Which I think is one of the reasons Burns made this documentary when he did. In one interview I saw, Burns claimed that he was motivated to make the documentary because some high school students claimed that Russia was our enemy in WWII, so I think he intends to make clear the Russian role in the war. He also pointed out that WWII vets are dying at the rate of 1,000 a day, so we better talk to them sooner rather than later.

As far as disecting the causes and "what shoulda happened, but didn't" aspects of WWII, that will go on forever. A lot of this analysis will be claptrap and much of it will be a fairly clear-eyed analysis of the miscues and mistakes leading up WWII and the failures and successes of the military strategy. We still have some lessons that can be learned from both World Wars and the ones that followed, so let the debate begin or continue.

In the meantime, we are in a very short sliver of time, where the last of the WWII vets, as mentioned before, are dying. In a few years, most will be gone, along with their wives. I'm willing to give them one last listen, I'm willing to see if age has changed their perspective or memory.

Some have criticized Burns for not showing the point of view of other countries. How is he supposed to do that? Budgets for documentaries are not that big, even for Burns, and nobody is going to watch a 65-hour documentary, which is about the minimum length needed to include all points of view. And if he did, he would probably be criticized as an ugly American for co-opting another country's history.

This documentary might not include it all, but still includes enough that might not have been known (or remembered) even by a well-read historian. I didn't know that only 134 commercial passenger cars were made during the war. Although I knew that millions of civilians were killed during WWII, I didn't know there were more civilian deaths than military deaths. I'll take what knowledge I can get. I have never expected a movie or documentary to give me the full story on anything, but I'm perfectly capable of finding out more if I want to, and so is everybody else.

As far as these vets being the greatest generation? Too soon to tell. The greatest generation included my parents, and they are too old for me to want to pick on them now, although I have been willing to do so in the past. My objectivity will return in a few years.

Someone said that the soldiers in the documentary were not articulate enough to be interesting. They would prefer another Shelby Foote wanna-be to narrate the documentary. I only paraphrase this poster's observation because I really wonder if we were watching the same documentary. My second favorite post is the one about stop showing all the dead bodies because we get it already! Clueless, totally clueless, but funny.

WWII is still not over for a lot of people

A lot of Americans were raised by severely post-traumatic veterans in an era when PTSD didn't yet have a name or any treatment aside from a night at the bar drinking with old friends.

I think that had a lot to do with the sixties. A significant fraction of baby boomers were raised by traumatized veterans who treated their PTSD with booze and rage.

If you grew up in a home like that, then marijuana would have felt like it was sent to you by God. You would have wanted to run away to San Francisco and put flowers in your hair dream up some better way to live.

A war is never really over when they say it is.

-- Silenced

Several people have made mention of this. Of course, we didn't have that name back then, but we did call it "shell shock" or "battle fatigue." It is/was no less real, though. The scene where Patton slapped a "shell shocked" soldier and called him a coward was eye-opening.

I think PTSD explains a lot about my dad's generation, something we realize only way too late in retrospect. The only time my dad ever hit me was when, as a naive boy, I expressed disappointment that he had never personally killed a German.

That tells you something right there. Too chickenshit to even use a screen name.

Then there are the armchair historians who want to argue over whether Midway or some other battle was the turning point. Then there are the inevitable tedious moronic scolds who just can't pass up another opportunity to remind us that:

1. Nothing was ever worth fighting for.

2. We slaughtered the Japanese and German people too.

3. We're a bad country and we do bad things.

4. What about the terrible racism of the times?

5. The "Greatest Generation" is a lot of hooey and they are all a bunch of greed-heads who spent this current generation into debt.

Man!

Whay is it that when Burns writes on baseball, jazz or WWII Latinos do not exist?

2. We slaughtered the Japanese and German people too.

3. We're a bad country and we do bad things.

4. What about the terrible racism of the times?

My goodness! If you just so much as suggest that America is Anything Other than the Perfect Blameless City Upon the Hill suddenly you are a tedious scold!

What I find wonderful and remarkable about this film so far (only seen eps 1&2) is that it does not hold back about the bad OR good. That so many of the veterans can look back and see the complexities of it all so clearly ... the fighter pilot who said that honestly, a lot of young guys enlisted because it was exciting, not because they were patriotic. Or the gunner who lamented that for a long time the bombers were simply not very good at hitting their targets.

That they said that ... that it was true ... doesn't mean that nothing in World War II was worth fighting for. It means that the war was fought by HUMAN BEINGS ... who were full of contradictions and selfishnesses and ambiguity and occasional incompetences just like us. Who made mistakes and did terrible things along with the good things.

As Burns himself put it, the war brought out the best AND the worst in human beings.

You want to talk about tedious? The constant eyerolling and handwringing of those who really prefer the cartoon version of history. BORING!