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The First World War

Jonathan Lewis

Alan Clements

The First World War: Episode 5: Shackled to a Corpse

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Episode 5

Episode 5: Shackled to a Corpse

Shackled to a Corpse

BBC Four - The First World War, Shackled to a Corpse

The war on the Eastern Front initiated many horrors of 20th-century warfare.

Ten-part series based on the book by Hew Strachan. Part five looks at the ferocious battle for the Eastern Front, fought from the Urals to the Alps.

The war on the Eastern Front was racial - Slav verses Teuton. It was highly mobile, fought across brutal terrain from the Urals to the Alps. It initiated many horrors of 20th-century warfare - chemical weapons, mass expulsions of civilians, the persecution of Jews. The Italian front with Austro-Hungary was perhaps the bitterest of all. Soldiers lived and fought for years in the harshest environments, enduring avalanches and frostbite as well as relentless enemy action. Mistrust and contempt increasingly threatened alliances. Germany shored up her ally Austria-Hungary, feeling herself 'shackled to a corpse', while Austria-Hungary saw Germany as her 'secret enemy'.

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Ten-part series which tells the story of the First World War as never before.

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Episode 5: Shackled to a Corpse

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