Synopsis

To Arms Mud and trenches; incompetent command and carnage; waste and futility - this is how we have come to see World War One. Based on the book by Hew Strachan, Professor of the History of War at Oxford, The First World War is the first entirely new comprehensive documentary series on the Great War for 40 years, demolishing myths and offering new and provocative answers to core questions about the war, its causes, conduct and legacy. Filmed in 28 countries, it uncovers fresh and extraordinary material. Hundreds of contemporary eyewitness accounts from front-line soldiers, generals, statesmen, children and women from all sides in the conflict have been gathered. A supreme treasure trove of archive film and stills, much not seen for 90 years, from newly available archives in Central and Eastern Europe and around the world, have been painstakingly authenticated wherever possible. Also uncovered are rare audio, new stills of the war in Africa; original documents as well as views and sequences shot on the actual battlefield locations. This first film covers the period from 1908 and how the seeds of the conflict were sown in Austria-Hungary and the Balkans, examining how a small local conflict escalated into a world war. With mobilisation across Europe, the run up to war and the call-up of reserves are recounted from the public's point of view. The film looks in detail at Britain's decision to support France and Russia and establishes that this was not a war that the British had to fight. Britain feared its allies as much as its enemies and as a neutral stood to lose just as much from a Franco/ Russian victory as it has to fear from their defeat.

The First World War

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