Question

Describe the causes for World War II and outline the progress of the war.

Argue what you think are the best reasons why the Allies won World War II, and the best explanations for the Axis defeat, using examples of strategy, specific operations, and technology.

Answer 1

Among the causes of World War II were, to a greater extent, Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party's political conquest of Germany in 1933 and its aggressive foreign policy, and to a lesser extent, Italian Fascism in the 1920s, and Japanese militarism accompanying China's 1930s invasion. The immediate cause was that on September 1, 1939 Germany invaded Poland, and on September 3, 1939, Britain and France declared war on Germany.

During the summer of 1939, when Nazi attentions turned to settle the "Polish Corridor Issue," Britain and France agreed to an alliance with Poland, threatening Germany with a two-front war. To their side, the Germans secretly split Eastern Europe into Nazi and Soviet spheres of influence by forming a non-aggression pact with them in August.

The Vichy regime signed an armistice after the fall of France in June 1940, which persuaded the Empire of Japan to join the Axis powers and occupy French Indochina to strengthen their military situation in their war with China. This prompted a response by the then neutral United States with an embargo. The Japanese government, whose aim was Japanese Asia-Pacific dominance, felt they had no choice but to strike the US Pacific fleet pre-emptively, which they did by bombing Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

Everywhere in 1942 British forces came close to defeat. Clearly unprepared for the enormous demands of total war, the American economy was a peacetime economy. The Soviet system was all but destroyed in 1941, taking two-thirds of its heavy industrial strength, and destroying its large air and tank armies. The German attackers believed that Soviet Communism was a corrupt and primitive structure that crashed, in the words of Goebbels "like a pack of cards."

Such assumptions were reinforced by the facts of how badly the Red Army fought in 1941. In six months, more than five million Soviet soldiers were captured or killed; they fought with incredible courage, but troops who were better armed, better trained and better led were outclassed at every stage of combat.

On the Eastern Front, the Soviet Union did not turn the tide on its own. Although the role of American and British Lend-Lease support has been played by Soviet historians for decades, its real importance has now been recognized. The Soviet war effort was supported by a flood of food and raw materials and construction equipment from 1942.

The dependence on American support reveals just how much the Allied war effort owed to the United States ' superior material and logistical capacity.Usually taken for granted the potential of the world's largest industrial economy to turn to mass weapons and war equipment production. Yet the transition from peace to war was so swift and successful that by maintaining a vast material supremacy, the US was able to compensate for the lag in developing adequately equipped armed forces.

Designed in late 1943, the long-range fighter made bombing more safe and provided the instrument to destroy the German air force over the Reich. The weakening effects on German air power also limited German aircraft's contribution to the Eastern Front, where Soviet air forces outnumbered German. Air power in Europe's success prompted American military leaders to seek the same way to end the war with Japan.

The May 1945 city bombings devastated a vast area of metropolitan Japan and paved the way for a surrender, completed with the fall in August 1945 of the two atomic bombs. The U.S. government and the public were also keen to avoid more heavy casualties here.

Air power offered a shortcut to victory in both theatres; British and American wartime casualties were a fraction of those suffered by Germany, Japan, and the Soviets, making it easier to convince democratic citizens to continue fighting even in times of crisis and stalemate.