Micheal Baker

3/12/15
7 page paper

World War 2- Effects and Impact

After World War 2, many nations political views as well as technological

developments changed vastly, creating a new era that involved international
cooperation. Because the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. had become superpowers after the
defeat of the Axis, they were mostly in control for the the fate of their countries in their
designated region. Thus, it resulted in U.S. being responsible of rebuilding Japan and
western Europe through the Marshall Plan, and the Soviet Union declining this plan to
eastern Europe. This passive aggressive conflict between the Soviet Union and the U.S.
later became the Cold War, which became a nuclear arms race that resulted in a mutual
assured destruction. (sunysuffolk and wikipedia)
Besides these superpowers influencing each hemisphere, many nations were
economically damaged from the expenses or physical destruction of the war. Great
Britain, being a sufferer from the expenses, spent about a quarter of the nations money
throughout the war, many of which was paid for american military equipment. Most of
these expenses were created before the lend-lease policy in 1941(ended in 1945),
which stated that the United States would supply funding, food, and such to all Allied
nations. However, even with the policy, the economy dropped significantly and bread
rationing became required from 1946-1948 until the economy were to be restored.
Other nations that suffered from similar issues were Italy as well as a few other nations
in Europe. (sunysuffolk and wikipedia)
Russia, or the U.S.S.R., was another sufferer from the war that was mainly an
effect of population decrease and other expense issues. With a decrease of around 40

million people along with mostly western Russia territory devastated, the economy and
Russia became very affected from the war. To regain its footsteps, U.S.S.R. relied on
mostly eastern Europe to supply machinery and raw materials. By 1953, industrial
production doubled compared to the 40s, and although food production was low, the
large amount of resources and large army Russia ended up with allowed her to become
one of the superpowers during this era. Despite everyone's suffering and unfortunate
outcomes, World War 2 improved the economy and well being of America. The war
increased a higher demand in production of war materials and basically ended the
depression in the United States. There was almost no physical destruction and with a
growing economy and military, the U.S. became the other superpower. (wikipedia and
sunysuffolk.edu)
Some other effects of World War 2 were the technological and science
developments during this time period. Some of these inventions were early stages of
popular devices such as the T.V. (further developed from the radar), while others were
created for dark uses and meanings such as the Nazi Holocaust. Regardless of the
uses of technology and science, World War 2 was very involved with these topics and is
often referred to as the first high tech war. (learn nc and sunysuffolk)
One of the first, more common inventions was the radar, which became a
profound reason the allies became victorious. Soon after Heinrich Hertz first discovered
radio waves would transmit through different materials except conductors in the late
1800s, many nations began to experiment with this technology in secrecy further
creating different versions of the radar. The radar idea really became successful after
these machines could create short pulses of radio energy, and although Great Britain,

Germany, United States, the USSR, Japan, the Netherlands, France, and Italy all
created different systems, Great Britain shared their ideas with the U.S. and the term
RADAR was used in 1939 by the USSC for the Navy. From there, it was never
commonly used by the military until MIT further developed it in a newly built laboratory
called the Radiation Laboratory. This highly effective piece of technology allowed for
nations to see incoming air attacks, guided bombers, and guided anti-aircraft guns to
their target. Furthermore, researchers also created a counter system to any enemy
radars as shown in allied bomber raids, they would drop thousands of tiny pieces of
tinfoil that jammed radar. The military also found other uses for it; meteorologists were
able to track storms, other inventions were created like the proximity fuse, and other
means of radar navigation such as LORAN. (wikipedia and learn nc)
Just as there were advances in weapon warfare, there were were also advances
towards other means, such as medicine. Penicillin played an important role during the
war and was first mass produced to aid millions of soldiers in need. This medicine is
and was critical to our world as it treats many diseases. Other medical technology were
invented to prevent other major diseases like malaria, which became the reason for the
creation of a pesticide called DDT, killing many mosquitos which transferred plenty of
life threatening diseases. Another major improvement was aviation medicine, which
allowed pilots to fly at higher altitudes for longer periods of time and blood transfusions,
which was perfected. (learn nc)
Throughout the war, chemical warfare as well as other resources became
popular during this time. In chemistry labs: incendiary bombs, smoke screens, and
flame flowers were created and first used by the U.S. against the Japanese. Also,

because many automobile companies and companies that manufactured common

goods switched to manufacturing war materials, many substitutes such as plastics
became widely known as well as other sources to replace metal and tinfoil. Other
amendments were created such as a national Victory speed limit that saved wear on
tires and shorter women clothing like the 2 piece swimming wear that is later known as
bikinis. (named after a Pacific island known for the testing of atomic weaponry) Overall,
World War 2 material innovations became plastic, fiberglass, polyester materials that
eventually grew into the roots of Americas modern world. (learn nc)
The most known warfare weapon that was invented during WW2 by far was the
nuclear bomb. They were first invented by American scientists that worked in
designated areas; a 59,000 acre area in Oak Ridge, Tennessee dedicated to the
creation of the uranium bomb and a 500,000 acre area in Hanford, Washington for the
creation of the plutonium bomb. The original thinking behind the creation of two bombs
was to increase the chance of it being successful mainly because the chemistry and
technology was so complicating. Luckily, both Little Boy and Fat Man worked, arguably
ending the world war. Besides America, there were other nations that were creating a
variation of the nuclear bomb like Germany, however, America supplied the scientists
with so much material and money that U.S. scientists successfully created the two
bombs before Germany even had blueprints. (wikipedia and learn nc)
With most of these technological advancements being used for bad purposes, no
invention is more dark than what the Nazis used on civilians to scare them into
submission and torture/death. During the Nazi Holocaust, many Nazi scientists tried to
apply science into their ideas that the Aryan white race is superior as well as apply

many of their new inventions to kill and scare civilians and POWs they captured. Some
of these inventions involved high tech rockets and buzz bombs which were mainly used
to terrorize civilians, and these weapons were so powerful that if they were used for
other purposes such as against the Allies, they might have made it more difficult for the
Axis to become defeated. Even though these acts were pure evil, were justified as they
were defeated from Americas and the Allies most advanced technology. (learn nc)
Another topic that was affected by WW2 was the political views and what their
goals were. Because of the detrimental effects of WW2, it was pretty understandable
mainly because it threatened human civilization as a whole and there was a mutual
agreement between all the major nations that it should not occur again. This resulted in
the idea of international cooperation, which has been previously discussed by Woodrow
Wilson, a previous president.
One major idea was recreating an organization that could maintain this goal,
which was later known as the United Nations. The forerunner of the U.N. were the
League of Nations, which had a similar concept but was unsuccessful seeing it could
not prevent World War 2. One of the major issues the League of Nations had was the
fact that they were powerless, and couldnt enforce much. Although there were many
successes, the powerlessness affected their ability to act to situations and maintain
peace. One example was in 1920, Vilna (the capital of Lithuania) was invaded by
Poland and even when the Lithuanians asked for help from the League of Nations, they
couldnt persuade the poles, so they won by force. However, what was different about
the United Nations is it became very involved and was a lot more organized with 51
nations joined once founded in October 24, 1945 compared to only the 5 major nations

for the League. Also, the U.N. had a peacekeeping army known as the peacekeepers
and was divided into 6 different parts handling the main topics of issue such as: the
General Assembly, Security Council, ECOSOC (Economic and Social Council), the
Secretariat, the International Court of Justice, and United Nations Trusteeship Council.
With this setup and prepared organization, the United Nations soon became very
successful. (un.org, nations encyclopedia, history learning site, and wikipedia)
Another idea that was set into play was at a United Nations conference about the
topic of trade and employment. The original meeting was to discuss about creating an
organization from a group of governments called the International Trade Organization.
However, there was a failure to organize these governments in charge of this
organization so the GATT (General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade) was created, which
was a multilateral agreement that regulated international trade. This was officially signed
by 23 nations on October 30, 1947 and was in effect on January 1, 1948. This worked
successfully for 46 years until a new organization was created and signed by 123
nations on April 14, 1994. This organization was then declared the World Trade
Organization (WTO). The main reasoning behind this idea was to prevent further
decreasing economies such as the one experienced from the Great Depression. This
agreement and organization were significant in maintaining this goal was because the
economy was very dependent of tariffs and trade, and by agreeing to regulate will
continue the growth of worldwide economies. (gatt.org, wto.org, wikipedia, and
sunysuffolk)
World War 2 played a significant role in the development and creations of many
viable technologies and such, and although it was the bloodiest war in the history of

mankind while being almost the end of the world, it taught humanity many important
morales as well as the new idea of international cooperation. With the changes in
technology and political views, WW2 has now become one of the building blocks that
humanity has grown off of and evolved into a more cooperative species, that learns
from our pasts and applies it to the betterment of mankind.
Bibliography
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n.d. Web. 02 Feb. 2015.
Hickman, Kennedy. "Causes of World War II." About.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Feb. 2015.
"Result and Effects of World War II." Results and Effects of World War II. N.p., n.d.
Web. 07 Feb. 2015.
"Social Effects of the War - Boundless Open Textbook." Boundless. N.p., 14 Nov. 2014.
Web. 07 Feb. 2015.
"World War II." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 7 Feb. 2015. Web. 7 Feb. 2015.