World War II: A Military and Social History

Engross yourself in a comprehensive overview of the single largest event in history with this enthralling course by an Ivy League professor.

Overview

Course No. 810

Between 1937 and 1945, approximately 55 million people perished in the series of interrelated conflicts known as the Second World War. No continent was left untouched, no ocean unaffected. The war led to the eclipse of Europe and the emergence of the United States and the Soviet Union as global superpowers; ushered in the atomic age; produced, in the Holocaust, the most horrific crime ever committed in the history of Western civilization, and led to the end of Europe’s colonial empires around the world.

This engaging series of 30 lectures is rich in detail and near-cinematic portraits of leaders and events. It explores not only the origins of the war, including the impact of the Treaty of Versailles, but also how it unfolded on both battlefront and the American home front, with focused looks at key subjects like Nazism and the Holocaust and the philosophy of strategic bombing and its impact on the future nature of warfare.

Video Lectures

• The Origins of the Second World War (33 min)

2. Hitler’s Challenge to the International System, 1933-1936 (30 min)

3. The Failure of the International System (32 min)

4. The Coming of War (32 min)

• Blitzkrieg (31 min)

• The German Offensive in the West (33 min)

7. “Their Finest Hour” – Britain Alone (30 min)

8. The Battle of Britain (30 min)

• Hitler Moves East (30 min)

10. The Germans Before Moscow (30 min)

• The War in Asia (31 min)

12. The Japanese Gamble (31 min)

13. The Height of Japanese Power (31 min)

• Turning the Tide in the Pacific – Midway and Guadalcanal (30 min)

• The War in North Africa (32 min)

16. War in the Mediterranean – The Invasions of Sicily and Italy (30 min)

• Stalingrad – The Turning Point on the Eastern Front (29 min)

• Eisenhower and Operation Overlord (29 min)

19. D-Day to Paris (29 min)

• Operation Market Garden and the Battle of the Bulge (28 min)

• Advance Across the Pacific (27 min)

• Turning Point in the Southwest Pacific – Leyte Gulf and the Philippines (26 min)

23. The Final Drive for Japan – Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and the Fire-Bombing of Tokyo (32 min)

24. War in the Air (34 min)

• Hitler’s New Order in Europe (36 min)

26. “The Man’s Army” (30 min)

27. Daily Life, Culture, and Society in Wartime (32 min)

28. The Race for Berlin (31 min)

• Truman, the Bomb, and the End of the War in the Pacific (28 min)

30. The Costs of War (25 min)