People Born in the Aftermath of the Second World War Grew Older

Reading Passage Question

People born in the aftermath of the Second World War grew older, entrenched in the belief that fascism in general and Nazism in particular had been defeated forever in the Second World War. But Right-wing authoritarian and ethnic nationalist movements on the rise across the world in recent years have forced us to ask the question: can Hitler’s or Mussolini’s ideology come back like the phoenix? Throughout the late-20th century, one neglected body of British writing stressed that Nazism’s defeat was never inevitable, nor was its spirit entirely exorcized. Looking at that work today, we can see why postwar British writers continued to dwell on the possibilities of a Nazi triumph.

Britons consider the defeat of Nazism to be a defining national achievement, and they have been especially aware of its chance. That’s why every year on the 15th of September, Britain commemorates how precarious the situation appeared on that date in 1940, when the Battle of Britain was still in progress. The battle for control of the air space over England and the Channel was ultimately won by the Royal Air Force, and most Britons believe that the RAF’s victory in the air discouraged the Germans from launching an amphibious cross-Channel invasion of the United Kingdom. At the time, the air battle was understood as the first stage of the nation’s struggle to repel the invading force. Winston Churchill, then the prime minister of England, announced a few days after the beginning of the Blitz that: ‘These cruel, wanton, indiscriminate bombings of London are, of course, a part of Hitler’s invasion plans.

The Germans called their cross-Channel invasion plans Operation Sea Lion. They were initially so certain of success that they made little attempt to conceal the operation. The whole world watched intently – in part because Germany seemed at that point to be unstoppable; its blitzkrieg across western Europe had taken it to the coast of the English Channel where it paused, confronting a nation that refused to make peace despite the defeat and retreat of the British Expeditionary Force from the Continent. All the action of the war had narrowed to the confrontation across the Channel. The tides and the weather would do much to determine if or when the invasion began. Ultimately, Nazi Germany did not launch any invasion of Britain. But suppose the Luftwaffe had managed to defeat the RAF? Might the Germans then have started across the Channel? And if so, what might have happened then?

The question requires counterfactual historical analysis. Counterfactual history uses hypothetical thought-experiments to imagine the probable results of changes in the historical record. The hypotheses are two-part conditional statements, consisting of an ‘if’ and a ‘then’ clause: if the Luftwaffe had won the air battle, then the Germans might have successfully invaded Britain. Military historians have used counterfactual analysis for centuries. Among professional historians, they are still the most consistent practitioners of this kind of analysis primarily because real military strategy is firmed up pretty much the same way. As soon as the German records for that summer had been fully declassified in the mid-1950s, military historians began to form judgments on the feasibility of an invasion. They concluded that even if the Germans had won the war in the air, their invasion might never have launched or would have failed if it had. A Luftwaffe victory would have been a necessary but by no means sufficient condition for a sea landing.

Historians point out that the Royal Navy had more than enough flexibility and fire power to prevent a German armada from getting across the English Channel and, by cutting them off from their supply lines, could have stranded any German forces that did manage to land in Britain. German armored divisions could not have stormed out of landing craft onto beaches because there weren’t any real landing craft at the time. The Germans’ hastily modified barges and other river boats could not have been made suitable for crossing the Channel. These facts do not, of course, rule out other ways in which an RAF defeat might have led Britain to succumb to Nazi domination. If the RAF had been badly defeated, it might have discouraged the United States’ entry into the war. Or if air victory for the Luftwaffe had eventually permitted a successful blockade of the British Isles so that the colonies could not have supplied them with food, the people might have been starved into submission. As in most counterfactual investigations, proposing the initial change allows us to see many other possible historical roads, several of which might have led to a Nazi Britain.

“People born in the aftermath of the Second World War grew older”- is a GMAT reading comprehension passage with answers. Candidates need a strong knowledge of English GMAT reading comprehension.

This GMAT Reading Comprehension consists of 7 comprehension questions. The GMAT Reading Comprehension questions are designed for testing candidates’ abilities in understanding, analyzing, and applying information or concepts. Candidates can actively prepare with the help of GMAT Reading Comprehension Practice Questions.

Solution and explanation

1. Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?

1. Britons who lived through the Second World War never came to believe that fascism or Nazism had been totally eliminated.
2. Britons who were born in the aftermath of the Second World War knew that there was no reason to believe that a German invasion of Britain would necessarily fail.
3. The average German who lived through the Second World War believed that Britain could be conquered easily.
4. Historians who lived after the Second World War believed that the Germans had absolutely no chance of conquering Britain.
5. Britain could withstand the fight with Germany because it was self-sufficient in food production during the Second World War.

2. The military historian differs from the serving general in that

1. The historian uses if-then analysis while the serving general uses counterfactual analysis.
2. the serving general has the entire body of information at the government’s disposal while the historian has to depend on estimates or partial disclosures.
3. The historian works on what could have happened in the past while the serving general works on what will happen in the future.
4. the serving general starts his work without any clear idea how it will end while the historian starts his work with a clear idea how it could have ended.
5. the historian studies the verity of a report while the serving general prepares a verifiable report.

3. It can be inferred from the passage that

1. if the Luftwaffe had defeated the Royal Air Force quite badly, the United States would have been forced to declare war sooner than it actually did.
2. if the Luftwaffe had been able to sink all the cargo ships carrying provisions from colonies to England, England would have been supplied by submarines laden with foodstuff.
3. if the Luftwaffe had not defeated the Royal Air Force, the United States would not have declared war against Germany.
4. if the Luftwaffe had not defeated the Royal Air Force, Germany could not have invaded Britain.
5. if the Luftwaffe had defeated the Royal Air force, England could not have invaded Germany.

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