Originally a group of people back in the late 1700s in Bavaria. More recently Novelist Dan Brown read a piece of fiction written in the 1980s and decided to elaborate on it for his novel 'The Da vinci code' he needed a good name and a pretend history, and came across this old club. He needed baddies and Illuminati sounded suitably exotic, when his novel became a big hit some loonies decided it must all be true, and concocted all sorts of stories, all fiction like the Da vinci code itself.
Note, what amazes me is that Ian Fleming in his James Bond novels actually has 2 organisations which really did exist, Smersh and Spectre, Smersh was created by Joseph Stalin around 1943, but soon disbanded, because they were being too successful and Stalin was frightened they might pose a threat to his power base in the Kremlin. Spectre is rumoured to have been some disillusioned ex spies from both sides of the iron curtain, who tried blackmailing the various secret services, just after WW2, but as both sides went after them they were very short lived? Yet the conspiracy theorists largely ignore the fact that the 2 real organisations actually existed?
I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.