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00:00The Eastern Front was the conflict at the heart of the First World War.
00:30A struggle which devastated the lives of Eastern Europe's peoples.
00:34As old scores were settled, new hatreds forged.
00:39A harbinger of the Second World War.
00:44There has never been such a war as this, waged with such bestial fury.
01:00The Eastern Front was the first time of the Second World War.
01:12This is a war of the first time of the Second World War.
01:18This was a racial war between Teuton and Slav,
01:38between the Germans and Austro-Hungarians on one side
01:41and Russia and her Slav ally Serbia on the other.
01:48Caught between the clashing giants were Poles, Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Croatians, Jews.
01:57Without statehood or voice, with no means of defence.
02:04It was also a war of alliances, stretched to breaking point.
02:10Germany, hands full on the Western Front,
02:13looked to Austria-Hungary to bear the brunt of a Russian attack.
02:16But Austria-Hungary's empire was crumbling and weak.
02:19Theirs was a partnership with different agendas, many enemies.
02:25Germany's eastern flank bordered directly onto Russia, down what is now Poland.
02:30To Austria-Hungary's south lay her dreaded enemy, Serbia.
02:35Around them, a ring of neutrals, as yet undecided which side to join.
02:39Russian troops are blessed before leaving for the war.
02:58One officer presented his men with an historic opportunity.
03:00Hey, brothers. Our eternal enemy, Germany, is trying to enslave Russia, our country,
03:09which has long suffocated under Germany's dead weight.
03:14The time has come to end their Teutonic rule.
03:17Not everyone saw the conflict in such epic terms.
03:23Russian conscript Vasily Mishnin left to fight the Germans, filled with dread.
03:29A shiver ran through my whole body.
03:36The third whistle.
03:38Everybody breaks down.
03:40I kiss my Niura for the last time.
03:43And all my family kiss me.
03:49Niura shouts,
03:50Why are you crying for Russia?
03:52You said you weren't going to cry.
04:02The challenge to this war on the backward side of Europe was logistics.
04:11There were vast distances to cover, from the Urals to the Alps,
04:14with desperate problems of communications and supply.
04:28On the 17th of August, 1914,
04:31the Russian First Army seized the initiative and invaded Germany.
04:35the Russian First Army seized the initiative.
04:40This would be a mobile war, and some units went in hard from the start.
04:52Russian cavalry officer Vladimir Litauer had already crossed the border,
04:57scouting ahead.
05:00We started while it was still dark.
05:01Around 7 o'clock in the morning,
05:04our squadron reached the objective for the day,
05:07a large German farm.
05:09The scene on the German side of the border was frightening.
05:13For miles, farms, paystacks and barns were burning.
05:18Like every army under the sun, we looted and destroyed.
05:22And later hated to admit it.
05:25The scope for atrocity was greatest where places suddenly changed hands,
05:33where soldiers left off the land,
05:35where you weren't sure who the enemy was.
05:42Litauer's regiment was fired on at the village of Santopan in East Prussia.
05:46The Russians blamed locals for directing the attack from the church tower.
05:57Groton completely lost his temper and shouted,
06:00they are all spies, shoot them!
06:02In a moment, they were all dead.
06:04Horror stories spread, as 12-year-old German Pieter Kur recorded in her diary.
06:15Whole columns of East Prussian refugees came through our town.
06:20Many are crying.
06:22There are mothers with tiny children.
06:23They say Russians tied German women who stay behind to trees,
06:29set up wooden crosses in front of them,
06:31and nail their little children to them.
06:34When the kiddies have died before their mother's eyes,
06:37the Russians mutilate the women and kill them.
06:39The German army fell back 100 miles.
06:57Two men took over Germany's defence in the East.
07:00General Paul von Hindenburg, brought out of retirement,
07:03and General Eric Ludendorff, poached from the offensive in the West.
07:11They would, in time, become more powerful than the Kaiser.
07:24The Germans planned to hit the Russian Second Army in these woods,
07:27near the East Prussian town of Tannenberg,
07:29where, 500 years before,
07:32a Polish army had defeated a force of Teutons.
07:37The stakes were high,
07:39Germany fighting to defend her native soil.
07:50Julius Bolt's regiment was whisked from Western to Eastern Front.
07:54After a 60-hour train ride,
07:56a quick march for nearly four hours straight to the battlefield.
08:01I had my baptism of fire.
08:03Oddly enough, it left me completely cold.
08:07In a flash, I thought of home,
08:09gave one glance to heaven,
08:11and then straight into the line of fire.
08:20When the injured scream, your heart clams up.
08:23There's almost nothing left of this hospitable town.
08:29What's left of the buildings is either still burning or in ruins.
08:34Charred corpses lie in the streets.
08:37Tannenberg stopped the Russians in their tracks,
08:49and made up for the lack of German victory in the West.
08:51Hindenberg and Ludendorff were seen as saviours of the nation,
08:55as schoolgirl Pieter wrote.
08:56Paul von Hindenberg is mighty big and strong.
09:01He has a square head with a moustache and many wrinkles in his face.
09:05The people here in the East worship him.
09:09Germany needed heroes.
09:11The battle entered pan-German mythology.
09:13Payback for the Russian invasion,
09:14final revenge for that ancient defeat.
09:16This massive monument was completed in 1927,
09:19a rallying symbol for Germany's ambitious right.
09:20A few years later,
09:21Hindenberg showed Adolf Hitler the site of Germany's historic triumph.
09:23The battle entered pan-German mythology.
09:24The battle entered pan-German mythology.
09:25Payback for the Russian invasion,
09:26final revenge for that ancient defeat.
09:27This massive monument was completed in 1927,
09:29a rallying symbol for Germany's ambitious right.
09:31A few years later,
09:34Hindenberg showed Adolf Hitler the site of Germany's historic triumph.
09:53Today, the monument lies in ruins,
09:56Today, the monument lies in ruins,
09:58blown up by the Russians after the Second World War,
10:01last blow in the saga of Slav-Tuton clashes at Tannenberg.
10:13Poland, January 1915.
10:17The Russians were firmly dug in.
10:20The Germans were now on the offensive, trying to dislodge them.
10:26The village of Bolimov was in the front line.
10:30The Germans turned to technology to give them the edge over the Russians.
10:39Bolimov would be the testbed for an experimental weapon.
10:45Francis Smolenski, a civilian, raised the alarm.
10:51I got up, went outside,
10:55and then I saw this something which looked like smoke.
10:58I ran back home, shouting,
11:00Fire!
11:07Behind the Russian lines,
11:08General Basil Gurko got snippets of information that didn't add up.
11:12Hundreds mysteriously killed.
11:15Trenches full of corpses that might not be dead.
11:19Bodies in a state of collapse with little sign of life were lying in the wood.
11:25What was the reason for this unusual occurrence?
11:28Had some of those already buried been in a state of coma and not dead at all?
11:33From this church tower, German observers watched the first major use of chemical warfare ever.
11:46The Germans fired 18,000 tear gas shells onto the Russians.
11:52The conventional wisdom is that the wind was blowing the wrong way and it was too cold for the gas to work.
12:08The Russians withstood the attack.
12:11But there were victims, as General Gurko heard and Francis Smolenski saw.
12:23They were carried, crowded onto wagons, some lying on top of others.
12:28Those who could, walked.
12:30Their faces were pale blue.
12:32They had foam at their mouths.
12:36Three months later, Ypres on the Western Front wrongly earned the morbid distinction of being the site for the first gas attack.
12:44Bolimov went unreported, never investigated.
12:55Meanwhile, Germany's main ally, Austria-Hungary, was fighting for survival.
13:01The Russians had invaded and were now besieging the fortress city of Przemysl.
13:09If it fell, so might Hungary herself.
13:18The Russians sat outside for six months, lobbing shells, waiting.
13:23Inside, 300 Austro-Hungarians a day were dying of starvation.
13:38Przemysl was a microcosm of the Austro-Hungarian Empire itself, a crucible of ethnic frictions.
13:44Orders of the day had to be issued in 15 languages.
13:49Austrian patriots cheek by jowl with Russian sympathisers.
13:53Questions of race, questions of loyalty, fears of the enemy within.
14:02There's execution after execution.
14:04The Austrians are hanging people by the dozen now.
14:11Innocent ones too.
14:13The Austrians are hanging people by the dozen now.
14:14Innocent ones too.
14:15The Austrians are opening up in these streams.
14:33March 1915.
14:36Nikolai Mioskovsky was one of the Russians preparing for the final assault.
14:40Instead of the total shootout we expected, there were only a few shots of shrapnel, and
14:54then we reached the fort quite easily.
14:56The Austro-Hungarian garrison had fallen apart.
15:15Przemysl surrendered to the Russians without a fight.
15:23The first Russian train crosses the river San.
15:38British observer Bernard Pears quickly realized how divided the Austro-Hungarians were.
15:45The troops, instead of being all Hungarians, were of various nationalities.
15:51The conditions of defense led to brawls, and in the end, open disobedience of orders.
16:03Austro-Hungarian prisoners were paraded through Moscow.
16:11A German official said, referring to Austria-Hungary, that his country was now shackled to a corpse.
16:28Russians bury the German dead after yet another battle.
16:35While great armies tore at one another's throats on the Eastern Front, a circle of small nations watched, like vultures, waiting to see which side to join.
17:00Forget liberal ideals and high principles.
17:07The question was, who would offer them the most, and who would win this war?
17:15These smaller nations, Italy, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, also had scores to settle, lands they wanted back.
17:28The price of any alliance would be high.
17:32Marie, Queen of Romania, at her post-war coronation.
17:49British born as Princess of Edinburgh, Marie had effectively led Romania as Britain's loyal ally in the First World War.
18:01She kneels before her husband, King Ferdinand.
18:10But behind closed doors, Marie called the shots.
18:14She was instrumental in brokering the critical deal.
18:16Marie had written to the Russian Tsar, cousin Nicky, and to the British king, cousin George, putting Romania's entry in the First World War out to tender.
18:32Being neutral, I get news from all sides.
18:37Each tries to persuade us that defeat for them is impossible.
18:41Promises and threats being dangled over our heads.
18:45The Romanian government, prodded by Marie, fixed the price for entry on the Allied side.
18:55Transylvania, the Bernat, and Bukovina.
18:58She added for George V's benefit.
19:03These geographical explanations must be Chinese to you.
19:07But the places can be found on a map.
19:10Her Prussian-born husband, Ferdinand, rather fancied joining Germany.
19:15But by August 1916, the Allies agreed Romania's terms in full.
19:20In Rome, Italy's leaders had already cashed in.
19:34Instead of joining the Central Powers, in line with pre-war treaties, Italy initially declared neutrality.
19:46But in October 1914, Prime Minister Salandra said Italy must act for her own national good.
19:53He called this policy Sacro Egoismo, sacred self-interest.
19:59In practice, it meant joining the side of the highest bidder.
20:04A few Italians wanted to fight.
20:10But the Allies offered a chunk of Austria-Hungary, part of the Dalmatian coast, and threw in a few islands.
20:19So without consulting parliament, Salandra accepted, landing his people with one of the harshest fronts in the entire war.
20:34Italy's border with Austria-Hungary zigzagged for 375 miles into Europe's highest peaks.
20:46The Austro-Hungarians had the advantage, holding the high ground along the entire front.
20:51It was brutal terrain.
20:58Italian Alpine troops inch up to the front line.
21:14An officer beats out a rhythm for men hauling a field gun up the slope.
21:26An officer beats out a rhythm for men hauling a field gun up the slope.
21:38In May 1915, Italian troops seized the mountain village of Cortina d'Ampezzo.
21:55In front of them, the vast Lagazzuoy mountain.
22:12By sunrise, the Italians had climbed its sheer rock face to a narrow ledge.
22:30They were now fighting a vertical war.
22:33Above them, the Austro-Hungarians had fewer men, but showed a tenacity they lacked elsewhere.
22:56Austrian Colonel Victor Schemfil watched his men attack the Italians below.
23:00They threw several hand grenades on the ridge, which was about 100 meters below them.
23:07Judging by the screams of the wounded, and from the fact that the machine gun hasn't fired a single shot all day,
23:15we must have been successful.
23:21But the Italians clung on, two miles above sea level.
23:30Each side burrowed into the mountains, and spent the next two years trying to dislodge the other.
23:44Fifteen men slept in this cave carved out of the rock.
23:47Both sides worked 24-hour shifts, digging tunnels, trying to reach the enemy's position, and blast the mountain under them.
24:05Some went mad listening for the sound of enemy drills.
24:08My nerves are shot to pieces. I've got to calm down.
24:12I've now been in the front line 4 months, amid constant fear and torment.
24:17Some went mad, listening for the sound of enemy drills.
24:26My nerves are shot to pieces. I've got to calm down.
24:31I've now been in the front line four months, amid constant fear and torment.
24:35Avalanches became another hazard of war, sometimes triggered by shellfire.
24:53Austrian Eugenio Mich was caught in one that wiped out nine barrack huts, killing 272.
25:07I stayed squashed under the debris of the beds.
25:11For the first quarter of an hour, I could feel 50 or so men moving around me,
25:17and then one by one, they fell silent and died.
25:23Italy's frontier with Austria-Hungary leveled out along the Isonzo River.
25:36Italy's first attack failed with heavy loss of life.
25:39But General Luigi Cadorna bloody-mindedly ordered another and another.
25:45Eleven battles in all, at a cost of 300,000 lives.
25:53They never reached their main objective, the port of Trieste.
26:05Giuseppe Cordano served in the Julian Alps,
26:08in a trench system just 15 metres below the Austrian positions.
26:11Between the two trenches, it's a cataclysm.
26:28The dead are scattered everywhere, half-buried.
26:31Havisacks, rifles, rags of clothing, and human body parts.
26:35A couple of grenades fall in the middle of the dike, where some soldiers are sheltering.
26:41And everything is thrown up in the air.
26:44Rocks fly and fall with furious destruction.
26:48Laments and screams for help can be heard from everywhere, but how can one move?
26:53How can one help them?
26:54I'm astride the crest, and I carry on, metre by metre, ducking my head under shrapnel fire.
27:07Ten metres in front of me, Zanni, from Vicenza, is hit in the head,
27:11screams, and falls down the precipice.
27:14I watch his body tumbling down.
27:18He was a good lad.
27:19I keep going, forever asking myself when my time will come.
27:37In the winter of 1914, Germany's high command told the Kaiser
27:42they'd decided to launch the major offensive of 1915 against the Russians.
27:49The generals ruled out total victory,
27:54but a decisive blow might force the Russians to sue for peace.
28:03Germany moved eight divisions from the Western Front to the Eastern
28:06to try to break through the Russians at Gorlitzer,
28:10in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains.
28:13Now, German fought alongside Austrian.
28:15Austrian Matthias Migschitz sensed the change of mood.
28:25It sounds wonderful to hear German troops speaking.
28:29Everyone is sure of victory, conscious of their might.
28:32You hear no melancholy talk, no bleak forecasts.
28:39Florence Farnborough, a British nurse with the Russian Red Cross,
28:42travelled with her camera along the Eastern Front.
28:49Her nursing team went by horse cart to Gorlitzer.
28:53They had no idea a third of a million Germans and Austrians
28:56were massing to attack the town.
28:58We have already chosen our hospital.
29:02It is a well-built house with several nice, airy rooms.
29:06We are surrounded by the Carpathians.
29:10I love watching them at night,
29:12when the mountains lie mysteriously quiet and passive.
29:14Then the wounded started to arrive.
29:42They came in there hundreds, from all directions,
29:46some able to walk, others crawling,
29:49dragging themselves along the ground.
30:00As the Germans got near,
30:02Florence's team was ordered to evacuate.
30:04And the wounded?
30:07They shouted to us when they saw us leaving,
30:10called out to us in piteous language to stop.
30:14We had to wrench our skirts from their clinging hands.
30:22Caught by surprise and low on shells,
30:25the Russians retreated.
30:25Infantryman Miaskovsky wrote to his friend,
30:33the composer Sergei Prokofiev.
30:36My dearest Sergei Orzenka,
30:39we're in a state of unstoppable, panicked retreat.
30:42Our troops are melting away like snow.
30:45Only 6 to 700 survived out of a 3,000-strong regiment
30:48in one day alone.
30:53The Russian army fled,
30:55but not towards the negotiating table.
31:03They scorched the earth.
31:08Vasily Mishnin retreated through the village of Dombrouvo.
31:11The locals received us well,
31:17but in the evening,
31:19when the Cossacks arrived
31:20and began to drive them out with cruelty,
31:22then there were tears and grief
31:25and cursing of the war.
31:37The Russians were looking for scapegoats,
31:39and the Jews of Eastern Europe fitted the bill.
31:44They didn't look Russian,
31:45and their language, Yiddish,
31:47sounded suspiciously like German.
31:59In 1914, there were 4 million Jews in the Russian Empire.
32:04Battered by pogroms
32:05and denied rights allowed the Tsar's other minorities,
32:08Jews were forced to live in specified areas,
32:12known as the Pale of Settlement.
32:19And even though 650,000 Jews served in the army,
32:23many Russian officers and men
32:24saw Jews as dirty, half-human creatures.
32:261st of April, 1915.
32:40The Ruskies make fun of the Jews,
32:43saying they can munch their matzos for now.
32:46But when Passover's finished,
32:48they'll sort them out,
32:49send them to Siberia.
32:51Helena Jablonska lived at number 20,
32:57Franciszek Street,
32:58in the heart of Old Pshomyssel.
33:03A third of the town's population were Jews.
33:07They'd been safe enough there under the Austro-Hungarians,
33:09but now Helena watched the Russians root them out
33:12within days of taking over.
33:14Tuesday, the 30th of March.
33:20Jews are treated with no mercy.
33:23They cut the beard and sideburns
33:24off the old rabbi from Beersia,
33:26then strapped him to a horse
33:28and dragged him away.
33:30They beat his wife.
33:33Jews are not allowed to own any shops.
33:35Saturday, the 17th of April.
33:46The Cossacks waited till the Jews went off to pray,
33:50then set upon them with whips,
33:53taking them from synagogues,
33:56streets and doorsteps.
33:58Many hundreds of Jews.
34:01What'll they do with them?
34:02Some of the older, weaker ones couldn't keep up
34:06and were whipped.
34:08The round-up will go on till they've caught the lot.
34:12Such lamenting and despair.
34:16Some hide in cellars,
34:19but the Russians will find them.
34:25No one knows how many Jews were killed
34:27in Eastern Europe during the First World War.
34:29600,000 were uprooted,
34:33of whom 200,000 never returned home.
34:42After their experiences under the Russians,
34:45many Jews looked to the Germans for better treatment.
34:53German officers enter the main Jewish street
34:55of Mlaueva, north of Warsaw.
35:00The Germans tried to win the support of Jews
35:02in Eastern Europe
35:03by promising them liberation
35:05from the Russian yoke.
35:09Meanwhile, the assimilated Jews of Germany
35:11showed their patriotism by joining up.
35:15Emma and Fritz Schlesinger
35:16see their friend, Ludwig Bornstein,
35:18off to the front,
35:20one of 100,000 Jews who fought for the Kaiser.
35:22German Jewish soldiers marked Hanukkah,
35:29the Festival of Lights, in 1916.
35:3612,000 were killed in the war.
35:39Nearly 30,000 received decorations.
35:45But while Jews were tolerated
35:47within the German army,
35:49many soldiers despised them.
35:51I couldn't bear to watch as a Polish family
36:08struggled on foot
36:09while the entire lazy Jewish population
36:12travelled on carts.
36:14I hauled the Jew off
36:15and gave his arse a good kicking
36:16before making the three Poles
36:18with all their baggage
36:20climb up onto the cart.
36:22I'll let everyone know
36:23that I would have all the Jews shot
36:25if they didn't let the Poles
36:26continue on their journey.
36:31The breakthrough continued
36:33through the summer.
36:34This was the greatest victory
36:36of the Central Powers in the war,
36:38seizing present-day Poland,
36:40Lithuania,
36:40parts of Belarus
36:41and the Ukraine.
36:50As the Germans advanced,
36:52they entered a world half-destroyed.
36:53German troops convert Russian railway lines
37:04to the narrower German gauge.
37:08Rebuilding the communication system
37:09became a key task,
37:11rich in symbolic meaning.
37:13Germany aimed to recast Poland
37:27as an independent state,
37:29but under her wing.
37:33Advancing troops saw themselves
37:35as bringing civilizing order
37:36and discipline.
37:37That which seemed forever lost
37:43was created anew
37:44by the German battalions of Kultuer.
37:47The German spirit blows
37:49through the poor land
37:50and new life rises up
37:52out of the ruins.
38:02But that's not how it worked out.
38:04However keen the Germans were
38:06to present a caring image
38:07to their newsreel audiences.
38:14American woman Laura Deterchenovic
38:16lived in the occupied town of Svalki
38:19near the Lithuanian border.
38:29To her,
38:31the rebuilt railways and roads
38:32weren't bridges between cultures.
38:34They were Germany's means
38:37of whipping war booty back home.
38:41Furniture was carted daily
38:43to East Prussia.
38:44The woods were cut down,
38:46every agricultural implement taken,
38:48every woman outraged.
38:51All Poland was to be emptied
38:52and carted away,
38:53beaten into the bargain,
38:55and made to pay
38:55such terrible contributions.
38:57the German army
38:58and the German army
38:58began transporting men
39:00to the west for forced labour.
39:09Faced with a chronic labour shortage
39:11and with little love
39:12for Slav or Russian,
39:13the German army began transporting men
39:16to the west for forced labour.
39:17The American Red Cross distributes food aid
39:26to starving Polish peasants.
39:36Reluctant to feed conquered populations,
39:38the German army became increasingly obsessed
39:41with cataloguing them.
39:44Everyone over 10
39:45was to be documented
39:46and nearly 2 million
39:48photopasses were issued.
39:54The Germans also began
39:56to view the east
39:57as a place of disease
39:58and started large-scale
40:00disinfecting programmes.
40:01On the 17th of October, 1915,
40:06the German field medical commander
40:08ordered that all railway crossings
40:09on the eastern border
40:10be sealed off.
40:21Everyone crossing the frontier
40:23had to be deloused
40:24before setting foot
40:25on German soil.
40:31Winter, 1915.
40:50The racial war of Tutank
40:52versus Slav
40:52neared its peak.
40:58German and Austro-Hungarian forces
41:00moved south
41:01to destroy Serbia.
41:04This would win control
41:06of the Balkans,
41:07final revenge
41:08for the assassination
41:09of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
41:15And they had a new ally,
41:17Bulgaria,
41:18tempted by Germany's military muscle
41:20and certain this was
41:22the winning side.
41:27The bait dangled
41:28before Bulgarian leader Ferdinand
41:30was the promise
41:31was the promise
41:31of vast swathes of Serbia.
41:34Born in Vienna,
41:36Ferdinand had few sympathies
41:37for his Slav neighbours.
41:43The purpose of my life
41:45is the destruction of Serbia.
41:47on the 6th of October 1915,
41:54a joint German-Austro-Hungarian force
41:56invaded Serbia,
41:57taking the capital
41:58in just two days.
42:01The Bulgarian army
42:02then entered
42:03from the southeast.
42:05The Serbs' only way out
42:07of their country
42:08was into Albania,
42:10but that lay across
42:11treacherous mountain ranges.
42:12as their enemy's claws
42:20closed around them,
42:22the Serbian army
42:23slipped away
42:23and the people
42:25fled with them.
42:31Serbian photographer
42:32Rista Marjanovic
42:34documented his nation's exodus.
42:36One of the refugees
42:55was 12-year-old
42:56Katerina Kostic.
42:58We spent the nights
42:59in the open
43:00beside a fire
43:01which would scorch
43:02one side of your body
43:03while the other froze.
43:08One morning,
43:09a woman refugee
43:10woke up
43:11and happily announced
43:12that she'd had
43:13something soft
43:13beneath her head
43:14that night.
43:16To our horror,
43:17the soft thing
43:17turned out to be
43:18a human corpse.
43:27One soldier
43:28threw away his rifle
43:29to carry an old woman
43:30who had collapsed.
43:33She gestured
43:34towards the sound
43:35of the enemy
43:35closing in
43:36and handed him
43:38back his weapon.
43:44They halted here
43:46on the field
43:47of blackbirds
43:48in Kosovo.
43:51The Serb nation
43:52drew breath
43:53while its leaders
43:54met in the town
43:55of Prizren.
43:57The choices were grim.
43:59Battle it out.
44:00Surrender.
44:01Will survive
44:02to fight another day.
44:06Journalist
44:06Gordon Gordon-Smith
44:08watched the debate
44:08inside the town seminary.
44:12The final councils
44:13did not last long.
44:15On November 24th,
44:17the Supreme Resolution
44:18was taken.
44:19The king,
44:20army,
44:20and government
44:21would refuse
44:22to treat with the enemy
44:23and would leave
44:24for Albania.
44:25hundreds of thousands
44:32of troops
44:32and civilians
44:33set off
44:34into the mountains.
44:42Their plan
44:43to reach the Mediterranean
44:44and sail to safety.
44:50This epic retreat
44:52shaped modern
44:53Serbian self-perception
44:54taking its place
44:56in national myth
44:57alongside the 1389
44:58defeat by the Turks
45:00on the same field
45:01of blackbirds.
45:03Still an open wound
45:05today.
45:09A Serbian film
45:10directed by a veteran
45:11of the march
45:12reconstructed its agony.
45:14The further we went,
45:19the worse it got.
45:22You didn't hear
45:22the usual
45:23men swearing,
45:25officers yelling orders.
45:27This huge funeral procession
45:29of the state of Serbia
45:31endured the pain
45:32in silence.
45:36Who tramped behind me?
45:38Who in front?
45:40Where was my company?
45:41All too soon
45:43we fell apart.
45:45Now it was
45:46every man
45:47for himself.
45:48We staggered up mountains
46:01then clambered down
46:02avoiding quagmires
46:03from which the hands
46:04reached out
46:05of poor people
46:06who'd got stuck.
46:09We stumbled
46:10running out of strength
46:12but could not turn back.
46:14We had to move on.
46:15The survivors
46:24gathered on the island
46:25of Corfu.
46:33Exhaustion, starvation
46:34and disease
46:35continued to take their toll.
46:37Half the army,
46:50over 200,000 men
46:52had died on the march.
46:55No one knows
46:56how many civilians.
46:59But Serbia's death rate
47:00was the highest
47:01of the First World War.
47:02There was no question
47:10who was winning
47:11the titanic struggle
47:12of Teuton versus Slav.
47:15The central powers
47:16were now the masters
47:17of the Eastern Front.
47:20Columns of Russian prisoners
47:22became a familiar sight.
47:27The street was full of them.
47:30Thousands,
47:30driven along like dogs.
47:32Taunted,
47:33beaten if they fell down.
47:35Kicked until they either
47:36got up or lay still.
47:38Forever.
47:38Kaiser Wilhelm even suggested
47:43that 90,000 Russian prisoners
47:45be driven onto a barren peninsula
47:47along the Baltic shore
47:48and starved to death.
47:59The German and Austro-Hungarian
48:01high commands meet in the Tirol.
48:03But behind the mutual congratulation,
48:10the partnership
48:11is rotten to the core.
48:15Practicing his handshake,
48:17Archduke Frederick,
48:19the Austrian commander-in-chief,
48:21waits to meet
48:21one of the world's
48:22most powerful men,
48:24the German Kaiser.
48:25war has exposed their differences,
48:31not bound them closer.
48:35Germany thought the Austro-Hungarian Empire
48:38a shambles.
48:39She wondered whether to take
48:40the whole lot
48:41into the German Reich.
48:44Austria-Hungary found Germany
48:46arrogant and domineering.
48:48The Austrian chief of staff
48:51on the left
48:51called the Germans
48:52our secret enemies.
49:00In time,
49:01the Austrians would even send
49:03secret peace feelers
49:04to the Allies.
49:08But they could never
49:09break away from Germany.
49:12It was alliances
49:13on both sides
49:14that would keep the war going.
49:18In the next episode
49:31of the First World War,
49:33the horrors of Verdun
49:34and the Somme
49:35as both sides
49:37try to break the deadlock
49:38on the Western Front.
49:39of the First World War.
49:40The First World War
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