I've always been interested when historians mention a pivotal battle and then say something, e.g. that after losing the Battle of Midway, the Japanese were destined to lose the Pacific theater in WWII to the US because the US had too many resources. I guess the idea is that the US natural resources were just too great and whether it took 5 or 10 years, eventually the United States would win.
The same holds true for the North eventually beating the South during the Civil War.
Has anyone read an easily accessible study/book on this matter?
It might be just as interesting to look at the stats and read wikipedia:
In 1940, the US had ~130 million pop. while Japan had 70 mil. So the US was double the size.
I didnt realize that the US had a 10 fold larger GDP than Japan toward the later stages of the war compared to Japan:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militar...duct_.28GDP.29
Lastly, has anyone ever come up with an algorithm/formula that finds the principal components of winning wars?