Eighty years ago the appeasement of Stalin continues

Britain might not have been able to satisfy Stalin's demands for military assistance by invading France, but it could continue to appease him domestically. The Communist Daily Worker newspaper had been banned for its ferevently anti-war stance during the period of the Ribbentrop/Molotov pact. Obedient to Moscow, the CPGB had swung in favour of the war after Barbarossa but the ban was not lifted. The Labour Party, notably Home Secretary Herbert Morrison, detested the Communists, but finally a campaign led by naive soviet supporters such as scientist  J.B.S Haldane and the Dean of Canterbury swung the Labour Party in favour of the Daily Worker. The ban was removed.

Helped by Ultra intelligence of German plans, the Eight Army under its new commander Bernard Montgomery, was able to hold off Rommel's last attempt to breakthrough into Egypt at the battle of Adam el Halfa. Montgomery deliberately lured Rommel's thrust into a gap in the south of his line but the Germans then encountered well-prepared British positions. British air superiority told against the Germans. An attack by New Zealanders against Italian positions in the north was a costly failure. Casulaties on both sides were comparable, but Rommel was running short of fuel and withdrew.

The Japanese foreign minister Shigenori Togo resigned in an obscure dispute over how the occupied territories were to be administered. He was an experienced professional diplomat and had opposed Japan's attack on the western nations. He was the last remaining civilian member of the cabinet and his removal symbolised Japan's doomed commitment to a military victory.