Eighty years ago the debate opens on the shape of the post-war world

 

Britain and the US began to muse publicly about what the world might look like once the war was over. Churchill had started the ball rolling with a high-profile speech later published under the title "A Four Years Plan for Britain." It addressed international affairs with the idea of "a world institution embodying....the United Nations" and some association of continental European countries, a Council of Europe. At that stage the United Nations was simply the informal name for the military alliance around the big three powers. Whatever came about would rest on agreement between Britain, the USA and the USSR. Americans went one bettter with the suggestion of China as a fourth major component in the alliance received an airing, in practice as a counterweight to Britain in Roosevelt's vision of a decolonized post-war world. The debate also opened as to what Germany's status should be, whether the German people would be allowed the opportunutiy to redeem itself.

The US publicly announced its new wonder-weapon after it had been successfully deployed in North Africa. Christened the bazooka after a large brass musical instrument, which had been mentioned in a 1909 novel by P. G. Wodehouse. It gave unprecedented firepower to infantry. A hollow 60mm diameter tube light enough for one man to carry fired a rocket weighing about 1.5kg. It was capabale of destroying a tank. The general in charge of the launch presentation slightly undermined his case by describing a fight in which a bazooka was fired at six tanks, missing them all but supposedly so demoralizing their crews that they all surrendered.