this post was submitted on 09 Jan 2025
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PragerUrine (lemmy.ml)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

"More than 80% of all combat during the Second World War took place on the Eastern Front."

For a fantastic look into the history of fascism and Communism as bitter enemies, Blackshirts and Reds by Dr. Michael Parenti.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

Yes, the United States and the other Western Powers played a role in WWII. The Eastern Front had 80% of the total combat in WWII contained within it, however. The absolute scale is massively different and the price paid was extremely unequal. This was by design, however. Harry Truman gave the game away:

If we see that Germany is winning we ought to help Russia, and if Russia is winning we ought to help Germany, and that way let them kill as many as possible, although I don’t want to see Hitler victorious under any circumstances.

Essentially, the Western Powers hated both the Communists and the Nazis, and allied in a manner that involved the most bloodshed on the Eastern Front as possible. That being said, they didn't ally with the Nazis as the Nazis wanted to colonize Western Europe and the rest of the world, the West did not want to be subject to the same force of extraction they used to plunder the Global South, like the UK with India.

The West also realized that the Soviets had no intention of invading Western Europe, and thus the Soviets became the one deemed better to ally with in the end.