BRITAIN should ensure its second world war history is “taught as it actually happened” and oppose revisionist readings boosting the far right, a communist historian argued as the Royal Mint announced a new commemorative coin.

The 50p piece will mark 80 years since the D-Day Landings of June 6 1944, which opened up a second front in Europe long requested by our Soviet allies, who had borne the brunt of fighting against the Nazis from 1941.

Phil Katz, author of Freedom From Tyranny, a history of the people’s war against fascism, warned that the far right are again on the rise throughout Europe, bolstered by resolutions like the EU’s 2019 On the Importance of European remembrance for the future of Europe which places the blame for the war equally on Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, whose armies liberated Europe from fascism.

“The Russians are not even invited to the commemorations,” he said, “but the fact of the wartime alliance is carved on the headstones in cemeteries across Europe, Asia, Australia, North America and Africa.”