PROFESSOR DAVID EDGERTON shows how the traditional narrative of Britain's Second World War is seriously misleading. Britain was the richest nation in Europe in 1939 and lay at the centre of a huge global empire. It also, despite appeasement in the 1930s, maintained a thriving military-industrial-scientific complex throughout the inter-war period. These advantages would enable the nation to fight a resource-rich, technological war.

The music in this episode is from Ida Pinkert's 'Four Songs', played by the Nimrod Ensemble of Berlin as part of the Lebensmelodien project, which seeks to rediscover the lost music of composers affected by the Holocaust (www.lebensmelodien.com).