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World War II Achievement “A wonderfully readable guide. Catherwood leads us through complex events with remarkable sure footedness.” Alexander McCall Smith Christopher Catherwood “Erudite, incisive and well-balanced, this is a signal II War World achievement. It strikes an informative, educational tone that both newcomers and veterans will find embracing.” Ashley Jackson – Professor of Military History, King’s College London World “Recommended. This book provides the why, when, and how of the conflict, and explains how people’s lives today have been shaped by the most convulsive event in history.” Hugh Bicheno – historian and bestselling author of Razor’s Edge With over sixty million casualties World War II was the War bloodiest conflict in history. In this incisive introduction, Christopher Catherwood covers all the key battles, while giving the wider story behind them. He also brings a fresh angle to the conflict, emphasising the huge impact of the preceding Sino- Japanese War on World War II and the relative unimportance of the British campaign in Africa. II From the impact of the Hiroshima bombing to the horrors wreaked by the Red Army and the Nazis, Catherwood makes clear the legacy of the war today. Full of text-boxes revealing Christopher Catherwood key details about intelligence, weaponry, and the social milieu of the conflict, there is no better brief introduction. Christopher Catherwood is a writer and historian based in Cambridge. He has taught at the University of Cambridge and the University of Richmond, Virginia. An expert on Winston Churchill, his previous books include the bestseller Winston’s Folly. “Insightful and informative, Oneworld’s Beginner’s Guides series makes mind-boggling concepts simple.” Christina Borg – The Sunday Times ONEWORLD Beginner’s Guides UK £9.99 US $14.99 HISTORY www.oneworld-publications.com Cover: vaguelymemorable.com; Image © Corbis GUIDES World War II A Beginner’s Guide ONEWORLD BEGINNER’S GUIDES combine an original, inventive, and engaging approach with expert analysis. Innovative and affordable, books in the series are per- fect for anyone curious about the way the world works and the big ideas of our time. aesthetics engineering modern slavery africa the english civil wars NATO american politics the enlightenment the new testament anarchism epistemology nietzsche animal behaviour the european union the northern ireland conflict anthropology evolution nutrition anti-capitalism evolutionary psychology oil aquinas existentialism opera art fair trade the palestine–israeli conflict artificial intelligence feminism particle physics the baha’i faith forensic science paul the beat generation french literature philosophy the bible the french revolution philosophy of mind biodiversity genetics philosophy of religion bioterror & biowarfare global terrorism philosophy of science the brain hinduism planet earth british politics the history of medicine postmodernism the Buddha history of science psychology cancer homer quantum physics censorship humanism the qur’an christianity huxley racism civil liberties international relations reductionism classical music iran religion climate change islamic philosophy renaissance art cloning the islamic veil the roman empire the cold war journalism the russian revolution conservation judaism shakespeare crimes against humanity lacan the small arms trade criminal psychology life in the universe sufism critical thinking literary theory the torah daoism machiavelli the united nations democracy mafia & organized crime volcanoes descartes magic dewey marx dyslexia medieval philosophy energy the middle east World War II A Beginner’s Guide Christopher Catherwood A Oneworld Paperback Published by Oneworld Publications, 2014 Copyright © Christopher Catherwood 2014 The right of Christopher Catherwood to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved Copyright under Berne Convention A CIP record for this title is available from the British Library ISBN 978-1-78074-510-7 eISBN 978-1-78074-511-4 Typeset by Siliconchips Services Ltd, UK Printed and bound by Norhaven A/S, Denmark Oneworld Publications 10 Bloomsbury Street London WC1B 3SR England Stay up to date with the latest books, special offers, and exclusive content from Oneworld with our monthly newsletter Sign up on our website www.oneworld-publications.com To Woodall Okuykendall Berry Jr and Lacy Foster Paulette Jr veterans of World War II and to their wonderful niece, my wife Paulette Contents Introduction ix 1 The Origins of War and the Great Betrayal 1 2 Wars in Faraway Places: The War in China and in Europe 1937–40 25 3 The Hinge of War: Britain Surviving May 1940–December 1941 39 4 The Eastern Front 1941–3 66 5 The Asian and Pacific War 1941–3 93 6 The Grand Alliance: The UK and USA 1941–3 107 7 The Path to Berlin 1944–5 134 8 The War in Asia and the Pacific 1943–5 154 Conclusion 176 Selective Chronology 178 viii Contents Further Reading 182 Acknowledgements 187 Index 191 Introduction Imagine eighty million people. That is the latest agreed figure for the total number of deaths in World War II, from sources such as the Public Broadcasting Service in the USA and British writers such as Anthony Beevor. It is far higher than the originally agreed death toll of 55 million. Whichever way one looks, it is an extraordinary figure as it repre- sents far more people than most nations today have people living in them. The United Kingdom has 63 million inhabitants and the biggest US state, California, has 38 million. As the Netherlands has around 17 million inhabitants, the new consensus death count is the populations of the United Kingdom and the Neth- erlands combined, or just over twice the number of Califor- nians. So imagine if all the British and Dutch were killed or if an earthquake wiped out the whole West Coast of the USA and Canada. And that would only approximate to the death toll of World War II. We are familiar with some statistics, including that of the near six million Jews wiped out in the Holocaust. But some of the even greater genocides from the war may not be so famil- iar. Twenty-seven million Soviet citizens were wiped out in the four years 1941–5, and a full fifteen to seventeen million of those were civilian non-combatants. A fifth of the entire Soviet state of Belarus lost their lives. At least twenty million Chinese were killed and over six million Poles. Of the belligerent nations, the Japanese lost at least three million and perhaps as many as nine million ethnic Germans were killed. x Introduction But then compare the two main English-speaking partici- pants, the United States and the United Kingdom, for which figures are probably more reliable. Some 418,000 Americans died, all but 1,700 being military. For Britain, the most recent count is 383,000 combat deaths and around 67,000 civilians who died in bombing raids and similar attacks. When we think of the war, what picture comes to mind? Is it the Blitz in London? The story of how brave American troops landed in Normandy on D-Day? Both these images are wholly legitimate and probably an accurate representation of how two English-speaking nations experienced the conflict. The death toll puts the carnage of the war into a very differ- ent perspective from the one familiar in Western countries. Four- teen percent of all Soviet citizens died, and 0.32% of Americans. Television documentaries, such as those by Laurence Rees, have begun to show the war in its true light. However, for many of us this perspective will be wholly new. It is to explain the more recent revised way of thinking about World War II that is the main purpose of this book. Furthermore, it is, as the title states, a Beginner’s Guide. One of the most widely used university textbooks is Gerhard Weinberg’s A World at Arms. It is a definitive work. It is also 1,178 pages long. To use a culinary example, it is a main course book. What we have in this book, therefore, is an appetiser, something to stimulate inter- est in World War II for non-specialists. By this I mean the keen amateurs who have not read the arcane expert literature, but who want a basic introduction on the foundation of which they can then dig deeper. It is inevitable that in so short a book much has to be left out. This is a bird’s-eye view of the war, written with the hope that someone wanting to know much more about particular details will now be inspired to follow up in depth about matters that could only be skirted over here. A Further Reading section is provided for this purpose. Introduction xi Just to take two examples of what this book will consider: when did the war begin and what proportion of German troops fought the Allies in Western Europe as opposed to the conflict with the USSR on the Eastern Front? It is said that a British actor realised that he needed to return home to the UK from Hollywood when his school-age daughter told him that World War II began in 1941. Of course, if you are American, then 1941 is the correct date of entry into the war – but for the British war broke out on 3 September 1939, over two years earlier. However, that is an English-speaking perspective. For the USSR the war also began in 1941. The surprise twist comes in that for the Chinese, 1937 is actually a far more logical place to begin, a whole four years and more before Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. Therefore, as we shall see, when war began is itself an issue for debate. Second, British people can be condescending – sometimes with good historical reason – about the Hollywood version of the past.
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