From my perspective, I have a letter which was written in Manila by my father and sent to my mother the day after the Nagasaki bomb was dropped. In it he states flatly that he doesn't know about these new, more powerful, bombs but if they end the war and let him and his buddies get back home they're all for them.

The problems with the WWI surrender of Germany has long been discussed by historians and it's pretty much agreed that the Versailles treaty led directly to Germany's re-arming, the rise of Hitler, and WW2. The policies that led to WW1 were formulated back around 1860 by Otto von Bismarck -- Grossdeutschland and all that. The Franco-Prussian War of 1870 confirmed Germany's opinion of itself (Austria-Hungary was considered a nice cousin) and its militaristic doctrine. The arms races -- in guns, ships, and armies -- that dominated the end of the 19th Century and first decade of the 20th led directly to WW1, from that to WW2.

Any point in history is the peak of a pyramid. I believe it was Chekov who wrote, "If you hang a gun on the wall in the first act, you must use it in the third." And that's what all too often happens.