Reuters Television
1) World War II
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English
Description
This program covers World War II from the invasion of Poland, soon after dawn on September 1, 1939, to the Nuremberg war trials and the hanging of the convicted Nazi war criminals. It covers the rise of Hitler and Mussolini, the beginning of the war, the Battle of Britain with the Blitz at its height, the occupation of Paris and the evacuation of Dunkirk, the attack on Pearl Harbor, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the campaigns in North Africa...
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English
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On April 30, 1975, advancing North Vietnamese Army tanks rolled into Saigon, paving the way for the South Vietnamese surrender and the end of the Vietnam War-a war which claimed nearly four million lives in the name of freedom, communism, or democracy. It depends who is telling the story. This program documents the story from the beginning, in 1941, when the only harassment of occupying Japanese forces was by Ho Chi Minh's guerrillas, backed by the...
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English
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Leader of the one and only successful French counter-attack against the Germans before the Liberation, who escaped to London and issued the clarion call, "France has lost a battle, she has not lost the war," Charles de Gaulle badgered and bullied his way through the war years, demanding a larger role for France than Churchill and Roosevelt were willing to give a country that had barely lifted a finger against Hitler. From the time he landed on the...
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English
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Showing Palestine under the British Protectorate and the arrival of Holocaust survivors in 1946, this program properly begins with David Ben-Gurion's proclamation of the state of Israel, and proceeds through the tumultuous first 40 years of the oldest surviving nation and the newest democracy in the Middle East. Included in the program are the '67 and '73 wars, the invasion of Lebanon and the destruction of the Iraqi nuclear plant, the trial of Adolf...
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English
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A documentary presentation of the events of the October Revolution, from the defeat of the czarist armies and famine in Russia, to the overthrow of Nicholas and the assumption of power by the Communists, drawn from Russian and Western newsreel footage and from the famous Soviet propaganda films that dramatized some of the events of the Revolution. The program also shows the effects of the Revolution in Western Europe: innocents and idealists cynically...
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English
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This program traces the life and legacy of Lenin, the philosophical and political founding father of the Soviet Union, the starring actor as well as the writer and director of much of the drama from the earliest days of the Russian revolutionary movement. When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, Lenin became the President of the Council of People's Commissars and remained the active head of the Soviet government until his death in 1924. Using documentary...
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English
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This program covers the anxious years since India became independent in 1947: the rioting and bloodshed of the first few weeks of independence, when tens of thousands died and millions became refugees as Moslems tried to get to the newly created Pakistan and Hindus and Sikhs to India; Gandhi's assassination and its aftermath; India's invasion of Portuguese Goa and clash with Chinese forces along the northeast border; Nehru's death; the war in Kashmir;...
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English
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From Pearl Harbor to the Persian Gulf-the American effort during World War II in the Pacific and European theaters, followed by Korea, the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, and Operation Desert Storm-this program covers 50 years of almost continuous action by America's military.
10) Juan Peron
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English
Description
This program provides and overview of the rise and fall and rise again of Juan Peron. Events covered include Peron's first presidency, during which his second wife, Evita (Maria Eva Duarte), died; the coup that drove Peron out of Argentina; Peron's return to Argentina and his second presidency; Peron's death and the succession of his third wife, Isabel Martinez de Peron (Maria Estela Martinez Cartas); the overthrow of Isabel Martinez de Peron; the...
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English
Description
It is not so long since women fought for the right to vote-women in Russia were enfranchised in 1917 as a result of the Revolution, in 1918 in Great Britain, and the U.S., Germany, and Sweden soon followed suit. This program begins with suffragette scenes and quickly moves to portray some of the outstanding women politicians of the 20th century: Lady Nancy Astor; Prime Ministers Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka, Indira Gandhi of India, Golda Meir...
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English
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This program looks at the life, the achievements, and the legacy of Mao Tse-tung: birth, education, enlistment in the revolutionary army revolting against the Manchu dynasty; founding the Communist Party and the first Chinese Soviet; break with the Kuomintang and the Long March; formulation of the rectification campaign adapting Marxism to Chinese culture; victory over the Nationalists in 1949; the Great Proletarian Revolution; the Cultural Revolution;...
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English
Description
This program covers the events that began with the Bay of Pigs invasion and ended with a blinking contest between John Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev, with nuclear war an apparently real alternative. The program follows the events, from the failed invasion, to the discovery through aerial photography of missile emplacements in Cuba, to the American blockade of Cuba; from speeches and marches and demonstrations on both sides, to Marine reenforcements...
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English
Description
On October 1, 1949, the People's Republic of China came into being following the victory of Mao Tse-tung's forces over the Kuomintang, which fled to the island of Taiwan. Thus the Communists completed a revolution begun by the idealistic Sun Yat-sen in the early 1920s. This program documents how Sun's idealism came under Bolshevik guidance; the roles of the young Chiang Kai-shek and Mao; the Long March and the conflict between Chiang and Mao; the...
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English
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This program shows the steely face of Communism as the Soviets sent troops to Hungary to suppress popular discontent with the government. The program shows what happened in the aftermath of Prime Minister Imre Nagy's announcement that Hungary was withdrawing from the Warsaw Pact: Soviet troops entered Budapest and other centers and simply crushed the revolt. Thousands of Hungarians died and 150,000 fled the country. The program shows the uprising...
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English
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This program covers the roots of the Spanish Civil War-the electoral defeat of right-wing forces by the union of left-wing parties into the Popular Front; the polarization of Left and Right as Fascism and Communism loomed on the far side of the Pyrenees; the young officers' conspiracy that began the uprising in Morocco. Within days, the conflict had spread to Spain, and the bitter Civil War had begun. The program covers the course of the war: the...
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This program contains contemporary newsreels shown to American and British movie audiences at year's end-important not only for the events shown, but for the emphases and biases of the participants in those events. The year 1945 began with V2s targeted on London and the Battle of the Bulge on the Continent. But then events rushed to their inevitable conclusion: the Russian attacks toward Berlin; the Yalta Conference; blistering air attacks on Germany...
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English
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On August 15, 1947, Pakistan was born. As the former Indian provinces debated whether to be part of India or Pakistan, religious differences flared into full-scale rioting, which led to large-scale migration; millions moved from India to Pakistan, and vice versa. This program documents the birth of the new country; the death of Mohammed Ali Jinnah, leader of the Moslem League; the economic and political problems of the new country; the Indus Water...
19) World War I
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English
Description
From the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo to the delegates signing the Versailles Treaty, this program covers the events that set off the war and the war itself: the German invasion of Belgium; the Battle of the Marne, of Ypres, Verdun, the Somme, Gallipoli; the naval Battle of Jutland, the sinking of the Blucher, and the German U-boat campaign; airplanes, Zeppelins, and the newly-invented tank; the U.S. entry into the war; the last massive German...
20) Fidel Castro
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English
Description
After Fidel Castro came to power in 1959, Cuba was transformed from American satellite to Soviet client-and, as the Soviet sphere of influence shrank, Cuba started on the way to being transformed into a stand-alone source of bad news 90 miles off the coast of Florida. This program documents Castro's direction of the overthrow of Batista; his accession to power; the Bay of Pigs attack; Che Guevara's role; changes in the Cuban economy; the continuing...