Best World War II documentary?

Interesting read so far, although I have not gotten through the whole thing yet (the site is huge!). Thanks for sharing.

Good points, after Germany committed to full unrestricted submarine warfare to besiege the UK, the USA had to intervene in that course of events or lose its key ally.

so foolish of Kriegsmarine and H to lose the battlecruisers and makes First/Second Happy Time seems like a diversion of resources, then there may have been a more credible medium/long term threat to the allied lifeline without these unsustainable efforts

With a timely and immediate entry of the US into the Atl. war (as actually occurred), they deployed tons of planes and ships, and technology, that wasn’t effective at first but needed to mature and develop to defeat the submarine threat on one hand, while demolishing the Japanese Navy with the other.

@CWO:

I’d say it’s one of those exceptions that proves the rule.  If it took 70,000 to 300,000 Persians (Herodotus claims a figure as high as two-and-a-half million) to kill 300 Spartans, that’s actually a pretty pathetic performance on the part of the Persians.

True. However, speaking just about shots and arrows, the Persians did get them all.

Guilt or innocence is a hard thing to quantify, so im not even going to touch that part of it, but on the waging a war of aggression, I can comment.

I dont think it is a crime to wage a war of aggresion, atleast not one they should hang you for. It is said that when a country wages it is only justified in doing so in defense of itself. How do you quantify something like that though? Japan felt that the US was threating it, threating to cut it off from needed raw materials and strangle their country.
Japan felt that they were acting in defense of themselves by attacking the US and the allies, were they wrong?

Jodl was a career solider, raising in the ranks and working his way to the top. He was no different from the 1,000s of other men who did the same thing, spent their life in the military, and did what they were ordered to do. In a totalitarian state like Nazi Germany one man and his cloest cronied have total control on everything the state does. Jodl wasnt one of them, and he had very limited control over what the German armies did or where they went, that rested with Hitler and his thugs. Hitler told Jodl what he wanted done, and Jodl was left to figure out how to go about it. To have expected him to disobey Hitlers would have been expecting him to commit suicide.

I think this was a very key consideration for the UK, Germany, Russia and Japan:

@KurtGodel7:

However, one reason for Hitler’s impatience in invading the Soviet Union was the British food blockade of Germany; and the resulting starvation in German-held lands. Delaying the invasion of the Soviet Union by two years would have meant two extra years of famine conditions; especially in occupied territories and population groups assigned low or mid-level priorities for scarce, precious food calories.

Only the US and some parts of the British empire had abundant food.  The UK, Germany, (and later Japan) were squeezed by naval (or submarine) blockades.  Russia was squeezed by the vast territories taken by the Germans.  Of course I’ll grant that in the early part of the war, Germany did quite well by taking the food and supplies found in France, Belgium, Ukraine, etc.

Grizzly, you make a good point.  The Germans were never going to be able to invade the UK; but they did try to starve them.  An excess of wheat in Australia and Canada does no good for the UK if it cannot be delivered.  I guess we disagree on whether or not British hunger, lack of heating oil, etc. would have been sufficient to make them either sue for peace with Germany…If the British were hungry enough (and I think without the US merchant marine), I could see them saying screw the French, lets have a ceasefire and let the USSR and Germany fight it out.

Regarding the USSR, I once read an estimate that 7/8 of the entire Germany war effort was fought on the eastern front.  This estimate includes the forces in Norway, the battles in Africa and the Balkans, Crete, the U-boat effort, the battles in Italy, the defense of France after D-day, the V-1 and V2 and other technological weapons, etc.  The defense of France required minimal forces in the early part of the war, especially early in the war when it was obvious the UK was in no position to invade.  I don’t think this small difference would have been enough to turn the tide in the East despite the small margin of victory by the USSR during 1941 and 1942.  I even doubt Hitler would have reduced the forces occupying France at this time had the UK capitulated.

Cool!!!  Wow, I wonder what kind of damage the Abrams could do going that fast!!!

@Upside-down_Turtle:

Yeah, I saw that show.  It’s partially what inspired this thread.

Tom Clancy said the Abrams can go 70+mph w/o a governor.  Is that really true?  It’s a lot higher than the “official” stats.

Man, 70+ tons going 70+mph…that’s a load going fast!  It’s faster than the Leopard’s “official” top speed.  However, it’s suposidly ad risk of destroying the drive train, but if that’s true, couldn’t you just somehow make it stronger?  I’m no mechanic, but I’m sure it could be done.

A 70 mph tank would kick @$$!  :-D

@Adlertag:

@Captain:

The recreation of Poland as a state was welcomed by the people living there, and they fought pretty darned hard against the German occupation.

I dont want to be negative, and are just curious more than anything, butt since you are a history teacher from New Zealand, did the Maori’s fight hard against the British occupation, or did they welcome the brits as liberators ? And how about the Aborigins in Australia, or the Zulu’s in South Africa, or the Indians in North America, or the black slaves from Africa that was sailed on british ships to their new home in U$A’s cotton fields and mines. Did all this natives fight against British exploitement, or did they recognize the brits as great liberators ? As I said, just curious. And I wont pull the string and ask if the Polish was happy to be liberated by allies in 1945. My country too was liberated by the Red Army, so of course we all are very greatful to comrade Stalin, our belowed hero.

Ok?

What point are you trying to make here?

Race Relations in New Zealand, the Treaty of Waitangi, the Kingitangi movement, Musket Wars and New Zealand wars are very complex issues. Some Maori did fight against the Europeans, but NZ was never invaded as such. It was brought into the empire with a treaty that recognized the unique status of Maori as native peoples. There have been really bad moments in NZ’s history, but work is being done to redress some of the grievances the Tangita whenua have endured in an effort to restore things that were illegally seized from Iwi in NZ. Becuase the government here recognizes the Treaty of Waitangi, Maori goups (Iwi) have legal grounds to make claims against actions that went on.

NZ is not perfect, but i fail to see what this has to do with the invasion of Poland.

Comparing those other colonial incidents above to NZ history is misguided, comparing them to the invasion of Poland is just sad.

I  watched it on PBS, They repeated it today starting at pearl habor.

Awsome show.