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The conscription of 12 million men into the military is the only reason for the drop in unemployment.

Conscription began in 1940 (the first peacetime draft in U.S. history). By that time the unemployment rate had already been cut to less than half what it had been at its peak.

Furthermore, there's no reason this should be surprising. Standard macroeconomic theory holds that, other things being equal, government deficits will produce an increase in aggregate demand, which will tend to reduce unemployment (but promote inflation). It was my impression that even the Chicago School monetarists had come around to acknowledging some role for fiscal policy. Government spending, taxes, and deficits do matter.

BfloGuy attributes the improvement to citizens' own efforts. Obviously that was part of it. If that were the sole explanation, though, you'd have to ask why it didn't occur earlier (such as under Hoover). Conservative Coulter Fan criticizes Hoover for trying to keep wages propped up, but Roosevelt did the same thing through the National Recovery Administration and then through the Wagner Act.

I know that "post hoc ergo propter hoc" is considered a fallacy, but sometimes an earlier event does cause a later one. Roosevelt got into office, discarded his own campaign rhetoric, instituted policies that were denounced as "socialism" by Republicans, and saw unemployment plunge as a result. If the change in policies didn't cause the plunge, what did?