Putin's war begins its fourth year

Is three years enough? Let's look at where we Americans stood in December 1944, after three years of war: The siege of Leningrad had been lifted. American, British, and Canadian troops had landed in France and begun to free Western Europe. Paris had been liberated. The US Army was fighting along the Rhine River in Germany, the Soviet Red Army in Ukraine, and the British Army in Burma. Mussolini had been deposed, Italy had surrendered, and Allied troops had captured Rome and were fighting the Germans at Monte Cassino. The US Army had landed in the Philippines.

And in New Mexico, atomic reactors were working, the design of Fat Man and Little Boy was settled on, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress was modified to carry them, and Col Paul Tibbets was tapped to command the 393 Bombardment Squadron which -- if the bombs actually worked! -- would deliver them to Japan. That would end the Second World War, three years and nine months after we joined it.