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00:00This is a production of WGBH.
00:30The Wehrmacht, 18 million men under arms, commanded by Adolf Hitler.
00:38This army will march into Europe and wage the bloodiest war in history.
00:44What sort of an army was it?
00:47Obedient followers of Hitler or millions of manipulated young men?
00:55Young men trained and sent to the front.
00:58One in three will perish.
01:03Hitler's officers and generals, status-conscious military professionals, most of them non-political.
01:10Some of them were thoughtful men.
01:12Many were spineless careerists.
01:16Did they all share Hitler's goals?
01:21What part did they play in the crimes committed in the name of the German people?
01:28Ordinary soldiers who put their lives on the line.
01:31Privates, non-commissioned officers.
01:35What did they feel?
01:36What did they believe in when they went to war?
01:39Everyone said, man, that's a child, that wants to be with them.
01:44Everyone wanted a little bit of a held.
01:48Today, you see the role of a soldier a bit more critically.
01:52But at the time, you were happy to be able to come to the young man.
01:58You see the role of a soldier, you see the soldier, you see the soldier.
02:01Automatisch habe ich geschossen auf ihn und musste gleich bei diesem ersten Einsatz schon erleben, dass ich einen Menschen getรถtet hatte.
02:15Das befolgt mich bis heute.
02:17Die Gedanken haben wir uns nicht gemacht. Wir waren ja auch in einem Haufen, der ziemlich zusammenhielt.
02:28Wir haben neben unserem toten Kameraden unser Brot gegessen.
02:34Oder das Korrische auf ihr Lรถffel, nicht?
02:36Und haben einfach nur einmal gehofft, dass wir im Durchkommen.
02:41Das Gefรผhl, dass ich mein Gewissen habe vertaufen mรผssen gegen die Verpflichtung zum Gehorsam, heute wรผrde ich sagen, Kadavergehorsam.
02:56Ein Stรผck Leben wurde uns gestohlen. Anders kann ich das nicht sagen.
03:02At first, the Wehrmacht seems invincible.
03:05German soldiers are victorious in almost every battle.
03:09Battles that cause the deaths of millions.
03:11First of the enemy, then increasingly Germans too.
03:15What made this army so destructive?
03:19In military terms, Hitler was an amateur.
03:22Yet he made himself commander-in-chief of the armed forces.
03:26In a series of ruthless power struggles, he gained absolute authority.
03:29And he made the Wehrmacht his tool.
03:31Recent research has uncovered new sources that give us a clearer picture of Hitler's Wehrmacht than ever before.
03:45The files give new answers to old questions.
03:48They illustrate how little separated good and evil.
03:51They reveal in a horrific way how people were abused and manipulated.
03:55And they show how many refused to heed their conscience.
04:06Newly discovered records offer a unique glimpse into the world of the German military elite.
04:10British Secret Service files.
04:11They were discovered and evaluated by historians รnke Neitzel.
04:17Until recently, these documents were still top secret.
04:21Tens of thousands of pages, on which secretly recorded conversations are transcribed.
04:26The conversations of leading generals of the Wehrmacht.
04:30This is where it happened, the idyllic country estate of Trent Park near London.
04:41This is where all the German generals who fell into the hands of the Western Allies were held.
04:46The German generals were taken captive in a dramatic circumstances.
04:50They were then on this traumhaft gelegenen Herrensitz, where they were in peace and peace with all the conditions of life.
05:00And they were there to do nothing to do.
05:03And this nothing to do has its effect.
05:06It has been to have a consequence.
05:07They talked together.
05:08They talked together.
05:09They talked about the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war, the war.
05:13And that's special about the situation is that the Britons have these conversations on plates.
05:20And the special value of the problem is that it were private conversations.
05:24And that in these conversations there was no point of attention on the people, on the family, on the woman.
05:31In these conversations, from Kamerad to Kamerad, there was ungeschminkt spoken.
05:35We come also very close to the general, what they thought and how they reflect.
05:42Without realizing it, the captured generals gave away their real opinions about the war and the Nazis.
05:49World history will concede one point to the Fรผhrer, that he recognized this great Jewish danger for the whole of mankind.
05:57Once it was Genghis Khan, or Attila the Hun.
06:01This time, it's Jewish Bolshevism.
06:03We and our tiny West European countries have been so short-sighted.
06:09We were always bickering with each other over petty issues.
06:12We simply failed to understand what was threatening us from the East.
06:16In this, the Fรผhrer was absolute...
06:18But what he did was stupid.
06:20We were the stupid ones.
06:21The countries of Western Europe refused to join us, those idiots.
06:25And we suddenly found ourselves fighting on two fronts.
06:28And doing the dirty work for the Western world.
06:34Few Wehrmacht soldiers are completely free of anti-Semitism and nationalism.
06:39They're children of their times.
06:42They don't realize they're witnessing the beginning of the greatest disaster the world has ever seen.
06:47They even regard Hitler as a man of peace.
06:51Hitler has always said that the first world war, that the first world war, that the first world war, that the first world war, that he would not start a war.
07:07That's what Heinrich Hussmann has learned from the propaganda.
07:26He's with the 5th Panzer Division, based in Upper Silesia, in the summer of 1939.
07:38On September the 1st, the tanks crossed the border into Poland.
07:42It's the start of World War II.
07:47The older soldiers have mixed feelings.
07:50But the young are consumed by Hitler's ideas.
07:54Walter Heinlein is 20 years old.
08:00I was surprised.
08:02I wanted to become a soldier.
08:04But I didn't know how it was later.
08:07I was surprised.
08:10Now it's going on.
08:11Hopefully I'll come back.
08:12It's too late.
08:13On this first day of the war, Adolf Hitler addresses a jubilant German parliament.
08:20He makes a blatant threat.
08:23So, as I'm ready to set my life every time, everyone can take me for my people and for Germany.
08:32So I want to do the same of everyone else.
08:35But who believes that this national issue,
08:39whether it's directly or indirectly, can't be able to do it.
08:42Who's wrong?
08:44The terrorists have not been warned.
08:46The soldiers are not prepared for the horrors of war.
09:16They are not prepared for the war.
09:19The army is far superior to the defending Polish forces.
09:22Even so, the ugly reality comes as a shock.
09:26But the men can't give vent to their feelings.
09:29The men have not cleared for the men.
09:30They shall have only the Obi-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan-Wan.
09:32The first, in the moment, two deaths in our company.
09:42During theๆปmer on Plesk, the Poles had a bunker line.
09:46And that we should take as tall soldiers.
09:50It would be as low troops.
09:53And that is not possible.
09:54Approximately 1.8 million Wehrmacht soldiers have been mobilized.
10:01They're going to war, under the command of the generals.
10:09Men like infantry general Johannes Blazkowicz, the son of a pastor from East Prussia.
10:16His mother died when he was still a baby.
10:20He was raised in military academies, the elite establishments of the Prussian aristocracy.
10:33Here he's trained for the life of an officer, the toughest education in the entire Reich.
10:39In exchange, a penniless young man gains entry to a privileged world.
10:45A uniform makes you something superior.
10:48Officers are treated with the highest respect.
10:50They receive the best service in restaurants and the best tickets are reserved for them at the theatre.
10:59In World War I, a formative experience for most Wehrmacht generals, Blazkowicz makes rapid progress.
11:06At 33, he's appointed to staff headquarters.
11:12But then comes the defeat of 1918 and the Treaty of Dersailles, a humiliating blow.
11:23The German army is cut to 100,000 men.
11:27The generals want only one thing, the return of their former power.
11:32Johannes Blazkowicz, now a colonel, is accepted into the new army.
11:37But he's given administrative duties.
11:39For the time being, there's no hope of career advancement.
11:50Unknown to him, the military office in Berlin and undercover general staff is already planning rearmament.
11:56Karl Dirks, himself a World War II veteran, has written a book arguing that the army leadership wanted massive rearmament.
12:12This war since 1923 in the Schatten of the Ruhr-Besetzung planned.
12:22At the time, I could plan my protection with patriotic duty.
12:30And then, I could put the Holy Spirit of the terrorist duty on the back of 48.
12:36And now, he would have no more questions about how to plan that or not.
12:43Hans von Siegt, Head of the army, is the driving force behind Rearmament.
12:47It must be kept secretโฆ
12:49For the planning alone is a violation of the peace treaty.
12:54In reality, ZEGT is planning for war.
13:19When Hitler comes to power in 1933, plans for the deployment of the Wehrmacht are ready.
13:42Karl Dirks has shown that the Wehrmacht of 102 divisions, with which Hitler begins World War II, corresponds exactly to the blueprint of the generals.
13:52Everything is ready for Hitler.
13:55Rearmament now moves ahead at top speed. The effects can be felt in everyday life.
14:03It was all in uniform within eight months.
14:09There were people, police, who were involved in the government.
14:14They were civil police.
14:16There was also someone on Dohmansweg who always greeted us.
14:21We lived on the third floor in the Fruchterallee.
14:25Every time we sat at the window, he greeted us.
14:28Four weeks later, he came in uniform with boots.
14:32He came in uniform with Sรคbel.
14:33And then he said, look, look, Herr Sohn, I will the name not name.
14:37Der ist schon in uniform.
14:38Das sagte mein Vater.
14:39Jetzt wird auch der Brieftrรคger bald ein Schwert haben.
14:41Ich schwรถre bei Gott diesen heiligen Eid.
14:46Ich schwรถre bei Gott diesen heiligen Eid.
14:49Dass ich dem Fรผhrer des deutschen Volkes und Reiches, Adolf Hitler, jederzeit bereit sein will,
14:58fรผr diesen Eid mein Leben einzusetzen.
15:00Jederzeit fรผr diesen Eid mein Leben einzusetzen.
15:04Das ging mir zu herzen. Das war meine feste รberzeugung.
15:08From 1934 on, millions of manipulated young men had to swear allegiance directly to Hitler,
15:14a man who is planning a war of conquest.
15:18The idea came from the Wehrmacht leadership itself.
15:21Some of the generals hope that by this overt act of loyalty,
15:25they will preserve the military's independence.
15:28They're wrong.
15:30The Minister of War, Werner von Blomberg, is the first to suffer the consequences.
15:39In 1938, Blomberg is dismissed for marrying a former prostitute.
15:45Hitler himself was best man at the wedding.
15:48He feels he's been deceived.
15:51He exploits the situation for his next move.
15:55There's only one man he can trust to take charge of the Wehrmacht.
15:59himself.
16:05General Wilhelm Keitel, in charge of the newly created OKW,
16:09the Armed Forces High Command, reports directly to Hitler.
16:14Franz Halder becomes Chief of Staff of the Army High Command.
16:18The two organisations become permanent rivals.
16:21Ideal conditions for Hitler's intrigues.
16:24Panzer General Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma knows the Army High Command well.
16:34In November 1942, he's captured by General Montgomery in North Africa,
16:42and greeted with a handshake.
16:52The British are experts in dealing with high-ranking prisoners.
16:56First they question them, and keep them in basic accommodation,
17:00the same treatment given to an ordinary soldier.
17:06After they've suffered these disagreeable conditions for a while,
17:09they're taken to the more salubrious surroundings of Trent Park.
17:13The idea is they'll feel comfortable here and converse freely with one another,
17:18not suspecting their every word is recorded by the microphones of the British Secret Service.
17:25It works.
17:27Thoma speaks quite openly about the Army's leadership.
17:30I tell you, don't expect anything from the General Staff.
17:36Ninety-nine percent of them are completely spineless.
17:42They have always been survived.
17:47They were never commanders.
17:52They were more like assistants.
18:02Which is why most of them have no backbone.
18:07It's their upbringing, of course.
18:13You can't expect anything else!
18:18Hitler is mistrustful of his generals too, since he hasn't got them completely under his control.
18:31But he knows how to get his way.
18:33The generals are no match for him.
18:41Colonel Karl Heinz Friese is a military historian in today's German Army.
18:47In the end it came to a modus vivendi, to an unheilful alliance.
18:52Both of them needed each other.
18:54Hitler needed this reactionary military station to lead his wars.
19:00And for the generals, Hitler was not only the new divisions,
19:05but also the new services as the divisions commanders.
19:10But Hitler wants more.
19:11He wants to enslave the Slav peoples and to create Lebensraum, living space, in the East.
19:25Poland will become the first victim.
19:29There were only negative opinions about Poland.
19:32Poland's culture, and dirty, and unmodern, and ugly.
19:37It was all modic.
19:39What was unmodic, was Polish.
19:41And if it was dirty, it was Polish.
19:44Poland was also a very bad enemy.
19:47It should take about 2-3 weeks, and then the war was over.
19:52And then the war was over.
19:53In that belief, it was for us.
19:55Old prejudice and new belligerency fanned the flames against Poland.
20:00Johannes Blazkowicz is one of the generals in charge of the invasion.
20:04A few days before the start of hostilities, he issues a command.
20:08Soldiers of the Eighth Army.
20:11From today, the Eighth Army is established.
20:14The command of which has been entrusted to me by the supreme commander of the Wehrmacht.
20:18Our duty is to execute his will with hard, fast, forceful strikes.
20:23Long live the Fรผhrer.
20:28The Polish campaign is a war between unequal opponents.
20:31The Poles put up fierce resistance, but in the end they can only wait in vain for the help of the Allies.
20:37Just three and a half weeks after the outbreak of war, Blazkowicz accepts the Polish surrender on a bus in Warsaw.
20:47Hitler's plans seem to be working.
20:50He presents himself as victor to the Poles and to his own generals.
20:57This commander-in-chief can advance their careers.
21:02Soon after the victory parade, General Blazkowicz is awarded the Knight's Cross.
21:11He becomes head of the German occupation forces in Poland with the title Commander-in-Chief of the East.
21:17He's still a loyal, hard-working general in Hitler's Wehrmacht.
21:21But he slowly begins to have misgivings.
21:26This war is different from previous ones.
21:29In the area under his command, Jews are being harassed, pressed into forced labor, abused and even shot.
21:36The generals only talk about it behind closed doors.
21:43It's the SS, not the Wehrmacht, that are carrying out the deliberate mass murders in Poland.
21:54But the overall head of occupying forces is Blazkowicz, a Wehrmacht general.
22:03After several months, he issues a statement.
22:08Only later is it apparent that many officers and generals have been disturbed by the events in Poland.
22:21Edwin Count von Rothkirch is a 50-year-old colonel in a cavalry regiment.
22:26He has a hobby, making amateur films with his 8mm camera.
22:31He also likes appearing in his films.
22:35Later, as a prisoner of war, he recalls a disagreeable situation.
22:43Only now does he dare to speak about it.
22:46I was in Kutlo.
22:50I went there to film.
22:52I make films. That's all I do.
22:55I knew an SS officer there quite well.
22:58And we were talking about this and that.
23:00And then he said,
23:02Do you feel like filming an execution?
23:05I said, no.
23:07I find that too disgusting.
23:08He said, well, it doesn't make any difference.
23:13We always shoot people in the morning anyway.
23:16But if you prefer, we still have a few left.
23:19We could also shoot them in the afternoon.
23:22You can't simply imagine how these men, they've become animals.
23:27They've become animals.
23:34September the 4th, 1939.
23:37Czern Stochow in southern Poland.
23:39The fourth day of the war.
23:41For some unexplained reason, wild shooting breaks out shortly after German infantry enter the town.
23:47Eight German soldiers are killed and 14 wounded.
23:50The Germans retaliate in the most brutal fashion.
23:57Thousands of civilians are rounded up.
24:00At least 100 people are murdered, many of them Jews.
24:07Thus, from the opening days of the war, Wehrmacht units, some under Blazkowicz command, have participated in atrocities.
24:14In this case, the original shooting seems to have been friendly fire.
24:27Nervous German soldiers shooting at their own comrades.
24:33It was nothing unusual for their nerves to get the better of young soldiers.
24:36When they had a vaccine in their hand, then they hit them their hands.
24:45Then...
24:47Then...
24:49We can't...
24:50When the situation is there, they are happy if someone says,
24:56man, I'm going to put it on the ass, or I'm going to put it on the fire zone.
25:06Nervous soldiers and aggressive Nazi ideology. A potent mix.
25:15Private Heinrich Hussmann records his experiences in his diary.
25:20September 10th, 1939. Uppatov. Jews' paradise.
25:25I believe at least 85% of the inhabitants are Jews.
25:29And that's what it looks like. A terrible stench everywhere.
25:33And the Jewish shops are worst of all. They demand outrageous prices.
25:38We wouldn't dream of giving these vermin so much money.
25:43Anti-Semitism was not rare in the Wehrmacht, but other soldiers are much less prejudiced.
25:49Da waren wir in einem kleinen Dorf.
25:54Und da kam eine junge Dame, die mag 25, 30 gewesen sein.
26:02Und fragte mich, ich war damals, Feldwebel glaube ich, ja.
26:09Und sie fragte mich damals, sagen Sie mal, mรผssen wir Angst um unser Leben haben?
26:17Und ich merkte, dass das scheinbar eine Jรผdin war.
26:21Ich habe zu ihr gesagt, also soweit ich weiร, brauchte sie keine รngste haben.
26:26Und ein Jahr spรคter oder Monate spรคter hรคtte ich hier gesagt, hauen Sie bloร ab.
26:33General von Rotkirch feels partly responsible for the atrocities he witnessed in Poland.
26:38Just look how savage we have become ourselves.
26:43I drove through a small Polish village.
26:46There were shooting students there, just because there were students.
26:50And Polish aristocrats and landowners, too.
26:53They were shooting everyone.
26:54I went to General Bockelberg and told him about it.
26:58He just said...
27:04He just said, now listen to me.
27:07It has to be done.
27:08There is no other way.
27:10The students are the most dangerous of all.
27:13They all have to go.
27:15And the aristocrats, they're always going to make trouble.
27:18And don't get yourself so horribly worked up.
27:21If we win the war, it won't matter.
27:26I said, Herr Generaloberst, that may be.
27:30But first of all, I will have to get used to these new principles.
27:38But he didn't protest.
27:42Not so General Blazkowicz, a devout Christian.
27:44He's genuinely horrified by the systematic murders the SS task forces have been carrying out.
27:50Though he ignores the actions of his own units,
27:54he criticizes the misdeeds of the SS and the police
27:57in two memos to the commander-in-chief of the army, Walter von Brauchitsch.
28:01The army refuses to be linked with the atrocities of the security police
28:05and refuses to work with the SS task forces,
28:08which function almost exclusively as execution units.
28:10The police have so far only spread terror among the population.
28:15To what degree the police are able to come to terms with the fact
28:18that they are forcing their own people to take part in this murderous frenzy
28:22cannot be judged from here.
28:24It is impossible to establish security and peace in this territory
28:27with violent measures alone.
28:28Hitler is outraged and Blazkowicz is dismissed.
28:35However, only a few months later, he's given a new post in the West.
28:41The transcripts from Trent Park reveal that his fellow generals knew the background to his dismissal.
28:48and did nothing.
28:52We shot people.
28:57It started in Poland as early as 1939.
29:03Apparently, the SS really cleaned up around there.
29:08That's probably why they dismissed Blazkowicz.
29:13Yes, of course.
29:15As people were promoted.
29:19Instead of being shot.
29:22Shortly after victory in Poland, Hitler reveals his next plan to the generals.
29:26He intends to attack France as soon as possible.
29:30Most of his generals believe it can't be done.
29:34Franz Halder, chief of the army general staff, wants to talk Hitler out of it.
29:41He considers it the idea of a madman.
29:47But still, he wavers.
29:50Christian Hartmann, a historian at the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich,
29:57has researched Holder's life and his relations with Hitler.
30:01Halder was the great
30:02Zรถgerer, the Zauderer.
30:05Although it was not only a psychical component in Halder,
30:08but also an intellectual calculation.
30:12General Stรคbler was always used to work with several options.
30:18And he characterized him as a back-to-sicherer.
30:22And I think Halder's role comes very well to the expression.
30:26The date for the war in the West is postponed again and again.
30:36Could this give Halder his chance?
30:39For weeks, according to a confidant,
30:42Halder went to see Hitler with a pistol in his pocket, in order to shoot him.
30:47It is important that Halder has not given the failure of Hitler.
30:52That is the springing point.
30:54What we also know is that there are always big differences in times,
30:57not only in 1938 and 1939, but also in 1941 and 1942.
31:02So it is a very ambivalent relationship.
31:04But at the end, the attack has not happened.
31:08And only this counts.
31:09In November 1939, Halder witnesses Hitler in a fit of rage,
31:16railing against the cowardliness and ineptitude of the generals.
31:22Halder now believes he has been betrayed,
31:25and resigns himself to remaining silent.
31:27A contemporary described the chief of staff thus.
31:33Halder is like a balloon man, strong and brave when someone pumps him up,
31:38floppy and hollow when deflated.
31:45Meanwhile, in Koblenz, on the banks of the Rhine,
31:48in the Prince Bishop's palace now taken over by the army,
31:50a rival of Halder is planning the campaign against France.
31:59General Erich von Manstein, chief of staff of the newly formed Army Group A.
32:05Together with Panzer General Heinz Guderian,
32:09Manstein has developed a totally new concept.
32:14He doesn't think in fixed positions like First World War strategists.
32:17His will be a mobile war, a rolling attack that never stops,
32:22spearheaded by motorized units.
32:25The idea runs counter to the thinking of all the generals of Europe.
32:29From a military standpoint, it's revolutionary,
32:32but it poses immense logistical problems.
32:39There are many myths about the French campaign.
32:42Research by military historian Karl-Heinz Friese has traced some of them back to their roots.
32:51The Germans make something crazy.
32:53After the idea of the General of Manstein,
32:55they took their weapons through the woods of Ardennes.
32:57They took their weapons through the Arctic of Ardennes and were surprised by the allies.
33:01The allies were completely surprised.
33:03The second one was the first use of the weapons in the operation of the army,
33:05on the operational level.
33:06While the allies, who had over 4200 soldiers,
33:08had their weapons along the whole front,
33:10they concentrated the Germans in their 2400 soldiers,
33:13mainly in the Ardennes,
33:15and went through here.
33:17And then the big surprise was achieved.
33:18The surprise attack is to come through south Belgium,
33:21where no one is expecting it.
33:23No one worries about infringing the neutrality of the Benelux countries.
33:27This is the famous Sickle Cut.
33:29The idea of Mansteins,
33:31which was so atemberaubend,
33:33it felt so crazy.
33:35It was sort of a strange attack,
33:37but it was the same as the late country of the Oldenburg soldiers,
33:38the Ardennes,
33:39and then the Ardennes and Ardennes,
33:42the biggest surprise was achieved.
33:44The surprise attack is to come through south Belgium,
33:45where no one is expecting it.
33:47No one worries about infringing the neutrality of the Benelux countries.
33:49This is the famous Sickle Cut.
33:52The idea of Mansteins to Sickle Cut,
33:53It was so heartbreaking, it was so crazy, it was like an alpine transition, honey bites with elephants,
34:00that it would rather be the fantasy of Jules, but not the methodical pedantic thinking of a German general.
34:09And so it was the complete surprise.
34:13The weak point in Mannstein's plan is that the Sickle Cut will expose a hundred kilometer flank to the Allies.
34:20It's a huge gamble.
34:22The inventor of the Mannstein's plan was his first victim.
34:26The General of Mannstein was removed because he explained this plan as crazy and crazy.
34:34Army Chief of Staff Halder exiles Mannstein to an unimportant post in the provinces.
34:39But Mannstein still manages to present his plan to Hitler.
34:43The irony is that Hitler can't stand Mannstein and doesn't grasp the full significance of his plan.
34:49Nevertheless, Mannstein becomes the key creative mind for the invasion of France.
34:54Er hat es damals natรผrlich als seine grรถรte Leistung gesehen und wir zu Hause wussten, dass es von ihm stammte.
35:03Und er war natรผrlich entsprechend nicht gerade sehr erfreut, dass nunmehr alle anderen den Plan einschlieรlich Hitler fรผr sich reklamierten.
35:13Und dass Hitler ihn als seine geniale Idee und Tat verkaufte.
35:24Hitler wurde im Nachhinein von der NS-Propaganda als der Schรถpfer des Sickleschnitts gefeiert.
35:30In Wirklichkeit aber, hatte er diese Idee gar nicht richtig verstanden.
35:35Thus concentrated, the tanks are to push through northern France all the way to the Channel,
35:40with full aerial support and virtually without stopping.
35:44There hasn't been a campaign like it in all military history.
35:49General Guderian will lead the most important tank formations.
36:00Walter Heinlein is a gunner in a Panzer Division under General Guderian.
36:08His upbringing has made him entirely ready for war against France.
36:22He is the enemy enemy.
36:26The enemy enemy is the spirit of the times.
36:29On May the 10th 1940 the attack in the West begins.
36:32The rapid advanced units of the Wehrmacht are to push forward to the Ardennes in southern Belgium.
36:37What you want to do is to participate in France.
36:41I want to be an example of the attack in Germany.
36:47The rapid advance units of the Wehrmacht are to push forward through the Ardennes in southern Belgium.
36:53The countryside is so hilly and the roads so narrow, they're considered to be impossible for tanks.
37:01They take the risk. More than 40,000 vehicles have been prepared for the attack.
37:10As there are no supply depots along the way, fuel and provisions for hundreds of thousands of soldiers
37:16have to be brought along and made available at specific points, an exceptional feat of organisation.
37:26But the terrain in the Ardennes keeps posing new problems.
37:31It seems the critics of Manstein's plan were right.
37:38The advancing columns of tanks and following infantry repeatedly clog the narrow mountain roads.
37:44They called it the biggest tailback in history.
37:48The
37:51The
37:54The
37:54We stood with our tanks, and I was at a military infantry company.
38:03We stood on our vehicles.
38:07We could always sit on seven men.
38:08We could always sit on the side of the road and not walk further.
38:13If spotted, these stationary vehicles would be an easy target for enemy air forces.
38:36Eventually they succeed in unravelling the tailback.
38:40The Allies had not expected an attack through the Ardennes, so there are few casualties along the way.
38:45The element of surprise is crucial.
39:10The soldiers come to believe they are part of a modern, almost invincible army.
39:19It will turn out to be a dangerous illusion.
39:22The strength between the Western Alliants and the German Wehrmacht was strongly against the Western soldiers.
39:34They even had much better soldiers.
39:37The German engineers had to take a huge return.
39:40In 1940, the Western soldiers were almost all over the course.
39:45The few modern divisions the Wehrmacht possesses are deployed like the steel tip of a lance.
39:53Out of a total of 157 divisions, only ten have tanks, and only six are fully motorized.
40:01Behind the tanks come the horse-drawn units, technologically unchanged since the Napoleonic Wars.
40:09The vast majority of soldiers march on foot.
40:17Most divisions are poorly equipped and insufficiently trained.
40:21Only about half the army is fully battle-ready.
40:25Yet the ideas behind the army are modern, especially the system known as Mission Command.
40:34The German army was famous for the upper people to play for the instructions.
40:44It doesn't mean that you drive now, drive with your people here the hang of it,
40:49drive back through the woods and drive from the top of the hill.
40:53But the company drives the enemy there, after a local discovery,
40:59the Prime Minister leads the attack.
41:03And then he could perform the optimal position,
41:07which they couldn't even know.
41:11Thus, every individual has his task.
41:14At the same time, the responsibility of non-commissioned officers
41:18and ordinary soldiers is increased.
41:20In the moral sense, too.
41:22The question of good and evil is posed to each and every individual.
41:26A bunker, near the town of Sedan in France.
41:31The next obstacle to the Wehrmacht, south of the Ardennes.
41:34The valley of the Maas is like one gigantic fortress.
41:38The Germans had won an important victory here in 1870.
41:43Hitler wants the army to pause after taking Sedan.
41:48Yet, in Manstein's plan, the Maas is just one point in the advance to the channel,
41:53which is to continue without interruption.
41:55Conflicts in the Wehrmacht leadership have become inevitable.
42:06The attack on Sedan begins with a massive bombardment.
42:09The French put up desperate resistance, but the defenders are finally overwhelmed.
42:14Now, Walter Heinlein finds out about the terrible side of the war.
42:21When we were on the Mars, we noticed that he was also a opponent.
42:28And we had a very good attack.
42:31We had the first dead.
42:33And then, you see, what's going on?
42:37The Krieg is still not a sailboat.
42:39Heinlein's early enthusiasm soon evaporates.
42:46The battles are intense, but brief.
42:48The very next day, 60,000 men and 22,000 vehicles, including 850 tanks, cross the Maas near Sedan.
42:57Then, on May the 14th, the Panzers break out of their bridgehead.
43:02Without waiting, they strike out towards the west, towards the channel.
43:06General Guderian's tank corps is advancing against the express orders of his superiors and Hitler.
43:15According to Hitler's supposedly brilliant plan, the Blitzkrieg was to have stopped here.
43:19Through his own initiative, Guderian saves the campaign.
43:44Guderian gets his way, and his tactics seem to succeed.
44:02A mid-level general of the Wehrmacht has shown up the commander-in-chief.
44:07It's very embarrassing for Hitler.
44:09Ten days later, the Wehrmacht is almost at the channel.
44:15Manstein's plan calls for an encirclement of the Allied armies in Belgium, preventing their retreat through the port of Dunkirk.
44:22But then something extraordinary happens.
44:25Hitler orders the attack to halt.
44:31For three days, the Panzers don't move.
44:33The generals feel like hunting dogs held back in the heat of the hunt.
44:37They watch their prey escaping.
44:44The order to stop before Dunkirk was a critical mistake.
44:48Many people still scratch their heads about it today.
44:51Did Hitler intentionally let the British escape across the channel?
44:55The soldiers can't believe it.
44:58The soldiers can't believe it.
45:01We thought, why is it not going on?
45:03We have all the tools there.
45:04We have all the tools there.
45:05We have our Panzers there.
45:06We can all the Englanders in the water.
45:08They didn't.
45:09They didn't.
45:10And then came the Luftwaffe.
45:11They had bombarded on the ships.
45:13Many of them didn't get caught.
45:16No one in their enemies was gone.
45:17It didn't work well then.
45:18The Germans went through the water.
45:19But unfortunately, many of them were injured.
45:20In the war there, many of the German corps were sentenced to water.
45:23English core you were saying come from Dunkirk the bulk of the allied armies
45:30are evacuated across the channel 340,000 men only vehicles and heavy
45:37equipment are left behind hinterher a far is that it's an Fรผhrerbefehl
45:43gegeben hat das nicht auf die fliehenden Englรคnder geschossen werden
45:48durfte das sogenannte Expedition her sollte die Schiffe erreichen
45:53da haben wir noch gesagt was ein Blรถdsinn
45:55und da hat unser Kommandeur gesagt na ja die Englรคnder das sind Wikinger
46:00das ist die germanische Rasse
46:02war doch damals die Rassenwahnsinn der war doch da weit verbreitet
46:06there was no such order the real reasons were different
46:11to ensure the rapid success of the operation the army high command had taken
46:16important decisions without consulting the commander-in-chief once again
46:20Hitler felt ignored Hitler wollte bei den Kirchen gar nicht die Panzer stoppen
46:27sondern die generale bei den Kirchen kam es zum allerersten und auch zum letzten
46:33mal zu einem Aufstand des Oberkommandos des Heeres gegen Hitler zu einer Art
46:38Machtkampf einer Machtprobe und Hitler gewann sie es war quasi ein Aufstand gegen
46:44ihn als militรคrischen Fรผhrer und nun statuiert er eben dieses Exempel und
46:50befahl aus prinzip dass die Panzer halten mรผssen
46:54Hitler's ploy works the generals have lost a crucial showdown for him that's
46:59more important than three hundred and forty thousand of the enemy escaping
47:05a short time later France surrenders and Hitler can once again play the role of
47:11brilliant Victor commander of genius a large part of France is occupied by the
47:16Wehrmacht
47:21in their euphoria the soldiers are ignorant of the power struggle going on behind
47:26closed doors their feelings of invincibility seem fully justified the few
47:32critical voices in the army are silenced
47:38victory comes at a high cost twenty five thousand German and over a hundred
47:44thousand Allied soldiers have lost their lives thousands of civilians have been
47:48killed
47:55whenever von Anfang an eigentlich dabei war und man รผberlebt dann ist es doch ein
47:58ganz seltenes glรผck so herzlich und die jungen leute die dann sterben mussten die fรผr
48:03wen und fรผr was fรผr wen sind die dann gefallen das heiรt wir fรผr das Vaterland aber fรผr wen
48:08an important shift has taken place in the power structure of the Reich now more than ever before the
48:16Wehrmacht is at the mercy of the dictators win the military leadership has become a passive tool in
48:22Hitler's hands at Trent Park the captured German generals wonder how it could have come to this
48:29no matter how hard I try I just can't get into my head what it was that made us
48:37follow that mania Hitler and how did it begin the officers were so unpolitical and
48:44they believed that the government was just as honest as they were if it had
48:50been a democratic government we never would have believed them it was the
48:56national spirit he wrapped himself in the cloak of national spirit and he
49:02deceived us from a negative from a criminal point of view the Nazis did what
49:08they did extremely well and so logically the click around him they are to blame
49:15they all should have sat in my funeral now it's perhaps you wouldn't let them say
49:20anything then they should have resigned but no one did Franz Halder stayed at his post until 1942
49:40then following arguments with Hitler he was dismissed after the assassination attempt on
49:46the 20th of July 1944 he was arrested Halder lived until 1972
49:54at the end of the war Heinrich Hussmann is a sergeant major the terrible things he
50:00see help him to get over his belief in Hitler's ideology today he's a deeply
50:05religious man Johannes Blazkowicz is appointed to various senior posts and is
50:11highly decorated in 1948 he takes his own life while on trial at the Nuremberg military
50:18tribunal the reasons for his suicide are not known Walter Heinlein was wounded six
50:24times he was decorated and reached the rank of captain after the war he became a
50:30carpenter later an architect and building contractor today he still gives lectures
50:35about his war experiences Erich von Manstein was further promoted but in 1944 Hitler dismissed him
50:43he refused to take part in resistance efforts after the war he became a consultant for the formation of
50:49the new German army he died in 1973 Georg Pendle saw out the war in his Luftwaffe ground unit at the end
50:59he felt betrayed but wiser after the war he became a policeman most of the Wehrmacht soldiers kept
51:10their enthusiasm for the commander-in-chief for a long time but Hitler's blitzkrieg as represented
51:16by Nazi propaganda was a myth Hitler war nie populรคrer as not the Westfieldsug er wurde as an art
51:26in 1940 in 1940 Hitler his army and many ordinary Germans are intoxicated by the victory in the West the prestige of the Nazis is at its highest point
51:56Hitler need no longer fear opposition from the army
52:10the consequences of that will be seen the following year in the East with the war against the Soviet Union
52:26we're not completely
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