Neighburg who is at the Army War College. Mike and i were colleagues mike, this is going back aways. Around 2006 or so in the History Department at the university of southern mississippi, we were together, but weve stayed in touch and always have had shared interests. Mike, its great to be here with you today and have a conversation on a subject thats extremely timely, which is really responding to crisis. You know, obviously what needs to be said for our audience theyve seen all the evidence they can of a current crisis, the coronavirus crisis, economic downturn thats going to be a serious issue for leaders, for every day people for a while to come. It seems a good time to talk about two major 20th century crises. At the end of two world wars how leaders responded and to raise the issue about what light that might throw on the present, a framework for comparison. Mike, obviously youre one of the people to talk to about this. There are just too many of your books to list for the audience. I thought i would mention your fighting the great war, your history of world war i, the blood of free men the book you wrote about the liberation of paris. Two books that will be of interest to our audience is your concise history of the treaty of versailles. I thought i would take your approach in your book to world war i and maybe if we have time at the end we can raise some issues about how that relates to the present. Where to begin, mike . Maybe the place naturally to begin is the world as it appeared to allied leaders in 1918, 1919, the end of world war i. Some 10 Million People perished in that conflict. As the american, french, british, italian leaders met to talk about how to go for war. They were faced with their own pandemic. The great 1918 influenza. Mike, looking at that world and looking back on it, how did these leaders respond to these crisisin cris crises . How did the world look to them . Thanks, jason and thanks to nbc and thanks to chrissy and kate for all the work putting this together. Thanks to all of you for signing in. I hope youre being safe and using this as an opportunity to use this time productively. For me its a time to reflect about the ways in which the days that you live in, the present time you live in, changes the way you think about the past and changes the way that you think about these Big Questions that jason identified, both how you deal with pandemic and how you deal with great power of competition in the era of crisis, which is certainly whats going on in 1919. I dont think anybody was under any illusions whatever they decided at the paris peace crisis was going to end great power competition. How do you make sense of the new world youre living in and what ideas or philosophies do you want Going Forward . One thing this crisis has done for me its made me realize how similar they were thinking 100 years ago. What i mean by that is this is simplifying things too much. There were two major groups of thinkers. One argued by wood row wilson who argues that problems like pandemics, great power competition, dealing with communi communism, those are International Problems that need international solutions. There are other folk, the french Prime Minister, who arent opposed by working with other countries, but they want to go with a national model. In some ways the question is what do you think is causing the problem and what do you think is the appropriate solution . There are people thinking internationally 100 years ago and there are people who are thinking nationally. In some ways those two mindsets would be familiar to people from 100 years ago looking to our world. They would have recognized a lot more in our present situation than maybe we expect. That leads me to the next question, mike. You were talking about the issue of frameworking different visions that were there from the beginning. These countries fought together. Britain and franks were in the fight since 1914. The u. S. Jumping in three years later. At what point do tensions between wilson and the french Prime Minister and lloyd george begin to emerge about an international versus national framework, how to deal with germany . The fact that germany was defeated germany is not occupied in 1918, 1919. How do you deal with that . Well come back to other questions too. In this case there were early on tensions about how to respond and what kind of vision would inform a peace. Could you say a bit act that . Sure. When the french Prime Minister saw wood row wilsons 14 points said god was content to give us 10. David lloyd george was asked to evaluate his own performance and he said i dont think i did so bad seeing as i had in a policy yeen on one side of me and jesus christ on the other. Wood row wilson was the first president to take american ideals and apply them to the old world. Theres that problem. A lot depends on what you think caused fundamentally caused the war. If youre the french Prime Minister, its the aggression, the theres something inherent in the german character. It was him who was the mayor of the french neighborhoods who had argued for fighting on. To David Lloyd Georges mind its a question of power, that germany grew too quick, too fast. Although they were allies during the war, they had different definitions of what they thought they were doing there and different ideas of the ways to solve it. In world war ii many of the same problems are there. What do you think is the fundamental cause of the problem . Until you answer that question, you cant look to solutions. So to the french, the american approach is way too ideal us tick. To wilson, his Solutions Look Like more of the same. Part of it comes from an understanding of how you view the past. The further you look back, the further you can look forward. Its a different definition of what they see when they look backwards. You noted the differences about germany and how they understood the sources of the conflict and how, for example, the french deal wilsons idealism. Its one of the things thats brought up about that kind of perspective. Its idealism. Beyond wilson, is there any real sense on the french and british side that democracy in germany and the fact that the kizer was forced out germany in 1919 is in the process of becoming a republic. So, you think that might for wilson by a signal that, yes, the german people are trying to step up and move past an older a regime. You would think the wariness of france would be deeper about germany and not convinced that because we have someone now running germany that there really hasnt been much change. On the british and french side is there much, you know, interest at all in the fact that germany seems to be transitioning to some kind of democratic system . For wilson that might be confirmation for him that his point of view is correct. I think youre right about both points. There are plenty of french people, politicians, who argued that germany is going to need time to figure out what its democracy is going to look like. You need to open the borders up and build links between the british and french. There are catholic movements inside france. There are youth movements trying to bridge movement. Theyre saying the fundamental cause was prussia. It wasnt germany. The bavarians are like it wasnt us. It was those guys. There are people who are sympathetic. Its the two germanys argument. There was a germany that have been corrupted. Now with that gone, germany has a chance to move forward. Doesnt mean that everyone in france and britain trusts that. It means theyre saying if were looking for a post war strategy its better to try to build that up. Again, we all know this works better at the end of the second world war, at least by the 1960s and 70s. Theres an expression you can do this under different historical circumstances. Every time i cross that border with nobody checking a passport i know its been a while. A shared currency, consultation on Foreign Policy this is what people are envisions in 1919 that you might eventually get to Something Like that. Its not all theyre not all wildly optimistic or wildly ideal us tick, but theyre hoping if you can build bridges between the two you increase the chance for cooperation rather than competition. Thats similar to the debate were having now. Whats the best way to deal with this crisis . Is it the best way to build bridges between governments that dont trust each other, or governments that have Different Things theyre trying to accomplish . Or is the best way to do it to wall yourself up . Theres no obvious right answer to that question. Well, mike, those are very important points. I think they then lead to two followups on that. One is that youre noting that we shouldnt be monolithic in the way we understand the responses of these three countries to how to build a new order after world war i. So the first question would be what kinds of popular pressures do you see britain lloyd george had an election at the end of 1918. Woodrow wilson, there had been a Congressional Election and he has now republicans in congress who are not excited about the International Side of the peace making process. The french dont have an election to deal with, but there are popular pressures they need to respond to as well. A lot of people the sacrifice, the casualty that france undergoes and destruction in parts of the country that need to be listened to. We can get focussed on the big three and whats going on with them as theyre trying to figure out a treaty that everyone can agree to. They also have to as democracies, the third republic, britain with their long tradition, the u. S. , they all have to deal with pressures. The easiest way to study the treaty is to look at the big three. Looking around at our own country, theres no one american answer to the covid crisis. These are determined by where you live, middle class versus working class, all kinds of things determine your response. To me its interesting to the ways in which the debates reach across national lines. The big one is do you want to solve the problems at the National Level . If youre british do you want to open up the empire to International Trade or do you want to increase the imperial ties . Increasing tariffs, keeping americans out of the markets and trying the best you can to reinforce the empire. Both of those arguments are out there. The imperial argument wins at the end of world war i largely. It doesnt win at the end of world war ii. The americans were able to force open the British Empire. In the United States the debate over the treaty and the league of nations is fascinating. Theres a group of senators that say im not signing it. Theres another group that says theres ways we think this is unconstitutional. Theres ways the league of nations could draw the United States into a war and the obligation to declare war belongs to the u. S. Senate. You cant do that. There are ways in which this ties us down. There are people who are making the argument the league of nations is one nation, one vote. Why would we as americans accept the same level of power in an International Organization that ecuador would have . Why would we do that . On a pure power basis it makes no sense. Thats why the u. N. Comes with the Security Council and five vetoes. Otherwise its not clear the u. N. Would have got through the u. S. Congress. To paint opponents of the league as backward looking dinosaurs is unfair. They had legitimate grievances. The world health organization, do you want to be part of an organization in which you cede some of your sovereignty . If you accept that principle, then w. H. O. Makes sense. If you dont, youre not going to do that. The french case is more complicated because of the medi immediacy of the german threat. I think you set me up for the second question which is really its the issue of democracy, in that you pointed out about popular pressures and there are a range of different views coming forward. We should take these seriously, these different perspectives about should there be a league of nations . What kind of authority should it have . Should it be able to intervene in conflicts . Theres a lot of different perspectives in there. Because of the 1930s the league is so badly remembered for people that its even difficult to have a serious conversation about what things looked like in 1918 and 1919. Just on the side of, mike, democracy. The u. S. Fought world war i with a segregated military. American women dont have the right to vote until 1920. British women during the 1920s get it. French women not until the end of world war ii. The fourth republic, right. Thats the whole issue of the colonies where the british and french used colonial troop and those empires are like what about democracy . So much was being fought in the name of democracy and german military. During the deliberations, these become real issues, right, about what do we do about opening things up . You mention ed the issue of trade. Should we grant more autonomy . What do we do about movements calling for independence . Those become quite violent in 1919. The massacre in india in 1919, et cetera. What do we do with that, mike, about the issue of democracy and how that rhetoric had been there late in the war and how the big three have to confront that . That will be also for our viewers a segway into addressing the particular challenges. There are issues about democracy they have to address. They have enormous issues. The imperial question is an enormous one. Its enormously complicated. Miff canadian friends are found of the anecdote, the first treaty they signed, they signed on the wrong line. My canadian friends love to point that out. Much more negatively you pointed out india. G ghandi was a supporter of the war at the beginning. By the end of the war he realizes this isnt a war about independence and freedom and all the things the allies talked about. The supremely talented history january from harvard talked about how people from around the world talked about this is what Woodrow Wilson means. In the paris Peace Process wilson doesnt have in mind the end of the empires. He has in mind americas right to trade into those empires. Of course president roosevelt is going to try to bring that back with the atlantic charter. Hes going to put more teeth behind it than wilson did. Theres a couple parts in the world, china and syria, where these interests and values come in conflict with each other and the United States doesnt know what to do because were still trying to figure out what this all means. The end of the First World War creates these legacy conflicts that are going to come back and bite people before the 20th century is over. In a lot of ways we talk at the Army War College about the wars were fighting right now as the wars of succession. Were still trying to figure out how you govern a complicated place like the middle east without a centralized authority. Theres a wonderful quotation and ill end with this. David lloyd george in 1917 in the middle of the third battle talks about british operations in iraq and palestine. He says right now were focussed on the third because its where our troops are fighting. When we look down the road, its palestine well have to deal with. Thats fundamental to american Foreign Policy even as we sit here. We can talk about the uprising in present day iraq that the british have to deal with. The issue of palestine would be a whole other webinar. They would. China, you mentioned the may 4th movement that starts in 1919. This is a huge question. I think it connects directly then to the particular kind of challenge that the revolution posed to the big three. This is a subject im very interested in and how, once lenin seizes power in october or november in 1917, they of course publish all the secret treaties that russia signed with britain and france expecting a victory and who was going to get what in terms of territory from austria, hungary. They were glad to show countries around the world that this is what this war is being fought over. Lenin gives an overriding vision to revolutionaries that the world war was not a tragedy. It was it wasnt that europe went crazy. This was a necessary growth of imperialism. Its a worldwide system and so theres no theres really no desire to go back to the status quo which a lot of socialists, in fact, during the war say. We should go back to what we had prior to june 28th, 1914. Lets go back. Just try to turn the clock back. If we could go back. The only youre going to move beyond sources of the world war is revolution. He saw the revolution in russia as the beginning of a worldwide revolution. That would not only take place in the capitalist countries themselves but in the colonized world. It was a global vision. For the big three, we can even bring in here italy and say orlando because theres going to be so much turmoil in italy. How did they make sense of this and how they thought what should we do to respond to this . Its interesting. Theres a way to interpret as the understanding among the western powers. Great power competition has shifted. Germany is no longer your great power competitive. Its now the soviet union. Theres way to understand wilsons 14 points and the treaty as responses itself. I dont recommends that people do but if you want to read it, it includes a lot about protection of labor. It includes a lot about the right of women to vote even fp theyre not allowed to vote in states in which they live as you talked about earlier. I talks about guarantees of minimum wages. It talks about right of people no matter where they live in europe that their wages cant be cut. It talks about all that stuff. We can sustain this system without going down that crazy road. Theres a way you can get what you want without going down that road. Theres way in which we can understand this. As you mentioned, one of the things i think is so different in great competition at the end of world war i from its beginning, its france against germany. By the time you get to the 20s, 30s and world war ii theres an ideological dimension playing over this. Should we invite them to the paris peace conference. This answer to that is no. If youre not going to do about that. What do you about them . Theyll have to work hard with japan to get japan support. Its a way to get japanese spot support for this war they think they have to fight in russia. The interrolocking pieces and y think about system engineers problem, when you push on one part of the system, it will produce weird outcomes in another part. You have to give the peninsula in china to the japanese. Hast the thing theyre trying to deal with in paris. Thats fascinating point and to add to that, one of the things just overtly present as an alternative is instead of parliamentary democracy, kind of models, for all their variations, british, frenchamerican. Theyll say those molds are directly tied to this war. Theyre really kind of mask for power. Workers, radicalized soldiers, sailors. This is a model in a workers democracy that they want to present. This is before it turns into a one party state. He hopes will sap some of the energy and discontent coming out of the war. Germany, austria, the Baltic States that are trying to mobilize that. Theyre not the only ones that are trying to mobilize discontent. When we get into 1919, we have brand new player politically on the scene. I know this is a lot to pack in here but the way you look at this history, how do we relate the beginnings of facism to this rebuilding movement. A student complained to the dean in my department that i was trying to turn them into facsists. Thats not what im trying to do here. Marxism and communism could not be right. If class conflict was truly the engine of world change as marx argued then the workers of france would not have killed the workers of germany and the workers of germany wouldnt have killed the workers of russia. In effect, marx had to be wrong. What the intellectuals around him concluded is it must be the nation state and must be some ir rationality that drove them forward. As you pointed out, what that does is it taps into this environment of all of these land claims and everybody thats disaffected by the war and the way that the war ends. I also think you get this kind of almost mirror identification so facism becomes identified. You get this polarization in the societies that have occurs all across europe. Its a civil war in spain informed by this. The center really comes under a lot of pressure. The way i try to describe it to student s both of these systems are real challenges to the kind of democratic capitalist system that, aleast in the Anglo American world, they are trying to hold that center ground. The second war war is how that doesnt happen and two of those systems end up fighting the third. The Anglo American capitalist system end up as temporary allies. You can see the cold war as the final kind of, at least, in some versions of history, the final competition of the end of the First World War. Its also instructive to think about the ways in which facsim is more nationalistic. The lands unite. Workers of all lands unite. I got reported to the deanss office doing this in class. I dont want to make the case. There is a way in which you have to explain why people in europe are so disaffected by the world that they see that they are moving to these two extremes rather than reenforcing the center. The Great Depression only fuels that verdict. Youve already raised the second wor war. I think we should transfer over. We have a very good basis for thinking about the moment, the end of the First World War and how we can really compare that looking at the world in 1945. They have to come together and cooperate to defeat hitler, imperial japan. How does the world look, if were going to work out this frame work of comparison and then youre going to end and joseph stalin. Its a different big three. Its really two when we come down to it about the terms of the emerging super powers. How do we make since that 1945 perspective. Were not going to rely on fai and love and the trut of man to do this. Were going to come in with serious instruments of power. He knew the atomic bomb succeeded. Well take the same principles we took. Were not doing this by persuasion anymore. This time were going to say if you dont want to play the game our way, here is the ways in which we can hurt you. The atomic bomb is the most extreme version of that. Even the loan terms to the British Empire at the end of the war are things you can use. Part of lend lease is were going to get to trade inside your empire. Those days are done. The way i think about, its the americans coming in with very similar ideals but very different ways they want to achieve it. It was the great germany up to borders and remove it from having a central government. You want to put resources into germany so the germans can balance the soviet union. To me, they know it. These guys know it. They all remember the p tretrea versailles. We got another bite at this apple. If we do as badly as they did 25 years ago, were just going to screw it up and create a third world war. The american decision is theres going to be no single treaty that comes out of it because they dont want to do what wilson had to do. We can adjust whatever we had to do as we go and well have three parties represented there. The whole world is not going to come. Theres going be three parties there. Frans doesnt come. Poland doesnt come. Just three countries. Thats it. Its done very differently than they to it at versailles with a different outcome. Theres really three thats there and we could focus on truman and stalin. In the british case, if we think about lloyd george thats been faced with an election in 1918 when he was at versailles and what he thought wads expected of him. In the british case they have an election where churchill is out. Given where the americans and soviets were at. What should we do with this with the british . What kind of changes or what was going on there in the way britain understood itself from churchill understand thanksgiving is a different landscape than we faced 25 years earlier. I think the british are going through that same question. What do you want to do . Do you want to reenforce the empire . Draw resources out of that empire at the end of the war or do you need to think about radical changes in how youll organize society . Our future political and economic success will be tied to the americans whether we want it to or not and the empire will be our money loser. Its going to be too hard to go back in there and do things the way we had done it before. Hes voice thats arguing for complete change of thought on the way that britain thinks about everything that it organizes. As with many visionaries, a lot of people dont like listening to him because they think its too radical a change. I think a lot of this kind of rhetoric of special relationship is build to mask an awful lot of that and a way americans understood. Were not going back to what we had. We are now clearly going to be top dog and were going to set things the way we want to set them which is what the United States did. Its the postwar world for the United States. For britain its an awareness youll come out of this war much the way the fren ch came out of First World War. Youll need time to come back up and face very difficult questions Going Forward especially given the british want to put in National Health insurance and all these social rewards. A good friend of mine has just written a book, basically arguing that this is what british soldiers believed they were fighting for. Yes the defeat of germany but were fighting to create a britain that will provide the working classes with some of the rewards that citizens of a great country should have. Those things are expensive. They are difficult to deal with. Theres a wonderful, one of the British Air Force museums has the first British Nuclear missiles there and theres a sign on it. Britain is going to have an independent Nuclear Force and that will have a great big bloody union jack on it. Were still going to be here and be independent. Thats good for every one to remember it about the fact the United States and soeviet union are the real power brokers in this immediate postwar world. We have harry truman who has only been in office three months. They had not been in 1919. So much had been about as noted been about positioning the restaurant world against the spread of the revolution but here stalin is there. How did the americans and british respond . Thats the great competition question of 1945. How do you read the russians. If you try to take poland up move up closer to their border, theyre going to push back at you. The question becomes, theres three different ways of looking at the russians. This is a Global Worldwide communist problem that were going to end up dealing with all over the world. Better to deal with these guys now than let that grow. Theres a third argument. It becomes the containment argument that says you cant stop them from expanding. What you can do is keep them, you cant stop them from being a world power. What you can do is stop them from expanding until the internal contra dicdictions of r own system makes it collide. The core argument is that its a system thats basically a house of cards. If you push against it they have enough military strength to push you back. They have shown that over the past 150 years. The best way to do it is to let them stew in their own juices until the economy, society, politics of this corrupt system just comes a part. Again, its a question of how to you think the soviets got there and what you think they are up to condition to the american response. Most people go into that conference still believing that the United States and soviet union can have a constructive relationship in the postwar period. Theres a photograph i love to show when i talk about potsdam. The notion is we have beaten the germans. Were not yet enemies. Were wrapping up and about to take questions. I think the western allies, whether they were aware of it or not, in many cases didnt want to see it. Its interesting that stalin shared much of their vision about revolution. He was weary about pes sanasant. He wants to keep a tight lid on movement in his own sphere of influence. They share a real war riness about anything too radical coming from below. This is the argument for seeing stalin. Its another czar. Were just not sure what toopd with the soviets. I want to thank you for a great conversation. We covered a lot of ground in 45 or so minutes. We should open things up. We had one question here. Im going to jump in and take us through a few of these. We have from dan in michigan, can you help me understand why the u. S. Allowed berlin to be divided. The argument is eisenhower called it a objective. It was going to be a shared option of germany. We still have a war with the japanese we have to deal with it. Im not going to let my souldsiers get killed for something we have to give back to the soviets any way. The argument was physically, the occupation of it, taking of it is the responsibility of the soviet union but the postwar political arrangement is theres some level of sharing and cooperation. Eisenhowers mind, it makes no sense to see american soldiers get killed for something youll have to hand back. I think thats a perfectly defensivable from the perspective of 1944, 1945 especially the assumption, so many of these troops will rotat. That leads to the next point about the atomic bomb is its own thing. Its a fundamentally new development in world history. Truman announces it to stalin there. Where do we fit the atom bomb. Theres this hugely complicating factor which is the splitting of the atom and the weaponization of that and how does that fit in the way we think about the resolution of the world war ii crisis . One o of my favorite anecdotes that come ut of potsdam, as soon as the reports they have succeeded, churchill says this is the end of all our problems. This is a cheap way to keep military power. The british chief of staff writes i had to calm winston down and he didnt like it. I had to explain this is not like other weapons. He saw that right away. Again, theres another question of what do you do with these weapons once you develop them . We have followed the allen brook strategy. Theres other things we could have done. Thats another kind of dark cloud hanging over it. I also site in the book, i like to recite these for my students here. Most Senior Leaders virtually all of them were incredibly depressed. That the trinity test didnt work. What it meant was either, war was going to be separated from it s strategic dimension or it went you were going to end up with whatever war you fought killing hundreds of millions of people every time you went about and did any military action at all. They are very dark and have moe roes. They are very upset about it. I love to point that out to people. This is not a moment of triumph in their eyes. This is a moment of something we may have to do and its better that we did it before the soefr y soviets or the germans did it. Its a giant step back ward in the way people are thinking about military strategy. Mike, you noted about the soviet union being in. This was a different thing. How does that affect the whole tr frame work of negotiations . We have a viewer who wanted to know about charles de gaulle. The big three are there and theyre going to decide the americans and soviets and other countries are going to have to accept that fact. How does he respond to this new thing being proposed . He aint happy. Hes excluded on those grounds. Hes excluded because truman and churchill had enough of him. Truman makes a comment which i happen to come across by accident in the library when i was looking through papers when he says if i want to talk to de gaulle i would send for him. The notion is theyre not sure what they want to do with france yet. Do we treat france as a liberated country or treat it as an occupied countried the way we might treat italy. The first time americans go into combat its against french troops. What to we want to do . Its a very different kind of france and represents a different kind of france. The United States has a more or less have determined by this point that it didnt have a choice. He just not at that level yet. Hes furious and churchill snubs him. Neither on the way down there or back did churchill go to paris to meet with de gaulle. He will get his revenge but it will be a few years in the making. Hes thinking about it the whole time. No doubt. Were almost out of time. I want to close with one question thats been hoposed he. Its not a small one but maybe you can say briefly about it is there any unity at all among the leaders of the u. S. , britain and the soviet union about the colonial issue at potsdam . Is there anything they can come together with respect on, here we are, another world war has been fought. The colonized world played a huge role in that. Is there anything they can agree on about what to do about that coming out of potsdam . Maybe my brain has been a bit conditioned by the de gaulle question, but the one thing they do agree son the french empire is done. Its not going to go back to france. The general sense i think is the United Nations will be the instrument to handle this. I think there was an expectation on the soviet side. The empire just theres no way the british and french could wac walk back into those places. I think there was some expectation on the american side that something similar would happen. The british, even a labor leader and fairly far to the left wanted india to stay inside the British Empire. The major big issues about what to do are perfectly wide open. The issue of is one that will become a major Sticking Point between the british and the americans in the late 1940s. I dont think theres much agreement exsthaept the states that are represented are the ones whose empires might go away. Theres so much to say about that question and the other ones we covered today. Let me thank you very much for a great discussion. I hope our viewers really got something out of it. Please consult if you want more on mikes two books about the concise history of the treaty of versailles and the book on po potsdam. Its great to see you as always. Thank you. Be safe, everybody. Thanks. American history tv is on cspan3 every weekend. As my daughter says we started out before sunrise. That i might introduce him to the terrain. By the time we returned near sunset, she said that the two of us had her great smiles upon our face in the sense of jocularity. She was certain a deal had opinion made and it was. I gifted senor with about 150 acres nearby which he proceeded to refer to as colle farm which in italian means small hill. Thats where he began to cultivate. Unfortunately, my fellow citizens, they never rooted properly. Thats a lament because i think the competition och our soil, the altitude, precipitation is just as good as anything you can find throughout the kingdoms of europe to cultivate. Until wine becomes a necessity, i doubt it will be successful. Here in virginia the labor, the efforts for productivity and cultivation must be put to three particular foremost cash crops. You know what they are. Tobacco, tobacco, tobacco, in that order. Until we relieve ourselves from that, i doubt we will ever be successful. At the end of world war ii, million of servicemen and women returned to the United States after a experience of a lifetime. Nec on real america, from 1945, welcome home. A War Department film designed to show the public what the veterans may have been through. How it may have changed them and how their newly acquired skill will be useful in the postwar economy