World War II

By the summer of 1940, World War II was raging. Much of Europe was in the hands of Nazi Germany. In the fall of 1940, the nation's first peacetime draft was enacted and the National Guard was called to active duty.

The draft and mobilization were to last for only one year, but in September 1941, the term of service for draftees and mobilized Guardsmen was extended. Three months later the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entered World War II.

All 18 National Guard divisions saw combat in World War II, and were split between the Pacific and European theatres. National Guardsmen fought from the beginning. Three National Guard units participated in the heroic defense of Bataan in the Philippines before finally surrendering to the Japanese in the spring of 1942. When the U.S. Marines needed reinforcements on Guadal Canal in the autumn of 1942, North Dakota's 164th Infantry became the first large body of U.S. Army troops to fight offensively in World War II. In the European theater, one National Guard division, the 34th from Minnesota, Iowa, and South Dakota, was the first to arrive overseas, and among the first into combat, in North Africa. The 34th went on to spend the rest of the war fighting in Italy, and claimed more actual combat days than any other World War II division.