Costs Of World War Ii

Costs of World War II
In terms of losses in human lives and material resources, World War II was undeniably the most destructive military conflict to date. ‘There can be no real statisticalmeasurement of the human and material cost of World War II. The money cost to governments involved has been estimated at more than $1,000,000,000,000 but this figure cannot represent the human misery,deprivation, and suffering, the dislocation of peoples and of economic life, or the sheer physical destruction of property that the war involved.’ As a general consequence of the war and in an effort tomaintain international peace, the Allies formed the United Nations, which officially came into existence on October 24, 1945. The UN adopted The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, "as a commonstandard of achievement for all peoples and all nations." The Soviet Union abstained from voting on adoption of the declaration. The U.S. did not ratify the social and economic rights sections.Country | Military | Civilian | Total | After war |
U.S.S.R. | 8,668,000 | 16,900,000 | 25,568,000 | The property damage in the Soviet Union consisted of complete or partial destruction of 1,710cities and towns, 70,000 villages/hamlets, and 31,850 industrial establishments. The Soviet Union also experienced a rapid increase in production in the immediate post-war era. |
China | 1,324,000 |10,000,000 | 11,324,000 | China, following the conclusion of its civil war, was essentially bankrupt. By 1953, economic restoration seemed fairly successful as production had resumed pre-war levels. Thisgrowth rate mostly persisted, though it was interrupted by economic experiments during the disastrous Great Leap Forward. |
Germany | 3,250,000 | 3,810,000 | 7,060,000 | West Germany, after havingcontinued to decline economically during the first years of the Allied occupation, later experienced a remarkable recovery, and had by the end of the 1950s doubled production from its pre-war...