Between 1941 and 1945 around 30,000 French citizens voluntarily joined the German army and engaged in terrible war crimes in central and eastern Europe. This documentary explores a little-known chapter in the story of the second world war and France’s collaboration with Nazi Germany.
D-Day, June 6th, 1944. As the Allies storm the beaches of Normandy, Hitler orders the return of the Das Reich, the infamous Panzer elite division known for its mass murders in Ukraine and Belarus, based at that time in southwest of France. Its mission: to push the Allies back into the Atlantic and turn the tide of the conflict in favor of the Nazi Germany.
During the darkest days of the Third Reich, the most dreaded sound was a knock at the door after dark. Everyone who lived under Nazi rule lived in fear of the secretive agents known colloquially as "V-Men". Hitler called them his "deadliest weapon", and without them the Fuhrer's ambition could never have been realized.
Daniel Costelle and Isabelle Clarke have found at the NARA (National Archives in Washington DC) almost four hours of footage, mostly in colour, filmed by Hitler's mistress, Eva Braun between 1938 and 1944. It's an unbeleivable eyesight on Hitler's private life from the happy life in the "Eagle's nest" till his suicide in his bunker.
APO 923 was a proposed one-hour adventure television series, set in World War II and created by Gene Roddenberry. It was not picked up by the network, and only the pilot episode, "Operation Shangri-La", written by Roddenberry, was filmed. That episode can be viewed at The Paley Center for Media in New York City.
The story of the irreconcilable confrontation between two professional snipers, senior lieutenant of the special department Egorov and Lieutenant Lother Von Dibitz, which began in 1943 in the siege of Stalingrad and continued in 1944 in the forests of Belarus.
Often forgotten, and rarely punished, the lies of those in power always achieve their goals: THEY CHANGE THE COURSE OF HISTORY
Who are the liars? Heads of state, politicians or military leaders, supported by their hierarchies. They have no qualms about lying to the radio, to television, to millions of people, end even, on oath, to the highest authorities and institutions. They use secret services, military strategy or communications agencies to make their lies more credible. The only motto is: «the bigger the lie, the more it will be believed!»
In affairs of state, all and every means can be used to certify or conceal an operation. Lies are not just a matter of words, or of silence. They entail practical acts as well as technical support. Whole teams are sometimes necessary to construct believable illusions. In the service of a nation, lying just means reinventing the world.
As morning broke on the 1st of September 1939 and the first invasion force of German troops crossed the Polish border, few could have imagined the sheer scale of devastation, misery and bloodshed that the following years of war would bring. World War II saw the mobilisation of over 100 million military personnel as all corners of the globe were thrown into a state of 'total war', where each nation involved drained every resource at their disposal - human, natural, economic, industrial and military. The result was the conflict to end all conflicts. With over 500 minutes of footage, this gripping documentary series covers all the major events, people and machinery involved in the 20th Century's most terrible conflict and examines the roles of all three branches of the armed forces - navy, air force and army.