World War II was the most lethal conflict in human history. Hanson examines how combat unfolded in the air, at sea, and on land to show how distinct conflicts among disparate combatants coalesced into one interconnected global war. He argues that despite its novel industrial barbarity, neither the war's origins nor its geography were unusual. Nor was its ultimate outcome surprising. "A definitive account of World War II by America's preeminent military...

Covers the long ideological conflict between the communist world and the Western democracies from the end of World War II to the collapse of communism in Europe in 1990.