Was watching band of brothers...

I have a major fascination with BoB.

I absoutly love Stephen Ambrose stuff, i have nearly all of his books, and everyone is as epic as the other.

The read is prety epic too imo. Such a good series though, and it envisaged the book really well.

Amazing is all that can be added to this series.


**** Sobel tried to commit suicide aswell, but failed many times. He had a break down and lost contact with everyone. Just an FYI :)
 
I think most of Easy company, if they looked back after the war, would realize Sobel did a good job of training them. His obsession with forcing his men to hate him was a form of reverse psychology, pushing them to excel was a powerful tool in creating a sense of companionship between members of Easy needed for the confrontations they were approaching. Unfortunately he seemed to have let that get to his head and refused to accept that he was a poor battlefield leader, his failings and stubbornness combined with the resentment for him created by his harsh training methods caused him to lash out in an unnecessary fashion.

He was largely responsible after all for creating the foundations that made Easy company such a powerful and efficient unit, arguably one of the most important things needed before you send young men out to face their likely demise.

Just my opinion on the guy tbh, I believe pretty strongly that Easy wouldn't have ended up being so successful if he wasn't involved. Fortunately he was removed from command before his weaknesses on the battlefield took their tole.
 
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slambo69 said:
Didnt one of the boys from easy company admit that they probably wouldnt have made it through normandy if it wasnt for Sobel's rigorous training.

He doesnt seem any worse for discipline than sgt hartmann...
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Herbert Sobel was the first man assigned to Easy Company. A clothing salesman in civilian life, Sobel was not particularly athletic. Paradoxically, as the unit's commanding officer, he was in charge of training the men for battle. Sobel was a strict disciplinarian, handing out cruel punishments for seemingly harmless infractions of the rules. During training in England, he threatened to court-martial Lieut. Richard Winters for his alleged failure to inspect a latrine at the appointed hour. In response, Easy's non-commissioned officers offered to turn in their stripes out of loyalty to Winters. Shortly before the company headed to France on D-Day, Sobel was reassigned and became commander of a parachute jumping school. Despite Sobel's unpopularity, many credit Easy Company's success in battle to the rigorous standards that he set for his men.
 
The respect I have for those men is huge, they went through hell to protect their beliefs and country and are heroes. I'm looking forward to the new series, but I'd really like to see one made about the British, maybe something in Africa or about the RAF, because our boys were just as brave and brilliant as the American soldiers.

I had tears in my eyes watching the concentration camp episode, and then watching the interviews with the soldiers is incredibly moving as well. Even 60 years on, it is obvious how traumatised many of them are.

p.s. Winters and Spears must have been amazing leaders to serve under.
 
nicktay2605 said:
The respect I have for those men is huge, they went through hell to protect their beliefs and country and are heroes. I'm looking forward to the new series, but I'd really like to see one made about the British, maybe something in Africa or about the RAF, because our boys were just as brave and brilliant as the American soldiers.

I had tears in my eyes watching the concentration camp episode, and then watching the interviews with the soldiers is incredibly moving as well. Even 60 years on, it is obvious how traumatised many of them are.

p.s. Winters and Spears must have been amazing leaders to serve under.
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There is a book by Ambrose called "Pegasus Bridge"

It is about the British Glider division, the first people ever into allied territory about 12 hours before D-Day started. True story obviously.

It isn't written aswell as BoB, and does not cover a long time span. Only a few days. But they were officially the first people into France to attack. No support, no help. All on their own for a fair few hours surrounded by Germans everywhere.

Also another little fact i found out the other day. In Africa, did you know the British and German troops stopped fighting at 5 o clock, primarily for a tea break. It was a treaty that Romel and ? Montgommery i think it was signed. Also captured enemy vehicled had to be returned by morning and other such things.

How ever this ended after a while after Hitler advanced futher forward on the front.
 
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Maybe we should petition the bbc to do something to honour our fallen heroes in campaigns protecting our empire? The last good military/history documentry that wasnt policially twisted was the ancient rome series.

Pegasus Bridge was an amazing book, after reading I decided to go there. At Bouneville theres a brilliant museum which includes the original bridge! (the canal was widened after the war and a new bridge built), it even still has the bullet holes in it made by a straffing meschershmitt (sp?)!

How they managed to land there with such accuracy and such little room for error still baffles me - no electronics, automatic landing devices and other nonsense just shear balls!

The british paratroopers had one hell of a ride through the war. :(
 
I found it moving how most of the soldiers would run out of the hospitals to get back to their mates and fight along side them.#

When is the new series out?
 
Dick Winters is a true hero. Courageous, brave and humble in equal measure. Band Of Brothers is an exemplary piece of WWII film making. Get yourself the blu-ray version, it is stunning.

Let us not forget that there where heroes on every side of the WWII conflict. Pegasus Bridge and Arnhem Bridge typifies the bravery of the British Para. Ernst Barkmann's exploits in the Ardennes shows the skill and bravery of the Panzer crews.

Camalot said:
I found it moving how most of the soldiers would run out of the hospitals to get back to their mates and fight along side them
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A wounded soldiers desire to get to his unit quickly was to ensure they got back before a 'replacement' could be sent to fill their space in the unit. Otherwise, they would be sent wherever needed to fill gaps and would then be in the company of strangers, not knowing how they would react in a firefight. Far easier to fight with friends beside who know your cues for actions such as throwing grenades and can provide cover immediately rather than be with guys who miss these cues and fail to cover your backside.
 
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Very sad about Sobel. What do you do? Coddle those under you so you're well liked and die or treat them like **** and survive?
 
To be fair, they had a massive budget to make the series but it is still my favourite and have lost count the amount of times I've watched it.
 
Viper² said:
To be fair, they had a massive budget to make the series but it is still my favourite and have lost count the amount of times I've watched it.
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In comparison to most series, Heroes has a huge budget and look how that turned out. Budget can be easily wasted :)
 
Heads up

10th Episode has just been added to Virgin On Demand. Is that the final episode?

If so, if you haven't seen any of this, the whole series is on SD/HD on Virgin.

Get watching :)
 
Ordered it on Blu-ray Friday night. I'm going to have to watch it all again in high def. These joint BBC/HBO productions have worked really well, we get their budgets, they get quality actors. A win-win siotuation for everybody. Rome was the same.
 
The original Das Boot was a TV series which I think was excellent. If you like BoB you'll like Das Boot. Try to watch the original undubbed version. As theres a shorter dubbed version which ruins it a bit.
 
Americans, despite their relatively large contingent, have that fantastic detail to their stories. Every surname counts, every life lost is documented and felt in those books, movies and even games. The British, German, Russian (especially Russian) approach at the time was pretty much what counts is officers name, the rest is collateral wall of bodies. Both battles of El Alamein had 6 times less casualties than Battle Of Bulge and yet you will find so many more personal, well told, incredibly detailed accounts of the latter. It's almost like no other nation cared what happened to their foot soldiers. And then there is that "cannon fodder" aspect - we never hear stories about Canadian soldiers, Australian soldiers, New Zealanders. Like they never existed.
 
I have a great ritual with this, every Christmas i spend a day with a bottle of southern comfort and my Band of brothers set, i watch it from start to finish and love it every time, i don't think they will ever make anything like this again or could for that matter. The story is immense and the detail is staggering.
 
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