14and we were the haves.
37:16But out of this supposed lack,
37:19they built up
37:19the greatest war machines
37:21the world has ever known.
37:25These are the published figures
37:27from the German military budget.
37:32Actually,
37:33between 1933 and 1939,
37:36Hitler's program of rearmament
37:38cost more than $80 billion.
37:43The Natchez alone
37:44assembled a striking force
37:46of 30 panzer divisions,
37:4870 motorized divisions,
37:53140 infantry divisions,
37:55plus the Luftwaffe,
37:57the world's largest air force.
37:59And they had no raw materials.
38:02Think of the bread,
38:04the automobiles,
38:05the good things of life
38:06that the German, Italian,
38:07Japanese leaders
38:08might have given their people
38:10if they had spent this money
38:11for peace instead of war.
38:14You know what billions
38:15we are now spending
38:16to match their military force?
38:18No.
38:20No, these arguments
38:21were all smoke screens.
38:23When war came,
38:25the democracies proved
38:26to be the have-nots
38:27and our enemies the haves.
38:30And when war came,
38:31where did it come?
38:43Remember that date,
38:46September 18, 1931.
38:49A date we should remember
38:50as well as December 7, 1941.
38:54For on that date,
38:55in 1931,
38:57the war we are now fighting
38:59began.
39:00The place was Manchuria,
39:03the northernmost province
39:04of China,
39:056,000 miles from San Francisco.
39:08Manchuria,
39:09the first objective
39:10in the Tanaka Plan.
39:13By September 18,
39:14the Japanese,
39:15who by treaty patrolled
39:16the Southern Manchurian Railway,
39:18had secretly and illegally
39:20increased their garrisons.
39:25On the Korean-Manchurian border,
39:27an entire Japanese army
39:28was assembled,
39:30conveniently equipped
39:31for a winter campaign.
39:33All they needed
39:34was an excuse.
39:36They made their own.
39:38At 10.30 that night,
39:40just after the Mukden Express
39:42had passed by,
39:43a section of track
39:44was dynamited,
39:45causing damage
39:46to one rail
39:46and two fish plates.
39:52Japan's honor
39:53had been violated.
39:55Within half an hour,
39:57the Japanese railroad garrison
39:58launched a coordinated attack
40:00on the barracks
40:01of the sleeping Chinese army
40:03at Mukden.
40:04The slaughter was appalling.
40:09By midnight,
40:11the conveniently placed
40:12Japanese army
40:13poured across
40:14the Korean border
40:15and the first
40:16open act of aggression,
40:17the invasion of Manchuria,
40:19was on.
40:21In four days,
40:22they had occupied
40:23the whole of
40:24Southern Manchuria.
40:25And shortly after,
40:27the whole country.
40:29Manchuria became
40:30Manchukuo,
40:32a puppet state
40:33with an obedient stooge
40:34on the throne,
40:35Henry Puyi,
40:37a weakling
40:37whom the Japanese
40:38had prepared for the job
40:40with seven years
40:41of women
40:41and song.
40:47In Washington,
40:48Henry L. Stimson,
40:49then Secretary of State,
40:51now Secretary of War,
40:52sent out a blistering
40:53denunciation of the attack.
40:55The League of Nations
40:57sent a committee of five
40:58headed by Lord Lytton
40:59and including our own
41:00General Frank McCoy
41:01to Manchuria
41:02to investigate.
41:03In October of 1932,
41:06the committee issued
41:07its report.
41:09We found that
41:10the Japanese occupation
41:12of this large part
41:13of China
41:14was not justified
41:15on the ground
41:16of self-defense
41:18and that the new state
41:20which had been set up
41:21was a Japanese protectorate
41:23rather than a genuine case
41:25of Manchurian
41:26self-determination.
41:28Shortly after,
41:29the League condemned Japan
41:30as an aggressor nation.
41:46It is a matter of common knowledge
41:49that Japan's policy
41:51is fundamentally
41:53inspired by a genuine desire
41:57to guarantee peace
41:59in the Far East
42:00and to contribute
42:02to the maintenance
42:04of peace
42:05throughout the world.
42:07Japan, however,
42:10finds it impossible
42:12to accept
42:13the report
42:15adopted by the Assembly.
42:18In answer,
42:18the Japanese delegates,
42:20knowing there were no guns
42:21behind this condemnation,
42:24smiled,
42:25took up their briefcases,
42:27marched out of the League.
42:29More than Manchuria
42:30was dead.
42:32Collective security
42:33was dead.
42:34A green light
42:35had been given
42:36the aggressors.
42:37We and the rest
42:38of the world
42:38knew that these aggressors
42:40should be stopped
42:40and punished,
42:41but we were unwilling
42:43to make the necessary sacrifices
42:44to back up
42:46that opinion.
42:47It was impossible
42:48to convince a farm boy
42:49in Iowa
42:50or a driver
42:51of a London bus
42:52or a waiter
42:53in a Paris cafe
42:54that he should go to war
42:55because of a mud hut
42:57in Manchuria.
43:02Yet,
43:03the subsequent course
43:04of history
43:05makes it clear
43:05that that incident,
43:07so many miles away,
43:09is the reason
43:09that you
43:10and millions of others
43:11are in uniform today.
43:16the Japs had Manchuria.
43:18Phase number one
43:19of the Tanaka Plan
43:20was completed.
43:21Phase number two,
43:23the conquest of China.
43:26In 1932,
43:27without warning,
43:28the Japs attacked
43:29the Chinese city
43:29of Shanghai.
43:30China.
43:35.
43:42.
43:43.
43:44.
43:44.
43:45.
45:46Under the inspired leadership of General Chiang Kai-shek, the Chinese people fought and still fight on.
45:58Meantime, what of Japan's partners?
46:02What helpless people were they planning to bomb, slaughter, drive into slavery?
46:08Hitler was not yet ready, but Mussolini was.
46:11Mussolini had to be.
46:13His people were growing restless.
46:16Fascism hadn't produced the heaven on earth that he had promised them.
46:19So he pulled the old trick of launching a foreign war to divert attention from troubles at home.
46:25So Mussolini beat his chest like Tarzan and looked around for a worthy foe.
46:30He found one.
46:32Ethiopia.
46:35A good country for the beginning of a glorious empire.
46:38Its army had no machine guns.
46:41Its army had no tanks.
46:44Its army did have an air force.
46:47Exactly one old airplane.
46:50One airplane against the nation which had developed the new theory of total air war.
46:55Of the blitz which would wipe out cities, destroy civilians, men, women, and child.
47:02In October of 1935, following the Japanese example, an incident was provoked at the little settlement of Walwal near the
47:11border of Ethiopia and Italian Somaliland.
47:15Italy's honor had been violated.
47:18Refusing any arbitration, Mussolini moved the whole might of his army through the Suez Canal to overrun the undefended country.
47:27Ethiopia's emperor Haile Selassie appeared before the League of Nations.
47:37I must still fight on until my tardy allies appear, and if they never come, I say to you without
47:43bitterness,
47:44the West will perish.
47:52Members of the League half-heartedly stopped trading with Italy,
47:55but refused the only thing that will stop any aggressor.
47:59Force.
48:03Ethiopia was left to herself.
48:07Native leaders came to pledge their allegiance.
48:23The people of Ethiopia, with their spears and bare hands,
48:28faced the guns and the tanks of the invaders,
48:31fighting desperately and gallantly to save their country from conquest.
49:02They fought, and they fought, and they fought.
49:05But in the end, there could be but one result.
49:10Might triumphed.
49:13Italy conquered Ethiopia.
49:15Many of our elected leaders warned us of danger.
49:19Without a declaration of war,
49:21and without warning or justification
49:24of any kind,
49:27civilians,
49:28including vast numbers of women and children,
49:32are being ruthlessly murdered
49:35with bombs from the air.
49:37But we were still hypnotized by the fact
49:40that two broad oceans stood between us
49:42and the rest of the world.
49:44We didn't realize that the time
49:46when months were needed to span these oceans
49:48was ended,
49:49that the steamship had cut these months to days,
49:52and that now the whole Earth's surface
49:54could be covered in the space of ours.
49:57Yes, we were a nation that wanted peace.
50:00But we hadn't yet learned
50:01that peace for us depends on peace for all.
50:05Nobody would run the risk of war
50:07because of some mud huts
50:08and barren plains in Ethiopia
50:10any more than we would run the risk
50:12for some similar huts and plains in Manchuria.
50:16Correctly interpreting our attitude,
50:18the aggressors were all the surer
50:20that they could get what they wanted.
50:23Japan had started on her march at conquest.
50:27Italy had begun her new empire.
50:29And now the third gangster.
50:32What about him?
50:33We'll take him up on our next film
50:35and show how he joined his partners
50:38and put in his bid.
50:39For this is what we are fighting.
50:42Freedom's oldest enemy.
50:44The passion of the few to rule the many.
50:47This isn't just a war.
50:49This is a common man's life and death
50:52struggle against those
50:53who would put him back into slavery.
50:55We lose it,
50:56and we lose everything.
50:58Our homes.
51:00The jobs we want to go back to.
51:03The books we read.
51:04The very food we eat.
51:06The hopes we have for our kids.
51:09The kids themselves.
51:12They won't be ours anymore.
51:14That's what's at stake.
51:16It's us or them.
51:19The chips are down.
51:21Two worlds stand against each other.
51:24One must die.
51:26One must live.
51:29One hundred and seventy years of freedom
51:31decrees our answer.
51:33They won't be ours anymore.
51:37They won't be ours anymore.
51:42They won't stay.
51:46You the least.
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