Lista episodi

As the 1930s progressed, it became obvious that war in Europe was inevitable. Equally, it became increasingly obvious that air power would have a significant role to play in the forthcoming war. Looks at the preparations for war from the mid-1930s to the Fall of France in 1940. It tells the story of the 'official' foundation of the German Luftwaffe In 1935, with its emphasis on offensive aerial capabilities and parachute forces capable of supporting the new 'Blitzkrieg' tactic. It also reveals France's failure to develop adequate air defences contributed to her swift defeat and looks at how the RAF prepared for the coming onslaught.

With France defeated and occupied, Britain found herself next in Hitler's sights. If the Luftwaffe could gain aerial superiority over the Channel, then the way would be clear for the Wehrmacht Invasion barges to launch an invasion force against Southern England. This episode covers the Battle of Britain and the bitter months that followed, concentrating on the role of RAF Fighter Command in defeating the Luftwaffe and the terrible suffering inflicted on British cities by Nazi bombers.

Churchill famously said that the only thing he was really afraid of was the U-Boat menace. If German submarines and surface raiders could destroy the Allied convoys bringing vital supplies across the Atlantic to Britain, then the nation would eventually be unable to fight, it was the Germans who first realised that air power had a significant role to play in the Battle of the Atlantic from 1940 to 1942, but the British soon caught on. Now RAF Coastal Command began to actively hunt down the submarines and raiders and take an ever more lethal toll.

The Luftwaffe had bombed London initially by mistake. Churchill retaliated by sending bombers against Germany. Now cities were legitimate targets. This episode looks at early strikes by RAF Bomber Command and the start of Britain's strategic air bombardment of Germany from Spring 1941 to Spring 1942. It also looks at how Germany used its air force in strikes against the Balkans and to support the invasion of Russia during 'Operation Barbarossa'.

The air war was fought in the Mediterranean and over the Western Desert was different in many respects from the air war over Europe. This episode covers the conflict from Italy's entry into the war in Summer 1940 to the establishment of an advanced wing of the Desert Air Force in Tripoli in 1942. It covers the invasion of Crete, celebrates the heroic defence of Malta, while in the Western desert, Allied air power played an important role in the defeat of the Afrika Corps, often under the most inhospitable of conditions.

Between 1942 and early 1943, American bomber squadrons arrived in force in Britain and the Allies were able to mount evermore powerful and devastating strikes against Nazi targets. But the bomber formations would be met by swarms of German interceptors, and caught in merciless aerial battles stretching across hundreds of miles of sky. At the same time, the arrival of U.S. air power boosted the Allies' offensive capabilities in North Africa against an increasingly beleaguered Afrika Korps.

The surprise aerial attack on Pearl Harbour by the Japanese in December 1941 was proof that the aircraft was now a potentially war-winning weapon. Once seemingly invincible battleships were exposed as terrifyingly vulnerable to the bomb-load from a single plane. The sea war in the Pacific would be decided by aircraft carrier task forces, launching waves of strike aircraft against each other. This episode covers the air war in the Pacific from Pearl Harbour to Ceylon and reveals how the Allies were almost completely unprepared to defend India and Burma from the air.

From the Spring of 1943 to early 1944, the Allies were pounding Nazi Germany by day and by night. By day, formations of 8th Air Force B-17 Flying Fortresses would battle their way through heavily defended skies to deliver their deadly bomb-loads. At night it was the turn of the Lancasters of RAF Bomber Command to take the war to Germany. There was much talk of 'area bombing' and 'precision bombing' - but ordinary German civilians paid a terrible price for their leader's ambitions.

This episode covers the rarely mentioned air campaign fought in the skies over Italy from July 1943 to July 1944. It looks at how the Allies used their air superiority to support the Sicilian and Salerno landings and how the foothold gained on the Italian mainland allowed them to create forward bomber bases capable of striking previously unreachable targets. As the Allies pressed ever northward, air power would play a significant role in the Anzio landings, at Cassino and in the liberation of Rome.

This documentary shows how the air forces helped win Operation Overlord before, during and after June 6, 1944.

In the days and weeks and months that followed D-Day, the Allies used their air superiority to help crush enemy concentrations holding up the land advance at Caen and Falaise, and to support the advance on Paris and through into Belgium. The Germans retaliated with their new 'Vengeance Weapons'. V-1 flying bombs fell upon Southern England and the RAF had to resort to desperate measures to intercept them. At the same time, it became vital to find their hidden launch sites and obliterate the flying bombs before they could be unleased.

As the noose tightened around Nazi Germany, Allied air power seemed to be tipping the scales everywhere. The converging Allied air forces could be found in Norway, helping to beat off the powerful German counter-offensive in the Ardennes, in Italy, in the Balkans and on the Russian Front. Vast waves of bombers smashed the German communications and material production. The Luftwaffe collapsed almost completely under the strain of trying to defend the Fatherland and victory was assured.

Air power would be an even more decisive factor in the defeat of Imperial Jan than Nazi Germany. This episode covers the air war in Burma, where the ability to deliver troops and supplies by air helped to convincingly defeat the Japanese ground forces. At the same time, as the Allies fought their way across the Pacific, Japanese cities easily came into range. Now even Tokyo found itself under fearsome attacks by formations of B-29s with their Mustang escorts. Japan fought on - until aircraft delivered the knockout blow. Atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There was no defense. Now a single airplane could destroy an entire city, Imperial Japan had no choice but to capitulate.

World War II was over. The U.N. tried to impose air controls but very quickly found itself embroiled in a new war, this time in Korea. Now new generations of jets clashed in Asian skies as MiGs met Sabres in ever faster and more lethal dogfights. The Cold War was heating up, and Britain both needed to develop a new approach to the Commonwealth air defence and to make a positive frontline contribution to N.A.T.O.

At the start of World War II, biplanes were still thought of as viable. By its end, new generations of jets like the Gloster Meteor and Me262 dominated the skies. Rocket bombs could deliver a devastating payload across vast distances and one bomb - one aircraft - could destroy an entire city. Air power had changed almost beyond recognition and with it changed the very world we lived in. This last programme looks at the development of air power and speculates on its future potential from the vantage point of 1954.