Stan and Grace are meeting up in Doncaster at lunchtime today and happily spending their leave together in Grimethorpe, but what is happening in the wider world and how is the war progressing? By January, 1943, the war had lasted more than three years. Hitler’s forces occupied most of mainland Europe plus Norway, the Balkans and Greece. Italy was allied to Germany. Spain, Portugal, Sweden and Switzerland were neutral. Germany was engaged in the invasion of Russia, with the battle for Stalingrad in process at the end of 1942. The British, Americans and their allies were engaged with Japan in the Far East and with Germany and Italy (the Axis powers) in North Africa. What was so important about North Africa? Firstly, the British were reliant on oil from oilfields in Iran, which was our main supplier in the 1940’s. This oil came by tanker via the Red Sea and the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean and on to the UK through the Straights of Gibral...
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