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For educational purposes
"EYE DEEP IN HELL"
On the Russian Front, there were no rules. No code of honour, decency or humanity, it was a barbaric struggle to the death. It was also the largest, and most brutal war in history.
It contained the biggest tank battles ever fought, and recorded the most casualties. Whole armies were swallowed up.
Enormous distances boggled the mind and the constantly changing seasons brought either mud and rain, heat and dust, or ice and snow, but misery was always present.
Combat on the Russian Front attempts to describe the indescribable, the experience of combat at the sharp end in this most vicious of conflicts.
"EYE DEEP IN HELL"
On the Russian Front, there were no rules. No code of honour, decency or humanity, it was a barbaric struggle to the death. It was also the largest, and most brutal war in history.
It contained the biggest tank battles ever fought, and recorded the most casualties. Whole armies were swallowed up.
Enormous distances boggled the mind and the constantly changing seasons brought either mud and rain, heat and dust, or ice and snow, but misery was always present.
Combat on the Russian Front attempts to describe the indescribable, the experience of combat at the sharp end in this most vicious of conflicts.
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LearningTranscript
00:12The human experience of the war can never be illuminated by mere statistics.
00:18The stiff military language of battalions decimated or divisions destroyed soon become meaningless.
00:26They throw no illumination on the countless individual dramas which lie beneath the bald facts and figures.
00:34Every single soldier from the Russian front has a human story to tell.
00:41These grainy figures from the newsreels are living, breathing men with hopes, dreams and aspirations as real as our own.
00:51The survivors naturally consider themselves lucky to have survived the largest and most appalling conflict in the history of humanity.
00:59Many still carry the physical and mental scars from this traumatic event.
01:05But millions more were left behind on the never-ending steps of Russia.
01:11This is also their story.
01:44However, there is no comeback to robots from and of their disgusting clash,
01:44This was theiraping agent to ask for fans and cleanup advocates for a certain part for Ășnica divisive marketplace.
01:44But people hold several steps in to as the attack or re-men being afraid of a querer-men being
01:44afraid of their health.
02:01On June the 22nd, 1941, three and a half million German troops stood in readiness for a surprise attack on
02:09Russia.
02:11Operation Barbarossa, the Great Offensive, launched on the back of a series of spectacular successes which Adolf Hitler had enjoyed
02:19as the supreme commander of the German forces.
02:24Hitler had seen his armies triumph in Poland, the Low Countries, Scandinavia, the Balkans, and France.
02:32But from the outset, the German high command were opposed to this new adventure.
02:39With his sense of self-worth and pride at the very highest level, the FĂŒhrer felt that he knew better
02:46than his generals.
02:47He was not to be dissuaded from taking the biggest gamble in a career which was marked by a series
02:53of gambles, each more risky and audacious than the one before.
02:57An attack upon Russia was absolutely central to all of his thinking.
03:02Hitler wanted to build a thousand-year Reich, a Reich that would be a global power and last for a
03:08thousand years.
03:09To do this, he needed much, much bigger Germany, much bigger population, much more resources.
03:15These resources could only be found by conquering European Russia.
03:20The whole ideological thrust of the German plan for war, which was not just a nominal war of conquest, it
03:28was intended to be a war of extermination.
03:31It was intended, first and foremost, to root out what they called the Jewish-Bolshevik gang who ran Russia.
03:38It was designed to destroy the political structure both of the Soviet Union and of the Red Army.
03:43Hitler, of course, was a gambler, and the decision to invade Russia was the biggest gamble in a career which
03:54was marked by a series of audacious gambles.
04:07During the 1930s, the German army had perfected a new form of warfare, which relied upon the close cooperation of
04:14tanks, aircraft, motorized inventory, and artillery to produce a highly mobile attack which was concentrated against a single objective.
04:24The overwhelming artillery and aerial barrage launched against a concentrated target area produced an element of shock, which could not
04:32be achieved over a wider front.
04:36The Wehrmacht was determined to avoid repeats of the slogging match of the First World War,
04:40and a great deal of stress was laid upon the ability of the new Panzer Divisions to keep moving past
04:47the point of penetration, deep into the enemy's rear area, where they were to cause panic and confusion in the
04:54supply lines.
04:56The job of mopping up the dazed survivors and dealing with any remaining points of resistance was left to the
05:03infantry divisions following behind on foot.
05:07So you penetrate deep, cutting supplies and communications, and then you curl around to encircle the enemy, and you create
05:19then a battle of encirclement.
05:21Behind the fast-moving armoured divisions are the slower-moving infantry divisions, which are four-fifths of the army, in
05:29fact,
05:29and they seal off this net that you're intending to create around the enemy forces.
05:37Now, the enemy forces are thus surrounded, and they lack supplies, communications, and above all, orders, information, instructions from their
05:46central command posts.
05:47They're cut off.
05:48They keep fighting, but in four or five days, they're running short of food, water, ammunition.
05:55Above all, they're running short of plans, information, and, in a sense, hope to keep going.
06:03And so the aim is to not so much kill very large numbers, but to so disorganise them that they
06:11become a rabble and they surrender.
06:14By the summer of 1941, the German Wehrmacht had grown accustomed to success.
06:21Their training, morale, and discipline were all of the highest order, and the lightning blitzkrieg campaigns of the early war
06:28years
06:29had given them a newfound sense of pride, which helped to wipe away the lingering taste of defeat from the
06:36Great War.
06:38This time, there will be no short, sharp, triumphant campaign.
06:43Hitler was about to lead the largest invasion force ever assembled into a total disaster on a scale never before
06:50witnessed in the history of the world.
06:54The men of the German Wehrmacht, preparing for the surprise attack on the Soviet Union, were about to experience a
07:01descent into hell,
07:03and they would drag the men of the Red Army with them.
07:17In the popular imagination, the German army of World War II has come to be viewed as an armoured juggernaut,
07:24smashing all before it.
07:27While it is true that the Wehrmacht was quickly moving towards a larger degree of mechanisation,
07:32in 1941, most of the army still marched on foot.
07:38Despite the fact that it was the German army which had developed the revolutionary concept of the panzer division,
07:43the transport for the army was still largely horse-drawn.
07:48Some 650,000 horses were required to draw the guns and carry the baggage, which this huge assemblage of men
07:56needed.
07:58For the Russian campaign of 1941, only 19 of the 145 divisions deployed for the attack were panzer divisions.
08:09The rest of the army had to make do with a horse-drawn artillery.
08:14The infantry trudged alongside on foot.
08:21Despite the reservations of the generals, when the surprise attack opened,
08:25the Wehrmacht, as usual, carried all before it.
08:45In typical fashion, Adolf Hitler had launched the attack without any declaration of war.
08:52The element of surprise was complete,
08:54and initially, the German forces cut through the ranks of shocked Soviet soldiers
08:58who could only offer limited resistance.
09:02For the men of the Wehrmacht, this was business as usual.
09:05They had come to expect any enemy forces ranged against them
09:09to collapse under the ferocity of their blitzkrieg attack.
09:13But as the Russians were to demonstrate over the coming four years,
09:17this was no ordinary encounter.
09:30The first signs that something was different in this campaign
09:33came from the fact that instead of a total collapse,
09:36the Russian resistance actually began to increase
09:39as the German forces bit deeper into Russia.
09:44One feature of the Russian soldier which frustrated the Germans
09:48was the ability of the Russians to dig in
09:50and create a defensive position with incredible speed.
09:55It soon became an established part of the German tactical doctrine
09:58that in the event of a Russian attack which captured a German position,
10:03counterattack should be mounted as quickly as possible.
10:06Otherwise, the Russian soldiers would have seized the opportunity
10:08to dig in and build a new defensive position
10:11which meant heavy casualties to recapture.
10:16When it came to attacking,
10:18the Russian forces suffered from a very limited tactical doctrine.
10:22From the very first days of the Russian war,
10:25the soldiers of the Red Army were committed in mass attacks
10:29carried out by soldiers advancing in human ways
10:32which were designed to swamp the German defenders
10:35by the sheer weight of numbers.
10:38This antiquated tactic had been found wanting even in the First World War
10:43and the German machine gunners were presented with a perfect target.
10:49These waves of Soviet troops charging the open spaces,
10:53shouting their last war cries,
10:55are about to be moaned down by German machine gun fire.
11:04When the Russians were attacked in 1941,
11:07they were taken by surprise.
11:09They were attacked by very powerful forces
11:11and, remember, by very experienced forces.
11:14The Germans had been fighting for two years.
11:17The Russians were just beginning fighting.
11:19Experience matters a very great deal.
11:21Therefore, the Russians had to improvise tactics
11:24and many of them were, in fact, very badly improvised.
11:27The Soviet forces on the defensive were superb.
11:31Despite all the things that had happened to them in the campaign,
11:34they were able to dig in
11:36and they were renowned for their capacity to defend.
11:39Where it fell apart was in offensive operations.
11:43The tactics were very rudimentary
11:45and they were more like the First War rather than the Second War.
11:48They simply advanced in these mass human waves
11:52and, of course, they paid the price.
11:54The order simply was advance.
11:56But you mean advance against crack German divisions.
12:00And many of the Red Army divisions simply broke up.
12:03And what you got were very large pockets of Red Army troops.
12:09For example, within a matter of four or five days,
12:12the Wehrmacht, the German army in the East,
12:14had managed to encircle 350,000 Red Army soldiers.
12:17350,000.
12:18That was the first of the beginning, actually,
12:21of a number of huge encirclements.
12:23And by the last week in November,
12:27Red Army strength dropped to a level
12:30which was its lowest during the war
12:32because the Germans had taken 3.1 million prisoners.
12:36These men faced an appalling prospect.
12:39They were treated with inhuman contempt by their captors
12:42who made no provision for their welfare.
12:46Some of them look almost happy,
12:48as if they are relieved to be out of a war.
12:50But most of the men that you see here
12:53would not survive the coming months.
12:56These are the faces of men condemned to die
12:59a slow, agonising death
13:01by starvation, disease and neglect.
13:11Superficially, you could argue
13:12that it was because of the lack of provisions.
13:15If you take a million prisoners
13:17in a matter of a month or six weeks
13:19out on the open Russian steppe,
13:22there is very little in the way
13:23of food or shelter for them.
13:25So it might be argued that it was because
13:27of simply lack of materials to sustain them.
13:32I think that would, however, be a superficial argument.
13:35In the first place, the Germans knew very well
13:38that there were going to be millions of prisoners
13:40because their battle plan required it.
13:43They intended to take millions of prisoners.
13:46They didn't make preparations for them
13:48and as a result you can draw your own conclusion
13:50about their intentions.
13:51It's almost impossible for a more enlightened society
13:55for us to understand the racist views
13:58that were held by the bulk of the people
14:01in the German armed forces at that time.
14:03The Slavs were beneath contempt.
14:06They actually used Soviet prisoners
14:09as the first in the gas experiments
14:12which led to the nightmares
14:15of the concentration camps.
14:17And Hess and his own memoirs
14:19doesn't even give them consideration
14:21as human beings
14:22when he describes
14:23how the Russian prisoners were used
14:25for these grisly experiments.
14:28They were left in the open.
14:30They were starved.
14:30They were beaten.
14:31They were shot.
14:33They were used.
14:34As a matter of fact,
14:35the German army very frequently used
14:37the bodies of Russian prisoners
14:38as emergency bridging equipment.
14:42So the degree of barbarisation
14:45which set in at a very early stage
14:48in the Soviet-German war,
14:50the Great Patriotic War,
14:52was a feature which persisted
14:54until the very last day of that war.
14:57It has been estimated
14:58that more than three million Russian prisoners of war
15:01died in German captivity.
15:24As the German forces drove deeper into Russia,
15:27the immensity and monotony
15:30of the Russian landscape
15:31now began to present its own problems.
15:34For the infantry divisions,
15:36these were mainly psychological.
15:38The never-ending open spaces
15:40of European Russia
15:41had a disorientating and depressing effect
15:44on men who were used
15:45to the varied landscapes of Western Europe.
15:49Of even greater concern
15:51to the motorised columns
15:52was the unfinished state
15:54of the Soviet roads.
15:55In summer, huge columns of dust
15:58rose from the highways
15:59which, in reality,
16:00were little more than dirt tracks.
16:03This dust had a terrible effect on vehicles.
16:07As the air filters gave way
16:09and could not be replaced,
16:10a fine quartz dust
16:12was sucked into the engines
16:13and many of the tanks broke down.
16:28As they withdrew into the interior
16:30of their vast country,
16:32the Russian forces adopted
16:34the same scorched-earth policy
16:36which had served their forefathers so well
16:38against the advancing armies of Napoleon.
16:42Everything which could conceivably
16:44be of value to the advancing Germans
16:46was destroyed.
16:47Whole villages and towns
16:49were set alight
16:50by the retreating Russians.
16:52Bridges, railroads,
16:54telephone exchanges
16:55and civic buildings
16:56were blown up
16:57to prevent their capture.
17:00Every newsreel
17:01from the Eastern Front
17:02shows the same sad backdrop
17:04of burning houses
17:05and wrecked lives.
17:09In consequence,
17:11it proved very difficult
17:12to provide accommodation
17:13for the millions of men
17:14fighting on the Russian Front.
17:16Unlike France and Holland,
17:18there were no bars or cafes
17:20in which the troops
17:20could spend their off-duty hours,
17:22so there was little
17:23to differentiate the rest periods
17:25from active service.
17:28For the soldiers,
17:29living constantly
17:30amidst the wreckage
17:31of civilisation,
17:32this was just one more
17:34demoralising aspect of life
17:36on the Russian Front.
17:38A good stream of mail
17:40and supplies from home
17:41could have lifted morale,
17:43but the Russian rail system
17:44proved to be another headache
17:46for the Germans,
17:47who relied upon
17:48the Russian rail networks
17:49for supply.
17:51Russian railways
17:52had a different gauge
17:53from the German system,
17:54which meant that
17:55only Soviet locomotives
17:56could be used
17:57on the Russian tracks.
17:59The only alternative
18:00was to convert the railways
18:02to take German locomotives,
18:04or to convert
18:05the locomotives themselves.
18:07Both of these options
18:09were an immense task,
18:10requiring a great deal
18:12of planning.
18:13In the meantime,
18:14supply difficulties mounted.
18:17Those difficulties
18:18were to turn into a nightmare
18:20with the advent
18:21of the muddy season.
18:32known in Russia
18:33as the Rasputitsa,
18:35all travel ceased,
18:36as the roads
18:38of European Russia
18:38turned to bottomless mud
18:40with the arrival
18:41of the autumn rains.
18:43The Rasputitsa of 1941
18:45arrived just in time
18:47to save Moscow
18:47from almost certain capture.
18:51As the dirt roads
18:52turned to mud
18:53at the onset of autumn,
18:54the German offensive
18:55began to grind
18:57to a fall.
19:07It's not just during this time,
19:09however,
19:09that there are transport problems,
19:11because the majority
19:11of Russian roads
19:12were not, of course,
19:13tar-sealed.
19:14They were simply
19:15earth-surfaced.
19:17Drive a few hundred
19:18wheeled vehicles
19:19over these,
19:20and drive a few hundred
19:21tanks over them,
19:22and you tear them up
19:23in a tremendous manner,
19:25and then just a small
19:26amount of rain
19:27will also turn that
19:29into mud.
19:30Fighting,
19:31when fighting in Russia,
19:33you could only advance
19:34for about two to three hundred
19:35miles
19:36before you had
19:37to make a stop
19:38and pause for
19:40four to five
19:41or even six weeks
19:42to restore your supplies
19:44before you could
19:46advance again.
19:47You had to bring forward
19:48not just petrol,
19:49oil, ammunition,
19:50and so forth,
19:51but you had to bring
19:52forward spares,
19:53replacement parts
19:53for the tanks
19:54and the trucks
19:55and all of this equipment.
19:57And so there is a limit
19:58to the range
19:59of the German attack.
20:02The German forces
20:03driving towards Moscow
20:04now had to fight
20:06every step of the way
20:07through clinging mud.
20:09The atrocious conditions
20:11under which they now laboured
20:12was described
20:13by one German soldier
20:14as the worst
20:15imaginable torture.
20:17But there was
20:18much worse to come.
20:35By an eerie coincidence,
20:37the winter of 1941
20:38proved to be
20:39the most severe
20:40in living memory.
20:42After the awful months
20:43of mud
20:44came a winter
20:45of unparalleled ferocity.
20:48The thermometer
20:49plunged to minus 41 degrees
20:51and the attack
20:52which had been
20:53floundering now
20:53came to a complete stop.
20:57It is almost impossible
20:58to convey the horrors
20:59of the winter battles
21:00fought in December 41.
21:03Hitler had been
21:04absolutely certain
21:05of a short campaign
21:06and in consequence
21:07had made no provision
21:08for winter clothing
21:09at the front.
21:11Although large stocks
21:12of cold weather gear
21:13were available in Germany,
21:14the overstretched
21:15Russian rail network
21:17was pushed to the limit
21:18to supply the front line
21:19with the essential
21:20reinforcements
21:21and ammunition
21:22for the ever-hungry guns.
21:25Faced with the stark choice
21:26of ammunition
21:27or winter clothing,
21:28the army naturally
21:30had to prioritise
21:31the ammunition.
21:32It meant that they
21:33could keep fighting,
21:34but the consequence
21:35of Hitler's oversight
21:36was the death
21:37of thousands
21:38of German soldiers
21:39who had to face
21:40the full rigour
21:41of the Russian winter
21:42dressed in a summer uniform.
21:45Despite all of these hardships,
21:48the Germans had got
21:48so close to Moscow
21:50that they had captured
21:51a suburban terminus
21:52of the Moscow tram system
21:53and the soldiers
21:54of the foremost German battalion
21:56had actually glimpsed
21:57the spires of the Kremlin
21:58in the distance
21:59before the fierce
22:00Russian counterattack
22:01led by 11 well-equipped
22:03Siberian divisions
22:04pushed them away
22:06from the capital.
22:09The brutal realities
22:10of combat
22:11under these harsh conditions
22:13is almost beyond comprehension.
22:16Conditions were so extreme,
22:18the oil froze
22:19in the engines
22:20of the tanks,
22:21ammunition would not fire,
22:23and metal became so brittle
22:24that the firing pins
22:26of rifles and guns
22:27shattered in the act of firing.
22:29For the first time
22:31in the war,
22:32the German forces
22:33began to retreat
22:34through a wilderness of snow.
22:37In their haste,
22:38they lost countless guns
22:39and massive stocks
22:40of ammunition and equipment
22:41and suffered terrible casualties.
22:44But somehow,
22:45they managed to hold
22:46just enough cohesion
22:47to maintain a front line.
22:49If you talk to the Russians,
22:50they will say,
22:51and they will tell you,
22:52and many will tell you,
22:53that 1942 was a worse year
22:55than 1941.
22:56Stalin had a rush of blood
22:57to the brain
22:58and decided on
23:00premature offensive operations
23:02in the early,
23:05the late winter,
23:05if you like,
23:06in early spring of 1942.
23:08And if you look
23:09at the war records,
23:10I think it's fair to say
23:11that this was when Stalin
23:13sounded the most alarming
23:14and warning note.
23:15This was when he issued
23:16the order
23:17not one step backwards,
23:19and he meant
23:19not one step backwards.
23:21So the whole scale
23:22of this dislocation
23:24was more than that.
23:25It was almost like
23:26a military earthquake
23:27which rose out of the ground,
23:29which shook the Russian,
23:31the Soviet state
23:32to its foundations
23:32and also the Red Army.
23:34Paralyzed by cold,
23:36the German troops
23:37could not aim their rifles,
23:39bolt mechanisms jammed,
23:41strikers shattered
23:42in the bitter cold,
23:43machine guns
23:44became encrusted with ice,
23:45and the recoil liquid
23:47froze in the breaches
23:48of their guns.
23:50As the deep snow built up,
23:52ammunition supplies
23:53began to fail.
23:55Only one German tank in ten
23:57had survived
23:58the autumn muddy season,
23:59and those still available
24:00could not easily move
24:01through the deep snow
24:02because of their narrow tracks.
24:05The new Russian tanks
24:06in the form of the T-34
24:08and the KV-1
24:09were purposely designed
24:10for the Russian winter,
24:11and their wide tracks
24:13gave them the mobility
24:14which they required
24:15to keep up the momentum
24:16which had now passed
24:18from the Germans
24:18to the Russians.
24:21New innovations were of course
24:23not limited to the Russian side.
24:25Germany had introduced
24:26a number of terrifying weapons
24:28of its own.
24:29Perhaps the most famous
24:30of these is the Nebelberfer.
24:32This devastating weapon
24:34fired a barrage
24:35of six high-explosive rockets
24:36which fell together
24:38on the target
24:38in a close-packed group,
24:40producing a pattern of explosions
24:42of terrifying intensity.
24:45Frequently,
24:46the terrifying sound
24:47of the rockets,
24:47as much as their ferocious punch,
24:49would be sufficient
24:50to cause inexperienced
24:52Russian soldiers
24:52to panic and surrender.
24:56The Germans had held
24:58the early lead
24:59in the use of artillery,
25:00but it was the Russians
25:02who were to become synonymous
25:03with the use
25:04of massed artillery fire.
25:06They first of all
25:08developed their own answer
25:09to the Nebelberfer
25:10in the form
25:11of the Kachuskaya,
25:12a simple rocket fire
25:14carried on the back
25:15of a lorry.
25:15It was nicknamed
25:16the Stalin's organ
25:18by the troops
25:18who heard its famous
25:20morning sound
25:21on the battlefield.
25:36The Germans now had to cope
25:38with the emergence
25:39of a new terror.
25:40Behind the lines,
25:42groups of Soviet soldiers
25:43who had avoided capture
25:45now came together
25:46to form the first
25:47partisan groups
25:48operating against
25:49the German supply lines.
25:51This was a particularly nasty
25:54and brutal form of warfare
25:55in which isolated groups
25:57of German troops
25:58were ambushed
25:58by small bands
25:59of partisans.
26:01Terrible atrocities
26:02were committed
26:03by both sides.
26:04Prisoners were frequently
26:05tortured before being
26:06brutally murdered.
26:08A series of tit-for-tat
26:09reprisals
26:10began a spiral of violence
26:12which raged unabated
26:13for the whole four years
26:15of the conflict.
26:15The war that was fought
26:17between the German rear troops
26:20and the Russian partisans
26:22is almost beneath
26:25any concept
26:27of human dignity
26:28or human behaviour.
26:30There were the most
26:31barbaric atrocities
26:32committed by both sides.
26:34One frequent activity
26:36for the partisans
26:37was to gouge the eyes
26:39from captured German soldiers.
26:42It really was a spiral
26:43downwards
26:44into the most brutal,
26:47barbaric,
26:48and inhuman activity
26:49on both sides.
26:50The attacks contributed
26:52to the decline in morale
26:54of German troops.
26:56It increased greatly
26:57their feeling
26:58that they were fighting
26:59in a tremendously hostile
27:01and foreign environment.
27:04German troops
27:04that I've spoken to,
27:06old men now
27:07who were on the Eastern Front,
27:09speak all the time
27:10of the feelings
27:12of despair
27:14that they had
27:15with the endless horizons
27:17that they were advancing
27:18deeper and deeper
27:20into a hostile countryside,
27:22a countryside
27:23that would kill them
27:24if it got a chance.
27:26This attempt
27:27to induce terror
27:28among the German forces
27:29certainly worked,
27:31but the predictable
27:32German response
27:33was vicious in the extreme.
27:35Bloody reprisals
27:37were carried out
27:37against the Russian population
27:39and large-scale public executions
27:41of hostages
27:42were ordered.
27:44Hitler thought
27:45that something
27:46of the order
27:47of a hundred Russians
27:49or Yugoslavs
27:50or Poles
27:51or whatever it might be
27:52should be killed
27:53for every German soldier
27:55that was killed
27:55by partisan activity
27:57and 50-odd killed
27:59for every German soldier
28:01that was wounded.
28:02You have whole villages
28:04being burnt
28:05and razed to the ground.
28:06Also,
28:07at the invasion of Russia
28:09orders were issued
28:10that the maltreatment
28:12of civilians
28:13would not be a crime.
28:15German soldiers
28:16would not be court-martialed
28:18if they robbed,
28:19raped Russian civilians.
28:22And it was deliberate
28:23and it was organized,
28:24it was systematic.
28:25And although the German army
28:27has tried to make excuses
28:28for itself,
28:29Sergei had no part of it,
28:29this is simply not true.
28:31Indeed,
28:32if you look at
28:33Manstein's early orders
28:34in 1941,
28:35he is as enthusiastic
28:37for this barbaric policy
28:39as was anybody else.
28:40So it simply wasn't
28:41the Einsatzgruppen
28:41or the SS who did it.
28:43The German soldier
28:45finally was relieved
28:46of all sense
28:47of criminal responsibility
28:48under German military law.
28:50He was,
28:50from that point of view,
28:52an unbridled
28:52and unchecked agent.
28:54And don't worry,
28:56he took full advantage of you.
28:59All pretenses
29:00were now cast aside
29:01and an inhuman conflict
29:03devoid of any mercy
29:05was the result.
29:08Against this darkening scenario,
29:11the German armies
29:12once again managed
29:13to regain their cohesion
29:14after the near disasters
29:15of the winter of 1941.
29:18With the arrival of summer,
29:20they once again
29:20took the field
29:21in a new offensive
29:22designed to knock Russia
29:23out of the war.
29:25By now,
29:26the opposing ideologies
29:28and the brutal excesses
29:29committed by both sides
29:30had established
29:31an implacable culture
29:32of unforgiving hostility.
29:35It was a path
29:36which was to lead downwards
29:37to the horror of Stalingrad,
29:39one of the most notorious battles
29:41in the history of warfare.
29:51The fighting in and around
29:53the streets of Stalingrad
29:54represented the new depths
29:56to which the conflict
29:57had sunk in 1942.
30:00The very name of the battle
30:01has become a byword
30:02for savagery and suffering.
30:06As the Germans fought their way,
30:08building by building,
30:09towards their ultimate goal
30:10of conquering the city
30:11which bore Stalin's name,
30:13the Russians defended
30:14each block of pounded rubble
30:17to the very last bullet.
30:21Stalingrad became,
30:22if you like,
30:22a symbol of German endurance,
30:24of German capability.
30:26It also had important
30:27strategic significance,
30:28by the way,
30:29because if they'd cut across
30:29the Volga,
30:30they sliced right through
30:31the Russian lines of communication
30:33for oil, for transport.
30:34So it wasn't a facile thing.
30:37But it became invested
30:39with enormous psychological significance.
30:43Both sides,
30:44really in this ghastly
30:46chest-to-chest struggle
30:49from which they couldn't be unlocked,
30:51from which no one could see
30:53how they could be unlocked,
30:54except one had to be destroyed
30:56and the other become victor.
31:05Stalingrad was no longer a city.
31:07It was now a mass of flaming rubble,
31:09pounded day and night
31:11by the German artillery
31:12and the aircraft of the Luftwaffe.
31:14Stalingrad became the symbol
31:16of the titanic clash of wills
31:17between the two preeminent dictators
31:19of the 20th century.
31:22But it was the men on the ground
31:23who paid the full cost of struggle.
31:26Groups of soldiers
31:27fought vicious hand-to-hand battles
31:29for possession of the landmarks
31:31of the city,
31:32names which have now become infamous.
31:35The Red October Tractor Works,
31:37the Railway Station,
31:39the Chemical Works
31:40and the Meat Factory.
31:42Some buildings changed hands
31:44over a dozen times
31:46as men fought desperate
31:47hand-to-hand struggles
31:48which continued even
31:50in the sewers of the city.
31:52Snipers of both sides
31:54prowled the wreckage
31:55for vantage points
31:56from which they could pick off
31:58unsuspecting victims.
32:01Hitler had now become obsessed
32:03with the capture of Stalingrad
32:04and he personally assumed control
32:06of the bitter struggle
32:07for its capture.
32:09Under his orders,
32:11new German units
32:12were fed piecemeal
32:13into the Mincer
32:14which consumed battalion
32:16after battalion
32:17in the unceasing fighting
32:18among the smoking ruins.
32:21fought at close quarters
32:23with flamethrowers,
32:24hand grenades,
32:24machine pistols
32:25and cold steel.
32:27These vicious encounters
32:28were not just a feature
32:29of the Battle for Stalingrad.
32:31They were repeated
32:33in a host of similar struggles
32:34for control
32:35of the Russian cities
32:36and towns
32:36along a 2,000-mile front.
32:41The Red Army
32:42proved to be dogged defenders
32:44and the German tanks
32:45were all but useless
32:46in the cities
32:47so the tragic pattern
32:49of Stalingrad
32:50was repeated in Kharkov,
32:52Kiev,
32:53Sevastopol,
32:54Minsk
32:54and countless other
32:55towns and villages
32:56as the very lifeblood
32:58of the German army
32:59was drained away
33:00drop by drop
33:01in a never-ending struggle.
33:05The ghastly struggle
33:06inside Stalingrad
33:08became even worse
33:09with the arrival
33:10of the first sign of snow.
33:12On top of all
33:14the other privations,
33:15the men fighting
33:16in the city
33:16now had to endure
33:18the full force
33:19of the second
33:19Russian winter
33:20of the war.
33:22Ultimately,
33:23the Russians
33:24would lose 1.7 million men
33:26in their defense
33:26of Stalingrad,
33:27but they at least
33:28were to emerge victorious.
33:31In a fierce
33:32surprise counterattack,
33:33the Red Army
33:34surrounded the city
33:35and caught the German
33:36attackers
33:36in a ring of steel.
33:40The importance
33:41of Stalingrad
33:42is simply this,
33:44that it was the first
33:45major,
33:47unmistakable
33:48defeat
33:49of German forces
33:50in the Second World War.
33:52A whole army
33:53was destroyed,
33:54a quarter of a million men.
33:56It is inescapably
33:57a major reverse,
33:59and it was recognized
34:00as such
34:01both on the Allied side
34:03and on the German side.
34:05The Second World War
34:06is full of episodes
34:08of truly desperate fighting,
34:10but Stalingrad
34:11has got to be
34:12amongst the most
34:13appalling examples
34:15of fighting.
34:16Men were fighting
34:17from room to room
34:19in multi-story buildings.
34:21They were fighting
34:22at the top and the bottom
34:23of granary silos.
34:25They were fighting
34:26across and along
34:28the great big tractor factories
34:30in Stalingrad.
34:32And at the end of it,
34:33the city,
34:34which is many miles long
34:35and a couple of miles thick,
34:37the Russians perhaps
34:38held barely
34:39all three quarters
34:40of a mile of it.
34:42They had been driven
34:43to the very narrowest pocket
34:46before the trap was sprung.
34:49The disaster at Stalingrad
34:51was on such a colossal scale
34:52that news of the destruction
34:54of the Sixth Army
34:55simply had to be made public.
34:58The German high command
34:59and German intelligence
35:00and the German military
35:01as a whole
35:01had vastly underestimated
35:03the ability of the Red Army
35:05to resist.
35:07Whatever they did
35:07to the Red Army
35:08and they batted it mercilessly,
35:10they didn't destroy it.
35:11It was still basically there
35:13at the end of December.
35:15After Stalingrad, of course,
35:17Goebbels had to try
35:18to change the message somewhat.
35:20and the message moved
35:22in the direction of
35:24an appeal to the Germans
35:26for endurance,
35:28a sort of German version
35:29of Churchill's
35:30Blood, Sweat and Tears,
35:32an appeal to the Germans
35:34to remember that they are
35:36the bastion of Western civilization
35:38against these barbarian hordes
35:41that are coming in from the East
35:43and that we must hold the line.
35:46Finally, the appeal came
35:48in the form of a dire warning
35:50that when the Russians come,
35:52dreadful things will be done
35:54and dreadful things were indeed done
35:56to the German population.
35:59These images are taken
36:01from the wartime propaganda magazine,
36:03Signal,
36:04and from the Wehrmacht's own magazine
36:06published at the time.
36:08They are in sharp contrast
36:10to the triumphalist tone
36:11of the material
36:12which had been produced
36:13up to this point in the war.
36:15In these images,
36:16one can sense that the Nazi cause
36:18had passed its high watermark.
36:21These unflattering scenes
36:23point towards impending disaster
36:24and defeat,
36:26a forerunner of what was to come.
36:30It was ordered
36:31that officers in the field
36:32should read out the last message
36:34received by a shortwave radio
36:36from the last defenders
36:37still holding out
36:39in the ruins of the Red October
36:40Tractor Factory.
36:43We are the last survivors
36:45in this place.
36:47Four of us are wounded.
36:48We have been entrenched
36:49in the wreckage
36:50of the Tractor Factory
36:51for four days.
36:52We have not had food
36:53for four days.
36:55I have just opened
36:56the last magazine
36:57for my automatic.
36:58In ten minutes,
36:59the Bolshevik hordes
37:01will overrun us.
37:03Tell my father
37:04I have done my duty
37:05and that I shall know
37:06how to die.
37:08Long live Germany.
37:09Heil Hitler.
37:14In the end,
37:15the desperate supply situation
37:17at Stalingrad
37:18finally forced
37:19Field Marshal von Paulus
37:20to surrender
37:21with his remaining garrison.
37:32Like the thousands
37:33of Russian soldiers
37:34before them,
37:35these men,
37:36already weakened
37:37by malnutrition
37:38and disease,
37:39are marching
37:40to their deaths.
37:4290,000 German soldiers
37:44marched into captivity
37:45in February 1943.
37:47Only 5,000 would survive
37:49to see Germany again.
37:50The German prisoners of war
37:52were, of course,
37:53treated by the Russians
37:54with very considerable severity
37:56given all that the Germans
37:58had done in Russia,
38:00given all the things
38:01that the Russians
38:01had seen
38:02during the German retreat.
38:05I suppose one could say
38:06the German prisoners of war
38:08were treated
38:08with about the same degree
38:10of severity
38:11as the Russian inhabitants
38:13of the Gulags
38:14received under Stalin.
38:17The majority
38:18of the German prisoners of war
38:20were released in 1949.
38:22They were released then
38:24because at that point
38:25the Russians were in the process
38:27of setting up
38:28the East German communist state
38:30and they wanted this
38:31to be reasonably popular
38:32with the German population.
38:34One thing that the German population
38:37held against the Russians
38:38at that point
38:39was the number of prisoners
38:41still held in the Gulags.
38:43And so to sweeten
38:44the German population,
38:46the Russians released
38:47released a very large number
38:49of the prisoners of war.
38:51A number remained
38:53and these were finally released
38:55in 1955.
38:57It should be said
38:58that very many of these
39:00who were held until 1955
39:02were regarded by the Russians,
39:04whether rightly or not,
39:05as war criminals.
39:06and they were released
39:08in 1955
39:09because at that point
39:11there was some détente
39:12going on between Germany
39:14and Russia
39:14following the death of Stalin
39:16and the West German government
39:20was preparing itself
39:21to recognise
39:22the Russian government.
39:24And so the final relief
39:25of release of prisoners
39:27was part of this political arrangement.
39:31By another miracle
39:33of discipline and tenacity,
39:34the German army
39:35was once again
39:36able to recover
39:37from the disaster
39:38at Stalingrad.
39:39And in one of the most astonishing
39:41about turns of the war,
39:42the hard-pressed men
39:43of the Wehrmacht
39:44actually returned
39:45to the offensive once again.
39:47Under the inspired leadership
39:49of Field Marshal von Manstein,
39:50the Germans managed
39:51to blunt the Russian offensive,
39:53which followed
39:54on the heels of Stalingrad,
39:55and actually take
39:56the offensive themselves.
39:59This newfound confidence
40:01was to prove short-lived.
40:02Although the first SS Panzer Corps
40:04managed to achieve
40:05a startling victory
40:06with the recapture of Kharkov,
40:08the tide turned decisively
40:10against the Germans
40:10with their defeat
40:12in the Titanic Battle of Kursk.
40:14At Stalingrad,
40:15a lot of men were lost,
40:17but not a huge amount
40:18of tanks and heavy equipment,
40:20whereas at Kursk,
40:22the Germans risked
40:243,000 tanks,
40:266,000 aircraft,
40:27a million men,
40:28and they lost.
40:29And after that,
40:31they never had the cutting edge
40:32again to take the offensive.
40:34Following Kursk,
40:36they could mount
40:37limited counter-attacks,
40:39but there was never again
40:40a major German counter-offensive.
40:51from the 19th of August 1943
40:54until the final defeat
40:55in 1945,
40:57the German army was firmly
40:58on the defensive in the east.
41:00An unremitting pattern
41:02of defeat and retreats
41:03which led all the way
41:04to Berlin
41:05now awaited them.
41:07What they were now witnessing
41:09in war
41:09was the Blitzkrieg
41:11in reverse.
41:13Just a few years previously,
41:15Germany had used
41:16massive artillery bombardments
41:18to pave the way
41:19for breakthrough manoeuvres
41:20by large tank forces.
41:22Russia now repaid
41:24the complement in time,
41:25but on a far greater scale.
41:28Huge artillery bombardments
41:30of a hitherto unheard-of size
41:32pulverized the front lines
41:34before wave after wave
41:35of Russian tanks
41:36rolled through the gaps
41:38in the German lines.
41:43Faced by shortages of men,
41:45vehicles, and ammunition,
41:47the Germans no longer
41:48had an answer
41:49for the Red Machine.
41:52As they retreated,
41:53the German forces attempted
41:55to introduce
41:56a new scorched earth policy,
41:58and the devastated soil of Russia
42:00witnessed a second wave
42:01of violence and destruction
42:03as the retreating Germans
42:04did everything in their power
42:06to slow the advance
42:07of the pursuing Red Army.
42:09In addition to the massive demolition
42:11of the infrastructure
42:12of the country,
42:13they laid millions of landmines
42:15and constructed thousands
42:16of booby traps,
42:17which claimed many lives,
42:19but ultimately did little
42:21to slow the Red Army advance.
42:23As the supreme commander
42:26of the German armed forces,
42:28it's undoubtedly Hitler
42:29who has to carry the blame
42:32for the debacle
42:33that the war on the Russian front
42:35degenerated into.
42:37One of the reasons for that
42:38is that he had developed
42:40what he considered to be
42:41a policy of holding on
42:43at all costs.
42:45So Hitler's policy
42:45of turning defensive positions
42:49into what he called fortresses,
42:51even though they didn't really have
42:53the proper defensive arrangement
42:54for a fortress,
42:56was a key part of his policy.
42:59During the winter of 1941,
43:02it is arguable that this policy
43:04actually saved the German armies.
43:07After that,
43:09it became so ingrained
43:10in his thinking
43:11that he wasn't prepared
43:13under any circumstances
43:15to yield up territory in Russia.
43:18The 6th Army at Stalingrad
43:20paid the price for that.
43:22The 17th Army in the Crimea
43:23was also surrendered.
43:25And large segments
43:26of Army Group Center
43:29when they were on the retreat
43:30were surrounded
43:32and Hitler actually refused
43:34them permission
43:35to fight their way back
43:36to the German lines.
43:38In 1944,
43:40some 50,000 of the men
43:41who were captured
43:42during the collapse
43:43of Army Group Center
43:44were paraded through
43:45the streets of Moscow.
43:48Despite all they had suffered,
43:50the Russian population
43:51was remarkably subdued.
43:53As the weary
43:54and dispirited prisoners
43:56shuffled by,
43:56the civilian population
43:58stood and stared
43:59in sullen silence.
44:02Perhaps the citizens
44:03of Moscow realized
44:04that but for an accident
44:06of birth,
44:07these men could easily
44:09have been their own husbands,
44:10sons, and brothers.
44:13Many of the men
44:14moving slowly past the camera
44:16would not survive
44:17to see Germany again.
44:19Others would be held
44:20in captivity for ten years
44:22while they were forced
44:23to labor to repair
44:24the damage that they
44:25or their colleagues
44:26had done.
44:29Of the five million prisoners
44:31taken into captivity
44:32by the Germans,
44:34only one and a half million
44:35survived to see
44:36their homeland again.
44:39Three and a half million deaths
44:41is a colossal figure
44:42in any estimation,
44:44but they were just
44:45the tip of the iceberg.
44:47It has been estimated
44:48that in total,
44:50some 30 million lives
44:51were lost
44:52in the Russian war,
44:54the largest
44:55and bloodiest conflict
44:56in the history of the world.
44:58We can only hope
45:00that no other war
45:01shall ever claim its place.
45:06The Red Army did have an opportunity
45:10as they advanced
45:11into Germany
45:12to prove that human dignity
45:16and decency
45:17could overcome
45:18all of the horrendous things
45:20that we'd just witnessed
45:21in the previous three years.
45:24Unfortunately,
45:24they didn't do that.
45:26And with the connivance
45:27of their officers,
45:28they committed mass rape,
45:30they committed looting,
45:32and they also committed murder.
45:34That, for me,
45:35is the final tragedy.
45:36I have asked many, many Russians,
45:38whom I know very well,
45:39what really happened
45:40in terms of a choice.
45:42He said,
45:43we were faced with a choice
45:44between two dictators,
45:46Hitler on the one hand
45:47and Stalin on the other,
45:48but we preferred to pick
45:50the one who spoke Russian.
45:51Their system wasn't perfect.
45:53It had sacrificed millions of men.
45:55It wasn't all that efficient,
45:56but when it was all boiled down,
45:59what are they left with?
46:01I mean,
46:02this barbarous,
46:03murderous,
46:03genocidal regime
46:04which exploited the country
46:07and even more, actually.
46:09And this is a point
46:10which has never much
46:11been explored,
46:12but which actually
46:12humiliated the Russians,
46:14denigrated them
46:15as a people.
46:16And this coming
46:16from the Germans,
46:17whom they'd always respected
46:18as Beethoven,
46:20Goethe, Heine.
46:21What kind of people
46:22were these?
46:22It wasn't just the SS.
46:24It was the whole
46:27German impress of this
46:29which I think
46:30shocked the Russians
46:31tremendously.
46:32It's also a shock
46:33from which I think
46:33they haven't recovered
46:34even to this day.
46:35The German army
46:36was worn out
46:37and finally destroyed
46:39on the Eastern Front.
46:42The Allied invasion
46:43in Normandy
46:44didn't come until 1944.
46:47By that time,
46:48the German losses
46:49were so great
46:50that the outcome of the war
46:52could not be endowed.
46:54something that has been buried
46:56in Cold War history
46:58is this fact
47:00that we did not like
47:01to face
47:02and probably do not
47:04like to face
47:04that without the war
47:07on the Eastern Front,
47:08it is very hard indeed
47:10to see how Britain
47:11and America
47:12could have prevailed
47:13against Germany.
47:15And for that reason,
47:17one can perhaps say
47:18that the war was decided
47:19on the Eastern Front.
47:38by the Eastern Front
47:41and the Eastern Front
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