War has played a key role in the history of the United States, from the nation's founding

right down to the present. War made the U.S. independent, kept it together, increased its

size, and established it as a global superpower. Understanding America's wars is essential for understanding American history.

Welcome to Key Battles of American History,

a podcast in which we discuss American history through the lens of the most important battles of America's wars.

Here is your host, James Early.

Thank you. host, James Early. Hello and welcome back to Key Battles of American History.

In this episode, Sean and I will continue our series of in-depth discussions of the

epic award-winning 2001 HBO miniseries Band of Brothers.

Today is a real treat for you.

We're going to break down episode seven, the breaking point for you.

John, I got to tell you, this is my very favorite episode.

I love all of them.

I especially love this one, and I'll go into Y later.

This is definitely my favorite. It's just simply amazing. It's beyond perfect. But before we jump into the plot,

as always, I'll give Sean the first word if you want to say anything to as by way of

introduction, background, or you could save it to the end, whichever you want to do? What do you

want to talk about, Sean, before we get... No, I mean, it's, this is, best own is really a two-parter,

and so this is part two of the best own. Yes, so we saw last time how greatly the company as well as

their other companies, the rest of the regiment, how greatly they were suffering because of

cold, lack of supplies, constant German artillery fire. Lots of men got wounded, long-time members

of the company dragged away, some of them out of the war for good, others killed, and it's still

...