This critically acclaimed series documents the true story of perhaps the most bitter arena of the Second World War. For countless Americans, British, Australians and New Zealanders, as well as the people of the Asia-Pacific region, the war meant ferocious fighting, and for many, appalling conditions in Japanese captivity. Atrocities were committed on both sides in a war without mercy. Rare and extraordinary archive film, and powerful and poignant eyewitness accounts bring to life a brutal conflict in places that looked like paradise but turned out to be hell.