Military History on the TV can be pretty bad, with poor history, a need for new 'revelations' and a tendency towards repeating itself every two minutes. But last night I caught up with the BBC Timewatch programme 'Bloody Omaha' which attempted to analyse what happened on the beach during the D-Day invasion, and although it occasionally exhibited some of these symptons it turned out to be pretty good. With an impressive line-up of talking heads including Steven Zaloga the programme took a sober view balancing personal experiences with historical analysis. The most chilling phrase, consistently repeated was "it was a numbers game", a statement graphically illustrated when the casualty figures were re-examined and doubled since they were originally worked out. It covered the Allied plans for invasion, the increase in German defences after Rommel took over and the incredible raid at Pointe du Hoc.
You can still catch it for the next few days on the BBC iPlayer site but hurry up as it will soon be gone. Steven's analysis of the battle for Osprey will be back in print in March.