I am reading the warbook. The war is over. The account was interesting
of multiple "capitulations" and local surrenders that allowed the
Germans units, on one occasion whole armies to slip behind American
lines while continuing to fight the russians. if I were  a Geman
soldier I would much rather be an American POW than be marched off to
the GULAG. Yalta conference politics is well explained.  Pauwels says
100K soviet soldiers died taking Berlin (I was off an order of
magnitude) but he says that it was still more than all american
casualties in the european theater of operations. Idiot Patton wanted
to keep on marching East. Pauels is betting on the US over Soviets to
win if this to have happened. I am not sure but I can see why Stalin
was trying to avoid it as much as possible.

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Pauwels says that the number of strikes in the US during war years
exceeds that of any other period (that's with no-strike laws and big
labor cooperation with the war effort).  The strikes were mostly
wildcat and led to a significant increase of the living conditions.

    The war may be good for labor :-)
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The warbook turned for the better. Pauwels left the internals of the US (where
he appeared to lack experience) alone and turned to the account of the
war. The narrative picked up. There are fewer "anecdotes" about who
loved Hitler in the US power elite and more of the realpolitik global
dynamics of the war. Interesting fact. Some we already know. But nice
to read about them still.  At any time 3/4 to 3/5th of all German
divisions were on the Eastern front. Charles De Gaulle was not popular
in France and was installed in France because he was conservative
enough to suit the British/Americans, the Soviets had to go on the
offensive to help the Allies during the battle of the Bulge. For every
allied soldier killed 51 soviet ones died. The Yalta conference was
actually a victory of the British/Americans because they were afraid
Stalin would cut a deal with Hitler. Daylight bombing and the use of
fabled F-17 before the opening of the western front were of little
strategic significance and a waste of resources and manpower.

Pauwels, btw, is a red. He was holding out at first. But somewhere
mid-book, he starts using outright Marxist terms.

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So it is a simplified "synthetic" analysis of the American involvement
in the wold war II presented to European high-school
students. 

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And I'd also say I know about 70-80% of what Pauwels says (how did he
manage to come up with this screwed up spelling of his name?)  but the
20% and the summary of the rest is still fun. Later, for example, he
covers the attack on Dresden, how it was timed for Yalta conference
and placed such that the soviet troops can see the conflagration from
the frontlines and will be able to enter the city first to assess the
damage for themselves. That is pretty devious. I new the Allies did it
to impress and scare the soviets but I did not now the details.