Contents
Page Introduction xi Chapter I. Germany and the Western Allies in the Autumn of 1944 (i) Germany 1 (ii) The Western Allies 15 Chapter II. Delay in Europe, October 1944-January 1945 (i) The Western Front and Italy 29 (ii) Developments in South-East Europe 40 (iii) The German Counter-Attack 64 Chapter III. Plans for Final Victory in Europe, January-February 1945 (i) Agreement on the Western Front and Italy 77 (ii) Relations with the Russians: Yalta 96 Chapter IV. Victory in Europe, February-May 1945 (i) The Western and Eastern Fronts, February-March 113 (ii) Victory in the South, April-May 117 (iii) Dresden or Berlin? 131 (iv) The Last Weeks 151 Chapter V. The Reconquest of Central Burma, October 1944-May 1945 (i) The Plan of Campaign and the System of Command 165 (ii) Operations to January 1945 174 (iii) The New Directive, and Operations to May 1945 185 Chapter VI. The Strategy for the Pacific, October 1944-June 1945 (i) The American Strategy 203 (ii) The Russian Rôle 211 (iii) The British Rôle 220 Chapter VII. Stage Two 237 Chapter VIII. The Strategy for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, June-August 1945 (i) South-East Asia: To Singapore and Beyond 247 (ii) Plans for the Invasion of Japan 257 Chapter IX. The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb (i) The Initial American Decision 275 (ii) The British Part in the Initial Decision 295 (iii) Potsdam and After: The Japanese Surrender 299 Chapter X. The Central Organization (i) The Organization in London 315 (ii) The Western Alliance 338 (iii) The Allied Commands 351 Index 409
Appendices
Maps
I. The Western Front in Europe, Autumn-Winter 1944 29 II. The Advance on Germany from South and East, October 1944-May 1945 130 III. The Advance on German from West and East, October 1944-May 1945 162 IV. The Reconquest of Central Burma 165 V. Burma and Malaya 167 VI. The Far East 312 End Papers Front: Festung Europa and the Japanese Position, October 1944   Rear: Combined Chiefs of Staff's Theatres, October 1944  
All plates are Crown Copyright, and have been selected with the help of the staff of the Imperial War Museum, where they are housed. Illustrations
Frontispiece: Mr. Churchill and Mr. Roosevelt
Plate I. Commanders on the Western Front 36 II. Mediterranean Commanders 56 III. The Yalta Conference 96 IV. Commanders in South-East Asia 176 V. Commanders in the Pacific 208 VI. The Potsdam Conference 260 VII. The Atomic Bomb 275 VIII. Mr. Churchill and The Chiefs of Staff's Committee 322 IX. The President and his Military Advisers 344
The last two years of the war, from August 1943 to August 1945, form a single period in the history of grand strategy, which may be called that of the strategic offensive. The design for Europe which emerged from the First Quebec Conference in August 1943, and the complementary limits to the Allied effort in the Far East, governed the plans for the next twelve months, and provided the background to developments in 1945. Ideally, therefore, the whole of the period should have been covered in one volume. But the weight and variety of the events make this difficult, if not impossible; and we have accordingly been obliged to divide the period into two parts, which form Volumes V and VI of this series. Introduction
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