A concise, richly illustrated narrative of the war and the effect it had on human life and history In September 1939 Hitler's Nazi Germany invaded Poland, sparking international condemnation and declarations of war on Germany from France and most of the British Empire and Commonwealth. From that beginning, this pocket history traces one of the greatest wars in history. It discusses how World War II witnessed the mobilization of more than 100 million military personnel, "total war" on a scale that had not been previously experienced by any of the countries involved. It examines how the war eclipsed everything--industry, technology, the economy, and home life; and changed generations of people who grew up under the shadow of war. It also discusses the legacy of the deadliest conflict in human history, with its loss of 50 million and over 70 million people, and the only use of nuclear weapons in warfare to this day.
