WW2 Start Date

[Valmy]

28 July 1914.

Well I guess if you can call a few conflicts with decades of peace in between the 'Hundred Years War' then that answer is as good as any.

[derspiess]

Dec 7, 1941

Until then it was a minor European squabble.

Actually for you it should be May 22, 1942, frijolero

[Valmy]

And the Sino-Japanese thing does not matter. Without the war in Europe, it would have not been a bigger deal than Italy's adventure in Ethiopia

Um...opposing the Japanese was what got the United States into the War.  The Japanese could have helped topple the Soviets if they had not been bogged down in China.

You euro-centric guys are smoking crack.  The Japanese were the 2nd most powerful member of the Axis.

[Valmy]

Actually for you it should be May 22, 1942, frijolero

Notice that soon after the Mexican military saw combat, in March of 1945, the Axis surrendered.  Coincidence?

[Eddie Teach]

You euro-centric guys are smoking crack.  The Japanese were the 2nd most powerful member of the Axis.

And closer to Germany than Italy on the scale. Japan had beaten Russia 30 years earlier, something the Nazis failed to do.

[jimmy olsen]

28 July 1914.

And the Sino-Japanese thing does not matter. Without the war in Europe, it would have not been a bigger deal than Italy's adventure in Ethiopia

Absurd, the war in Asia was bigger by orders of magnitude.

I vote 1937.

[The Minsky Moment]

Compared to the battle for the fate of the entire world that was the European war yes.

Not sure how you decide the "fate of the entire world" while ignoring the war going on in fully half of it.

Even today the European region is more significant than Asia.

Don't think so.  measured on a PPP basis, Asia is way ahead in GDP.  Measured on a currency basis, Asia is still behind but of course it is growing at a much faster rate.

Back then the gap was huge.

Irrelevant.  Back then Asia has enormous numbers of human beings and large quantities of valuable resources.  That made it significant.

A key consequence of WW2 was that it accelerated the break-up of European domination of Asia, an event of world-historical significance in the Hegelian sense.  In that context, the latest round in the long-standing European civil war - although intensely and bitterly fought - was arguably of less long-term significance.

[Eddie Teach]

Actually for you it should be May 22, 1942, frijolero

Notice that soon after the Mexican military saw combat, in March of 1945, the Axis surrendered.  Coincidence?

Yes. 

[Tonitrus]

28 July 1914.

Indeed....there was some historian I heard somewhere who called WW1 and WW2 the "Second Thirty-Years War"

[Razgovory]

Poor Euros.  They want everything to be about them.  1937 is a good date.

[Josquius]

Don't think so.  measured on a PPP basis, Asia is way ahead in GDP.  Measured on a currency basis, Asia is still behind but of course it is growing at a much faster rate.

By PPP its close...I can't be arsed to add everything together right now but India+Japan+China gives 15 559 142 which is marginly more than the EU.  Russia has a pretty high number though which puts Europe over the top and can probally let it stand up to a few more Asian countries added onto the total...and then of course I said European region, the N.Africans were clearly involved in the war too...
Whatever, other GDP listings definatly put Europe on top.
But anyway, that's not important, at the time of the war Europe was clearly higher. Asia's rise is quite a recent thing.

Irrelevant.  Back then Asia has enormous numbers of human beings and large quantities of valuable resources.  That made it significant.

A key consequence of WW2 was that it accelerated the break-up of European domination of Asia, an event of world-historical significance in the Hegelian sense.  In that context, the latest round in the long-standing European civil war - although intensely and bitterly fought - was arguably of less long-term significance.

The quickened break up of empires was far more down to the effects of the war on the European homelands than anything else in the world.

Sure, Europe was only a small chunk of the world. But a few European countries governed huge swathes of the rest of the world. Its what happens in those European countries that matters for their empires.

[dps]

3 October 1935.

[Valmy]

3 October 1935.

Ethiopia: first to fight!

[The Minsky Moment]

The quickened break up of empires was far more down to the effects of the war on the European homelands than anything else in the world.

It had something to do with the Japanese trouncing the colonial powers, seizing their colonies, and humiliating them in the eyes of their former subjects.

[Eddie Teach]

Poor Euros.  They want everything to be about them.  1937 is a good date.

It should probably be regarded as two separate, but entwined conflicts. China didn't give a shit about Poland, and the Poles returned the favor.