Abstract

This year marks the seventieth anniversary of the end of the Sec-ond World War. On May 8th, Nazi Germany surrendered to the Allied Powers in Europe. On September 2nd, Imperial Japan sur-rendered to the Allies on the deck of the U.S.S. Missouri in Tokyo Bay, thus ending a global conflict that is estimated to have cost the lives of upwards of 50 million people.

In autumn of 1945, everyone was looking forward, finally, to a world at peace that could recover from the destruction of a cata-strophic war and move towards a bright new future. But what kind of world was it to be?

Nazism and fascism had been militarily and ideologically pul-verized in the conflict. No one wanted to goose-step to Hitler and Mussolini’s grandiose dreams of a world-ruling master race or a war-worshipping aggressive nationalism to which innocent hu-man beings were to be sacrificed.