Allies Won

The opening line of historian Richard Overy's book Why the Allies Won is "why did the Allies win World War II?" It is a straightforward question, and yet one that is rarely posed with sufficient verve by scholars, students, or curious history buffs. That the Allies won is taken for granted due to the basic fact that history will be penned forever by the victors, or at least the perceived victors who control the discourse following the War. In reality, the Second World War was not necessarily "won" in the sense of definitive gains for England, the United States, and the Soviet Union, versus "lost" in the sense of measurable blows to Italy, Germany, and Japan. In fact, just laying it out on paper makes the concept of an Allied victory seem preposterous. Japan, Germany, and Italy have well moved on since the end of World War Two....
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