The Second World War is one of the most-mythologised events in history. In the West, we are led to believe that Winston Churchill and Roosevelt single-handedly led the Allies in a struggle for democracy against the fascist totalitarianism of Nazi Germany. But what’s the real story of WWII: the one they don’t teach you at school or on the History Channel?

We welcome Marxist theorist, revolutionary and historian Alan Woods onto the Spectre of Communism to talk about the war, which in the last analysis came down to single combat between Nazi Germany, with all the productive forces of Europe behind it, and the might of the USSR and its planned economy. Thankfully for all of humanity, the latter emerged victorious. 

The fact that Soviet Russia was chiefly responsible for Hitler’s defeat is often buried in the ‘official’ histories. So too is the fact that the European imperialists (Churchill and the British ruling especially) not only allowed Hitler to run roughshod over Europe for years (indeed, many of the British elite were sympathetic with fascism), but hoped for the collapse of the USSR, whose ‘communism’ they feared more the Nazis.

Alan dispels all the lies and historical mythology surrounding WWII, and explains why even today it is invoked by the bloated, half-blind imperialist politicians to puff themselves up on past glories, even as they blunder from one disaster to another on the world stage.

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The latest issue of the In Defence of Marxism theoretical magazine is out now, and is focused on the Second World War. 

Alongside articles about the betrayed revolutionary struggles in Italy and the France; an analysis from Marxist theorist Ted Grant in 1945 about the changed balance of world relations; and an investigation into postwar Italian neorealist cinema, the issue opens with an editorial by Alan Woods which offers some more detail about the topic of this podcast episode.

Buy your copy of IDoM issue 49: ‘1945: Liberation, Revolution and Betrayal’ HERE: https://marxist.com/magazine.htm 

Read Alan’s editorial online here: https://marxist.com/the-second-world-war-setting-the-record-straight.htm 

Sources:

‘D-Day and the truth about the Second World War’, Alan Woods, https://marxist.com/wwii-anniversary-one210704.htm 

‘Ted Grant Writings: Volume One’, https://marxist.com/ted-grant-writings.htm 

‘Ted Grant Writings: Volume Two’, https://marxist.com/ted-grant-writings-world-war-two.htm 

‘The Battle of Stalingrad – How the Soviet Union defeated the Nazis’, Alan Woods, https://marxist.com/seventy-years-since-the-battle-of-stalingrad-how-the-soviet-union-defeated-the-nazis.htm 

‘Hitler's war on the Soviet Union and how Stalin prepared the way for it’, Andrew Wagner, https://marxist.com/operation-barbarossa-stalin-s-bloody-catastrophe.htm 

‘History of British Trotskyism’, Ted Grant, https://marxist.com/history-british-trotskyism-ted-grant.htm 

‘The Treaty of Versailles - the Peace to end all Peace’, Alan Woods, https://marxist.com/treaty-of-versailles-to-end-all-peace.htm