[GZG] [OT] The myth of inevitable victory. (Was: [OT] Books (Weber/White/Meier) )

An excellent book on the hindsight-based myth of inevitable Allied  
victory in WW2 is the oddly-titled "Why The Allies Won" by Richard  
Overy.

I have never been a soldier, and I don't even play one on TV, so I'm  
in a poor position to comment on generalship on the battlefield. When  
it comes to the military and civil management of all the human and  
material resources needed to fight a modern war, I don't think	
there's much doubt that the Axis powers were comprehensively "out- 
generalled". There's a huge difference between potential resources  
and effective ones, and had the Allied powers used their resources as  
inefficiently as the Axis ones did theirs, the result could have been  
very different.

Just take a look at a map showing the territory (with its associated  
potential resources), controlled by the Axis powers at the end of  
1942. And ask yourself if any rational observer *at* *the* *time*  
would have regarded total Allied victory in less than three years as  
inevitable.

I'm with Atkinson on this. Resources don't guarantee victory; you  
have to fight effectively too.

Best regards, Robert Bryett

On 21/07/2008, at 14:46 , John Atkinson wrote:

> On 7/21/08, Richard Bell <rlbell.nsuid@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> In many ways the issue was never in doubt for WWII.	Once the USA was
>> involved, it was merely a matter of expending the resources.
>
> That is some serious 20/20 hindsight.

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