This thread seems densely populated with the rights and wrongs of WW II. I mean, after all, it is a WW II thread so it
is to be expected... Here are my views on the topic and I'm focusing mainly on why WW II actually started. I'm
pretty bad with dates but I hope I get my facts right at least...
Firstly historians will aruge that WW II is a product of WW I. Why? The treaty of versailles was simply too unfair to
the germans. They were an oppressed people, to sum it up. They couldn't have a decent defence and was made to bear
heavy debts among other things. Unemployment and the feeling of dissatisfaction with their "weak government"
grew. Then up came Hitler with his wild promises. Whats more, he actually fulfilled them. You could say Hitler was a
genius;a mad one, but a genius nevertheless... Whats more, he blatantly broke the treaty of versailles and none of the
countries supposed to see to the upholding of the treaty actually cared. Most were sympathetic about germany's
state of affairs and justified Hitler's action by pointing to it. This made Hitler bolder and bolder, leading,
eventually, to WW II as we know it.
In retrospect, you could say that WW II was a result of a combination of many mistakes. The first would, of course, be
the treay of Versailles. It punished the germans too harshly and it made them start another war. The Americans
apparently learnt from this and did the opposite with Japan after WW II. They helped with the rebuilding of Japan
instead of penalizing them. I don't think the Japanese have started a war till now, am I right? You can say that
the germans were a desperate people when Hitler came and his ideals drove germany to war. Desperation makes people grasp
at straws, even something as vague as "the perfect race", to give them renewed hope... The second mistake was
having a weak "overseer" among the nations, though overseer is used for want of a better word... Hitler
blatantly broke the Versailles treaty and though it sounds very nice in saying they were sympathetic, they were just too
tied up with their own problems to care. Besides, they saw that Germany would then be able to repay her debts if she got
rich, so they didn't stop Hitler from amassing military might (which incidentally led to economic growth as it
provided jobs). I'm pretty sure WW II could have been stopped from spiraling into such a big mess at many points.
Another thing I would like to mention about the war was the fact that America did not in fact join the war till very
late. At first, the American sentiment towards the war was that it was "not their business". American was a
huge power at that time and the war would have ended far earlier and not gone into such a state if they would agree to
join the war earlier. Its kinda sad they saw it as "Europe's war" and "Asia's War". The
thing that woke them up to the fact that the war did involve the world was Pearl Harbour, which is a great mistake by
the Japanese. It can still be debated whether America will simply watch if they didn't get attacked. I don't
blame America for this though since it is true that nations all over the world would care for their own interests first.
Another fact is that the second bomb dropped on Nagasaki wasn't meant for Nagasaki. It was meant for a military
base to the north. Reasons for the switch were things like "bad weather" though... However, it can still be
mantained that the second bomb wasn't actually necessary. After the first bomb went off, the Japanese were a
defeated people. Their head wasn't stuffed with enough pride to make them want to go up against the sheer might of
the A bombs... So though the first bomb might have helped to stop the war more quickly and prevent deaths, the second
simply increased the death toll.
One more thing I would say is it kinda benefitted the Southeast Asian countries was that it brought an end to colonnial
rule to this part of the world. It was accepted back then that Caucasians were superior and it was indeed so in terms of
military might and modernity. It was Japan's humiliating defeat of these so-called "superior" powers that
probably ended the era of colonnial rule.
