World War II: A Documentary History — Amazon DVD list
World War II — The Eastern Front — Animated maps describing the conflict
The Unknown War: WWII And The Epic Battles Of The Russian Front — Landmark 20 Part Documentary Series
The Unknown War — 20 Part Documentary Series
The Unknown War (Russian: “Великая Отечественная” (The Great Patriotic War) or “Неизвестная война” (The Unknown War) is an American documentary television series. The 20-part series documents the World War II conflict between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. The show was produced and syndicated for international distribution by Air Time International, and the executive producer was Fred Weiner. Each episode is about 48 minutes long, similar in format to the film The World at War. The footage was edited from over 3.5 million feet of film taken by Soviet camera crews from the first day of the war during Operation Barbarossa on 22 June 1941 until the Soviet entry into Berlin during the Battle of Berlin in May 1945. Most of these films have never been seen outside this documentary series.
The series is hosted by Academy Award Winner Burt Lancaster, who spent three weeks in eight cities in the USSR for location filming. Film footage from Soviet archives comprises a major portion of the series, supplemented by film from both the United States and British archives. Appearing in exclusive interviews would be Russian Commanders like Georgi Zhukov and Vasily Chuikov. Other interviews shot for the series included Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev and Averell Harriman, who was U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union during World War II.
The series was produced with Soviet cooperation after the release of The World at War, which the Soviet government felt paid insufficient attention to their part in World War II. Released in 1978, The Unknown War is sympathetic to the Soviet struggle against Nazi Germany. It was quickly withdrawn from TV airings after it ran in 1978. Later it returned to airings on cable, including A&E, the History Channel and YouTube.
Episode 2 The Battle for Moscow
Episode 3 The Siege of Leningrad
Episode 5 The Defense of Stalingrad
Episode 6 Survival at Stalingrad
Episode 7 The World’s Greatest Tank Battle
Episode 11 The Battle of the Seas
Episode 12 The Battle of Caucasus
Episode 13 Liberation of the Ukraine
Episode 14 The Liberation of Belorussia
Episode 15 The Balkans to Vienna
Episode 16 The Liberation of Poland
Episode 18 The Battle of Berlin
Episode 19 The Last Battle of the Unknown War
Episode 20 A Soldier of the Unknown War
Russia’s War, Blood Upon the Snow: The History of the Stalin Years (1924-1953) — Epic 10 Part Documentary Series
This acclaimed ten part documentary series describes the historic clash of the military forces of gnostic totalitarian collectivism — Hitler’s Wehrmacht and Stalin’s Red Army.
Russia’s War brings to life the story of the people of the Soviet Union during World War II who struggled to survive the tyrannical reign of Joseph Stalin. A compelling story of dictatorship, bloody battles and endless courage as the Soviet people combat not only Hitler and the German Army , but their own leader as well. Hosted by former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, this 10 hour program features never-before-seen Russian images, once-secret documents, and leading Russian historians to explore Russia from 1924 through 1953.
War of the Century — Acclaimed 4 Part Documentary Series
This acclaimed four-part BBC series investigates what led to the largest military operation in history – and the bloodiest. Assisted by leading historians and granted unique access to Eastern film archives and to both Soviet and German participants, War of the Century is the definitive series on a war that shaped the borders and attitudes of Europe for the second half of the 20th Century.
War of the Century — Episode 1
War of the Century — Episode 2
War of the Century — Episode 3
War of the Century — Episode 4
Andrey Vlasov: General for Two Devils – Documentary
Patriot or traitor? More than one-half century after his execution, General Andrei Vlasov remains one of World War II’s most controversial figures. A brilliant Soviet commander, Vlasov was captured by the German Wehrmacht in July, 1942, and soon became central to the campaign by junior German officers to launch a Russian Liberation Army (usually referred to as the ROA) against Stalin’s regime. These plans ran up against Nazi dogmas of Lebensraum and Slavic inferiority, however, and Vlasov spent much of the war under house arrest. Only in the last months of the war did the Germans consent to sponsor a truncated version of his Liberation Army, with predictably futile results. Yet Vlasov’s vision – of a Russia freed of Stalin’s yoke, with guaranteed freedoms for its peoples – survived his battlefield defeats; that he sought to attain his goals through German Nazi sponsorship underlines the tragedy of his – and Soviet Russia’s – predicament.
This new documentary offers newly-found film footage and extensive interviews with Vlasov’s surviving associates, lieutenants, and foot soldiers, including Igor Novosiltzev, Constantine Sacharevitsch, Nikolai Kozlov, Nikolai Numerov, Nikolas Vastchenko, and Nikolai A. Chiketov. The views of Vlasov’s German backers are represented by Hans von Herwath, Robert Krötz, and Helmuth Schwenninger, while William Sloane Coffin, Arthur Cowgill, Frank Roberts, and Tom Dennis comment upon the U.S.-British supervised repatriation of Vlasov’s surviving troops to the Soviet Union in 1945. With its multiple perspectives and rich visual documentation, this solidly-researched film provides the clearest picture yet of this difficult subject, revealing Vlasov’s tortured legacy in its many dimensions.
How the Red Army Defeated Germany: The Three Alibis – Dr. Jonathon House
The scholars of the Department of Military History at the U.S. Army’s Command and General Staff College provide an in-depth look at the significance of specific WWII battlegrounds, with attention to factors such as other major world players, campaigns and tactics, U.S. military-government policy, the role of women service members and the bombing of Japan.
9:55 pm on July 31, 2020
