The British Empire and the Second World WarIn 1939 Hitler went to war not just with Great Britain; he also went to war with the whole of the British Empire, the greatest empire that there had ever been. In the years since 1945 that empire has disappeared, and the crucial fact that the British Empire fought together as a whole during the war has been forgotten. All the parts of the empire joined the struggle and were involved in it from the beginning, undergoing huge changes and sometimes suffering great losses as a result. The war in the desert, the defence of Malta and the Malayan campaign, and the contribution of the empire as a whole in terms of supplies, communications and troops, all reflect the strategic importance of Britain's imperial status. Men and women not only from Australia, New Zealand and India but from many parts of Africa and the Middle East all played their part. Winston Churchill saw the war throughout in imperial terms. The British Empire and the Second World War emphasises a central fact about the Second World War that is often forgotten. |
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... Maltese women washing clothes in the ruins of their homes , June 1942 7 The Gibraltar Defence Force man a 3.7 inch AA gun 8 The King's African Rifles collecting surrendered Italian arms , 1941 9 New Zealand members of the Long Range ...
... Malta to that of Hong Kong ; how the Battle of the Atlantic affected the defence of British Borneo ; and how German domination in Europe threatened the security of Australia and Malaya . It is not a campaign history , though it places ...
... Malta , a tiny but priceless launch - pad for operations against Axis forces and convoys in the Mediterranean , is also well known . The fall of Singapore remains perhaps the most widely remembered imperial feature of the Second World ...
... Malta and the war in the Western Desert is part of our apprecia- tion of the European and Mediterranean war , but it is equally valid to see them as the result of Britain's imperial status in the Middle East and the Far East . They are ...
... Malta , Singapore and Tobruk are familiar , but there were also imperial campaigns in Abyssinia , Borneo , Iran , Iraq , Java , Kenya , Mada- gascar , New Guinea , Iran , Somaliland , the Sudan , Sumatra and Syria . The Indian Ocean ...
Contents
1 | |
11 | |
21 | |
41 | |
5 The Atlantic | 53 |
6 The Caribbean | 77 |
7 The Mediterranean | 97 |
8 Iraq Iran and Syria | 145 |
11 The Islands of the Indian Ocean | 307 |
12 India and Burma | 351 |
13 SouthEast Asia and the Far East | 405 |
14 Australia and New Zealand | 463 |
15 The Pacific | 513 |
16 Epilogue | 525 |
Notes | 535 |
Bibliography | 561 |