World War II in Colour

This film shows how the Great Depression sapped the will of the emocracies of the West to face up to a new and disturbing political phenomenon - the rise of European militaristic dictators. Resulting in the major powers allowing the likes of Mussolini and Hitler to begin the course that would lead the world into catastrophe.

This film shows how the Nazis developed a terrifying new military tactic – Blitzkrieg - how it caught first Poland, then Britain and France utterly unprepared. It charts the fall of Poland and it also reveals how heroic French resistance allowed the British to escape from Dunkirk and live to fight another day.

In July 1940, Britain stood alone against the Nazis. This film shows how close Britain came to defeat, as its exhausted air force struggled to fight off the German Luftwaffe. Hitler had victory in his sight, but Britain, using its brilliant team of code crackers and specially trained spies, it began the fightback.

Hitler's generals were horrified when he expressed his intention to invade Russia. Hitler's whole plan depended upon striking a swift and decisive knock-out blow. Get sucked into a long, drawn-out war and Germany would surely lose. This film takes in Stalingrad and the battle of Kursk, the biggest tank battle in all history.

December 7th 1941 is "a date that will live in infamy" proclaimed President Franklin Roosevelt. That was the day that Japan entered World War II, with its surprise attack upon the US Fleet in Pearl Harbour. They then defeated of a huge British army in Singapore. The war that would follow would be characterised by major innovations.

Mussolini's ambition had always been to recreate the old Roman Empire. Hitler chose to support him, a decision that would spell disaster for both of them. Hitler would lose thousands of troops. Mussolini would lose his life. This film tells the extraordinary story of the war in North Africa withstanding wave after wave of Nazi assault.

Both the Allies and the Nazis were always looking for a single knock-out blow to end the war. Britain's Sir Arthur "Bomber" Harris thought the answer might lie in "strategic bombing". But it led directly to the tragedy of Dresden. Allied planes firebombed tens of thousands of ordinary Germans, a battle of cat and mouse ensued.

By July 1943, the full extent of Hitler's failed gamble in the East had become clear. His army was now at the mercy of the vast Soviet war machine. This was war on a monster scale, pitching armies of millions against each other. But, it was also a war fought by small bands of partisans, men like Tito in Yugoslavia.

Today it is easy to see D-Day as an inevitable - a straightforward victory against a German army that was already all but defeated. This film explodes that myth. It charts the careful planning of the campaign, the development of specialised equipment needed for the amphibious landing. It reveals the deception plan that wrong-footed Hitler.

1944 America, Britain in the West and Russia in the East began to close their pincer around Germany. The Allied disaster at Arnhem and the tragedy of the Warsaw uprising; Polish freedom fighters were abandoned to their fate by Stalin. It tells the shocking story of death camps, the full extent of the Holocaust.

1941, a vicious war against Japan was being waged in the Pacific. The Japanese were driven back across the ocean, in savage hand-to-hand fighting. American dominance at sea was finally established in "The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot". This looks at units at war in the jungles slowly pushing back the Japanese despite horrific conditions.

The months of the war in Europe were shocking and desperate. This film follows Britain and America as they cross the Rhine, and Russia as they push through Poland into Germany itself. It covers the horrors of the liberation of Belsen and Buchenwald, and the final terrible street fighting in Berlin. Culminating in the suicide of Hitler.

The end of the War in the Pacific is one of the great and most terrible tales of modern history. Japan simply would not surrender and continued to fight island by island. US Air Force tried bombing Japan into submission, firebombing Tokyo, yet still Japan clung on. Ending in the fatalities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were sealed.