← Narrow Escapes of WWII

Season 1

13 episodes · 2015

  1. 1The Doolittle Raid

    01 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    Seeking to hit back at Japan, Col. Jimmy Doolittle puts B-25 bombers on aircraft for a mission that the crews have little chance of surviving.

  2. 2Wingate and the Chindits

    02 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    Surrounded by the Japanese, Orde Wingate led the 77th Indian Infantry Brigade in one of the most imaginative and complex escapes of World War II.

  3. 3The Black Battalion Holds the Line

    03 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    Unsung heroes: the battalion of black soldiers who were surrounded, down to their last ten rounds, and yet who helped win the Battle of the Bulge.

  4. 4Manstein Holds the Line

    05 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    Fleeing from the Russian troops, Erich von Manstein devised one of the most brilliant escapes in military history Â- one that is still studied in military schools.

  5. 5Lucky Laycock's Escape from Crete

    12 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    This is the dramatic story of how Crete was captured by the Germans and how Robert Laycock led a desperate rear guard action against crack German mountain troops.

  6. 6The Amiens Raid

    19 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    In advance of the Allied landings at Normandy, the British plan the aerial bombing of Amiens Prison, where a hundred Resistance fighters await execution.

  7. 7Breakout Through Hell's Gate

    26 Apr 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    With 60,000 German soldiers surrounded by the Russian army, this is the story of the heroic rearguard action that allowed thousands of troops to escape.

  8. 8The Road of Bones

    03 May 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    In 1944, 1500 outnumbered British and Indian troops amazingly hold Japanese forces at the key Burmese town of Kohima. This is their amazing story.

  9. 9Morshead Holds Tobruk

    10 May 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    By Easter 1941, all that stands between Afrika Korps commander Erwin Rommel and Egypt's Suez Canal is Tobruk. Australia's Gen. Leslie Morshead and his defenders are ordered to hold the Libyan port for eight weeks while the defenses of Egypt can be strengthened. The "Rats of Tobruk" are convinced that if they fail, the war against Germany will be lost.

  10. 10The Real Bridge Too Far

    17 May 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    Sadly, the Allied Forces did not manage to capture the last bridge near Arnhem. Arnhem quite literally proved to be 'a bridge to far'. More than 1,750 Allied soldiers who were killed during Operation Market Garden lie buried at the Airborne Cemetery in Oosterbeek.

  11. 11Evacuation in the Baltic

    24 May 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    As the war enters its final months, the nearly 2 million Germans living in East Prussia flee an advancing Red Army no longer distinguishing between German soldiers and civilians. Hundreds of thousands make for the Baltic ports--the start of the single biggest evacuation of WWII.

  12. 12Operation Pedestal

    31 May 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    By 1942, the fight between the Allies and the Axis for control of the Mediterranean is focused on tiny Malta. From there, British aircraft and submarines have been preying on enemy supply ships. When Hitler and Mussolini decide to crush Malta, Churchill dispatches a huge convoy to run the gauntlet of Axis air and naval power to reach the beleaguered island stronghold.

  13. 13Moore's Marchfinale

    07 Jun 2015 · 1 hr 0 min

    With the Italians preparing to invade Egypt in the summer of 1940, the British army's Long Range Desert Group (LRDG) causes havoc far behind the front. But after an LRDG patrol is attacked, a tough New Zealander named Ron Moore leads the survivors barefoot through the desert, 300 miles from Allied lines.