ABSTRACT
In 1933, the British Defense Requirement Committee, a subcommittee of the Committee of Imperial Defense, debated the possibilities of a future war. While Admiral Ernie Chatfield regarded Japan as the most dangerous threat to the British Empire, Sir Robert Vansittart, the permanent undersecretary of state, argued that it was Germany. World War II turned the worst-case scenario into reality, with cumulative effects on the status quo powers. India became a cornerstone for the decolonization process after the spring of 1942, when it was threatened with direct Japanese attack. The economic exploitation and transit routes that made Africa increasingly important for US military strategy during World War II. The course of World War II saw the emergence of major local difficulties for colonial powers, with the particularly significant rise of antieolonialist nationalism. The military and economic power demonstrated in wartime gave the United States a crucial role in the post-1945 decolonization process.
