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00:00many believe they are invincible
00:30The men of the Wehrmacht.
00:46Then they invaded the Soviet Union.
00:51And everything changed.
01:00They were a shadow of their former selves.
01:13How did the wave of victories come to an end?
01:16What were the soldiers really thinking?
01:24Trent Park in England.
01:26Captured German officers have been held here in luxury
01:29since 1942.
01:31Believing they're unobserved, they speak freely.
01:35One topic dominates.
01:36The Russian campaign.
01:39The Russians have destroyed our aura of invincibility.
01:43We have sacrificed the flower of our nation's youth,
01:46and our best divisions are dead and buried.
01:49The English newspapers are right.
01:51They say we are suffering from delusions of grandeur.
01:55They say, you are arseholes.
01:59You have become megalomaniacs.
02:02You have gambled everything on one card.
02:05And you have lost everything in Russia.
02:13And everything was going so well.
02:15It was all perfect.
02:17And then it went downhill because of bloody Russia.
02:19There were two people who didn't know that Russia gets cold in winter.
02:24One was Napoleon Bonaparte, and the other was the Führer,
02:27our amateur strategist.
02:29Everyone else knew.
02:30The captive German officers don't realize the British secret service
02:35is listening to every word they say.
02:39Now the secret transcripts of those conversations have been released.
02:43Historian Zönke Neitzel has evaluated them.
02:46Never before and never again did the officers of the Wehrmacht speak so openly.
02:50All the senior people who understood anything about it,
03:16whether they were economists or officers,
03:20they all advised against the attack on Russia.
03:24They said it just cannot work.
03:27You can't fight a Blitzkrieg against Russia.
03:29The invasion of the Soviet Union is imminent.
04:00Operation Barbarossa.
04:02It's a fateful moment.
04:04That's clear to everyone.
04:12Hans-Erdmann Schoenbeck went straight from school into a panzer regiment.
04:23Manfred Gussovius was a 21-year-old tank commander.
04:29This is the man who built up the Wehrmacht's Panzer force.
04:53Heinz Guderian, no Nazi, but an ardent Antikommunist and a battle-hardened commander.
05:03Er war immer vorne mit dabei und tauchte überall auf.
05:06Insofern war er geachtet, aber auch manchmal gefürchtet,
05:10weil er nämlich unverblümt auf die Finger klopfte.
05:14Guderian war für uns Panzersoldaten schlechthin das Idol.
05:19Und das war ja nicht nur aus Daffke, weil wir ihn gerne mochten,
05:23sondern weil er uns, die Panzertruppe, ja ganz hervorragend mit blendender Taktik
05:29und schon blendender Strategie vorher geführt hatte.
05:32Und wir hatten unsere Erfolge ja durch Guderian.
05:38But the captured German generals at Trent Park see their illustrious colleague differently.
05:43I remember when Guderian heard about the Russian business for the first time.
05:52I was there.
05:53He said,
05:54What?
05:55Another act of stupidity?
05:58Not that.
06:00Russia is so colossal.
06:02It just can't be done.
06:04Three days before it began, Guderian came to see us.
06:07At that time he believed in it himself.
06:11He said he had once been firmly against it, but now the orders had been issued.
06:17And he went wild with enthusiasm and almost believed what he said himself.
06:24Even though his views were once the exact opposite.
06:27In the Casino-Gespräch war es offenbar gang und gäbe,
06:35hier auch Zweifel zu äußern an gelingende Operation,
06:38an den Vorbereitungen, im vertrauten Austausch mit den Kameraden.
06:41Aber wir dürfen diese Quelle auch nicht überinterpretieren.
06:44Guderian war als Antikommunist überzeugt vom Unternehmen Barbarossa.
06:47Er wollte diesen Krieg führen und er wollte ihn erfolgreich führen.
06:51Und wir wissen aus anderen Dokumenten,
06:53dass er im Juni 1941 auch daran glaubte,
06:55den Angriff auf Moskau, den er führen sollte,
06:58erfolgreich durchführen zu können.
07:00En route to Moskau, showing enthusiasm on demand.
07:03His Soldiers called him Vast Heinz.
07:07Guderian hatte die richtige Taktik als Parole ausgegeben.
07:11Wir waren einfach schnell.
07:13Wir konnten bis zu 120, 150 Kilometer ohne Kampf natürlich am Takt zurücklegen
07:19und waren dadurch immer da, wo man uns nicht erwartet hatte.
07:23Wir waren beweglich und konnten uns miteinander unterhalten durch Kehlkopf-Mikrofone.
07:30Das war ein Riesenvorteil für die deutsche Panzerwaffe,
07:34weil wir ruckartig in andere Richtungen umdirigiert werden konnten.
07:40Und wir hatten auch den Befehl, wenn wir Widerstand gebrochen hatten,
07:44völlig unabhängig von der seitlichen Rechts- und Linksbedrohung tief in das Feindesland vorzustoßen.
07:50They were absolutely at their peak.
07:55I mean, they had prepared for this, thought about it.
07:57They had seen what worked well.
07:59And so this extraordinary combination of tanks, aircraft, armoured vehicles and so on
08:05was virtually unstoppable.
08:06Don't do it small, do it big, was Guderian's motto.
08:13Break the Red Army's defences with panzer vectors supported by artillery and the air force.
08:22Would Stalin give in?
08:24Would the Soviet colossus collapse as the German strategists hoped?
08:29In the summer of 1941, the Wehrmacht went from one victory to the next.
08:41Sie bekamen kaum Zeit zum Nachdenken.
08:44Das erste Nachdenken passierte ungefähr drei Wochen,
08:48nachdem wir immer nur vormarschiert sind.
08:50Immer nur in Gefechte verwickelt waren.
08:52Ich hatte einen Freund in der Kompanie und da haben wir darüber gesprochen.
09:01Was ist das?
09:03Wie ist das mit den Russen?
09:05Stimmt das, dass die in ein paar Wochen fertig sind?
09:09Und uns war klar, das stimmt nicht.
09:11Die Propaganda, von denen wir dieses und jenes hörten, stimmt der nicht.
09:18Wir haben gesehen, wie Tzeh, unglaublich opferbereit,
09:24der russische Soldat uns gegenüber war.
09:28Statistisch, ein Soldat hat jetzt zwei und ein halb Jahre zu leben.
09:33Aber jeden Tag könnte sein, dass er der letzte.
09:35Auf einmal kam der Ruf, Gruppe Fausten nach vorn.
09:45Und ich hab mich nicht gemeldet.
09:49Und mein Freund Eckhardt rief, wie er kommt.
09:53The order?
09:54To take out a pocket of resistance in a village.
09:56Wir lagen ungefähr 20 Minuten davor, als wir eingedeckt wurden mit Handgranaten.
10:10Eine, die fiel neben dem Ecker hat und explodierte, der schrie.
10:16Ein Mann, der rechte MG-Schütte, kam vorbei und sagte, ich bin verwundet
10:21und hatte die Hand nur noch an Fasern hängen und riss sich die Hand ab und sagte, ich muss zurück.
10:30Ich war allein dann übrig, der noch schießen konnte, als die Russen zum Gegenangriff antraten.
10:39Und ich konnte mich also gerade noch zwischen Russen durch, nach rückwärts retten.
10:47Otto has to leave his friend Eckhardt behind.
10:51Ich hab dann einen vollkommenen Zusammenbruch gehabt.
10:56Denn vom Dorf her rief immer noch mein Freund Otto.
11:04Otto.
11:08Hat der Kompaniechef, der unser Verhältnis kannte, einen Schützenpanzer beordert, holt ihn raus.
11:18Die sind nach vorne gefahren.
11:22Nach zehn Minuten kam nur noch der Unterzieher, der Sanitäter, sagt, der Waren ist hin.
11:31Die übrigen sind tot.
11:35Costly victories.
11:37Almost 60,000 German Soldiers are killed in only six weeks.
11:41And the end of the campaign is not in sight.
11:44What to do now?
12:15Guderian and the Army High Command want to concentrate everything on Moscow.
12:20But Hitler decides differently.
12:22Die Generalität war erzogen in der traditionellen Vorstellung, man entscheidet einen Krieg, indem man die Hauptstadt des Feindes erobert und vorher eine Entscheidungsschlacht schlägt, in der die feindliche Armee besiegt wird.
12:37Hitler hatte im Vergleich dazu eigentlich das modernere Kriegsbild.
12:42Er wusste, dass ein moderner, industrialisierter Krieg nicht allein auf den Schlachtfeldern entschieden wird, sondern in den Produktionsstätten.
12:49Und darum war das Entscheidende, dass diese Produktionsstätten erobert würden und der Sowjetunion die Fähigkeit zur weiteren Kriegführung entzogen würde.
12:56Thus, Guderian has to turn his Panzer Division south, towards the Ukraine, the Soviet Union's breadbasket and source of raw materials.
13:05Behind Kiev, the Wehrmacht traps several Soviet armies in the middle of August 1941.
13:11The fighting lasts three weeks.
13:14Then the victory of the Wehrmacht is complete.
13:16One more victory.
13:25Wenn es dann hieß, wir haben es geschafft, das war eine unerhörte Erlösung innerlich.
13:32Für mich war überwältigend, diese gefangenen Schlangen an uns vorbeiziehen zu sehen.
13:41Das hat mich unerhört beeindruckt.
13:43Mit dem Gefühl, das möchtest du selber nie erleben müssen.
13:49Und auch mit dem Gefühl, die armen Kerle.
13:53But for the Wehrmacht's leadership, Red Army troops deserved no respect as fellow soldiers.
13:59It was racist mania.
14:01Die Russen merkten, dass sie von deutscher Seite als minderwertig und als nicht menschlich behandelt wurden.
14:12Das kann ich.
14:14Wenn ich das leugnen würde, würde ich lügen.
14:18The officers in Trent Park speak quite openly about the treatment of Russian prisoners.
14:24The return transports of the Russians after the encirclement battles were ghastly.
14:31They really were ghastly.
14:33I saw one of those transports.
14:36At the stations, the Russians peered out of the small hatches and screamed,
14:40Brad, God will bless you.
14:42Then Schildern arrived and brought pumpkins.
14:45The pumpkins were thrown into the carriages.
14:48And all you could hear were sodding and stumbling sounds and incredible screams.
14:52They were probably killing each other.
14:54I couldn't take it.
14:55I couldn't take it.
14:56And I asked the staff sergeant, have you nothing they can eat?
14:59He replied, Herr Oberstleutmann, where is it supposed to come from?
15:02We have nothing prepared.
15:03No, no, really.
15:08These are unimaginable atrocities.
15:12Some of the prisoners were even taken back on foot.
15:16We drove along that road many times.
15:20The ditches were full of Russians that chut.
15:23It was dreadful.
15:27We will be referred to as the Hun forever now.
15:32It makes you feel ashamed.
15:34At least two and a half million die.
15:58Most from hunger or illness.
16:04The Wehrmacht takes almost three and a half million prisoners by the fall of 1941.
16:11Hitler believes the Soviet Union is on the brink of collapse.
16:15The initial German campaign, of course, took a huge quantity of the Soviet resources.
16:23It took around about 60 million of its population and around about two thirds of its industrial and more material capacity.
16:30The Red Army had suffered exceptional degree of damage.
16:35Most states would have given up and I think that Hitler's view was not an irrational one.
16:39I mean, I think what he had underestimated was simply the sheer unwillingness of the Soviet people and the Soviet regime to abandon the conflict.
16:47It is fall when the Wehrmacht again takes up the postponed attack on Moscow.
16:54According to the Blitzkrieg plan, the campaign should already be over.
16:59Now the roads turn to mud.
17:01Tracked vehicles can still advance, but the Wehrmacht does not consist of tanks alone.
17:19Most of it is infantry, hardly more mechanized than their fathers were in World War I.
17:32And most of the artillery is pulled by horses, just as in the Kaiser's army.
17:38Karl Gottfried Feerkorn is a 20-year-old gunner.
17:50The Russian winter comes earlier than usual in 1941, and it's colder.
18:18Caught unprepared, at temperatures down to minus 40 degrees Celsius.
18:43I have seen in the frost, in the furchtbaren winter, a military equipment.
18:50The ship was attacked in the position with which it was shot.
18:58The knitted behind the cannon, three, four men, to ice-clumped.
19:05The Wehrmacht are losing more people through frostbite than through enemy action.
19:12Nothing works anymore.
19:14In Trent Park in England, the captured generals shudder when they think back to those weeks in the Russian winter of 1941.
19:27Our comrades in Russia.
19:30I don't think there can be a single family that isn't suffering terrible pain.
19:36The wounded were packed into freight wagons on bales of straw.
19:40The next day, they'd all frozen to death.
19:45Dead?
19:46Dead.
19:47Because none of the wagons were heated.
19:49Dead.
19:50Dead.
19:51Dead.
19:52Dead.
19:53Dead.
19:54Dead.
19:55Dead.
19:56Dead.
19:57Dead.
19:58Dead.
19:59Dead.
20:00Dead.
20:01Dead.
20:02Dead.
20:03Dead.
20:04Dead.
20:05Dead.
20:06Dead.
20:07Dead.
20:08Dead.
20:09Dead.
20:10Dead.
20:11They were cleaned a little and handed out again the army has to rob the corpses
20:20of the enemy because their own leadership have not supplied them with
20:23winter equipment in time a disaster for which the Wehrmacht itself not Hitler is
20:29responsible
20:31for the fall of a failure of the blitzkriegs strategy there was no plan b
20:38the blitzkriegs strategy had to work or the German Führer was their strategic
20:44base and this is the result of the failure of the blitzkriegs in the
20:52herbst 1941 to a such a, from the view of the German Führer, to a such a catastrophe
20:59the soldiers are no longer confident to victory
21:03all they can do is brood silently
21:09the nights were the worst, the time didn't go away
21:12then you would have to ask the neighbors to say, are you still there?
21:16or what? it was terrible, the bees were cutting us, the bees were closer to the fire
21:21the bees were closer, the bees were closer to the fire, the bees were closer to the fire
21:24because we had all the bees, we could not wash them weeks and so on
21:28the only bright spot was the mail from home
21:33i got a post and then there was a card in my mother with good wishes for the new year and for
21:47the Christmas and a marmorkuchen, my love
21:51also all things that were Nahrung for body and soul
21:56and from the few things that were in there, I gave everything to the people to the people to share with me
21:58and from the few things that were in there, I gave everything to the people to share with me
22:03then we read every word of my mother on the card
22:08and there was, there was, there was, there was mucksmäuschen still
22:14oh, everywhere was, there was all smucksmäuschen still
22:16that it was just outside of this furchtful catastrophe, from which no one can make a man's
22:19there, there was a picture in the world, there was something else on the world
22:22there was still, there was still let it be, there was still
22:24there was something else on the world, there was still
22:27if it was still, there was still an illusion, there was still a try of change, there was still
22:29Is it still a tree? Is it still a tree? Is it still a Christmas tree?
22:35Is it still on the world?
22:38Or is it just an illusion that we still have?
22:47The goal was so close, and yet so far away.
22:59In the morning sun, I saw the golden turrets of the Kreml.
23:07They lit up and blitzed.
23:10It was a fantastic picture.
23:13It gave me the feeling that you are in the middle of the road.
23:18We don't have it anymore.
23:22And that was it then.
23:25December 5, 1941.
23:29The panzer vanguard of the Wehrmacht is poised to enter Moscow.
23:38We went to 10 or 12 kilometers from Moscow.
23:46I had to run my car and went to the foot.
23:52The Soviet counterattack.
23:56Fresh, rested ski divisions that Stalin has transferred from Siberia to defend Moscow.
24:01from the streets.
24:06And from the street.
24:10And from behind the skiläufer.
24:11The panzer.
24:14And we are heading to the Panzer.
24:17I took the 08 out of the line.
24:20I thought if you will be now.
24:22If you will, you will, you will immediately be the pistol.
24:26the wehrmacht has suffered its first defeat the dream of a quick victory is gone
24:52das wir moskau nicht einnehmen konnten war eine riesen enttäuschung für den ehrgeiz der
25:02truppe unter dem motto das schaffen war schon aber es hatten wir eben nicht geschafft das gab es bis dahin
25:08ja fast für eine panzerdivision nicht und das machte selbstverständlich nachdenklich
25:16hitler gives the order stand firm at any cost no retreat he himself takes over command of the army
25:25dismissing all the top generals even panzergeneral heinz guderian he had dared to move his units back a
25:33little against hitler's orders and for that he has to go his men can't believe it
25:39man sagte wie kann man einen solchen fachmann wegen kaum nachvollziehbar gründe wie kann man so
25:53einen ablehnen also das war schon ein schlag gegen die traditions und selbstbewussten panzerleute
26:01hat uns nicht gefallen a year later the circumstances of guderian's dismissal still
26:10anger his comrades in captivity in england actually guderian is a decent man i have known him since he
26:19was a cap but he allowed hitler to treat him like a snotty child hitler gave him a bollocking and threw
26:26him out guderian asked for review he told me this himself but he was turned down at home in berlin he
26:38was a non-entity he said to me i'm ashamed to go to the barbers because they will ask me what are you
26:47doing here does it law often was that the troops in the east never they haven't been able to get him
26:56to wizard the army groups in ages only in an absolute emergency he stays at home and locks himself in
27:05absolute tyrannical lunacy after the moscow crisis hitler increasingly makes decisions on his own but the
27:16generals obey later they will say hitler threw away victory by delaying the march on moscow
27:22after the war many of the generals they had this obsession i think with capturing moscow now although
27:28moscow had real symbolic significance i'm not entirely convinced that the capture of moscow itself would
27:36have led to the end of red army resistance any more than napoleon's capture of moscow allowed the
27:42grand army to defeat russia february 1942 the wehrmacht is on the defensive for the first time and it gets a
27:53taste of its own medicine at demyansk near lake ilman six german divisions are trapped by the red army
28:00ninety-five thousand german soldiers are cut off
28:06they can only be supplied by air defeat is only a matter of time
28:16outside this pocket 35 kilometers away from the trapped army general walter von seidlitz kurzbach arrives
28:29he has instructions to break through the russian siege line joachim sandow was with him
28:36general von seidlitz is grundsätzlich with a carabiner
28:44unterwegs to be used that is also that was for a general a very good story a general came
28:50with a carabiner who came with a carabiner who came with a carabiner who came with a carabiner who came with a general
28:58well yeah then uh that is the wise to understand whether it's an officer or police or electricity
29:12he came from one of the most prestigious prussian military families his daughter ingrid remembers
29:32er war immer sehr sehr liebenswürdig hat keinen unterschied gemacht zwischen dem postboten
29:40und dem grafen so und so das lag ihm nicht er hatte allerdings ein starkes pflichtgefühl das
29:47habe ich auch als kind gemerkt und dass man auch wenn man aus so einem alten adelsgeschlecht kommt
29:55dass man auch ziemlich viel verantwortung eigentlich trägt und dass man der auch gerecht wird so ist
30:00er eigentlich aufgewachsen noblesse oblige it was no empty phrase for seidlitz
30:11heinrich graf von einsiedel got to know him in 1943 sein es war ein tapfer aufrichter klar
30:19denkender soldat in militärischen dingen klar denkender soldat politisch nahm vollkommen
30:26ungebildet zeit ist hat zu mir selber gesagt mir waren hitler nichts aufgefallen als schlecht
30:31sitzende uniformen und schlechte tischmann hier zeitlitz will be one of the few wehrmacht generals
30:40to openly oppose hitler but it hasn't come to that yet on march the 20th 1942 he orders the attack on
30:50the soviet positions near demyansk
31:02four weeks later the assault groups have fought their way to the trap army
31:09es war ja so dass links um die stelle wo gekämpft wurde wo wir angegriffen haben dass da überhaupt
31:17kein ordentlich gestanden es war mehrmals hin und her gegangen vorher und da ist natürlich nicht
31:26übrig geblieben the supply lines to the units of demyansk are open again and walter
31:33von seidlitz is the hero of the day das war für sein ist natürlich ein ganz großer operative
31:41erfolg zweifelsohne aber er hat sich durchaus fatal ausgewirkt weil man im oberkommando der wehrmacht
31:47und oberkommando des heeres nun glaubte auch eine größere armee gruppe aus der luft versorgen
31:52zu können und dieser glaube dieser irre glaube der sollte sich jetzt hat 42 noch fatal aus
31:58spring 1942 more and more fresh wehrmacht units arrive in russia but this picture is deceptive
32:10im juni 1941 galten und zwei drittel aller divisionen als wie es damals hieß voll angriffsfähig im märz
32:211942 waren es gerade noch fünf prozent wir sehen daran dass dieses heer das damals im juni 1941 zum angriff
32:33angetreten war im grunde nicht mehr bestand by march 1942 the wehrmacht has lost a million men
32:40they're especially short of frontline officers da hat mich der damalige kompanie-chef zu sich kommen
32:49lassen hat gesagt also wenn sie sich bewähren können sie oft gesandwerter werden ich habe das dann
32:57in meinem fahrzeug mitgeteilt worauf unser fahrer ein schreianfall bekam und sagt wir fahren von
33:04deutschland bis hier oben hin und jetzt kommst du erklärst jetzt müssen wir uns bewähren
33:09die normale laufzeit in russland eines panzerkernadierleutnant waren elf tage
33:19dann war er weg
33:22most of the companies are led by corporates and sergeants you have to look at it soberly we are losing
33:34too many men in these battles they waste too many lives and too much blood there's nobody left
33:44there's nobody left in the russian offensive of the last war i only had to replace my officers corps once
33:50the enemy strength increases from months to months while ours declines as early as january
33:59the ammunition supply was suspended in the midst of the fighting they stopped sending us ammunition
34:09i had a mortar battery and didn't fire a single shot for weeks for weeks not days
34:20not days you can't load cannons with philosophy
34:29nevertheless hitler expects the wehrmacht to win two more victories one to seize the russian oil
34:36reserves on the black sea and two to capture the city of stalingrad at the same time
34:43operativ war diese entscheidung eine katastrophe sie bedeutet die halbierung der angriffskraft und
34:54machte darum das scheitern in jedem falle vor stalingrad wie im kaukasus eigentlich wahrscheinlich
34:59so november 1942 most of stalingrad has been occupied by the wehrmacht the red army begins another
35:09counter-offensive now the soviets have mastered the very tactics that dealt them such devastating
35:15defeats at the beginning of the campaign the red army learned lessons from the wehrmacht and they
35:24learned how to fight the same way that the germans fought the great irony i think of this is that the
35:31wehrmacht in fact uh were the teachers for the red army that eventually defeated them november the 22nd
35:401942 the red army has completely surrounded the german soldiers at stalingrad
35:45and there were no longer there were no longer in the black batterie and i saw them through the glass and i thought
35:56i said to myself, there was a man who came to me and gave me god and said to myself,
36:01man, don't go there, don't go there! 888, yeah, they are German, but the
36:06besatzung is already russisch! what? they were already there, and there was already there, and there was
36:12We have to do it now.
36:14The water is closed.
36:16Cut off. Even General Seydlitz.
36:19Hitler had ordered the soldiers in Stalingrad to dig in and hold fast, like in Demiansk.
36:25But Seydlitz knows perfectly well, Stalingrad is not Demiansk.
36:29You can't supply more than 200.000 men from the air.
36:33So he decides to take an unprecedented step.
36:36He writes a memo to his superiors.
36:39It needed to make a last time clear, that our healing could only be in the immediate attack.
36:47And if it had to be, against Hitler.
36:50At the end of our thinking, we forced the army to take the freedom to take,
36:58if the order of the agreement would not be taken off.
37:02This was unheard of.
37:13A Prussian general calling for disobedience against the supreme commander,
37:18out of a sense of duty to his own soldiers.
37:21Seydlitz was the only one.
37:35the the the the also a new for a longer time
37:39so why then
37:40field is the man civil courage
37:43gegenüber seinen vorgesetzten
37:45and genau dass diese zivilcourage hat
37:47seydlitz bewiesen
37:49sightless was the only one
37:51the other generals follow orders
37:53against their better judgment
37:55they promise hitler they'll break through the
37:57soviet encirclement from the outside
38:00they fail
38:01get hurt and in this kind of next
38:03that was you're also quite when auch nicht
38:06wird sich gerade
38:07um
38:08den gefecht slalom
38:11und von weihnachts abend an entfernte der sich wieder
38:14na wussten wir natürlich genau was los war
38:18und wussten dann auch wir hatten auszahlen
38:21bis zur letzten patrone das war uns bekannt
38:25the news from russia also reaches the generals at trent park in england
38:31the
38:35they realize what it means
38:39if
38:40what's the newspaper say is correct them
38:43then we lose the worker
38:46then we lose telling god
38:48we must win the war otherwise it's finis camon
38:51yeah
38:54it has to work out all right otherwise it will be the end of germany for centuries
39:00that's right
39:02have hundreds of thousands of people died in vain again
39:09it's unsinkable
39:12stand firm at all costs
39:14the soldiers at stalingrad fight on with no hope of rescue
39:20too much has already happened in this war
39:22man kämpfte weiter aus angst vom russen
39:27wir wussten sehr genau
39:31wenn wir überlaufen und wenn wir aufhören
39:34geht's uns nicht besser als wenn wir noch bis zu ende kämpfen
39:40on january the 9th 1943 walter von seidlitz wrote to his wife
39:44my dear heart
39:47a picture of you and the children is on my desk
39:50where i can always see you
39:52and that helps me to deal with things which i might otherwise despair over
39:57farewell
39:58our future is dark
40:00you are my only light in these times
40:03we are not
40:05we are just
40:06we are simply
40:08we are not
40:11that he may die
40:13he's not
40:14anyone
40:14cannot
40:15this has to be his responsibility
40:17not allowed
40:18he was a
40:20very
40:22It will be nearly 13 years before Ingrid von Seydlitz sees her father again, back from
40:41Russian captivity. A man who many reactionary Germans still revile as a traitor.
40:52Stalingrad, the end of January 1943.
41:22The wound probably saves Hans Erdmann Schönbeck's life. He's evacuated from Stalingrad on one
41:37of the last planes.
41:44It's the end. On February the 2nd, 1943, the remains of the 6th Army surrender.
41:52Offen gesagt, in meinem Verstand war eigentlich null. Ich hab nur gesehen, dass ich jetzt nicht
41:59von irgendeinem wieder ein Bewachen umgebracht werde. Für mich war das das Signal zu sagen,
42:06jetzt versuche ich auf jede mögliche anständige Weise durchzukommen, um zu überleben.
42:13Noch nicht mal ob nach Hause zu kommen, nur zu überleben.
42:17Noch nicht mal ob nach Hause zu kommen, nur zu überleben.
42:32What awaits these men? 91,000 German soldiers are taken prisoner in Stalingrad.
42:42Only 6,000 will make it home. One of them is Manfred Gussovius, after more than 10 years
42:51of war and captivity.
43:12Stalingrad, it was more than just the end of an army.
43:16Es gab nach Stalingrad keine deutsche Strategie mehr.
43:26Es galt nur noch Zeit zu gewinnen, dem Regime letzte Atempausen zu geben,
43:32vor dem endgültigen Zusammenbruch. Und dieser Prozess zog sich dann über zwei Jahre hin
43:39und forderte etwa das Doppelte an Opfern, wie der Krieg bis 1943 gefordert hat.
43:46The Wehrmacht fights on. For most, the question of whether to give up,
43:53or even change sides, does not arise.
43:59Ich war ein deutscher Offizier. Ich hätte es nicht geschafft.
44:09Mehr kann ich dazu nicht sagen.
44:13Heinz Otto Fausten is wounded in 1943 and loses a leg. For the Fatherland. For the Führer.
44:25Ich hatte Verbandswechsel. Das war so unglaublich schmerzhaft.
44:30War nur auszuhalten. Die Schwester machte das.
44:36Indem ich gegenüber der Wand, den Postkarten groß, das Bild vom Adolf hatte.
44:48Und dann habe ich die Hand ausgestreckt und habe gerufen, Heil du Schwein.
44:54Summer 1943.
44:58Near Kursk, the Wehrmacht Panzers advance again.
45:01In vain.
45:06The hunters have finally become the hunted.
45:09The Wehrmacht lost the initiative.
45:14They'd held the initiative for two years.
45:16They'd been able to decide where to go, what to do, which operations to mount.
45:21But from the summer of 1943 onwards, the initiative lay with the Red Army.
45:27Meanwhile, in Trent Park.
45:31Our situation is hopeless.
45:35It doesn't matter where we attack.
45:38We cannot advance.
45:41We cannot achieve nothing.
45:44We no longer have the human materials we had at the beginning of the offensive.
45:50What else cannot be replaced.
45:52One of the few is Walter von Seidlinz.
45:55The war is lost.
45:57The war is lost.
45:58But the question is, what consequences do they take out of it?
46:01Most of them say, Hitler is guilty of the war.
46:05Other generals are guilty of the war.
46:07I don't.
46:08And there are only very few who can overcome this burden
46:13and say, no, I am responsible for all that,
46:17what is happening in German.
46:19One of the few is Walter von Seidlinz.
46:22While a prisoner of war in Russia, he completely breaks with Hitler.
46:26In the League of German Officers organized by the Russians,
46:28he calls on his Wehrmacht comrades to overthrow the Nazi regime.
46:33And the bitter attack of Stalingrad
46:35should be the rightful day.
46:38Do what is necessary, so it does not happen without you
46:40or even against you.
46:42He is here.
46:44Seidlitz remains who he is.
46:46A conservative patriot.
46:49He refuses to cooperate with Stalin.
46:52Hitler sentences him to death in absentia.
46:55We were also aware that we were in the Hitler regime.
46:59But we are still proud of it.
47:02Because our whole attempt was to prevent the self-mort of the German Reich.
47:08And this fear of a catastrophe over Germany was already broken down.
47:14So it is possible to cut off.
47:17Heinz Guderian, the Panzer Strategist, was at the opposite end of the spectrum.
47:22Hitler called him back into service in 1943.
47:25First as Inspector of Panzer Troops and then Chief of the General Staff.
47:30After the war, he became a consultant for the formation of the new West German Army.
47:34Karl Gottfried Fierkorn also had an invitation to join the new German Army.
47:41But he preferred a civilian career.
47:45Heinz Otto Fausten studied art after the war.
47:48He became a teacher and a headmaster.
47:51After 1945, Hans Erdmann Schönbeck worked in the car industry.
47:56They are still haunted by their war experiences.
47:59The war is always coming when they sleep.
48:04They dream.
48:06They dream.
48:07They dream.
48:08They have to attack.
48:12And they hear the razzle of the chains.
48:19And they feel the fear.
48:29They dream.
48:43They dream.
48:44That way that woman is not the scariest part.
48:45That is Austrian.
48:46The держits question.
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