Costing $135 million according to Brandon Stoddard in his Television Academy Foundation interview, it took over ABC's broadcast schedule for two one-week periods in 1988 and 1989, totaling 30 prime-time hours.

Shortly afterwards, cable television began the fragmentation of the United States broadcasting audience in earnest, leaving War and Remembrance the last of the giant miniseries.

ABC's standards and practices division also agreed to an unprecedented waiver allowing frontal nudity during the lengthy Holocaust sequences,[7] running parental advisories before any episodes beginning before 8pm.

Jan-Michael Vincent, who played Byron Henry in The Winds of War, was busy as the action lead in the American television series Airwolf.

Cast and crew also hint in more recent interviews in the featurette on the Winds of War DVD that Vincent's drinking made him difficult on set.

His request was aided by the intercession of TVP, the public Polish TV network, and the support of Poland's preeminent World War II expert, who approved the script.

When the Chernobyl nuclear disaster happened nearby, causing legitimate fears of fallout spreading across Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, Curtis called in nuclear scientists from the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna to give the location a clean bill of health, but allowed any crew members who were still afraid to wait in Munich for the production to return.

Filmed from January 1986 to September 1987, the 1,492 page script (by Earl W. Wallace, Dan Curtis, and Herman Wouk) contained 2,070 scenes.

[12] Filming took place in France throughout Paris, including the Paris Opera, where a scene from The Marriage of Figaro was staged with a 42-piece symphony orchestra and 500 extras,[9] and Lourdes, where the production took over the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes; in West Germany in Baden-Baden and Berchtesgaden, where members of the United States Army, stationed nearby were hired as extras for some of the scenes shot at Hitler's Eagle's Nest; in Rome and Siena, Italy; Bern, Switzerland; London and Cambridge, England; and Vienna, Austria.

[9] After principal photography was completed, a wrap party for cast and crew was held on January 8, 1988 aboard the ocean liner RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach, which had previously been used as a filming location for The Winds of War.

[6] The miniseries was originally intended to run on consecutive nights in January 1989,[6] but the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike caused ABC to move the first half, chapters I–VII, up to air in the fall of 1988.

[6] However, when they were broadcast in November 1988, the first seven episodes no longer aired on consecutive nights, as originally planned,[8] running instead spread out over eleven days.

[21] Because the ratings were lower than ABC had promised the various sponsors, the network was obligated to give additional free "make-good" advertising time to them.

The low ratings were also reported to be partly responsible for ABC entertainment head Brandon Stoddard losing his job in April 1989.

[7] Dan Curtis blamed the lower-than-expected ratings partly on the confusing airdates, saying in a 2002 interview that ABC "skipped Saturdays and Mondays, the viewers lost the thread, and they didn't even put up a sign saying 'To Be Continued' at the end of the first half.

[26] It also won three Golden Globes, receiving trophies for Best Miniseries, as well as two awards for John Gielgud and Barry Bostwick, who tied for Best Supporting Actor.