Airdate: The Abyss: The Rise & Fall of the Nazis

Next week the History channel premieres a new series, The Abyss: The Rise & Fall of the Nazis.

This is a 10 part series produced by Germany’s ECO Media TV-Produktion & ZDF Enterprises.

Europe in the 1920s and 1930s — a continent licking its wounds after the devastation of World War l, on the brink of economic crisis and jolted by streams of refugees as a consequence of revolutions and civil war, marked by the refusal to take in these desperate people: a fertile breeding ground for dissent with the fragile new democracies and the rise of authoritarian regimes. There are striking similarities between then and now — the rise of the far right, the turn of democracies to “illiberal” regimes, the shaky foundations of our financial system. Can the past hold warnings for the present? This series unpicks the complex sequence of events that boosted a new administration and allowed the unfolding of violence and brutality on an unbelievable scale. It’s a look at history with direct relevance to the world today.

Tuesday April 6 at 7.30pm on History.