Stalins war : a new history of World War II Drawing on ambitious new research in European and U.S. archives Stalins War revolutionizes our understanding of World War II by moving its epicenter to the east. Hitlers genocidal ambition may have helped unleash Armageddon but as McMeekin shows the war that emerged in Europe in August 1939 was the one Stalin wanted not Hitler. So too was the Pacific war of 1941 1945 the direct result of Stalins maneuverings which he orchestrated to unleash the furies of war between capitalist powers Japan and the U.S. This groundbreaking reassessment of the Second World War elucidates Stalins conquest of most of Eurasia from Berlin to Beijing for Communism