Why Did the Allies Win WW II?

There were three critical factors that led to the Allies’ defeat of Nazi Germany: (1) the superior air power of the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Force; (2) Russia’s heroic effort to hold the Nazis on the eastern front so the Allies could gather their forces for the D-Day invasion; and (3) America’s ability to out-produce Germany in the manufacture of war materiel. When the rest of Europe fell to the Nazi regime, Britain alone resisted Hitler’s attacks. The Royal Air Force defeated the German Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain and Hitler turned his eye to the east and Russia’s vast natural resources. Earlier, Hitler had cleverly bought Russia’s neutrality by negotiating a non-aggression treaty that resulted in Stalin invading eastern Poland after Germany attacked in the west. But in 1941, Hitler broke the treaty and invaded. Russia suffered millions of casualties on the eastern front, but was able to finally defeat the Germans. By the time America entered the war and geared up for wartime production, the Germans (and Japanese for that matter) simply could not keep up with America’s manufacture of planes, tanks, aircraft carriers, ammunition and arsenal. Three brutal and bloody years later, the Allied forces bombarded the Germans by air, invaded at Normandy and marched on to Berlin to meet the Russians.

Would World War II have ended sooner if the Soviets had allied with Britain and France from the beginning? Why or why not? How do you think the Soviets felt when they had to hold the eastern front for years, waiting for the invasion of Normandy?

Although Roosevelt did everything short of declaring war on Germany to aid the British, widespread isolationism in America kept us out of the war until the bombing of Pearl Harbor.  Do you think the US would have reacted differently in 1939 if it had been a member of the League of Nations?  If so, what would the US have done?