After the fall of France in June 1940, only Britain stood between Hitler and total victory. Desperate for allies, Winston Churchill did all he could to bring the United States into the conflict, drive the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany apart, and persuade neutral countries to resist German domination.

By 1942, after the German invasion of Russia and Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, the British-Soviet-American alliance was in place. But it was an incongruous coalition, divided by ideology and riven with mistrust and deceit. Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin were partners in the fight against Hitler, yet they were also rivals who disagreed on strategy, imperialism and the future of Europe.