Dive deep into one of history’s darkest chapters with Nazi Secret Files, the gripping documentary series that uncovers hidden truths, classified operations, and shocking discoveries from the era of Nazi Germany.
This powerful history documentary explores secret missions, mysterious projects, and untold stories that remained buried for decades. Through expert analysis, archival footage, and detailed investigations, the series reveals the real secrets behind the Third Reich.
📌 In this series you will discover:
Secret Nazi operations
Hidden WWII mysteries
Classified German war projects
Untold historical evidence
Rare archival footage
If you enjoy history documentaries, WWII investigations, and real historical mysteries, this series is a must-watch.
👍 Like, comment, and subscribe for more full documentary series.
#NaziSecretFiles #WWIIDocumentary #HistoryDocumentary #NaziSecrets
This powerful history documentary explores secret missions, mysterious projects, and untold stories that remained buried for decades. Through expert analysis, archival footage, and detailed investigations, the series reveals the real secrets behind the Third Reich.
📌 In this series you will discover:
Secret Nazi operations
Hidden WWII mysteries
Classified German war projects
Untold historical evidence
Rare archival footage
If you enjoy history documentaries, WWII investigations, and real historical mysteries, this series is a must-watch.
👍 Like, comment, and subscribe for more full documentary series.
#NaziSecretFiles #WWIIDocumentary #HistoryDocumentary #NaziSecrets
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TVTranscript
00:02Adolf Hitler, a tyrannical maniac hell-bent on world domination.
00:08But what could drive a struggling artist from Vienna to become history's most reviled figure?
00:16A top-secret psychological profile reveals how dangerous delusions...
00:22This is a person appointed by a heavenly power to lead the Germans into the third.
00:31Mass hysteria.
00:32People are saying he's the great man, he's what we're waiting for.
00:36It's absolutely la-la land.
00:39And bizarre beliefs convince Hitler he is a god, a modern-day pharaoh.
00:45It's clear to them that he's crazy.
00:48This is the incredible story of the rise and fall of the Nazi messiah.
01:04Summer, 1941.
01:08Nazi Germany has conquered vast swathes of Europe.
01:13They're now poised to launch their biggest, most audacious campaign yet.
01:18Operation Barbarossa.
01:22At 0.300 hours on June 22nd, 3 million Axis troops, 3,000 tanks, and 2,500 bombers storm the
01:35Russian front.
01:38Nothing on this scale has ever been seen before.
01:48Advancing at lightning speed, the German army annihilates everything in their path.
01:55If Russia falls, Hitler will be on the verge of world domination.
02:02Yet the man responsible for the most devastating military conflict in history started out as an unremarkable drifter from Vienna.
02:12Hitler's transformation into a Nazi messiah is nothing short of miraculous.
02:18He's a non-entity.
02:20He was living in a men's hostel in Vienna.
02:22He would ramble on about the Jews and different things.
02:25All of a sudden, he goes from being this loudmouth fool to a prophet.
02:34But how does he convince an entire nation to follow him on his murderous crusade?
02:40The story begins with the dark secret Hitler tried to bury.
02:47In 2012, a top secret government document comes to light.
02:54Previously unknown to historians, the report reveals British intelligence had shocking evidence
03:00of Hitler's unstable mental state.
03:06The wartime analysis of a speech Hitler delivers in April 1942 provides a glimpse into the mind of a monster.
03:14The report was an attempt to study Hitler's speech for the clues it might offer,
03:20both about his personality and about changes in the direction of policy in Germany.
03:27The psychological profile reveals signs of growing paranoia
03:32and suggests Hitler is caught up in a web of religious delusions.
03:37It concludes that Hitler is suffering from a messiah complex.
03:45Just weeks after the report is published,
03:48Hitler plays God when he sets in motion his final solution,
03:53the systematic extermination of the Jewish people.
03:58It's the sickening conclusion to a series of psychotic episodes,
04:03epiphanies that inspire Hitler to carry out increasingly depraved acts of biblical proportions.
04:12When he's just 17 years old,
04:14Hitler, already disillusioned with his Catholic upbringing,
04:18first suspects that he is guided by a higher power.
04:24It was a famous incident.
04:26According to his best friend, Auguste Kuvusek,
04:28he and Kuvusek went to a Wagner opera,
04:31where this figure, Rienzi,
04:33during the Middle Ages, rises up in Italy.
04:35He's a man of the people,
04:36and he's going to save Italy and bring back the glory of Rome.
04:40But he's kind of a messianic figure.
04:41There's a section in the opera where the people are yelling,
04:43high old tribune, folk tribune, high old folk tribune.
04:47Watching the performance, Hitler enters a trance-like state.
04:51This friend recalls afterwards that Hitler was just in a rapture after seeing this
04:57and was talking about how this was his destiny.
05:02And so he sees this play enacting this role of a figure who is enthusiastically embraced by his people
05:12and sees that as his destiny.
05:21The experience convinces young Hitler that he's sent by God as a prophet to guide the Germans to greatness.
05:28He believed that God had a special role for him.
05:31It's called Hitler, it's better, we can't fight!
05:39In 1914, a 25-year-old Hitler enlists into the German army.
05:45The Great War is a cause worthy of his calling,
05:48and on the Western Front, he receives a first-class Iron Cross.
05:53Once again, Germany's would-be messiah sees a greater power at work.
05:59He's a runner, one of the most dangerous positions in the war, and he survives.
06:03He's convinced, he tells stories that bombs are blowing up near him,
06:07killing everyone and not him.
06:09He just felt he had some sort of providential care.
06:13God was protecting him for something great.
06:18Hitler's military career is cut short in October 1918,
06:22when his unit suffers a gas attack, leaving him temporarily blind.
06:27The injured men from his unit are taken to a nearby field hospital.
06:31But the doctors refuse to treat Hitler.
06:35They believe his blindness is psychological,
06:38brought on by an inability to process the horrors of war.
06:44Hitler is diagnosed with war neurosis,
06:48and sent to recuperate in a psychiatric hospital 600 miles north,
06:52in the German town of Paysvalk.
06:55The First World War was shadowed by the phenomenon of so-called shell shock,
07:00in which many men on the Western Front suffered mysterious ailments and symptoms
07:07that couldn't be clearly explained as medical problems.
07:10It might be problems in hearing,
07:12it might be tremors,
07:14tics,
07:15extreme anxiety,
07:17nightmares,
07:18flashbacks,
07:19in Hitler's case,
07:20temporary blindness,
07:21that led in turn to a lot of speculation about what did that do to him psychologically.
07:31Humiliated by his mental condition,
07:33while lying in his hospital bed,
07:37Hitler experiences another epiphany.
07:40Hitler has this,
07:42these visions,
07:44this,
07:44this experience,
07:45where he's hit absolute rock bottom,
07:50but in hitting rock bottom,
07:52has received this,
07:54uh,
07:55affirmation of his destiny.
08:00Writing seven years later in Mein Kampf,
08:03Hitler recalls,
08:04as I lay there,
08:05it came over me that I would liberate the German people,
08:08and make Germany great.
08:11His psychiatrist,
08:13Dr. Edmund Forster,
08:15diagnoses his visions differently.
08:17After examining Hitler,
08:19he concludes the would-be messiah,
08:21is a psychopath,
08:22with hysterical symptoms.
08:25And yet,
08:26within just 15 years,
08:28this man will be a head of state,
08:30on the brink of world domination.
08:39While Hitler recuperates at Peiswolk,
08:43the unthinkable happens.
08:47Germany surrenders.
08:50The war in Europe is lost.
08:56Germany is left torn apart,
08:58and humiliated by defeat.
09:02After the First World War,
09:03Germany was,
09:04I suppose,
09:05regarded as the moral beast of Europe.
09:08And it was the lowest of the low.
09:10To be a German is to be nothing.
09:12The sense of German humility,
09:14after the war,
09:15the degradation of the German people,
09:16the horrors at seeing their war lost,
09:19their country divided,
09:20occupied by the foreign powers,
09:21was too much for many people to bear.
09:26Hitler resolves to enter politics.
09:30Inspired by his visions,
09:31he sets out to start a revolution,
09:33and make Germany great again.
09:36God has a mission for him,
09:38that he is to help resurrect Germany,
09:41after this horrible lost war.
09:44But if his destiny is to become Germany's savior,
09:47he cannot do it alone.
09:49He needs disciples,
09:50and a chance meeting with a group of deluded occultists
09:54will help Hitler set in motion
09:56his deranged vision of a thousand-year Reich.
10:08November, 1918.
10:11The First World War is over.
10:15Defeat has hit Germany hard.
10:18And he couldn't understand that loss.
10:20I mean, throughout the war,
10:20there was a steady dose of German propaganda saying,
10:23we're winning, we're winning,
10:24and suddenly we lost.
10:26There are food shortages and civil unrest.
10:30Society is on the brink of collapse.
10:33They come out of this war,
10:34they're suddenly unemployed.
10:36Workers were fighting in the bourgeoisie,
10:38there were riots,
10:38there were communist uprisings,
10:40the Germans were turned against themselves.
10:42The post-war chaos is the perfect breeding ground
10:45for extremists and conspiracy theorists
10:48looking for scapegoats.
10:51In Munich,
10:52one such group emerges.
10:55The Tula Society
10:57is a secretive group of occultists.
11:00They are named after a lost continent
11:02they believe was home
11:04to a prehistoric master race
11:06from whom all Germans are descended.
11:08There was a northern Atlantis
11:10where this brilliant culture
11:11of Aryan supermen lived.
11:13They had psychic abilities,
11:15telekinesis,
11:16and all kinds of wondrous things.
11:19Purportedly,
11:20there's a huge earthquake.
11:21The Tula sinks below the sea.
11:23The Aryan godmen
11:25descend upon Europe.
11:27And wherever they go,
11:28they created these wondrous cultures.
11:31According to the Tula Society,
11:33the Aryan master race
11:35is behind all of history's great civilizations,
11:38including the Greeks,
11:40Romans,
11:41and Egyptians.
11:45It's absolutely la-la land,
11:47but that doesn't matter.
11:49It's creating a past
11:52to give your present a focus.
11:55The fact that it's just nonsense
11:58and no more based on reality
12:00than, say, you know,
12:01King Arthur and the Round Table
12:02is neither here nor there.
12:04As well as dabbling in the occult,
12:07the Tula Society
12:08is also deeply anti-Semitic.
12:11The idea was,
12:12since they were from the far north,
12:14they had blonde hair,
12:15blue eyes, light skin.
12:16As they descend further and further south,
12:19closer and closer to the equator,
12:20where the sun is closer to the earth,
12:21they not only start to get darker,
12:23but they start to intermingle sexually
12:25with these darker so-called subhumans.
12:30Basically, through this biological intermixing
12:33with lesser people,
12:34they start to lose their psychic abilities.
12:37The Tula Society holds the Jews responsible
12:41for the so-called dilution
12:43of the Aryan master race
12:44and the downfall of history's great civilizations.
12:49And they claim it's happening once again,
12:52this time in Germany.
12:55When the war ended so abruptly
12:57and so poorly for Germany,
13:00many Germans thought,
13:01we must have been stabbed in the back.
13:03Someone has to be behind this.
13:05They start to think
13:07that there's something greater happening here.
13:09That, yes, other great civilizations
13:11have been destroyed by Jews,
13:13but now this was the final attempt
13:15to take over the planet.
13:17And so by creating this scapegoat,
13:19it creates a very simple scenario,
13:21get rid of them,
13:22save the world.
13:25By 1918,
13:27the Tula Society boasts
13:29almost 2,000 members,
13:31all powerful men
13:32from wealthy backgrounds.
13:34Among them are several individuals
13:36who would later become
13:38Hitler's henchmen.
13:41Rudolf Hess,
13:45Heinrich Himmler,
13:48and Hermann Göring.
13:53But it's the lesser-known Dietrich Eckhart
13:56who transforms them
13:57from a harmless debating society
13:59into a force for evil.
14:01Dietrich Eckhart was a very strange man
14:04who was very involved in occultism,
14:06in esotericism.
14:07He was a poet.
14:08He was a playwright.
14:10He was a drug addict as well.
14:12The deeply disturbed Eckhart
14:14believes the stage is set
14:15for the coming of a German messiah,
14:18a man who will redeem Germany
14:20and vanquish the Jews once and for all.
14:23He's convinced that a coming figure,
14:26a Fuhrer, is imminent.
14:28He said it,
14:28and this was a war of Christ versus Antichrist,
14:31Arian versus Jew,
14:33good versus evil,
14:34and that we are at this huge
14:35turning point
14:36to save the world.
14:39Under Eckhart's influence,
14:41the Tula Society takes action.
14:43They create their own paramilitary group.
14:46They buy a newspaper
14:47and dedicate it to printing
14:49anti-Semitic propaganda.
14:51And they create their own political party,
14:54the German Workers' Party.
14:58But they are still missing
15:00their chosen one.
15:02Then in September 1919,
15:05when a loud-mouthed Viennese drifter
15:07joins the Tula Society,
15:10Eckhart finds his German messiah,
15:12and Adolf Hitler finds his disciples.
15:15For Hitler, it is the affirmation
15:17of everything he has ever believed.
15:20And Eckhart feeds this delusion.
15:23He helped tell Hitler how to talk,
15:25how to move,
15:26how to address people.
15:28Hitler had been kind of anti-social
15:30for most of his life,
15:31and Eckhart brought him out of that,
15:33brought him out of that shell
15:34and made him more accessible
15:35to the people.
15:35He introduced Hitler
15:37to all the right people,
15:38all the people who could promote him,
15:40who could support him
15:41and his political goals.
15:43Under Eckhart's patronage,
15:45Hitler finds his talent.
15:47When he talks, people listen.
15:53At last, Hitler is fulfilling his destiny.
15:56He was absolutely convinced
15:58that his mission is being the drummer
16:00and the prophet,
16:02the person who raises race consciousness
16:04through speeches and propaganda.
16:06By 1920, the party has acquired a new name,
16:10the National Socialist Party,
16:13or Nazis.
16:15But they remain true to their occult roots.
16:18The swastika and SS lightning bolts
16:20are both ancient Aryan symbols.
16:23Eckhart and his cronies
16:25may have been a fringe group of extremists,
16:27but it's clear there's something special
16:30about Hitler.
16:32Now an accomplished orator,
16:34he's become the Nazis' star attraction.
16:37A number of Hitler's close acolytes
16:40describe the moment
16:41of first hearing Hitler speak
16:42as a moment of transcendent change for them,
16:47that they somehow are hooked
16:48by his voice, by his body,
16:51by his passion.
16:54And as more and more people
16:55flock to his speeches,
16:56they're handing out pictures,
16:58people want autographs,
16:59and they start to call him
17:00things like Führer.
17:02Mein Kuhl!
17:06Hitler decides to seize the moment.
17:10He decides, well, we'll march.
17:12Because it worked for Mussolini,
17:14he just marched on Rome,
17:16and he took over.
17:18Hitler leads 2,000 Nazi members
17:20in a march through downtown Munich
17:22to seize power from the government.
17:27But the protest quickly turns violent,
17:30and the police open fire.
17:3314 Nazis are gunned down.
17:36It's a major political setback,
17:39but Hitler is more convinced
17:41than ever of his destiny.
17:43When a man linking arms with him
17:45is shot dead,
17:46it is another clear sign
17:48of divine providence.
17:50Hitler, in his developing
17:52messianic self-perception,
17:54took near-death experiences
17:55that he had as absolute evidence
17:58that God or the creator of providence
18:00was in fact protecting him
18:02for his mission.
18:05One thing his God
18:07cannot protect him from
18:08is the German law courts.
18:10He faces the death penalty
18:13for treason.
18:15It could have ended at that point.
18:17But he turns his trial
18:19into a showpiece.
18:20He closes by saying,
18:22I'm not a traitor.
18:22I did this for my people,
18:24my country,
18:24not against that.
18:26It makes him a huge celebrity.
18:28All of a sudden,
18:29people are saying,
18:30he's the great man.
18:31He's what we're waiting for.
18:34Incredibly,
18:35Hitler gets off
18:36with a five-year prison sentence,
18:38but he will be released
18:39within a year.
18:41During that year,
18:43he undergoes
18:44another major transformation.
18:47And when he leaves,
18:48it is with a blueprint
18:50for world domination.
19:02April, 1924.
19:04Nazi party leader Adolf Hitler
19:07is in prison
19:08after his failed attempt
19:09to overthrow the Munich government.
19:12Believing he has been saved
19:13from the death penalty
19:14by the hand of providence,
19:16Hitler refocuses his energy
19:18towards fulfilling his destiny
19:20as Germany's savior.
19:23This delusion is reinforced
19:25by his cellmate Rudolf Hess,
19:28a man so devoted to Hitler
19:30that he actually volunteers
19:32to accompany him to prison.
19:36Hess was a person
19:38who believed that Hitler
19:39was really a kind
19:40of messianic figure.
19:44That Hitler's character itself
19:47was strong and powerful enough
19:48to save Germany on his own.
19:50With Hess's encouragement,
19:52Hitler pens his manifesto,
19:55Mein Kampf.
19:56It is a masterpiece
19:57into brevity.
19:58Germany will be
20:00the world power
20:02for nothing.
20:04But as his words
20:06make it to paper,
20:07Hitler's true calling
20:09becomes clear.
20:10Almighty God,
20:12bless our battles.
20:14He suddenly realized
20:16that actually
20:16he's not just the messenger,
20:18he is the fuhrer,
20:20the guide,
20:21the leader
20:22of the German people,
20:23and that is his destiny.
20:26And this is
20:27an incredibly important moment
20:29where there is this fusion
20:31of ideology,
20:34politics,
20:35and the means
20:36of getting that
20:38to the German people.
20:40When Hitler left
20:41Landsberg prison,
20:42he was a changed man.
20:44The light of Providence
20:45had shone down on him.
20:46He tried to overthrow
20:48the government
20:48and walked away
20:49with only a slap
20:50on the wrist.
20:50And now he got the bit
20:52between his teeth
20:52and was ready to go out
20:54and do some real damage.
20:56Hitler formulates
20:57a dark new religion
20:59with himself
21:00as the figurehead.
21:02But if he is deluded,
21:04he will soon learn
21:05that there are millions
21:06ready to believe
21:07the delusion.
21:10Germany is heading
21:11for a religious war
21:12of devastating proportions.
21:18Upon his release
21:19from prison,
21:20Hitler returns
21:21to the Nazi party
21:22with a renewed
21:23fervor and purpose.
21:26But the country's
21:27newfound prosperity
21:28works against it.
21:32Stability has returned
21:34to Germany
21:34and Hitler's message
21:36of impending apocalypse
21:37seems too radical.
21:41After kind of hyperinflation
21:43in the mid-1920s,
21:44Germany settled down
21:45quite well
21:45and it was developing
21:46rather well
21:47as a democratic state.
21:49The aim was
21:50that it would rebuild
21:51its strength
21:52through industry,
21:54through manufacturing,
21:55and it was doing so
21:56with American help.
21:58All was going
21:59swimmingly well
22:00until the Wall Street
22:01crash of 1929.
22:04Suddenly those loans
22:06dried up.
22:07That democratic economic
22:09growth started to crumble
22:11and in its place
22:12and in its place
22:13came an alternative
22:13which was one
22:14of nationalism
22:16fueled by military conquest.
22:20And the person
22:21who was advocating
22:22that more than anyone else
22:23was Adolf Hitler
22:24and his Nazi party.
22:26The stock market crash
22:28is a gift from the heavens
22:29and Hitler is ready
22:31with a completely new style
22:32of political campaign.
22:35He was a brilliant manipulator
22:37of modern-style elections.
22:40He used airplanes
22:41to give three,
22:42four speeches
22:42in a single day
22:43in three, four different cities.
22:45He used radio,
22:46all kinds of modern technology,
22:48and understood
22:49the psychology
22:49of the masses
22:50and how to speak to them.
22:53And so they would have
22:55very simple messages
22:56in the propaganda,
22:57simple messages repeated
22:58again and again and again
22:59and done in such a way
23:01that people would come
23:02to believe it
23:03and see it as something
23:04good and powerful.
23:07Hitler offers
23:08the long-suffering Germans
23:10salvation from their
23:11greatest enemies.
23:12You either vote for Nazis
23:13and we will save you
23:15or the Jewish-Bolshevik menace
23:16will take over
23:17and destroy you.
23:20Either we walk over
23:21their corpses
23:22or they walk over ours.
23:28Nazi membership soars.
23:31They go from being
23:33a fringe party
23:34with just 3% of the vote
23:35to the largest single party
23:37with 37%.
23:40And in January 1933,
23:43Hitler becomes chancelline.
23:48But his dark past
23:50threatens to derail his career
23:52when a rival politician
23:54tries to investigate
23:55Hitler's mental history.
23:58The new chancellor
23:59has them arrested
24:01and executed.
24:06Hitler's medical files
24:07mysteriously disappear.
24:09And Dr. Edmund Forster,
24:12the psychiatrist
24:12who diagnosed him
24:13as a hysterical psychopath,
24:15is found dead
24:17by his own hand
24:18with a gun his wife claims
24:20he never owned.
24:23By 1934,
24:25Hitler outlaws
24:26all rival political parties,
24:28a move that gives him
24:29absolute power.
24:31The Nazi Führer
24:33has become a dictator.
24:36Hitler immediately plans
24:38a cultural and spiritual
24:39rebirth in Germany.
24:41He wants to emulate
24:42the great civilizations
24:43of the past.
24:50Hitler's chief of police,
24:52Heinrich Himmler,
24:53is particularly passionate
24:54about this subject.
24:55Here was a man
24:56who was obsessed
24:57with esotericism
24:58and occultism,
24:59as well as with archaeology
25:00and anthropology.
25:01The 17th century
25:03Wevelsberg castle
25:04is a pseudo-religious
25:05sanctum for the SS,
25:07where they partake
25:08in bizarre rituals.
25:11Wevelsberg was selected
25:12by Himmler
25:13to be the site
25:14of a kind of SS shrine,
25:17a kind of Vatican
25:18of the SS.
25:20It's Himmler's camelot.
25:22He even builds
25:23the Supreme Leader's Hall,
25:25a chamber intended
25:26to be his version
25:27of King Arthur's round table,
25:29with the 12 most senior members
25:31of the SS
25:31as his knights.
25:34There was going to be
25:35a large table in the middle
25:37and 12 chairs around it,
25:39and these 12 SS leaders
25:40would meditate there
25:41and create a kind
25:42of spiritual connection
25:43from Wevelsberg
25:44to their ancestral origins.
25:47There is a diagram
25:48on the floor of Wevelsberg,
25:50which is a Nazi black sun
25:52solar figure,
25:53which was considered
25:54to be the absolute center
25:55of the earth,
25:56and all things good
25:57and Nazi would proceed
25:58from there.
25:59Himmler also establishes
26:01an organization devoted
26:02purely to studying
26:03and perpetuating
26:04the myth
26:05of the Aryan master race.
26:07He organized
26:08an organization
26:10called the Ananerba,
26:11the Ancestral Heritage
26:12Research Division
26:13of the SS,
26:14which was kind of
26:15a boondoggle
26:16for all sorts of
26:17crank anthropologists,
26:19scientists,
26:19people who would
26:20promote an Aryan idea
26:23of what religion really was,
26:25and they sent archaeologists
26:26to every corner
26:26of the world
26:27to find evidence
26:28that the Aryan race
26:29had at one point
26:30ruled the entire world.
26:32Himmler assembles
26:33a team of crackpots
26:35as experts
26:35to help and advise him.
26:38He had a man
26:39called Willigut,
26:39who had once been
26:40a patient in an insane asylum,
26:42who claimed that
26:43he remembered
26:44all of his incarnations
26:45and all of his past lives
26:46going back
26:47more than 10,000 years.
26:49And Himmler considered him
26:50to be a good source
26:51of information
26:51as to how German people
26:53lived 10,000 years ago,
26:54long before there was
26:55Christianity or Judaism
26:56to quote-unquote
26:58infect them.
26:59Many leading archaeologists
27:00join the Ananerba
27:02as Himmler offers them
27:04the opportunity
27:04to search for evidence
27:05of the Aryan master race
27:07from Egypt
27:08to Antarctica
27:09and Tibet.
27:11So anything that had
27:12a swastika on it
27:13was considered evidence
27:14that the Aryan race
27:15had been there.
27:16Stonehenge was considered
27:17an Aryan creation.
27:19The pyramids at Giza
27:20in Egypt
27:21were considered
27:21Aryan creations.
27:23Relic hunters
27:24are dispatched
27:25to collect ancient artifacts
27:26and bring them back
27:27to Germany.
27:32The Nazi messiah
27:34looks to ancient Egypt
27:36as an inspiration
27:37for the Third Reich.
27:39And he will be
27:40Germany's pharaoh.
27:43One Egyptian king
27:45in particular
27:45provides the template
27:47for Hitler's rule,
27:49Akhenaten.
27:50For thousands of years,
27:53Egyptians worship
27:54a pantheon of gods.
27:55But when Akhenaten
27:57comes to power
27:58in 1353 B.C.,
28:00he sets in motion
28:01a religious revolution
28:02that transforms Egypt
28:04from top to bottom.
28:07He was the pharaoh
28:08who had introduced
28:09the concept
28:09of monotheism
28:11into the Egyptian religion
28:12to such an extent
28:14that he had
28:15other temples eradicated.
28:17He had them erased.
28:18He had the gods
28:19taken down,
28:20the statues removed,
28:21because he believed
28:22there was only one god.
28:23It was a solar deity.
28:26Akhenaten enforces
28:28the worship of one god,
28:30the sun, or Atan,
28:31above all others.
28:36As pharaoh,
28:37Akhenaten is God's
28:39sole representative
28:40on earth.
28:41Hitler would have seen
28:42a similarity
28:43in this idea.
28:44A religious leader
28:44who was also
28:45the political leader
28:46who was demanding
28:47a complete change
28:48of ideology
28:49among his people,
28:50demanding complete loyalty
28:52to one idea,
28:53one ideology,
28:54one creed.
28:55If you are
28:56a sort of godlike figure,
28:57then why do you need
28:58another religion?
29:00It becomes
29:01completely redundant.
29:02So in Hitler's mind,
29:04Christianity is redundant.
29:06Islam is redundant.
29:08Judaism is despicable.
29:09All religion is just
29:11utterly pointless.
29:12There is only one religion,
29:13and that is the Nazi state
29:15of which he is the head.
29:20Hitler's connection
29:21with Akhenaten deepens
29:23when he comes face to face
29:25with the pharaoh's wife,
29:27Nefertiti.
29:29This 3,000-year-old bust
29:31of Queen Nefertiti
29:32was unearthed in 1912
29:34by a German archaeologist
29:35and brought back
29:37to Berlin.
29:38After being unveiled,
29:40Nefertiti instantly
29:41becomes known
29:42as the most beautiful woman
29:44in the world.
29:46So all around the world,
29:48everybody knew
29:48there is a star
29:49and the star is Nefertiti.
29:51We have to come to Berlin
29:52to see her.
29:53And everybody who saw her
29:54wrote the poems about her,
29:56wrote long letters
29:56about her and so on.
29:58So she started
29:59this new wave
29:59of Egyptomania.
30:01The Egyptian authorities
30:03lobby for their queen's return.
30:07Senior Nazi Hermann Göring
30:09sees an opportunity
30:10to forge an alliance
30:11with the Egyptians
30:12and agrees to return the bust
30:15as a political gesture.
30:18But when Hitler
30:19hears of the plan,
30:20he flies into a rage.
30:22He declares,
30:23I will never relinquish
30:25the head of the queen.
30:26He liked the image
30:28of Nefertiti
30:29because for him
30:29this was the portrayal
30:30of the ideal
30:31German housewife.
30:32She was a strong woman,
30:35a woman who was a leader,
30:36a woman who was revolutionary
30:38right next to her husband.
30:40Some believe
30:41there are even more
30:43intimate reasons
30:44why Hitler is drawn
30:45to the great queen.
30:47There is good evidence
30:48that like Akhenaten,
30:50Hitler had what we now
30:53refer to as erectile dysfunction.
30:55He found in Nefertiti,
30:58as Akhenaten did,
30:59this perfect beauty,
31:01this ideal mate
31:02that he could mate with.
31:06Beside his attraction
31:07to the ancient pharaoh's wife,
31:09Hitler adopts Akhenaten's son motif.
31:13But while Akhenaten believed
31:15his power was derived
31:17from the sun,
31:18Hitler knows the source
31:20of his power
31:21is the German people.
31:22And he will do whatever it takes
31:25to keep them on side.
31:33Germany, 1937.
31:35Hitler is now both head of state
31:37and a Nazi god.
31:40And his propaganda machine
31:41has Germans believing
31:43he's performing miracles.
31:45Suddenly they're making themselves
31:47militarily strong again.
31:48They're defying the strict terms
31:51of the Versailles Treaty.
31:52They're winning back
31:53all those German-speaking lands.
31:55You know, people are standing
31:56a little bit straighter
31:57in the street.
32:00Hitler brings order
32:01out of chaos.
32:02They saw Hitler
32:04as much more than simply
32:05a political figure.
32:06He was also a religious leader.
32:09As the Nazi messiah
32:10becomes more powerful,
32:12his ambitions become
32:13more grandiose
32:14and absurd.
32:16I think the more
32:17megalomanic you are,
32:18the less in touch
32:19with reality you are.
32:21Just like his alter ego,
32:23Pharaoh Akhenaten,
32:25Hitler plans to erase
32:26everything that has gone before
32:28and create a new world order,
32:31including a brand new capital city.
32:38Hitler orders his master architect,
32:40Albert Speer,
32:41to transform Berlin
32:43into Germania.
32:45Germania will be a super city
32:47fit for the Thousand-Year Reich,
32:49where the Nazi messiah
32:51will reign.
32:53Speer borrows architectural elements
32:55from Akhenaten's
32:56ancient city of Amarna.
32:58The open space is the usage of light,
33:01including the nature,
33:02to be an integral part
33:04of your city.
33:05This is what both Speer
33:06and ancient Egyptian architects
33:07did design,
33:09so it couldn't be hard
33:11to say that Germania
33:12was Hitler's Amarna.
33:15Though Germania
33:17was never completed,
33:18this model shows
33:19exactly what was planned.
33:21The scale of the works
33:23is awesome and terrifying.
33:29Dominating this new urban center
33:31is the Volkshall,
33:33a 180,000-capacity hall
33:36where Hitler can address
33:37the citizens of Germania.
33:42The dome of the Volkshall
33:44is to rise from a massive
33:45granite podium
33:46to a total height
33:48of 950 feet,
33:50more than twice the height
33:52of the Great Pyramid.
33:55It will be so enormous
33:57that the breath and perspiration
33:59from the people inside
34:00would generate
34:02its own weather system.
34:07And Hitler rose out
34:08of all of that.
34:09In the rear part of the hall,
34:11there was a large niche
34:12inlaid with gold mosaic.
34:14It would have presented Hitler
34:16like a holy figure
34:17on an altar.
34:21Hitler not only emulates
34:23the ancient building forms,
34:24but their labor force, too.
34:28During the 1930s,
34:30it's believed the pharaoh Khufu
34:32built the Great Pyramid
34:34using slaves.
34:36The concentration camp prisoners
34:40were the workers
34:41who, without any rights,
34:42were used as slaves.
34:45The use of slave labor
34:47was not just for functional reasons,
34:50but was also closely linked
34:51to the Nazi ideology,
34:53the idea that large civilizations
34:56could only be created
34:57through the use of slaves.
35:04The jewel in the crown of Germania
35:06will be the museum of art.
35:08And at the center of the museum,
35:11Queen Nefertiti.
35:12And right next to her,
35:14Hitler himself.
35:16Yeah, I mean,
35:17I'd go so far as to say
35:18Nefertiti is the concrete embodiment
35:23of his identification with Akhnat.
35:25She was his wife and co-ruler,
35:27and now he had her statue.
35:29So I think that, you know,
35:31if anything,
35:32Nefertiti is a symbol
35:33of the sort of marriage
35:36across thousands of millennia
35:38to millennial megalomaniacs.
35:42Despite Hitler's messianic status,
35:45the Nazis have no religious buildings
35:47or official places of worship.
35:50What they do have
35:51are the Nuremberg rallies,
35:54orchestrated by Hitler's disciple
35:56Joseph Goebbels.
35:57These annual gatherings
35:59allow Hitler to appear in person
36:01before his followers.
36:04These rallies held in every September.
36:07This was the heart
36:08of the Nazi propaganda machine.
36:12The parade grounds cover
36:14a six-square-mile site
36:15and can hold tens of thousands of people.
36:19As minister of propaganda,
36:21Goebbels carefully stage manages
36:23every detail.
36:25There are lights, music, costumes,
36:29choreographed processions,
36:30and at the center of it all,
36:32the pharaoh, Hitler.
36:34When Hitler came here,
36:37he knew he could project this image,
36:40the image of the Fuhrer,
36:44the leader,
36:45the one individual
36:46rising above the masses,
36:48this messianic figure
36:50sent to lead the Germans
36:52into the Third Reich.
36:55And when Hitler enters,
36:58it is to the very music
36:59that first moved him
37:01to begin his messianic mission.
37:05The masses that had gathered here
37:07either side of the Fuhrer's road
37:10watched as he solemnly
37:12walked down here
37:14towards the Hall of Honor,
37:17flanked by the leader of the SS
37:21and the leader of the SA.
37:23They were slightly behind Adolf Hitler.
37:27He was presented, I suppose,
37:28as the high priest of his movement,
37:30flanked by two altarservers.
37:35This was one of Hitler's favorite buildings.
37:40All Nazi buildings
37:41are basically symmetrical.
37:43Symmetry for the Nazis
37:44represented power,
37:47order, discipline.
37:51On the top of the stone columns,
37:54they would have had flames.
37:56The Nazis quite liked flames,
37:58the eternal flame.
37:59This was quite something
38:01you often saw
38:02during their ceremonies.
38:04And also,
38:05there's this cold, hard stone
38:09representing the toughness
38:11of the Nazi movement.
38:13And I say there's power and order.
38:20The largest surviving building
38:23from the Nazi regime
38:24is the Congress Hall.
38:26Modeled on Rome's Colosseum,
38:28it was designed to hold
38:2950,000 of the Nazi faithful.
38:33Imagine the scene then here
38:36had the building been completed.
38:38One individual standing on a pulpit,
38:4250,000 people filling the Congress Hall.
38:47The only source of light
38:50beaming down on the one individual.
38:53When I imagine this ceremony,
38:56I think always of one of the Nazi phrases,
38:59the phrase is,
39:00Führer, mein Führer, von Gott mir gegeben.
39:03Lieder, mein Lieder,
39:05given to me by God.
39:06This is a person
39:08who has been appointed
39:10by a heavenly power.
39:15The theater, the spectacle,
39:17are topped with Hitler's
39:19spellbinding skill
39:20as an orator.
39:21It just seems crazy,
39:24but there is no question
39:26that he did have this power over people.
39:29I mean, for goodness sake,
39:31the Beatles were able to do it
39:32in the 1960s.
39:33You see all these sort of
39:34young teenage girls
39:35sort of weeping and fainting
39:36in front of them.
39:37It's the same sort of thing
39:39with Hitler, bizarrely.
39:41I mean, journalists who would go,
39:44some of them described
39:45these party rallies
39:46as like tent revivals,
39:48evangelical tent revivals
39:50with people just glassed over eyes
39:53and trembling,
39:54people crying,
39:54people with these smiles
39:57on their face
39:58that were almost otherworldly.
40:00One young Catholic Nazi
40:02recalls how his old faith
40:04is washed away
40:05by the new Messiah.
40:07In religion, I'm a Catholic.
40:10Then I heard the Fuhrer.
40:11What occurred inside of me,
40:13I cannot describe.
40:15Then I knew the man
40:17and his movement
40:19and nothing else.
40:21People would join the movement
40:22and suddenly they're transformed.
40:24They were hopeless,
40:26now they have hope.
40:27They were living a meaningless life,
40:28now they live in a life
40:29of meaning and purpose.
40:31All because of this man
40:33who brought light into their life,
40:35Adolf Hitler.
40:36The Nazis have created a cult.
40:39Any doubters leave the rallies
40:41fully converted
40:42and committed to the cause.
40:47The rallies abruptly end in 1939
40:50when Hitler invades Poland
40:53and ignites the Second World War.
41:00To ensure his mission cannot fail,
41:03the one-time Viennese drifter
41:05appoints himself commander-in-chief
41:07of the German army.
41:09As imaginative as we can be,
41:12it's kind of hard to sort of identify
41:15with this level of megalomania.
41:18But even when defeat looms,
41:21another epiphany will spur Hitler on
41:23to continue a war he cannot win.
41:32By 1942,
41:35Germany has been at war for three years.
41:38Cracks are starting to show
41:40in both Germany's war effort
41:42and Adolf Hitler himself.
41:44British intelligence
41:46is tracking his descent into madness.
41:49They scrutinize Hitler's broadcasts
41:51for subconscious clues
41:52to his next move
41:54and conclude
41:55that he is close to giving up.
41:58There can be no doubt
41:59that this is a speech of a man
42:01who is seriously contemplating
42:03the possibility of utter defeat.
42:05The tendency to abandon
42:08an endeavor that seems fruitless
42:10and the paranoic delusion of divinity
42:12are combined in this dying god myth.
42:17Brutal winter weather,
42:19huge loss of life,
42:21and a drastic lack of supplies
42:22are taking their toll
42:24on the German forces.
42:26In a fury,
42:28Hitler orders more soldiers into battle
42:30and more Jews into concentration camps.
42:33His army commanders
42:35witnessed the psychological unraveling
42:37British intelligence predicted.
42:40something had to be done.
42:44It's clear to them
42:45that he's crazy.
42:47Now, he was always crazy,
42:48but, you know,
42:49he was our crazy guy
42:51and he was our successful crazy guy.
42:53And then,
42:53when he started to fail
42:54and was unable to readjust his course
42:59because he was so committed to it,
43:01that's the point at which
43:02they tried to get to him.
43:06On July 20th, 1944,
43:10a plot is launched
43:11to stop Germany's mad pharaoh
43:14once and for all.
43:20Senior officer Colonel von Stauffenberg
43:23joins a briefing in the wolf's lair.
43:25He places a briefcase
43:27containing explosives on the floor
43:29and then leaves.
43:32At 12.42 p.m.,
43:34the bomb detonates.
43:37A stenographer and three officers
43:39are killed instantly.
43:41Miraculously,
43:42Hitler survives
43:43with only minor injuries.
43:46It should have finished Hitler.
43:48Instead,
43:48it convinces him
43:50that he will still prevail.
43:52The fact that I survived
43:53is clear evidence once again
43:55that Providence,
43:57the creator,
43:58is protecting me
43:59from my holy mission.
44:00This is 1944.
44:02The Germans have been losing this war
44:03for at least two years.
44:05And it's coming towards the end
44:07and he's still convinced
44:08that that's why I survived.
44:11God is protecting me.
44:14Reinvigorated,
44:14the Nazi messiah
44:16gives Mussolini a tour
44:17of the bomb site
44:18that same afternoon.
44:22He publicly thanks fate
44:24for allowing him
44:25to continue his work
44:26and declares,
44:27I am now more than ever convinced
44:29that the great cause
44:31which I serve
44:32will survive
44:33its present perils
44:34and that everything
44:35can be brought
44:36to a good end.
44:41By the end of the summer,
44:43the Allies are sweeping
44:44towards Berlin from the west
44:45while Russia closes in
44:47from the east.
44:49Allied bombing campaigns
44:51destroy German cities.
44:53Defeat looks imminent.
44:56Still, Hitler refuses
44:57to accept the end is near.
45:00So he might be losing
45:01millions of soldiers,
45:03cities are being bombed,
45:04everything is going to hell.
45:06But as long as he's still there,
45:08God will do something.
45:10Under any normal rules
45:12of warfare,
45:13you would expect Germany
45:14to have surrendered.
45:16But they don't.
45:17They just keep on fighting.
45:20Hitler orders
45:22a lunatic counteroffensive
45:23in the Ardennes.
45:25His generals
45:26try to reason with him.
45:27It's a doomed mission.
45:28They just don't
45:29have the resources.
45:31But Hitler overrules,
45:33convinced his leadership alone
45:35can deliver victory.
45:38Inevitably,
45:39the Ardennes offensive
45:40runs out of steam
45:41within just a few weeks.
45:44Hitler finally realizes
45:46it's over.
45:47He can't hold
45:48the Jews responsible,
45:50so he places the blame
45:52squarely with the German people.
45:56Yeah, he felt betrayed
45:57by the German people,
45:59and he had failed
45:59because they weren't
46:01sufficiently committed.
46:03Just as the British
46:05Intelligent Report predicts,
46:07Hitler abandons his mission
46:09and gives up completely.
46:12On April 30th, 1945,
46:15the Nazi messiah
46:17kills himself.
46:19It's as if a spell
46:21is broken
46:21and the cult
46:23is destroyed.
46:25Within weeks,
46:26the horrors
46:27of the Nazi regime
46:28are revealed
46:29to the world.
46:33The German nation
46:34is forced to face
46:35the fact
46:36that the man
46:36they were following
46:37was nothing more
46:39than a deranged despot.
46:41And just like Akhenaten,
46:44the heretic king
46:44of ancient Egypt,
46:46all traces
46:46of the Nazi messiah
46:48are erased.
46:53They just wipe out
46:55the memory
46:55of Akhenaten.
46:57Just wipe it out.
46:58They destroy
46:58the temples
46:59that he built.
47:00They scratch out
47:01his name
47:01wherever it was written.
47:03And the same thing
47:04with Hitler.
47:04You have this,
47:05you know,
47:06utter destruction
47:07of his legacy.
47:10Hitler was a drifter
47:11with delusions
47:12of grandeur
47:13living on the streets
47:14of Vienna.
47:15A chance encounter
47:17with a powerful group
47:18of occultists
47:19fed his psychosis
47:21and transformed him
47:23into a Nazi messiah
47:24who almost brought
47:26about the apocalypse.
47:29A lot of people
47:30walk around the streets
47:30holding a sign
47:31saying that the world
47:31is ending,
47:32follow me.
47:33You know,
47:33we just move
47:34to the other side
47:34of the street,
47:35call the police.
47:37It has to be
47:38the right time
47:38to get that message
47:39across.
47:40Hitler, you know,
47:41he could have ended up
47:42in an insane asylum,
47:43which is where he belonged.
47:45And instead,
47:46because the German people
47:47resonated so powerfully
47:49to the message
47:50of hope
47:51that he was offering them,
47:54he was able
47:55to turn Germany
47:56into an insane asylum.
47:57to the American people
47:59in the way that they
47:59and they wanted to
47:59And that's what
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