Eighty years ago the scene is set for decisive struggles in the Pacific, Russia, the desert and over the future of India

US forces seized an airfield newly constructed by the Japanese at the southwesterly limit of their expansion. It would have helped them dominate the Solomon Islands which lay astride access from the East to New Guinea which was being bitterly fought over. It was on a hitherto almost unknown island called Guadalcanal. The allied naval forces covering the landing almost immediately suffered a severe defeat in a night engagement, called the Battle of Savo Island, but the US Marines held on. More important, the US could afford to lose ships, whilst the Japanese could not. Savo Island was only the first of the many fights that gave the patch of the sea the nickname "Ironbottom Sound" from the number of ships that would be sunk there. After a series of set-piece naval fights, the Pacific War now featured a ferocious battle of sea, land and air attrition. German forces too a set a new south-easterly limit to the pentration of the USSR when they reached the city of Stalingrad whi