World War II was nothing if not complex, with combat on three continents and on
land, at sea and in the air. However, the conflict did have an almost elegant simplicity in
its essential course and structure. The conflicts in Europe and Asia were separate wars,
though they influenced each other critically, even decisively, at times. For the leading
example of the latter, Japan’s desperately ill-judged gamble in attacking the US Navy at
Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 triggered Hitler’s gratuitous declaration of war on the
United States four days later. It is true that he had promised Tokyo that he would take
that step should Japan go to war with the United States, but since when were political
promises sacred to the Führer? It is a revealing fact that the wars in Europe and Asia can
be treated as distinct, albeit connected, phenomena. The two contests were gigantic siege
operations. The war against Germany was continental, the one against Japan maritime,
and both were increasingly prosecuted in the air.
Germany’s territorial imperium expanded for three years; there was a period of
equilibrium; and then it contracted for two years. If the interwar years divide neatly
into two distinctive periods, so does the war in Europe. From September 1939 until July
1943, Germany held the initiative and the Third Reich expanded to the point where nearly
all of continental Europe, from the Pyrenees to the Volga, was either conquered or
dominated. The advance was halted in November 1942; and after July 1943 the Germans
were forced back. Thereafter, the military narrative of Germany’s war was one of
irregular, but inexorable, retreat. It would be an exaggeration to claim that Stalingrad
and Kursk were the decisive battles of the war, the battles which decided the ultimate
outcome, but there can be no doubt that they serve as two of the clearest markers in all of
military history of a definitive shift of strategic fortune and momentum. Following, first,
the encirclement of the German Sixth Army on the Volga between 19 and 23 November
1942 and its formal surrender on 31 January 1943, and, second, the defeat of the great
armoured offensive at Kursk between 5 and 16 July 1943, German soldiers were going
nowhere other than home, if they were fortunate.
There can be no doubt that Hitler passed what one might call ‘the Clausewitz test’ with
flying colours in 1939. As On Warinsists, ‘The first, the supreme, the most far-reaching
act of judgement that the statesman and commander have to make is to establish by
that test [of a war as an instrument of policy] the kind of war on which they are
embarking, neither mistaking it for, nor trying to turn it into, something that is alien to
its nature’ (Clausewitz, 1976: 8 9). When Hitler invaded Poland on 1 September 1939,
he knew that he was embarking upon his long-visualized and intended bid for world
conquest. Although he would act opportunistically, improvise when necessary, and react
to surprising events, his course was set and his goal was fixed. He would have only one
chance in his lifetime to realize his dream of a racially pure Germanic empire. It was
a case of victory or destruction. Should Germany fail, its bloodied and vengeful victims
would neither be merciful in victory nor leave Germany in any condition to make a
second attempt. There would be no repeat of the peace settlement of 1919.
Historians have debated whether Hitler planned a series of short wars, with victory in
each strengthening the Reich for the next encounter, or whether he anticipated a single,
great, protracted conflict. Naturally, he preferred the former, but strategic history dealt
him the latter. Ever alert to the lessons of 1914–1 8 , for a while he met with success
in avoiding the enervating problems of war on more than one front at a time. He was
surprised, but not alarmed, by the decision of Britain and France to declare war over
World War II in Europe, I 127