This three-session class will examine the military actions that took place in the Pacific Theater during World War II. The first class will focus on the road to war examining the rise of militarism in Japan, the Japanese incursion into China, the establishment of the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis and America's response to Japanese aggression through trade embargos and freezing of Japanese assets. The second class examines America's entry into a war with Japan, Japan's victories in 1941 and 1942, the establishment of the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere, and the crucial carrier battles of 1942. The last class will examine the turning of the tide in the Pacific and in Asia concentrating on the China-India-Burma theater, Admiral Nimitz's Central Pacific Island Campaigns, and General Douglas MacArthur's Southwest Pacific Campaign.