Part I: A World Made New

Derek J. Mitchell
Michael Mazza

World War II and the End of Asia’s Colonial Era

Derek J. Mitchell

The conclusion of World War II, like the end of the First World War, marked not just the end of a war but the end of an era. While the 1919 armistice led to the break-up of Eurasia’s empires, the peace treaties of 1945 were the beginning of the end of the centuries-old colonization of Asia.

Asia’s Nuclear Age

Michael Mazza

Most military-technological innovations are evolutionary. The advent of nuclear weapons was revolutionary. When the scientists and engineers of the Manhattan Project unleashed the destructive power of the atom, they ushered in a new era in which countries could pose existential threats to adversaries half a world away. Henceforth, diplomacy and war alike would be conducted under conditions in which annihilation was a genuine risk.