Franco David Macri

The value of this book is that it makes a strong argument for the importance of Hong Kong as a linchpin of the effort to keep the Nationalist Chinese regime in the fight as a means to maintain collective security in the face of Japanese aggression. For Macri the problem with that "collective security" is that it included the preservation of the regime of Joseph Stalin, which is seen as a bad bargain that can be in part blamed on a flawed western security stance. While I can easily understand the sense of bad faith (it should be noted that Macri dedicates this book to the Canadian troops lost at Hong Kong), there is also the reality that hypocrisy is usually the coin of great power politics. It might be a pleasant endeavor to imagine how historical outcomes might have been improved if the Axis powers could have been confronted with a military alliance that did not include Soviet Russia but I doubt that this was a practical prospect.… (plus d'informations)