How Reliable is "The Great War" youtube channel? Link in Post

by Algebrace

So this channel is attempting to do a week by week explanation or review of WW1 in real time. Its very interesting but im not sure how accurate its presented information is:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUcyEsEjhPEDf69RRVhRh4A

slcrook

First, thank you for posting this question. I had no knowledge of this channel, and in interest of providing an answer for you, I took a look at it. It's very well done, with good production values and encapsulating the war in a week-to-week nature makes for ease of learning. The narrative isn't overly technical, nor is it pandering. I found no glaring historical errors in the video I watched, and very few points in which I had a difference of opinion in the narrative; for example when the host uses the term "untrained" in reference to reinforcements being brought into the fighting at First Ypres, I would substitute that with "undertrained." These troops did not have the benefit of long service or wide military experience, but they did have a certain amount of indoctrination to the army. It wasn't substantial, but I think the distinction between the two terms changes the intended emotional reaction.

As an expert on the war myself, I would recommend this series as a very good starting point to understanding the events of the war in a chronological fashion; and hope that viewing these vignettes would inspire a desire to read and understand these events in much greater detail than can be imparted in a ten minute video. It would be good to introduce the topic for discussion among students at many levels of education, but would not be a substitute to a study in-depth to provide the comprehension required to gain a full understanding of the nature of the events. In short, these videos provide a very good answer to the broad question of "What" but would need more support to completely illustrate the question of "Why"-the answers to which is what I believe the study of history is about.