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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... five battleships , two aircraft carriers , seventeen cruisers , twenty - eight destroyers , twenty - one submarines , four corvettes , five armed boarding vessels , nine escort trawlers , four whalers , two gunboats , seven minesweepers ...
... five German submarines were transferred from the Atlantic on Hitler's insistence and an air group was dispatched to Southern Italy and another to Sicily . Fliegerkorps X was transferred from Norway to solve the Maltese problem and seize ...
... five carriers and four modern battleships that formed the core of Admiral Nagumo's fleet which had raided Pearl Harbor . Four of Somerville's five battleships were of First World War vintage ( the ' R ' class vessels HMS Ramillies ...