The years leading up to the outbreak of World War II through the Nazi invasion of Poland that triggered the joint British and French declaration of war on Germany to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the Battle of Midway.

Opening with some of the earliest color motion picture images ever filmed - of a victory parade in Paris at the end of World War I - the first episode takes viewers from the years leading up to the outbreak of World War II through the Nazi invasion of Poland that triggered the joint British and French declaration of war on Germany to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the Battle of Midway. Among the many scenes captured in color footage are life in Depression-era America; huge Nazi rallies in pre-war Germany; the sinking of a British merchant ship six weeks into the war and the rescue effort mounted by a passing American vessel; civilian refugees streaming along the roads of occupied France; the devastation at Pearl Harbor as photographed by a Navy film unit working for Hollywood director John Ford; and the U.S. victory over the Japanese at Midway - the decisive sea battle of the Pacific war.