After 50 years, World War II still looms large in contemporary thought as a great crusade which kept the world free from the tyranny of the Axis Powers. How the Allied Powers managed to forge their victory, and defeat the enemy, is an oft-told story which has changed little since 1945 when the first memoirs and histories began to appear. Now, in this original and provocative book, H.P. Willmott offers a fresh examination of the two concurrent conflicts that led up to war. Interweaving episodes from the European and Far East theater chronologically, Willmott narrates the entire course of the conflict from the earliest Japanese and Italian battles of the thirties through the fall of Berlin and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Challenging traditional perceptions of the belligerents and their battles, Willmott places them in the broader context of political, diplomatic and economic struggles that extended from the Versailles Treaty of 1919 into the third quarter of the 20th century. The Great Crusade takes issue with commonly held notions about the war offering new interpretations of major campaigns and individuals and a striking comparison between the American Civil War and the Pacific wars. It argues and debunks the myth of German military superiority.