1946: The Making of the Modern World

Sebestyen creates a taut, panoramic narrative and takes us to meetings that changed the world: from Berlin, July 1945, when Truman tells Stalin we have successfully tested the bomb; to Ye'nan, China, January 1946, General George Marshall tells the Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong Americans won't send troops to China assuring the Communists will attain power; Delhi, India, April 1946, UK Cabinet Members tell Pandit Nehur and Mahatma Gandhi that the British will leave India within a few months ending two centuries of British imperialism; to Jerusalem, May 1946, representatives of David Ben Gurion and moderate Zionists, meet Begin and Jewish terrorist groups, to agree to drive British from Palestine. The bombing of King David Hotel resulted, accelerating the creation of Israel. Drawing on new archival material and many interviews, Sebestyen reveals the major postwar decisions as he points up the economic collapse, starvation, ethnic cleansing, and displacement that followed the war. He gives a vivid, bleak, and detailed picture of suffering of the populations from Europe to Asia. It was the year it was decided there would be a Jewish homeland, that Europe would be split by the Iron Curtain, independent India would become the world's biggest democracy, and the Chinese communists would win a civil war that positioned them to become a great power. (With 16 pages of black-and-white photographs.)