From its causes to its aftermath, this book details in 200 mini-essays every key event of the war, including the rise of Hitler, the Dunkirk evacuation, The Battle of Britain, Pearl Harbor, Midway and Iwo Jima, the sieges of Leningrad and Stalingrad, the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, D-Day and the fall of Berlin, and much much more.

Covers all aspects of World War II: origins and politics; major battles; great leaders; weapons and technology; civilian life and atrocities; turning points and surrenders; and the reverberations of the war through history.

Illustrated with 200 contemporary photographs, images and maps.

Includes entries on: The Path to War; The Versailles Treaty; The Spanish Civil War; Mussolini and the rise of Fascism; Adolf Hitler, Winston Churchill, FDR and Joseph Stalin; The Sino-Japanese War; The Blitz; U-boat warfare and Enigma; The Desert War; Operation Barbarossa; The Battle of Moscow; Resistance and collaboration; The Final Solution; Colditz; Coral Sea and Guadalcanal; The Dambusters; The bombing of Dresden; Alamein; Kursk; Montgomery, Zhukov, Rommel and Eisenhower; Operation Overlord; The liberation of Paris; The battle of the Bulge; The Yalta Conference, The Berlin bunker; The battle for Okinawa; Kamikazes; The atomic bomb; Casualties of war; War crimes trials and The Cold War.