A couple of days ago I mentioned the DrsC were watching a History Channel miniseries called The World Wars, and indicated I liked the first episode. Since then I've watched the other two episodes and have revised my opinion, to something much more negative.
I'll freely admit I'm no expert on World War I, aka "the Great War." That war formed the substance of episode one. In episodes two and three we got the between-the-wars period and World War II. As an amateur World War II military historian, this is a period with which I am much more familiar.
My ignorance enabled me to enjoy episode one. If key things were omitted or glossed over, I did not recognize the faults. However, as we got into the period with which I've a particular interest, the series fell apart.
Imagine a discussion of World War II that entirely omits the war in North Africa! No Rommel, no Montgomery, no El Alamein, no Tobruk. Watching The World Wars you'd have thought the first time U.S. ground forces took offensive (as opposed to defensive) action was in Sicily. Utter rot.
Some of the errors of fact were visual. A glaring error was footage of a wing with engine nacelle and spinning propeller supposedly representing the Japanese launching the attack on Pearl Harbor. The wing was one side of a multi-engine aircraft as no fuselage was in evidence. The problem: no multi-engine Japanese aircraft participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor. Nippon operated no multi-engine aircraft from carriers in World War II.
Another visual error was the opening footage of infantry warfare supposedly representing the Battle of the Bulge in Europe, there was no snow on the ground. Subsequent footage showed a snowy battlefield. This battle began in mid-December and lasted until late January in northern Europe, there was snow on the ground the whole time.
The series gives credit for taking Italy to Patton, quite simply he didn't. The battle for Italy was at Churchill's insistence, and it proved very difficult mountainous terrain to assault, very easy for Germany to defend. Churchill's misjudgment leading to this tough slog is never mentioned.
To be fair, the series was right more often than it was wrong. For something purporting to be history, that is entirely too low a standard.
Coincidentally, when episode three finished the VCR switched to the local PBS feed which was doing a Nova program on technological innovations used in conjunction with D Day - the Mulberry harbors, the "funny" tanks with various attachments, the floating dock, etc. The contrast couldn't have been more stark: Nova nailed it, The World Wars was impressionistic and sloppy.
