Clash of Wings - 03 - Hitler's Biggest Gamble

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Clash of Wings is a 15-episode documentary television series which originally aired in 1998 on the Discovery Channel. The hour-long episodes were some of the initial shows of Discovery Network's 1999 launch of the Military Channel. Aired as a knock-off of the international best-selling Clash of Wings (1994) reference book by air historian Walter J. Boyne, the programs were produced in 1998 and aired the next year appearing as some of the initial original content in the launch of the new Discovery Wings cable channel (before its name change in 2005 to the Military Channel). The programs were hosted and partially narrated by Boyne, written by Boyne (also credited as associate producer) together with director-producer John Honey, and presented by executive producer Phillip Osborn. The effort adapted his encyclopedic work of the same name.

Like many World War II documentaries involving aircraft, the displayed content utilizes many scenes from gun camera footage and other military films now in the public domain. The series frequently also closely followed and interspersed color film of surviving combat aircraft types from multiple camera angles and in a variety of operations modes. Unlike many documentaries about the era, the series makes no effort to present on-camera interviews, instead focusing on an overarching narrative telling the historic story appropriate to that episode's specific title. Boyne is not the sole narrator, but utilizes other voices to describe details while Boyne appears to sum up and tie together segments as host.

Walter J. Boyne's credentials are impressive, and his works are frequently cited by others in bibliographies involving the history of air power and aircraft. Born in 1929, he is a retired United States Air Force officer, combat veteran, aviation historian, and author of more than 50 books and over 1,000 magazine articles. Too young for World War II, his military service spanned the Korean War, service with the strategic bomber forces of the deep cold war, and the Vietnam War. He is a former director of the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution and is currently Chairman of the National Aeronautic Association. The television series, like his book, is comprehensive and well organized by theater and timeline of the war he experienced personally as a teenager during his formative years.

Hitler's Biggest Gamble
The Russian Front: Operation Barbarossa and Germany's failure to bring a quick resolution to that particular campaign was arguably the turning point of the war in Europe. Aircraft featured: Polikarpov I-153, Tupolev SB-2, Il-2, PE-2, Bf 109F/G, Ju 88, Ju 87, Ju 52/3m, Yak-9, Po-2 and P-39 Airacobra.