Moral justification

Narrator's post:

The Allies gradually garnered popular and moral support from their societies to persecute the war against the Axis powers. In the USSR’s case, Stalin painted the USSR as victims of German aggression in order to mobilize the entire society for the war effort to encourage Russian citizens to unite and fight against the invaders. This was achieved through the dual employment of brute force in the form of the NKVD, and relentless propaganda highlighting the atrocities committed by the Wehrmacht in occupied Soviet territory and the heavy attacks against Soviet cities, which left much of them in rubble as a result. The figures evidently highlight the success of this policy: By 1944 the Soviets had nearly 12 million soldiers serving in various capacities. Though the coerciveness of Stalin’s regime was also crucial in producing such a large number of soldiers, many also joined in order to fight and protect the “Motherland” against further German aggression. Likewise, amongst other initiatives, the US government invoked the disaster at Pearl Harbor to rally ordinary Americans to the war effort, be it in war production or the armed forces. Ultimately, gaining the support of their societies in the war effort through moral means was to prove crucial in sustaining the Allies in their grand strategy of total war; in particular it made the transition of economies from consumer to war production all the more easier, as the increased production of armaments and other war materials by all sectors of society helped ensured total Allied victory.