Читать книгу Silver Stars - Майкл Грант - Страница 7

1943.

Three great Axis powers: Germany, Italy, and Japan. Italy’s Benito Mussolini began as Hitler’s mentor, but after failure upon failure it has become clear that Mussolini’s Italy lacks the resources and the will to fight effectively. The war in Europe will be fought between the Allies and Germany, with Mussolini more a hindrance than a help.

For too long Britain stood alone while the Soviet Union’s paranoid dictator, Stalin, purged his own army and worked backroom deals with the Nazis to seize Finland and divide Poland. But in one of the great mistakes of history, Hitler attacked Stalin. The Soviet Union’s vast size, terrible winter, and the astonishing courage and endurance of its people have proven too much, even for the Wehrmacht.

And now, thanks to the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, the United States of America is in the fight, bringing staggering industrial might and a military that will, in just a few short years, go from being a negligible force of 334,000 to a 12 million strong juggernaut.

In the Pacific, the US Marines have survived a protracted living nightmare on Guadalcanal. Japanese expansion is halted. Australia and New Zealand are safe, but China, the Philippines, and Southeast Asia still bleed under brutal Japanese occupation.

In Europe, the Soviet Red Army has fought the German Wehrmacht to a halt at Stalingrad. Hitler’s mad order allowing no retreat will lead to the death of a third of a million Germans and the surrender of 91,000 more. The greatest tank battle in history will be fought at a place called Kursk, and by dint of sheer numbers and steely determination, the Soviet T-34 tanks will beat the German panzers back.

London is still struggling to recover from the Blitz, and now German cities cringe beneath falling bombs. In Poland, the Jews who had been herded into the ghetto to be starved to death rise up against their Nazi oppressors and, despite great heroism, are exterminated.

The Americans, British, British Commonwealth, and Free French forces have pushed the Nazis out of North Africa. Benito Mussolini is weakened and discredited but not yet destroyed.

No one is certain about the next objective, including the Allied leadership.

The Germans have been bloodied, but Nazi Germany is very far from beaten. And in places called Dachau, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, and Auschwitz, the killing gas still flows and the ovens still burn hot.