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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... Fleet BR Burma Rifles BIA Burma Independence Army CAM Catapult Armed Merchant Ship CBME Combined Bureau Middle East CGA CIGS Ceylon Garrison Artillery Chief of the Imperial General Staff CLT Colonial and Locally Raised Troops CMF ...
... Fleet Air Arm , together with the air forces of America , the Dominions , India and other allies . Many international airports , including those in Bahrain , Ceylon , the Maldives , Malta and Mauritius , began life during the war as RAF ...
... fleets and squadrons that had historically policed the world , from the South Atlantic Station to the Mediterranean Fleet and from the China Station to the Eastern Fleet . All over the world imperial ports were used to the full by ...
... fleet would be available for dispatch to the Far East if Japan declared war . Unfortunately for the British , although Italy was being destroyed as a political and military power in Africa during the winter of 1940-41 , when chances of ...
... Fleet was kept at a strength that left the security of British possessions in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific fundamentally weakened . Singapore was there , but the battle fleet to operate from it did not exist . In the light of these ...
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 |