Figure 9: The War in India
The British and French Empires began supplying soldiers, money and raw materials for the Allied war effort. The only Free France that remained was in tropical Africa. The British Empire supplied material (both raw materials but also industrial goods from India), money and men–with the contributions largely written out of popular accounts of the war and general memories associated with it. Soldiers from British Africa were instrumental in pushing back Japanese attacks in Southeast Asia. British India had 2.5 million men in the armed services fighting, present from the fall of France to the end of the war. The disruption and inflation associated with war caused famine in Bengal, with the British government refusing to provide food relief from elsewhere, leading to the death of millions of Bengalis. Captured French and British African soldiers were given less food and treated harsher than their European counterparts. The contributions were costly-now the British were indebted to their colonies (especially India), the French and Dutch needed to reconquer their colonies, promises of independence were made to India and other African and Asians used the training, ideology (through its extreme actions, Nazisim discredited the foundation of imperial rule) and transnational connections they made to advocate for their own independence at the same time that the British, French and Dutch needed the dollar-earning potential of their colonies raw material exports greater than ever.
By 1941 the Nazi leadership had already considered four distinct versions of the final solution. The Lublin plan for a reservation in eastern Poland failed by November 1939 because the General Government was too close and too complicated. The Soviet plan failed because Stalin was not interested in Jewish emigration; the Madagascar plan by 1940 because first Poland and then Britain fought instead of cooperation and now the coercive Soviet plain by November 1941 because the Germans had not destroyed the Soviet state. The invasion of the USSR exacerbated the Jewish problem. About 5 million Jews now lived under German rule.
Lists of Jews were used by the incoming Germans and local guides were needed to help locate and kill the Jewish people throughout Eastern Europe and many Ukrainians, Poles and others joined the German Einsatzgruppen in the killing process, thus becoming instrumental to the genocide. Blaming the Jewish population for the spread of communism and for any local resistance, huge numbers of Jewish people were executed throughout Eastern Europe. Nearly half of the nearly 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust were murdered east of the Molotov-Ribbentrop line, usually by bullets sometimes by gas. Most of those killed were men. A million Jews were killed in the second half of 1941, in the first six months of the German occupation and another million were killed in 1942. In Latvia, 27,500 from Riga, the capital, were killed in three days as they were marched into the local woods, pits were dug and Germans and Latvians shot the victims in the back of the head. Another 3,000 were killed from November 7-9, including little children who needed to be held up while being shot and infants who were simply tossed into the mass grave. Outside of Kiev, 33,771 Jews were shot in a similar three day span; this time machine-gunned at close range, falling into a pit of dead bodies. In Lithuania, between 50,000 and 60,000 Jews were quickly killed. In other countries, such as France and the Netherlands, the Germans realized that the local Jewish population could not be simply killed in local ditches or forests and a solution was needed was more efficient and better for German morale.
Figure 5: A Crashed Plane in the Eastern Front
Within three weeks of the war, Russia had lost around 2 million men, 3,500 tanks, and over 6,000 aircraft. On 10 July, German Panzers renewed their advance on the gateway to Moscow and Smolensk fell six days later. The Germans broke through to take another 300,000 Red Army prisoners, 3,000 guns and 3,000 tanks. s However continued resistance from the Soviet forces temporarily sapped their momentum. The soviet army had almost been obliterated when Hitler differed with the Nazi high command, diverting supplies and men to the invasion of the southern countryside. His aim was to seize the grain and oil of the south. Stalin was faced with the German seizure of the western territory of the USSR and a giant encirclement in the south that threatened the major cities and armies. He devised draconian measures to terrorize his men into fighting. In the first week, he approved NKGB Order No 246 which proposed the destruction of the families of men who had retreated from battle, thus endangering the lives of millions of innocent soldiers, and Stalin.
Upon invading the USSR, the Germans lacked a contingency plan for failure. The troops had sensed that something was wrong. No one had given them any winter coats, and the night watchers were getting cold. But how could the German population be told that the invasion had failed? Nazi leadership could not admit that the war was going badly. According to Hitler and his top aides, then German civilians were to be spared of any negative consequences of the invasion; lest, the grumbling of stomachs could lead to the grumbling of citizens. Hitler failed to account for the size of the Soviet Union, failed to develop a coherent strategy and the goals of the invasion constantly shifted, with different regions given priority and the overall goal changing from defeated Soviet forces to seizing territory.
The Germans shot and killed half a million Soviet prisoners of war. By way of starvation or mistreatment, they killed about 2.6 million more. In total, 3.1 million Soviet prisoners of war were killed. Killing that much number of people did not weaken the Soviet state. The policies of starvation and screening stiffened the resistance of the Red army. The soldiers knew that they would starve in agony as German captives. Despite the attempts to keep the German civilians in the dark about the progress of the war, rumors of the stalled offensive in the East began to reach Germany. The German advance stalled. The Soviets pushed the Germans back in Moscow, Leningrad, and Stalingrad. The Soviet strategy of out-bleeding the German army by throwing millions of under-equipped and ill trained soldiers at the German army seemed to work. , In addition, the American supplies helped bolder the Soviet army. Capable military commanders were promoted to the top-ranks as the Soviet industry began to eventually supply the army with the much needed equipment such as new tanks.
The Germans shot over 500,000 Soviet prisoners of war. By way of starvation or mistreatment they killed about 2.6 million more. In all, maybe 3.1 million Soviet prisoners of war were killed. Killing such people did not weaken the Soviet state. The policies of starvation and screening stiffened the resistance of the Red army. The soldiers knew that they would starve in agony as German captives. However, rumors of a stalled offensive in the East began to reach Germany. The German advance stalled. The Soviets pushed the Germans back at Moscow. Leningrad. Stalingrad. The Soviet strategy of out-bleeding the German army by throwing millions of under-equipped and ill trained soldiers at the German army seemed to work, American supplies helped, capable military commanders were promoted to the top-ranks, Soviet industry began to eventually supply the army (develop new tanks).
Figure 10: The Japanese Empire
End of the War
Figure 11: Bombed European Cities
Simultaneously on the Eastern Front the Russians commenced their summer offensive on June 9th and by July 20th had reached the eastern borders of Poland.
The Americans and British invaded France and opened up a Western Front against Germany. On the 6th June, the Americans landed 57,500 troops with losses of 6000 men and the British together with Canadians landed 75,200 with losses of 4,300. The Americans landed on the west end of the beaches in areas code named Utah and Omaha and in spite of heavy losses had taken the port of Cherbourg by June 27th. By the end of 1944, the British, Canadians and Americans have retaken all of German occupied Western Europe up to the Rhine River. On the Eastern Front, the Russians advanced through Poland much quicker than anticipated, pausing only to let the Germans deal with an uprising in Warsaw, killing, raping and plundering as they moved forward.
On the Eastern Front the Russians are as far west as Warsaw, the capital of Poland and Hungary Budapest. However they had shown their true intent in Warsaw during August when the city inhabitants rose up against the Germans on the understanding that the Russians, only a few miles away, would support them. The Russians preferred to watch as the Poles were massacred by the Germans which would make it easier for the Russians to suppress rather than liberate the Poles a few months later.
One survivor of the war in the East remembered: “My family had to leave immediately taking only what they could carry. The whole town was in utter chaos with huge crowds of civilians and wounded trying to get onto the trains going west. The Allied bombers and fighters had complete control of the skies and shot up civilians and sank ships loaded with refugees fleeing the Russian onslaught, death was all around. Many people committed suicide, often poisoning their children so that the Russians would not capture them alive – the Russians were not at all worried about the age of females whom they gang raped. My mother was completely split up from her family – as it turned out all fled west into Vorpommern (western Pomerania) to Stettin and then further into the countryside.”
As both fronts closed on the Germany, Churchill wanted to beat the Soviets (Russians) to the German capital because he feared (quite rightly as it turned out) that the Russians would stay there as occupiers not liberators. However, he was overruled by the American President and his team who in spite of all the Russian atrocities still trusted them. With total defeat imminent and the Russians close to Berlin, the Germans surrendered to Americans on April 18th with Hitler committing suicide April 30th.
Crossing the Rhine for the final attack through Germany was no easy task and the necessary bridges were not taken until the end of March ’45 by which time the Russians had already taken some towns in the east of Germany and were only some 50 miles from Berlin which is in the East of Germany. Churchill had wanted to beat the Soviets (Russians) to the German capital because he feared (quite rightly as it turned out) that the Russians would stay there as occupiers not liberators. However he was overruled by the American President and his team who in spite of all the Russian atrocities still trusted them. The British, Canadian and American armies were instructed to ensure crucial areas like the industrial Ruhr in Germany was firmly in Allied hands. When the Germans guessed this plan some 2 million German civilians and army deserters fled the east of Germany (mainly by foot) to give themselves up to the English or Americans whom they realized they could trust to treat them humanely.
In Asia the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki led to an immediate end to the war in the Pacific. Ever since historians have debates the need for the bomb and whether the goal was to end the war as quickly as possible or to scare the Soviets (or a combination of both). However, the Japanese surrendered on August 12 and World War Two officially ended.
The statement of the Emperor of Japan to the Japanese people: Despite the best that has been done by every one – the gallant fighting of military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of Our servants of the State and the devoted service of Our one hundred million people, the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage, while the general trends of the world have all turned against her interest. Moreover, the enemy now possesses a new and terrible weapon with the power to destroy many innocent lives and do incalculable damage. Should we continue to fight, not only would it result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization. Such being the case, how are we to save the millions of our subjects, or to atone ourselves before the hallowed spirits of our imperial ancestors? This is the reason why we have ordered the acceptance of the provisions of the joint declaration of the powers.
The American Invasion of Japan
After a bombing and firebombing campaigns of many Japanese cities and preparing to invade Japan, the United States dropped the atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki between August 6 and August 9. The bombs wrecked both cities and killed between 129,000 and 226,000 people, most of whom were civilians. After meeting with his family on August 12, the Japanese Emperor surrendered on August 14.
In surrendering, the Emperor stated: “Despite the best that has been done by every one – the gallant fighting of military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of Our servants of the State and the devoted service of Our one hundred million people, the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage, while the general trends of the world have all turned against her interest. Moreover, the enemy now possesses a new and terrible weapon with the power to destroy many innocent lives and do incalculable damage. Should we continue to fight, not only would it result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization.Such being the case, how are we to save the millions of our subjects, or to atone ourselves before the hallowed spirits of our imperial ancestors? This is the reason why we have ordered the acceptance of the provisions of the joint declaration of the powers.”
The decision has developed into a historical debate over the motivations and need to drop the bomb. Those in favor of its use highlight the projected large numbers of casualties of the prolonged war and invasion of Japan, including at least 250,000 American soldiers and even more Japanese civilians. Thus, the quick conclusion of the war saved lives. In contrast, others highlight the high civilian death toll of the bomb and immorality of the bombings.In fact, that the Japanese empire was on the verge of collapse; thus, other possible alternatives would be enough to win the war.
Furthermore, the opponents argue that the bombings were anchored on the wrong premise. Truman’s new Cold War concern-that the bomb was intended to scare the Soviets-was not a reason enough to use these dangerous devices on the Japanese population.
The official figure is some 50 million people killed. The Soviets suffered at least 20 million war dead and of the 3 million prisoners of war taken by the Soviets, more than one-third died in captivity. Later, tens of thousands of Axis prisoners died on forced marches across the vast Soviet and east European landscape with thousands of other refugees dying as Germans throughout Eastern Europe fled back to Germany.
Still, for those fighting Germany or Japan, the end of the European war was a reason for celebration.
Mollie Panter-Downes, an English novelist wrote about the end of the war: “When the day finally came, it was like no other day that anyone can remember. It had a flavor of its own, an extemporaneousness which gave it something of the quality of a vast, happy village fete as people wandered about, sat, sang, and slept against a slimmer background of trees, grass, flowers, and water…Apparently the desire to assist in London’s celebration combusted spontaneously in the bosom of every member of every family, from the smallest babies, with their hair done up in red-white-and-blue ribbons, to beaming elderly couples who, utterly without self-consciousness, strolled up and down the streets arm in arm in red-white-and-blue paper hats. Even the dogs wore immense tricolored bows…The bells had begun to peal and, after the night’s storm, London was having that perfect, hot, English summer’s day which, one sometimes feels, is to be found only in the imaginations of the lyric poets.”
Conclusion
Following the end of the Second World War, the majority of the people throughout , and particularly the working class and returning servicemen and women, did not want a return to pre-war policies. The rebuilding of Europe, that had fought two civilization-ally defining wars in twenty years, change was needed. European countries were no longer the global powers that they once were; they were now eclipsed by the United States and Soviet Union. To prevent war and maximize its power, European countries would need to work together in order to survive. Conservative economic policies, which they blamed for the hardship of the 1930s, and there was a mood for widespread social change and fascist leaders would not no role in the rebuilding process. In the United Kingdom, At the 1945 general election, to the surprise of many observers, Winston Churchill was defeated by the Labour Party headed by Clement Attlee. The change had begun.
