Visions of Victory: The Hopes of Eight World War II Leaders. By Gerhard L. Weinberg. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2005. Pp. xxiv+292. $28.00. ISBN 978-0-521-85254-8.

Abstract

Weinberg pursues a simple question: What “visions” of the postwar world did the principal leaders of the major belligerent powers develop during the war? Weinberg's unsurpassed mastery of World War II as a global war allows him to pen eight compelling portraits of Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, Chiang, Stalin, Churchill, de Gaulle, and Roosevelt and their ideas for the future positions of their country. Each essay constitutes a minor masterpiece of concision and erudition in and of itself. My only quibble is that Weinberg exclusively concentrates on the top leadership and ignores the lower working levels of postwar planning—there may have been less “vision” there but most of the “grunt” work was done by those planners. Much information in these portraits is known to specialists, but there are some surprising insights, too.