It seems like your application is doable on GAE. My points of concern would be.
I have been dabbling with Clojure and App Engine for a while now and I have to recommend appengine-magic. It abstracts most of the Java stuff away and is very easy to use. As a plus the project seems to be very active.
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.