[Author’s Name]
[Institution’s Name]
Essay on Causes of World War 2
World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global military conflict that took place between 1939 and 1945. It was the largest and deadliest war in history, culminating with the dropping of the atomic bomb. The Allied Powers, led by Britain, the Soviet Union (which did not join till 1941), and the United States (1941), defeated the Axis Powers, led by Germany, Italy, and Japan. The war was fought in response to the expansionist and racist aggression of Nazi Germany under the dictator Adolph Hitler and the imperial ambitions of Japan in Asia. It is possible that around 62 million people, or 2% of the world population, died in the war; estimates vary greatly. (Noah Adams, Robert Siegel) About 60% of all casualties were civilians, who died as a result of disease, starvation, genocide (in particular, the Holocaust), massacres, and aerial bombing.
After World War II, Europe was informally split into Western and Soviet spheres of influence. There was a shift in power from Western Europe and the British Empire to the two new superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union. In Asia, the defeat of Japan led to its democratization. China's civil war continued through and after the war, resulting eventually in the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The former colonies of the European powers began their road to independence.
The real cause of World War II was Stalin and his USSR. Because Stalin was ultimately forced to fight on the same side as the democratic capitalist societies he hated, many people fail to acknowledge that Stalin and Hitler were first allies against the West, and Stalin and Japan were non-belligerents with respect to each other. Germany and Japan's expansionist policies to the extent they conflicted with capitalist Western interests......
