The Battle of Normandy: 85 Days in Hell • 2018

51:27

This film shows how the Nazis developed a terrifying new military tactic - Blitzkrieg - and how it caught first Poland and then Britain and France utterly unprepared. It charts the fall of Poland and how Hitler then conquered France in just a few weeks, an achievement that had eluded Germany throughout all the four years of World War One. It also reveals how heroic French resistance allowed the British to escape from Dunkirk and live to fight another day.

2/13 • World War II In HD Colour • 2009 • History

72:37

Russia invades Georgia and Ukraine, putting Putin under intense scrutiny. While disinformation thrives, threats of nuclear war persist.

S1E9 • Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War • 2024 • History

44:11

1947. Fearing that a damaged Europe might fall prey to Communism, President Truman launches the Marshall Plan, a major loan package offered to European nations to assist in their reconstruction. It is also a way to help the French in Indochina, where Ho Chi Minh has established a proper government, working from its "bamboo ministries". His army and his influence grow with each passing day. At the Kremlin, Stalin celebrates his 70th birthday. The grandiose celebrations organized for him around the world are a testimony to his power. In Berlin, he has imposed a blockade, which is overcome only thanks to the bravery of American pilots and their airlift. But Stalin prefers to focus on the success of his brand new atomic bomb. And the red wave continues to progress... In China, after a long civil war, Mao Zedong installs a totalitarian regime which will kill more than 50 million people in thirty years. In Korea, communist troops from the north have crossed the 38th parallel and are heading south, facing a South Korean army lacking men and supplies. Truman decides to intervene: commanded by General McArthur, the UN troops are sent to the front. A real debacle awaits them. Entrenched in the far south of Korea, in Pusan, Americans are surrounded by the enemy, will they be able to hold out

S1E2 • Apocalypse: War of Worlds 1945-1991 • 2019 • History

59:25

Simon explores modern Istanbul in search of the last desperate centuries of Christian Byzantium, in which the once glorious city was buffeted by enemies in both East and West, and yet still produced a golden artistic renaissance. This is story of the Christian crusaders who destroyed the city, and the Ottoman Muslims who restored it to life as an imperial capital after the epic siege of 1453.

Part 2 • Byzantium: A Tale of Three Cities • 2013 • History

51:56

By assassinating nearly a third of Europe's workers in some countries, World War 1 reduced the militant mass to silence. But it was above all the repressive measures of the major democracies that, from deportations to executions, dealt a blow to the anarchist movement. In this fertile inter-war period, where capitalism gave birth to its two foul beasts, Stalinism and fascism, more than ever before, anarchism continued to be the only force of resistance for the people, in the face of the totalitarian hydra that was increasingly generalising theft and industrialising death. From Boston to Barcelona, from Tokyo to Paris, anarchism was to lead a struggle on all fronts. It was eventually in Spain, during the course of a war resembling a revolution that the movement finally came within reach of utopia.

S1E3 • No Gods, No Masters: A History of Anarchism • 2016 • History

46:59

Harnessing fire is the ultimate origin event that made us modern. Fire allowed us to create, to destroy and to transform, but also taught us hard lessons.

S1E1 • Origins: The Journey of Humankind • 2017 • History