United Kingdom

The British were part of the Allies and fought against the Axis during World War II. The British fought in deserts of North Africa chasing the Desert Fox.

Pre-World War
Great Britain was formed around 9000 years ago at the end of the Pleistocene ice age when sea levels rose due to isostatic depression of the crust and the melting of glaciers.

Great Britain was first inhabited by people who crossed over the land bridge from the European mainland. Its Iron Age inhabitants are known as the Brythons, a group speaking a Celtic language, and most of it (not the northernmost part) was conquered to become the Ancient Roman province of Britannia. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Brythons of the south and east of the island became assimilated by colonising Germanic tribes (Angles, Saxons and Jutes) who became known as the English people. Beyond Hadrian's wall, the major ethnic groups were the Scots, who may have emigrated from Ireland, and the Picts as well as other Brythonic peoples in the south-west. The south-east of Scotland was colonised by the Angles and formed, until 1018, a part of the Kingdom of Northumbria. To speakers of Germanic languages, the Brythons were called Welsh, a term that came eventually to be applied exclusively to the inhabitants of what is now Wales, but which survives also in names like Wallace. In subsequent centuries Vikings settled in several parts of the island, and The Norman Conquest introduced a French ruling élite who also became assimilated.