[2] He started specializing in history films that related to the Nazis and the Second World War with his controversial programme A British Betrayal in 1991,[3] followed by Goebbels - Master of Propaganda in 1992.
[2] Rees was appointed editor of Timewatch, the BBC's historical documentary series, in 1992 and over the next 10 years commissioned and editorially oversaw more than a hundred different history films.
Through his own independent production company, LR History, Rees has also written, produced and directed the 2012 BBC television series The Dark Charisma of Adolf Hitler (and wrote the accompanying book) and the 90-minute feature-length documentary Touched by Auschwitz (BBC2 2015).
Clive James, in Revolt of the Pendulum, said that Rees was "currently producing the best documentaries ever made about the Nazi era".
[citation needed] Antony Beevor, in a book review in the Daily Telegraph, wrote that "Laurence Rees has done more for good history on television in this country than anyone else.
His most recent book The Nazi Mind: 12 Warnings from History was published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House, in the UK in January 2025.