Original subtitles

(machine whirring)

(ominous music)

- [Presenter] Adolf Hitler neither finished school,

nor had any vocational training.

(crowd cheering)

He occasionally lived in homeless shelters or on the street.

He refused to pursue a regular job.

To this day, it seems inexplicable

that he could come to power.

Out of nowhere, Hitler became the Fuhrer,

leader of the German Reich,

one of the most powerful men of the 20th century,

who brought the world to the brink of disaster

and death to millions of people.

The nation worshiped him

and followed him blindly into the abyss.

But during his lifetime,

he kept his origins and his life secret.

No one should know how or who he was.

Hitler's contemporaries, from his birth to his death,

flesh out the picture.

Who was Hitler?

(somber music)

(people chattering)

- [Narrator] On June the 30th 1903,

the 72-year-old Kaiser Franz Joseph I visits Braunau am Inn

to celebrate its 700th birthday.

An historical coincidence,

this border town to Bavaria of all places

is the origin of the oldest film footage

shot by an Austrian cinematographer.

- [Voiceover] "In the late '80s of the last century,

my parents lived in the small town on the Inn,

which is Bavarian by blood and Austrian by nationality."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] The customs inspector Alois Hitler

and his family occupy a small apartment

on the top floor of the Pommer Hotel in Braunau.

At Easter time, on April the 20th 1889,

at about 6:30 in the evening, Adolf Hitler is born.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Parish register, Braunau.

Adolfus Hitler, born on April the 20th 1889,

at 6:30 in the evening.

Baptized on April the 22nd at 3:15 by Ignat Proust.

(solemn music)

- [Voiceover] "To begin with, there's this picture

of little Adolf from the year 1889,

a few months after his birth.

One thing worthy of note in this first picture of Hitler

is the close resemblance of Adolf to his mother."

August Kubizek, childhood friend of Adolf Hitler.

- [Narrator] Adolf Hitler is the third

of the couple's six children.

He and his younger sister Paula

are the only ones to survive beyond childhood.

The mother is 28 years old at the time of the birth.

The father is 51.

Klara Hitler is related to Alois Hitler.

She's her husband's second cousin.

When Hitler is three years old,

his father is transferred to a new post

and decides to move into an apartment in Passau

on the German side of the border.

Adolf Hitler lives with his family in Bavaria

for three years until 1895.

- [Voiceover] "Actually, Hitler didn't speak

a typical Austrian dialect."

August Kubizek.

- [Voiceover] "In my youth, my German was the dialect

spoken in Lower Bavaria."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] The oldest film recording

made in Austria-Hungary

was shot by foreigners, the Lumiere brothers.

It shows Vienna, the capital of a multinational empire,

in the year 1896.

(vehicles clanking)

- [Voiceover] "In Old Austria,

you could travel without a passport,

from the Mediterranean, over the Alps,

way into the east, the west, and the north."

Oskar Kokoschka, painter and writer.

- [Narrator] Hitler's ancestry from Lower Austria

as well as a total of 21 years

spent in Upper Austria and Vienna

do not suffice to make him Austrian

in the sense of a citizen of that nation.

- [Voiceover] Kurt Schuschnigg,

Austrian Chancellor from 1934 to 1938.

"Austrians who spoke about the nation before 1938

meant the national culture

that extended beyond their borders,

which is what Austrian man also identified with."

- [Narrator] This cultural nation is Germany.

(hooves clopping)

Transporting a locomotive through the streets of Chemnitz,

16 workhorses pull the locomotive

as the factory has no rail connection.

(people chattering)

The majority of German speaking Austrians

feel close links to the Germans in Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria,

and the smaller federal states

already united in a partly industrialized Reich.

- [Voiceover] "He was a grumpy, reticent old man,

and like a lot of political free spirits at the time,

a stern German nationalist."

Joseph Mayerhofer,

farmer in the village of Leonding by Linz.

(pensive music)

- [Voiceover] "A visit to his parent's grave.

His school friends say his mother

was loving and kindhearted.

The father, cold, silent, and straight."

Joseph Goebbels, diary, July 22nd 1938.

- [Voiceover] "I never loved my father,

but feared him all the more."

Adolf Hitler, table talk,

recorded by his secretary Christa Schroeder.

(baby wailing)

- [Voiceover] "My brother Adolf provoked my father

to such extremes that he was beaten every day."

Paula Hitler, later Paula Wolff.

- [Narrator] In June 1939, Eva Braun films the small farm

in the village of Hafeld in Upper Austria

that Hitler's father leases after retiring early in 1895.

(melancholy music)

On May the 1st 1895, Hitler starts school

in a one-room schoolhouse

in the neighboring village of Fischlham.

In the year 1897,

Hitler's father sells the farm in Hafeld.

The family lives temporarily in the small town of Lambach.

(gloomy music)

In 1898, the Hitler family moves

to the village of Leonding near Linz.

Here Hitler's father buys property number 61,

including 1,900 square meters of land.

After five years of elementary school,

in 1900, Adolf Hitler aged 11

begins secondary school in the city of Linz.

Adolf Hitler has to repeat his first year

at secondary school due to poor grades.

- [Voiceover] "I remember the scrawny pale boy

who commuted every day

between Linz and Leonding fairly well.

He was definitely talented on the one hand,

but was not in control of himself.

He was considered rebellious,

and he didn't work hard."

Dr. Eduard Humer, Hitler's French teacher.

(children chattering)

- [Voiceover] "The quiet life enjoyed by the Hitler family

on its little patch of land only lasted a few years.

The head of the family died unexpectedly

of a heart attack in January 1903."

Max Zigstel, "Leonding, the Fuhrer's Hometown."

- [Narrator] Alois Hitler leaves his modest savings

to his four surviving children,

Alois and Angela from the second of his three marriages

and Adolf and Paula.

This inheritance is to be paid out when they come of age.

- [Voiceover] "The quiet cemetery of Leonding

was his final resting place.

His widow moved to the nearby city of Linz

for the better educational opportunities for her children."

Max Zigstel.

(melancholy music)

- [Narrator] In 1904, Klara Hitler

has to send her son Adolf, who due to bad grades

is again in danger of not moving up a class,

to the state secondary school in Steyr, 40 kilometers away.

(children chattering)

- [Voiceover] "Look at my school grades.

I had bad marks in German.

That idiot of a professor

spoiled the German language for me.

I would never be able to write a proper letter."

Adolf Hitler in the Fuhrer's Headquarters, 1943.

(children chattering)

- [Voiceover] Last grades at secondary school in Steyr.

Diligence, inconsistent.

German, insufficient.

Geography and history, sufficient.

Mathematics, insufficient.

Physics, satisfactory.

Freehand drawing, commendable.

Sport, excellent.

- [Voiceover] "I don't have a photograph of Adolf Hitler

during the years of our friendship.

There probably aren't any photos of Hitler

during this period.

Everything that could be said

about images of Hitler as a young man has already been said,

were it not for the drawing by a classmate

from the fourth grade of the junior high school in Steyr.

By chance, this drawing done in 1905 was preserved.

The boy could only draw profiles.

Nevertheless, there is something peculiarly fascinating

about this pencil sketch."

August Kubizek.

- [Narrator] After nine years, Adolf Hitler finishes school

without graduating.

For the following three years,

he lives in Linz on his mother's pension,

not really doing anything.

(jaunty music)

- [Voiceover] "All of his relatives

considered him worthless,

a person who shied away

from any gainful employment from the start."

August Kubizek.

(elegant music)

- [Narrator] Adolf Hitler talks his mother

into allowing him to travel to Vienna.

He wants to apply for admission

to the general painting class at the Academy of Fine Arts.

- [Voiceover] "From early in the morning to late at night,

I ran from one sightseeing attraction to the next,

but the buildings were the only things that fascinated me.

All of Ring Street affected me

like a spell from the Arabian Nights."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Voiceover] "From 1904 to 1908,

I was Adolf Hitler's only friend in Linz

and thereafter in Vienna."

August Kubizek.

- [Narrator] Hitler, who later in the opinion

of a few art experts was not entirely untalented,

manages to pass the first selection,

but is turned down after the second.

- [Voiceover] "Adolf Hitler, born on Braunau, Upper Austria

on April the 20th 1889.

German, Catholic.

Few faces, test drawing unsatisfactory."

Classification list of the general painting class.

- [Narrator] When Adolf Hitler,

disappointed by the rejection,

returns to his family in Linz after eight weeks,

Klara Hitler is struck down with a serious illness.

She's suffering from a swelling.

Nowadays, it would be diagnosed as cancer.

For several months, Adolf Hitler devotedly

takes care of his mother at home.

(foreboding music)

- [Voiceover] "Dr. Bloch, well-loved by all,

was the Hitler family physician."

August Kubizek.

- [Voiceover] "To a great degree,

the boy lived in his own world.

I have no idea what dreams he dreamt."

Dr. Eduard Bloch, Jewish physician of the Hitler family.

- [Narrator] Klara Hitler dies

in the night of December the 21st 1907,

surrounded by her family.

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] "The death of our mother

had a great effect on me and Adolf.

We were very attached to our mother.

When she died, Adolf stopped coming home."

Paula Hitler, Adolf Hitler's sister.

- [Narrator] In contrast to what

Hitler's sister Paula claims later,

Adolf Hitler remains in Linz

several weeks after the death of his mother.

He never tells his family or his friend Kubizek

that he failed the admissions test the previous year.

- [Voiceover] "Apparently, he was having

some really bad days.

He was easily irritated and gave me short shrift

when I started to talk about my studies."

August Kubizek.

- [Narrator] In the spring of 1908,

Adolf Hitler begins living

the life of a wastrel in the metropolis.

- [Voiceover] "Vienna was the most thorough education

of my life."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Voiceover] "The small inheritance

that was diligently managed by his guardian

had to cover both the cost of living and his studies.

He may have been able to supplement his income

through the sale of drawings and paintings."

August Kubizek.

- [Narrator] For the next month,

there's no trace of Hitler's activities in Vienna.

He's broken off contact with his family,

and he fails the second entrance test at the art academy.

He begins to copy street views of Vienna from books

and then sells them as postcards.

- [Voiceover] "I was a young inexperienced man

without any means of support.

Forced to get by on my own,

the few kronen, often only cents,

from the proceeds of my work

were barely enough to pay for my bed and board."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] Hitler's share of his father's inheritance

is paid out on April the 20th 1913, his 24th birthday.

Hitler met Rudolf Hausler in a men's hostel.

With him, he wants to move to the German city of Munich.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "He was just full of praise for this city,

and at the same time, he didn't forget

the large beer gardens and radishes, et cetera."

Housemate of Hitler's in 1912.

(train clattering)

- [Voiceover] "I had arrived in this town as a boy

and departed as a quiet and serious man."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] The main reason for leaving Austria

is probably that the later Commander in Chief Adolf Hitler

wants to get out of doing military service.

On Saturday, May the 24th 1913,

Hitler and Hausler give notice of departure to the police,

but don't state where they plan to live.

In Munich, Adolf Hitler has found the city

that is to become the center of his life.

He does, however, remain an outsider.

His inheritance helps him build

an uncertain yet adequate existence

on the fringe of society.

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] "It was a beautiful

Sunday afternoon in spring.

Someone knocked on the door and I answered it.

It was a young man wanting to see the room we were renting.

I showed it to him and we reached an agreement."

Frau Anna Popp, landlady, Schleissheimerstrasse 34.

(gloomy music)

- [Narrator] Adolf Hitler and Rudolf Hausler

rent a room together from the tailor Popp

at 34 Schleissheimerstrasse near the district of Schwabing.

- [Voiceover] "The younger generation that we belonged to

didn't know anything about war,

but were intoxicated by foreign wars.

We had no real idea what war was.

Adolf's father had never been a soldier.

Now and again, old men would talk about

Koniggratz and Custoza."

August Kubizek.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, June the 29th 1914.

"Archduke Franz Ferdinand,

the heir apparent to the Austrian throne,

has been killed along with his wife.

The scum of moral turpitude."

Henrietta Schneider, born 1872, housekeeper, East Prussia.

(bell tolling)

- [Narrator] The incident triggers a war in the Balkans

that grows to become a world war.

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] "For me, those hours were a release

from the annoying emotions of youth.

I'm not ashamed to say today

that I was overwhelmed with enthusiasm,

fell to my knees and thanked the heavens with all my heart

that they'd given me the good fortune to live in this era."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] On August the 2nd 1914,

the day after Germany declares war on Russia,

there is a big patriotic rally on Odeonsplatz

in front of the Feldherrnhalle.

(stately music)

Heinrich Hoffmann photographed the ceremony.

Years later, in an enlargement,

he discovers a face among the masses,

which is presumably Hitler's.

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] "On August the 5th 1914,

I enlisted in the army on a request to His Majesty

and entered the First Bavarian Infantry Regiment.

I was deferred for several days,

then transferred to the Second Infantry Regiment,

and finally assigned

to the Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment Number 16

on August the 16th."

Adolf Hitler, outline of my person.

(soldiers chattering)

- [Narrator] For the first time in his life,

Adolf Hitler wears a uniform.

(train rattling)

In the early morning hours of October the 21st 1914,

Hitler's regiment sets out from Munich Station

in a westerly direction.

(explosions banging) (gunfire rattling)

Shortly after the first combat mission of the List Regiment

Hitler is promoted to lance corporal.

He will reject further promotions

during the course of the war.

This would have involved an attachment to other army units,

and Hitler would have lost the camaraderie and security

of the regimental family.

(explosion banging)

- [Voiceover] "For the first time,

Hitler was part of a bigger community,

and with that came the order and structure

that spared him the daily struggle to survive."

Fritz Wiedemann, Lieutenant.

(ominous music)

- [Narrator] As of November the 9th,

Hitler is deployed as a dispatch runner

and assigned to the regimental staff.

In the eyes of many soldiers in the trenches,

the staff orderlies behind the immediate front

are privileged cowards.

- [Voiceover] "Whenever death was on the prowl,

a certain something attempted to rebel

and appeared to the weak body in the guise of reason,

and was, in fact, only cowardice

that was behind this disguise

trying to seduce the individual.

By the winter of 1915-16,

this battle was already decided for me.

The will itself had finally become my complete master.

Now fate could put me to the test

without me losing my nerves.

A young war volunteer had become an old soldier."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] Hitler is respected

by his comrades at regimental headquarters,

but he remains an outsider.

In five of six photos showing Hitler with his comrades,

he's either standing or sitting to one side.

Hitler is wounded by British artillery shrapnel

on October the 5th 1916

and is taken to the Red Cross Hospital

in Beelitz, south of Berlin.

(gunfire rattling)

By March the 1st 1917,

he's back running dispatches in the regimental staff.

In the following months,

he participates in combat activities.

On August the 4th 1918,

Hitler is awarded the Iron Cross First Class,

the highest military honor that soldiers of his rank

in the Imperial German Army can receive.

The nomination was submitted by a Jewish officer,

Lieutenant Hugo Gutmann.

(gloomy music)

- [Voiceover] "I never got out of Hitler

the reason for his fanatical hatred of Jews.

The experience with Jewish officers during the World War

couldn't have contributed to this."

Fritz Wiedemann, Lieutenant.

(gunfire rattling)

- [Narrator] In the night of October the 13th,

Hitler's war service ends in a heavy British barrage.

- [Voiceover] "Mustard gas was used.

On a hill south of the city of Werwick, on October the 13th,

we came under several hours

of artillery fire with gas shells.

Already around midnight, some of us dropped out,

including some comrades permanently.

In the morning, I too experienced pain

that grew stronger every 15 minutes,

and at seven o'clock,

I staggered and stumbled back with burning eyes,

taking my last message of the war with me."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] After treatment in a mobile army hospital,

Adolf Hitler is transported

to the Prussian Reserve Hospital

in Pasewalk, Western Pomerania.

He's been on the front for 42 of the 51 months of the war.

Hitler remains in Pasewalk for 28 days,

during which the world changes.

(somber music)

(crowd cheering)

In the military hospital in Pasewalk,

Adolf Hitler and the other patients learn

that a revolution has taken place,

the monarchy abdicated, and a ceasefire been concluded.

(crowd cheering)

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] "I hadn't cried

since the day I stood by my mother's grave.

Now, I couldn't stop myself."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] Like everything else in "Mein Kampf,"

this portrayal is a stylization and must be doubted.

We don't know whether it was Hitler's will

or merely coincidence

that influenced his future course from then on.

On November the 21st 1918, Adolf Hitler returns to Munich.

He tries to evade demobilization and remain a soldier.

There are clashes between supporters

of the Workers' Councils

and parliamentary democracy in the state capital.

The social democratic majority

allows right-wing volunteer groups,

the so-called Freikorps,

to break the power of the Workers' Councils.

- [Voiceover] Letter to Clara and Fritz Hess.

"The Volunteer Corps made an excellent impression.

Without them, we would have been finished in Bavaria."

Rudolf Hess, student and member of the Freikorps.

(foreboding music)

- [Narrator] Adolf Hitler keeps his distance

to the revolutionary forces,

but also to their right-wing opponents.

During this period, Hitler grows more radical.

He is under the influence of army officers like Karl Mayr,

the head of the Intelligence Battalion.

- [Voiceover] "When I met him for the first time,

he came across as a tired stray dog looking for an owner."

Karl Mayr, Captain of the Reichswehr.

(train rattling)

- [Narrator] Karl Mayr also finances patriotic parties

like the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei,

the German Workers' Party,

which is founded in Munich on January the 5th 1919,

mainly by a group of railwaymen.

(stately music)

On September the 12th 1919,

Hitler, who has in the meantime been demobbed,

is sent to spy on the German Workers' Party by Mayr,

who also provides financial support.

- [Voiceover] "During the discussion,

a professor spoke about separatist views.

A second speaker then took the floor

and in short powerful words demolished the professor.

It was Adolf Hitler."

Michael Lotter, Secretary of the German Workers' Party.

(pensive music)

- [Voiceover] "One day, I had the opportunity

to talk to a large audience,

and what I had always instinctively felt without knowing it

turned out to be true.

I could speak in public."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] In the second half of September 1919,

Hitler joins the German Workers' Party

and participates regularly in its meetings.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "Among the various

right-wing radical organizations,

the NSDAP was by no means the strongest,

but it was the most active and cohesive group.

Its significance is solely the result

of the effect of Hitler as a speaker."

Ernst Hanfstaengl, son of a publisher,

acquaintance of Adolf Hitler from 1920.

(foreboding music)

- [Narrator] On February the 24th 1920,

Hitler speaks for the first time

in front of more than 1,000 people at the Hofbrauhaus.

He also announces the 25-point party program,

which is formally valid for a quarter of a century

until the demise of the NSDAP.

- [Voiceover] First, we demand the unification

of all Germans in a greater Germany

based on the rights of self-determination of the people.

Second, we demand equal rights for the German people

in respect to other nations

and the abrogation of the peace treaties

of Versailles and Saint-Germain.

Third, we demand land and territory

for the sustenance of our people

and settlement of our surplus population.

Fourth, only a national comrade can be a citizen,

Only those of German blood can be national comrades,

regardless of creed.

Consequently, no Jew can be a national comrade.

(regal music)

- [Narrator] A few days later,

they changed their name from the German Workers' Party

to the National Socialist German Workers' Party or NSDAP.

- [Voiceover] "Hitler was the party,

and the party was Hitler."

Ernst Hanfstaengl.

(people cheering)

(regal music)

- [Voiceover] "Because right now, here in Munich,

a movement is starting so strong

that all young, powerful, and healthy forces

are attracted to it.

It is the National Socialist German Workers' Party.

To make it absolutely clear, we're anti-Semites."

Ilse Prohl, later Ilse Hess,

from 1921, member of the NSDAP.

Letter to her former college teacher.

(somber music)

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "When the first party congress is held,

the Augsburg SA is well-represented.

At this first public presentation,

I get the impression that this has substance.

We are not alone.

The idea of the Fatherland is growing."

Karl Wahl, Augsburg, former SA member.

- [Narrator] The German economy collapses.

In August 1923, hyperinflation sets in.

- [Voiceover] "Everything is getting worse, famine.

A loaf of bread, 140 billion.

Then reduced again to 80 billion.

Famine, famine everywhere."

Kathe Kollwitz, painter and sculptress.

- [Narrator] The national associations

overestimate their own strength

and believe that parliamentary democracy is at an end.

- [Voiceover] Interview with the Daily Mail newspaper,

October the 2nd 1923.

"If a Mussolini were to appear in Germany,

then the people would fall on their knees and worship him

more than Mussolini has ever been worshiped."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "A large revolt from the right in Bavaria

with Ludendorff at its head."

Henrietta Schneider, District L, East Prussia.

(dignified music)

- [Voiceover] Report of the regional government

of Upper Bavaria.

Munich, November the 9th 1923.

"The day before yesterday,

Hitler promised General Von Lossow

and Colonel Von Seisser personally

that he would not undertake anything.

The answer to this word of honor was given last night

when, with pistol in hand, Hitler extorted a declaration

in favor of a national dictatorship

from General State Commissioner Von Kahr,

General Von Lossow, and Colonel Von Seisser.

At the same time, the ministers present

were taken into custody by Hitler's people."

- [Narrator] Hitler presents his suggestions

for new governments in Berlin and Munich

and mentions Erich Ludendorff

as fuhrer and chief with dictatorial power

over the German National Army.

He asks the already drunken audience.

- [Voiceover] "Do you accept this solution

for the German question of a greater German state?"

- [Narrator] Then as the crowd shouts its agreement,

Hitler proclaims.

- [Voiceover] "Morning will either find us

with a national government in Germany or find us dead."

- [Narrator] The revolt is intended

to put Munich and Bavaria

in the hands of the revolutionaries,

and then with a march on Berlin,

to topple the democratic system.

The putschists are counting on defections

from the army in Bavaria and the Bavarian police.

These, however, fail to materialize.

On the morning of November the 10th,

2,000 revolutionaries, some armed,

march from the Burgerbrau Beer Hall

through the center of town to Ludwigstrasse at Odeonsplatz.

(ominous music)

10 years later, Munich, November the 9th 1933.

Amateur film of a tradition

that actually dates from the year of the seizure of power.

The annual march of the old fighters of the NSDAP

to the Feldherrnhalle.

Leading the column, as in 1923,

are Adolf Hitler and Hermann Goering.

(triumphant music)

- [Voiceover] "We retreated to Cafe Stephanie.

People soon came in and said

there had been a skirmish on the Odeonsplatz,

and the enormous crowd of Hitler men

turned and ran away from the state police."

Oskar Maria Graf, writer, from my life.

(gloomy music)

- [Narrator] On November the 12th 1923,

Adolf Hitler is sent to the fortress prison in Landsberg.

He is given cell number seven.

The leaders of the putsch are put on trial for high treason

in the main lecture theater of the Central War School

on February the 26th 1924.

- [Voiceover] Report of the Wittenberg emissary,

March the 13th 1924.

"I attended one of the hearings myself,

and I was upset to see how the observers,

who you could clearly see were mostly

from circles close to Hitler,

used every opportunity to show their support

for the accused."

Karl Moser von Filseck.

(gloomy music)

- [Voiceover] Letter to Clara and Fritz Hess.

"Hitler's final statement enclosed.

It is one of the best, most powerful speeches

that he has ever given.

Even those in the courtroom

who weren't particularly friendly to Hitler

were deeply moved."

Rudolf Hess, student.

- [Narrator] The verdict is handed down

on April the 1st 1924.

All of the accused, with the exception of Ludendorff,

are found guilty.

In his 13 months in Landsberg Prison,

Adolf Hitler begins the transcript of a manifesto

that portrays his alleged journey through life

and his development as a politician

and sets out his worldview.

- [Voiceover] "So I decided

not only to clarify the goals of our movement,

but also to draw a picture of its development.

With that, I also had the chance

to give a representation of my own development.

Adolf Hitler, Forward to "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] The biographical parts of his book

are, to a great extent, exaggerated and unverified.

However, his political goals are deadly serious.

His view of the world is voluntaristic.

He sees it as he wants to see it.

Hitler's political gospel is derived

from a primitive Darwinian idea of a struggle for existence.

It reflects the permanent fight

for survival of all against all,

transferred from nature to human society.

This struggle is, in his view,

a selection process in which so-called high quality races

have a better chance of survival.

At its head is supposedly a white person

of the Nordic race of Aryans, the founders of culture.

Like most anti-Semites before him,

Hitler believes in a Jewish race

disguised as a religious community.

He sees Jews in history as being

parasites in the bodies of other nations

and as contaminators of the blood of the Aryan race.

- [Voiceover] "For hours, the black-haired Jew boy

waits to ambush the unsuspecting girl

whom he pollutes with his blood

and thus steals her from her people.

With the same hidden agenda,

destroying the hated white race

with the inevitable resulting bastardization."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

- [Narrator] In another chapter, Hitler drafts plans

for territorial living space for his Aryan German people.

- [Voiceover] "We are stopping

the endless Germany movement southwards

and turning our gaze towards the land in the east.

If today we speak of new land in Europe,

we can primarily only have in mind Russia

and her vassal border states."

Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf."

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, January the 14th 1925.

"At the end of the month,

Hitler wants to call for the reestablishment

of the National Socialist German Workers' Party,

the only thing to do."

Joseph Goebbels.

- [Narrator] Hitler's remaining sentence

of three years, 333 days, 21 hours, and 50 minutes

is waived according to the pedantically exact court records.

On February the 27th 1925,

Hitler reestablishes the party.

In the first round of elections

for German president on March the 29th 1925,

Erich Ludendorff is the candidate

of the NSDAP and other nationalistic groups.

He only receives 1.1% of the votes.

When Paul von Hindenburg enters the race

in the second round of voting,

Hitler orders his party

to support the aging 77-year-old army general.

Hitler and Ludendorff go separate ways.

Hitler is now the sole leader of the national camp.

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] Diary, April the 26th 1925.

"Hindenburg elected.

Is he the man that Germany needs at this time?

Is he not too old?

Too easy to influence?"

Bella Fromm, German Jewish journalist.

(dignified music)

- [Narrator] From 1924 onwards, the German economy recovers.

This leads to the five golden years of the Weimar Republic.

(traffic clamoring)

- [Voiceover] "Looking back on it now,

I see the mad whirl of this Berlin of 1928 and '29

as a kind of Pompeian revel

on the eve of the Vesuvian eruption."

Sefton Delmer,

correspondent of the Daily Express in Berlin.

- [Voiceover] "The Nazis hated culture itself

because it is essentially international

and therefore subversive of nationalism."

Christopher Isherwood, British American writer.

(tense music)

(sprightly music)

- [Voiceover] "In the 1920s, Berlin was ahead of everything

that was known as new in our field.

It had everything.

Reinhardt's great theater, great film studios, great films.

The most beautiful bars and restaurants,

including gay bars.

Berlin was productive and rich with ideas,

rich in ideals, and at the same time practical,

a combination never achieved before."

Marlene Dietrich, actress and singer, memoirs.

(elegant music)

- [Voiceover] "Art was no longer a mere ornament of life,

but rather its immediate expression.

Cubism, futurism, expressionism,

whatever you want to call it, this is how we wear it.

This was our world,

so shaken and shocked that everything was upside-down.

Surrealism?

Of course! What else?"

Vicki Baum, writer and journalist.

(jaunty music)

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] Despite the lack of political success,

the party stages spectacular rallies,

first in Munich and Weimar,

then from 1927 onwards, exclusively in Nuremberg.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Nuremberg, August the 4th 1929.

"A stampede of people that exceeds our wildest hopes.

Outside, the drums are already booming.

Torch light processions, endlessly long."

Joseph Goebbels, NSDAP leader of Berlin.

(plane rattling)

- [Voiceover] "The party conventions are without question,

Hitler's personal work.

Just as he was involved in building the SA

from the smallest details of the uniforms

to the color of the collar patches,

he concerned himself

with the planning of the party conventions,

right down to the decorations in the Congress Hall."

Albert Krebs, NSDAP leader, Hamburg.

- [Voiceover] "Through the city, a triumphant procession,

everyone cheering and throwing flowers,

marched past, almost four hours.

A sea of joy and flowers."

Joseph Goebbels, diary.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] The continuing fragmentation

of the party landscape is advantageous

for the rise of the NSDAP.

In elections, they win more and more support

from the splinter and protest parties.

After imprisonment in Landsberg,

Hitler becomes the sole leader of the nationalist movement.

He feels chosen by destiny

to show Germany the way to national salvation.

Although the party remains unsuccessful at the polls

and membership increases only slowly,

the personality cult around Hitler is growing.

This fuhrer cult

holds the National Socialist Movement together

across ideological divisions and personal differences.

Between 1925 and 1929,

Hitler's small political movement

is marked by activism, dynamism, enthusiasm,

youthfulness, and strength.

Nearly 60% of new party members are under 30 years old.

(people laughing)

- [Voiceover] "Street processions, press promotions,

propaganda tours into the provinces

created an atmosphere of activism and tension.

There were countless clashes

and wounded people, even dead people left in the square."

Horst Wessel, autobiography.

(vehicles rumbling)

- [Narrator] In February 1930, one of the casualties

will be the Berlin student Horst Wessel.

(people shouting) (horses neighing)

(singing in foreign language)

(Hitler speaking in foreign language)

- [Narrator] On November the 16th 1928,

for the first time

after the ban on public speaking in Prussia has been lifted,

Hitler speaks in the Sportpalast in Berlin,

allegedly in front of 18,000 supporters.

For the first time, he uses

an electro-acoustic sound system,

speaking into a microphone,

and for the first time, his words are clearly understood

in every corner of a large space.

(reel rattling)

(speaking in foreign language)

(somber music)

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] October 1929.

"Angry autumn after a beautiful summer.

Rain and calm weather

and something suffocating in the air,

and it wasn't the weather.

For the first time on the street, manure brown uniforms."

Sebastian Haffner, journalist, memoirs.

(triumphant music)

- [Narrator] The SPD had won the German elections of 1928,

and since then led a coalition government

with the middle-class people's parties.

This falls apart one year after the death

of the liberal foreign minister

over domestic policy differences.

In 1930, Chancellor Bruning

convinces President Von Hindenburg to dissolve Parliament

and call for new elections 24 months early.

Bruning is determined to govern

with the help of the president,

if necessary, without a majority.

(stately music)

- [Voiceover] "National Socialists were now

sitting in Parliament.

The rise of the party could no longer be overlooked."

Ernst Niekisch, National Bolshevist, Hitler opponent.

(crowd cheering)

(rhythmic music)

- [Narrator] Following the example of Italy,

at the end of the 1920s,

movements which are called fascist

are gaining strength all over Europe.

In some Eastern European states,

dictatorial governments rely

on the support of such factions.

A union of fascists is also established in the UK.

(crowd shouting)

A party demonstration in Manchester in 1934.

- [Voiceover] Sir Oswald Mosley,

founder, British Union of Fascists.

"In 1930, unemployment had increased to 3,076,000,

and the National Socialists then increased their MPs to 108

with a vote of 18%.

Less than three years later,

the National Socialist Party came to power.

Unemployment had risen to 6,014,000."

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] New Year's Order, December the 31st 1931.

"The army of brown shirts has multiplied numerous times.

The movement has suffered a great deal of blood sacrifice.

Comrades, at the beginning of this year,

I thank you for everything that you accomplished

over the past year through dedicated work

and self-sacrificing battles.

You can enter the new year with joyful confidence,

proud of what you achieved in the year 1931."

Adolf Hitler.

(pensive music)

- [Narrator] After an internal party discussion

in Munich on February the 2nd,

Adolf Hitler decides to run in the first round of voting

in the German presidential elections of March 1932.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin, February the 16th 1932.

"What a strange country in which the presidency

must be decided between Thalmann, Hitler, or Hindenburg."

Thea Sternheim, art collector and author.

- [Voiceover] "Again it was the politics of toleration

when the SPD asked its voters to vote for Hindenburg,

and how faithfully they followed."

Golo Mann, son of Thomas and Katia Mann.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, February the 29th 1932.

"Who will win?"

Henrietta Schneider, housekeeper, East Prussia.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Election campaign flight, April 1932.

"Soon Hitler had sunk into morose apathy.

He just sat there staring gloomily out of the window,

wads of cotton in his ears,

a complete contrast

to the glad-hand, extrovert man at Tempelhof.

As the door of the aircraft was flung open,

Hitler ducked out and immediately threw himself

into his fuhrer pose.

There he stood, bare-headed, upright, and unsmiling,

his hand raised in greeting."

Sefton Delmer, British correspondent

of the Daily Express in Berlin.

(people chattering)

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Weimar, April the 10th 1932, Sunday.

"Second round of voting in German presidential election.

Hindenburg finally elected over Hitler."

Harry Graf Kessler, publicist and diplomat.

- [Narrator] In June 1932, Franz von Papen,

on behalf of Reichsprasident Von Hindenburg,

forms a right-wing conservative cabinet

which is without a majority in Parliament.

The new chancellor hopes for the support of Hitler,

and according to Hitler's demand,

asks the Reichsprasident

to call new parliamentary elections on July the 31st.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, May the 31st 1932.

"Lotte is coming on Sunday.

She's planning a trip with Karl to Westerland.

Yesterday, Bruning resigned.

Now what?"

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] "The hero of Tannenberg,

the hero of the German Republic had a dull spirit,

a grumpy field marshal with his robust conscience.

With truly Germanic blind loyalty,

he betrayed the pious chancellor to whom he owed his power.

Bruning was fired.

His successor,

the comparatively liberal General Von Schleicher,

was soon the target of wild intrigue."

Klaus Mann, son of Katia and Thomas Mann.

(children laughing)

- [Voiceover] "For far too long, we had been content

with laughing and joking about the house painter Hitler."

Carl Zuckmayer, German Austrian dramatist.

(children chattering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Sunday July the 31st 1932.

"The hatred of the parties is awful.

At 10 o'clock the elections begin without Wilhelm.

He is plagued with neuralgia."

Henrietta Schneider.

(people clapping)

- [Narrator] The triumph of the National Socialists

in the July elections of 1932 is a pyrrhic victory.

(stately music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, August the 1st 1932.

"Election results.

We have gained a little ground.

Marxism has gained a great deal.

Now we have to seize power and wipe out Marxism.

Either way, Hitler is also of this opinion.

We won't get an absolute majority this way."

Joseph Goebbels.

(majestic music)

(thunder cracks)

- [Narrator] As almost all the major parties

in the Reichstag want to bring down Von Papen's government,

Reichsprasident Von Hindenburg

dissolves the newly elected Parliament in September

and calls new elections for November the 6th 1932.

(thunder cracking)

- [Voiceover] "In the German elections of November 1932,

the NSDAP won 11.75 million votes,

the SPD 7.25 million,

and the KPD some six million.

So together, both workers' parties

were a lot stronger than the Nazis."

Manes Sperber, Austrian writer and KPD member at the time.

- [Voiceover] "Many leftists believed

that Hitler would never recover from this setback

and had ceased to be a menace."

Christopher Isherwood, British American writer.

(somber music)

(people laughing)

- [Voiceover] January the 1st 1933.

"Hitler was in a good mood that evening

and talkative, like in the old days.

Before he left, he added to his entry in the guestbook."

- [Voiceover] "On the first day of the New Year."

- [Voiceover] "Then he looked at me and said

with suppressed excitement."

- [Voiceover] "This year belongs to us."

- [Voiceover] Ernst Hanfstaengl,

Head of the NSDAP Foreign Press Bureau.

- [Voiceover] "After Hindenburg had decided

against Chancellor Bruning,

the president turned his attention

to the forces of the great agrarian heavy industry coalition

that operated with Hitler against Bruning,

his natural allies.

He took their view of Hitler.

The reconstruction and further expansion

of the great agrarian and heavy industry positions of power

was to be taken forward.

(elegant music)

But the power was not to be

transferred to the National Socialism."

Ernst Niekisch, journalist, National Bolshevist.

(stately music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, January the 30th 1933,

"Elsa came back from school with the cry 'Heil Hitler!'

Then we knew Hitler had become German Chancellor at last."

Henrietta Schneider.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] A fragment of film

produced using an early Agfacolor film process.

It shows thousands of extras

recreating the torchlight procession

through the Brandenburg Gate.

It is supposed to remind viewers of January the 30th 1933.

- [Voiceover] "That the Nazis are enemies,

enemies for me and for everything dear to me,

I was not for a moment mistaken about that.

Where I was completely mistaken

was how terrible an enemy they would become."

Sebastian Haffner.

- [Voiceover] "The majority of his ministers

were members of the German National People's Party.

He utterly despised the party and was convinced

that he would one day be able to rid himself of them.

To be able to carry this out, he set one condition

to which the German President also agreed.

He wanted the power to order new elections."

Ernst Niekisch.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Speech in the Berlin Sportpalast,

February the 10th 1933.

(Hitler shouting in foreign language)

"I cannot divest myself of my faith in my people

and stand firmly by the conviction

that the hour will come at last

when the millions who curse us today will stand by us

and with us will hail the new hard-won

and painfully acquired German nation

that we have created together,

the new German Reich of greatness and power

and glory and justice, Amen."

(crowd cheering)

Adolf Hitler, Reich Chancellor.

- [Narrator] The Reichstag elections of March the 5th

are the last more or less free elections

in the German Reich.

On the streets, dissidents are terrorized by the SA.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "The terror that was felt everywhere

interfered, of course, with free elections,

but it influenced the results only slightly."

Manes Sperber.

(people cheering)

- [Narrator] In the elections, the NSDAP profits

from the high turnout of 88.8%,

gaining 43.9%.

It has to form a coalition

with the German National People's Party.

But the majority of Germans

don't want a parliamentary democracy either.

The democratic parties remain clearly in the minority

because 12.3% of the voters

cast their votes for the Communists.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] March the 12th 1933, press dispatch.

"The Office of the Reichstag sent the newly elected members

an invitation to the opening session.

According to a directive,

the Communist members of the assembly

were not sent an invitation."

Vossische Zeitung Newspaper.

(speaking in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] "Two days later,

I was sitting in the Kroll Opera House,

not as a Reichstag deputy.

I was an observer, and on March the 23rd 1933,

I witnessed the Reichstag session

in which the Enabling Act was passed by 441 votes to 94."

(speaking in foreign language)

Artur Axmann, member of the leadership of the Hitler Youth.

(speaking in foreign language)

- [Narrator] With the so-called Enabling Act,

Hitler demands extraordinary powers

for himself and his government,

thus paving the way for a dictatorship.

(people applauding)

- [Voiceover] "The Social Democrats were the only members

to vote against the Enabling Act.

(speaking in foreign language)

But despite my conviction

that the Social Democrats had failed,

I was not unimpressed by Wels' speech."

Artur Axmann.

(speaking in foreign language)

- [Narrator] Article one of the act

describes the transfer of legislative powers

from Parliament to the Cabinet.

The legislative and executive branches become one.

Parliament has virtually abolished itself.

(speaking in foreign language)

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "He overrode the constitution

with the constitution

and thus won the fight for unlimited power

in the first and decisive rout."

Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, Finance Minister.

- [Voiceover] "Anyone who did not fight

against the Hitler state effectively served it."

Esther, Countess of Schwerin, East Prussian landowner.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "I, as a natural coward

and endowed with an excruciating imagination,

kept my mouth shut."

Marie Luise Kaschnitz, writer, notes.

- [Voiceover] "People cling to life.

You could certainly go along with it,

but you could also keep a low profile and become invisible."

Oda Schaefer, writer.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Letter from prison, June the 7th 1933.

"You know that imprisonment doesn't depress me at all.

What could I really do outside at the moment?

Shrug off the sad looks of the workers

with a humiliated heart and sagging shoulders

and tell them that I cannot change it either?

It's better to be outwardly unfree

and inwardly face the future with a proud soul."

Julius Leber, SBD member of the Reichstag.

- [Narrator] The first improvised concentration camps

are run by the SA

and are then taken over by Himmler's SS,

thus creating the SS state.

(majestic music)

At the Nuremberg Victory Rally in early September 1933,

SA Chief of Staff Ernst Rohm

is the most prominent party leader after Hitler

and clearly his right-hand man.

Rohm shows his loyalty to Hitler in public.

Privately, however, he criticizes Hitler severely

for his policy on the German Army.

Thanks to his instinct for power,

Hitler is willing to believe the rumors

spread by opponents of the powerful head of the SA

that the leaders of the SA, with its four million members,

are planning a coup.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin, June the 24th 1934.

"Politically it stinks.

Nobody knows why exactly.

A power struggle is impending between the SA and the SS."

Erich Ebermayer, writer.

(people chattering)

- [Narrator] The differences of opinion

between Rohm and Hitler, especially concerning

the issue of the German Army, escalate.

Before the SA leadership,

Rohm finally calls for the German Army

to be included in his command.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Sunday, July the 1st 1934.

"Mutiny of the SA leaders in Munich with Rohm at its head.

Hitler himself helped arrest the gang and had them shot."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Narrator] On July the 2nd,

Hitler announces the official end of the purge

in which between 150 and 200 people were shot.

(solemn music)

- [Voiceover] "Rohm was one of the last victims.

He was shot on July the 2nd 1934."

Hans Frank, Bavarian Minister of Justice,

Reich Legal Director.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] To crush the alleged revolt by Rohm,

Adolf Hitler uses the services of the SS,

whose leaders have already brought the police

almost entirely under their command.

The SS, which was formerly still affiliated with the SA,

is rewarded for its murderous service.

On July the 20th 1934, Hitler decrees.

- [Voiceover] "In view of the great services of the SS,

particularly in connection

with the occurrences of June the 30th 1934,

I hereby promote them to a self-contained organization

within the NSDAP."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Narrator] With that, Hitler has forged

the decisive weapon of his state.

The SA becomes a kind of folklore club for the NSDAP.

[Voiceover] "Hitler swore that only 77 people

had been executed.

It had been unavoidable that some were shot by accident.

Like a certain Willi Schmid in Munich for example.

The SS were in a hurry to shoot the first Willy Schmidt

they could find without court proceedings.

You have to consider how many Willy Schmidts

there were in Munich."

Friedelind Wagner, granddaughter of Richard Wagner.

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin, August the 1st 1934.

"At lunchtime, we drove to the Halensee Baths.

People are friendly and peaceful.

Even the young people seem well-behaved here.

The Berliner Zeitung newspaper

published a bulletin at 8:30 this morning.

Condition deteriorating, pulse weaker.

So the end is near.

This death does not come at a good time."

Erich Ebermayer.

- [Voiceover] "The newspaper reports the following

about the death of Hindenburg.

The government has enacted the following law

that is hereby announced.

The office will be merged with that of the chancellor,

which means all authority of the president

goes to the Fuhrer and Chancellor, Adolf Hitler."

Karl Windschild, retired pastor, Ballenstedt, diary.

(solemn music)

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Wednesday, October the 17th 1934.

"A law has been made.

Hitler will remain the leader

of the German people for life."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] "The magic formula,

the Fuhrer has ordered,

the Fuhrer wishes,

the Fuhrer accepts,

the Fuhrer forbids,

or the Fuhrer authorizes

became the completely new legitimized method of authority

to issue directives

that nullified all existing forms of state life in Germany."

Hans Frank.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "Arrived in Munich around 8:00

and went to the Hofbrauhaus, which was very interesting.

Hitler seems so popular here,

as Mussolini was in Italy."

John F. Kennedy, student traveling in Europe, diary.

- [Voiceover] "At first, what surprised me

was that most Germans, as far as I could see,

didn't seem to mind

that their personal freedoms had been taken away,

that so much of their splendid culture was being destroyed,

or soon became aware, to be sure,

that in the background

there lurked the terror of the Gestapo

and the fear of the concentration camps.

The vast majority did not seem unduly concerned

with what had happened to a few Communists,

socialists, pacifists, defiant priests and pastors,

and to the Jews."

William Shirer, correspondent

to the Universal News Service in Berlin.

(train chugging)

- [Voiceover] "Departure for Cologne via Frankfurt.

All towns are very attractive,

showing that the Nordic races

certainly seem superior to Latins.

The Germans really are too good."

John F. Kennedy, diary.

(train chugging)

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "I had to think a lot about the comments

of an ordinary middle-aged Berlin woman.

She said she went to all the ceremonies

and stood near the front rows where the Fuhrer walked by,

but she was never able to see him

because whenever he came near, her eyes filled with tears."

Erich Kordt, Department Head, Foreign Ministry

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "Hitler seemed modest, middle-class,

rather dull and self-conscious,

yet with a strange tenderness and appealing helplessness."

Martha Dodd, daughter of US Ambassador William Dodd.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "In private,

and we as personal bodyguards belonged to his private life,

he was uncomplicated."

Rochus Misch, SS Bodyguard Regiment.

- [Voiceover] "Simple lower middle-class life

was not hard for him.

It attracted a lot of empathy.

It gave him a lot of credit for other unpopular decisions.

Otherwise his simple manner

also had clear political intentions.

He often emphasized."

- [Voiceover] "If I am simple and unpretentious,

then my surroundings have to be pompous.

That way, my simplicity appears even stronger."

- [Voiceover] Albert Speer, "The Kransberg Protocol."

(majestic music)

- [Voiceover] "Goering, who'd become fat and out of shape,

seemed ridiculous in his fantasy uniforms

and his love of medals and decorations.

His greed for earthly goods turned him into a crook.

Robert Coulondre, who served as an ambassador

to Berlin in autumn 1938,

wrote that of all Hitler's sinister buddies,

he was still the best."

Paul Stehlin, Air Force Attache

in the French Embassy in Berlin.

- [Voiceover] "It has been suggested many times

that Hitler had unwavering faith in his old comrades.

As far as the Reichsmarschall was concerned,

this assumption is true unfortunately."

Heinz Guderian, Commander of the Second Tank Division.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "For the rest of the evening, he told jokes

about Goebbels and Goering."

- [Voiceover] "Do you know the difference

between Goebbels and Goering?"

- [Voiceover] "He asked, and when nobody could answer,

he solved the riddle himself."

- [Voiceover] "Goebbels is the maximum amount of nonsense

a man can utter in one hour,

and Goering is the maximum of sheet metal

a man can hang on his chest."

- [Voiceover] Friedelind Wagner.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Berlin, November 1937.

"In November, the hunting exhibition was opened

by Reich Master Hunter Goering.

Strong foreign participation contributed to its success,

causing a sensation in Berlin

and impressing the visiting guests from all over the world.

Our French countryman came in droves."

Paul Stehlin.

- [Voiceover] "He condemned the elegant passions

of his lofty colleagues, like hunting or horse racing.

These were the last remnants

of the feudal rule of the princes.

He made fun of them a lot."

Albert Speer.

- [Voiceover] "Hitler's evil sprit was Goebbels."

Ernst Hanfstaengl.

- [Voiceover] "On the same evening,

I saw Goebbels for the first time,

a small man with an overly big head on a child's body.

He was surprisingly ugly.

His defect, he has a club foot,

barely lessened the antipathy that he aroused.

He was, however, very intelligent

and, after Hitler, the best public speaker in the party."

Paul Stehlin.

- [Voiceover] "I couldn't care less what people think,

and I'll say this openly.

Goebbels was an interesting man.

I never disliked him.

He was only dangerous towards the end."

Zarah Leander, Swedish singer and actress.

(majestic music)

- [Voiceover] "He was capable of recognizing

the faults and weakness of the National Socialist system,

but he wasn't courageous enough

to point these out to Hitler.

In front of Hitler,

he was like Goering and Himmler, a little man."

Heinz Guderian, Major General.

(people cheering)

- [Voiceover] Speech in Munich, March the 14th 1936.

"With the confidence of a sleepwalker,

I am following the path marked out by destiny for me."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Sunday, March the 16th 1935.

"In the evening, we heard a proclamation

to the German people by Dr. Goebbels.

In answer to the adoption

of two-year military service in France,

Hitler has introduced

compulsory military service in Germany.

Jubilation in Berlin."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] Interview with Ward Price,

correspondent for the Daily Mail,

January the 17th 1935.

"I know the horrors of war.

No gains can compensate for the losses it brings.

I have seen that war is not the highest form of bliss,

but the contrary.

I have witnessed only the deepest suffering.

Hence, I can quite frankly state,

Germany will never break the peace of its own accord."

Adolf Hitler.

(children chattering)

- [Voiceover] "I saw a sign on the shop door,

dogs and Jews not allowed."

Edgar Feuchtwanger.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Sunday, September the 15th 1935.

"On the radio tonight, they're announcing the outcome

of today's resolutions in the Reichstag.

That is to say, the laws

that the NSDAP deputies have agreed on,

the anti-Jewish laws.

Marriage between Aryans and non-Aryans is forbidden."

Calvin Sched, retired.

(speaking in foreign language)

(audience cheering)

(speaking in foreign language)

(audience cheering)

(shouting in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin, December the 10th 1935.

"The genetic health act or sterilization law has been passed

and envisages extensive examinations

and tests for engaged couples before they get married.

If things continue like this,

we'll soon have a race of supermen.

So far, there is no sign of this happening."

Erich Ebermayer.

- [Voiceover] "Before the end of Culture Week,

I was once again in an airplane,

and even from the air, I could see the mass of people

inside the party buildings on Zeppelinfeld.

On the way back from the airport,

the boiling heat of this uniformed public festival

suddenly enveloped me.

Marching music, columns of men, swirling dust,

swastika flags in all possible and impossible places.

And the pavements brown with people."

Paul-Otto Schmidt,

Chief Interpreter at the Foreign Ministry, experiences.

(singing in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] "The march past took four hours.

He held his right arm out in the Nazi salute

for literally the entire time.

Afterwards I asked him how he was able to do that.

His answer, willpower."

Neville Henderson, British Ambassador to Germany.

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] "Each time, I noticed

how enchanted people looked,

their faces full of near biblical devotion

when they saw Hitler.

As if delirious, they stretched out their arms

and greeted him with screams and shouts of Heil."

Paul-Otto Schmidt.

- [Narrator] Over the years,

the procedures at the Nuremberg rallies are canonized.

The form, as Hitler expresses to Albert Speer

in a debriefing of the party convention in 1938,

must be an irreversible ritual for as long as he lives.

Canonization would provide his potential successor

with Hitler's borrowed charisma

and become a liturgy of the Third Reich.

(people chattering)

(crowd shouting)

- [Voiceover] "On Friday the 11th of March 1938,

Austrian Radio broadcast a program of light music.

It was 7:45 in the evening

when the announcer suddenly interrupted.

The Chancellor was going to speak.

Kurt Schuschnigg said that in order to avoid bloodshed,

he would capitate to Hitler's wishes.

He ended his speech with the words God protect Austria."

Dr. Eduard Bloch, the Hitlers' family doctor,

written in US exile, March the 15th 1941.

(guns banging) (pensive music)

- [Voiceover] "Apart from his resolve

to bring all Teutonic races into the Reich,

as so plainly described in 'Mein Kampf, '

Hitler had two reasons for wishing

to absorb the Austrian Republic.

It opened both the door of Czechoslovakia

and the more spacious portals

of Southeastern Europe to Germany."

Winston Churchill, "The Second World War."

(stately music)

- [Voiceover] "If it is still claimed today

that Hitler occupied Austria

against the will of the Austrians,

that doesn't coincide with my observations."

Fritz Wiedemann, Adjutant to Adolf Hitler.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Hitler's speech from a balcony

of the Hapsburg Palace.

(speaking in foreign language)

"As Fuhrer and Chancellor of the German nation and Reich,

I report before history the entry of my homeland

into the German Reich."

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] On March the 25th 1938,

Hitler begins the last election campaign of his life.

Hitler wants to confirm the annexation of Austria

in a referendum.

He estimates 80% will vote in favor of it in Austria.

He's more than surprised

when on the evening of April the 10th

the referendum results are announced.

99.7% have voted for the Anschluss,

more than in the Old Reich.

(crowd cheering)

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] "He's really very lonely.

Doesn't have any luck with women.

He's too soft with them

Women don't like that.

They need a man to lord it over them."

Joseph Goebbels, diary.

(people chattering)

- [Narrator] In October 1938,

Willi Forst shoots "Bel Ami" in the UFA Studios in Berlin.

(jaunty music)

(singing in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] Speech to the Nazi Women's League

in Nuremberg.

"There was a time when liberalism fought

for the equal rights of women,

but the faces of German women, of German girls lacked hope.

They were gloomy and sad.

And today, today we see countless beaming, laughing faces."

Adolf Hitler.

(singing in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] "He knew that he could have

any number of women.

He refused because he didn't know, as he said jokingly,

whether they favored him as Reich Chancellor

or as Adolf Hitler."

Albert Speer.

- [Voiceover] "As for Eva Braun,

no one outside the inner circles of the party and the SS

knew of her until the last year of the war."

Charles Bewley,

Irish Envoy Extraordinary to Berlin, 1933 to 1939.

- [Voiceover] "Privately Hitler was very nice.

Eva Braun loved him very much and he loved her."

Herta Schneider, friend of Eva Braun.

- [Voiceover] Diary, November the 18th 1934.

"I don't want it to be my fault

if he doesn't like me anymore."

Eva Braun.

- [Narrator] For several months in the years 1934 and 1935,

Eva Braun keeps a diary.

The diary includes the period when she attempts suicide,

probably to get Hitler to commit to her.

(squirrel chirping)

- [Voiceover] Diary, March the 11th 1935

"If only I'd never met him.

I'm in despair.

I'm buying sleeping powders again.

He only needs me for certain purposes.

Nothing else is possible.

When he says he loves me, he means it only at that moment."

Eva Braun.

(waves rustling)

- [Voiceover] "That was when Eva Braun

attempted her first suicide.

This act of desperation moved Hitler deeply."

Christa Schroeder, Hitler's private secretary.

"Politically she had no idea.

You often heard Eva Braun complaining."

- [Voiceover] "I don't know anything.

Everything's kept secret from me."

(breezy music)

- [Voiceover] "Hitler had got used

to his girlfriend's character,

but he didn't give in to everything she wanted.

She was subject to a lot of strict rules.

When she danced, she did so secretly

because Hitler disliked dancing."

Christa Schroeder.

(people chattering)

(elegant music)

- [Voiceover] "The efforts my wife and I made

to encourage Hitler to take private dancing lessons

weren't crowned with success."

- [Voiceover] "No."

- [Voiceover] "He said categorically."

- [Voiceover] "For a statesman,

dancing is an undignified activity.

All of these balls are purely a waste of time.

And besides, the waltz is far too effeminate for a man.

It's exactly this waltz mania

that made me hate Vienna so much

and how it contributed

to the downfall of the Habsburg Empire."

- [Voiceover] Ernst Hanfstaengl, from 1937 in exile.

(elegant music)

(people chattering)

- [Narrator] Hitler maintains his publicly spartan lifestyle

in surroundings of not inconsiderable luxury.

In addition to his private apartment in Munich,

he also has a residence in the Alps on Obersalzberg.

Unnoticed by the public,

he builds up a fortune worth millions.

- [Voiceover] "I don't have any stocks.

I don't own shares in any company.

I don't earn dividends."

Adolf Hitler in the Krupp works, Essen,

March the 27th 1936.

- [Narrator] The Reich Finance Ministry declares

that Hitler is no longer obliged to pay taxes

due to his constitutional position,

and as of 1934, Hitler no longer does so.

(foreboding music)

- [Voiceover] "When he had to make big decisions,

he went up to Obersalzberg.

Here, life was geared to his personal needs.

Strolls around Obersalzberg,

stopping in small guesthouses gave him, as he said,

the inner peace and confidence

to make the decisions that surprise the world."

Albert Speer.

- [Voiceover] "He didn't drink a drop of alcohol,

never ate meat, didn't smoke.

His asceticism was real and not artificial."

Hans Frank.

- [Voiceover] "One of those present

asked his personal physician

whether the health of the Reich Chancellor

forced him to keep such a strict diet,

and he answered that his spartan habits

were mainly for psychological reasons."

Gustaf Mannerheim, Finnish Field Marshal.

- [Voiceover] Incidentally, the Fuhrer tried to spoil

the meat eaters' enjoyment of their meal.

Although he didn't want to convert anyone to vegetarianism,

he suddenly began talking about how awful it was

walking through an abattoir.

Gertraud Traudl Junge, Hitler's private secretary.

(pig squealing)

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "Enjoying meat, he said,

triggered a desire for alcohol,

and then again, alcohol stimulated smoking,

and this was how one vice led to another.

Nicotine was, in his opinion, even worse than alcohol.

He actually toyed with the idea

of totally banning smoking throughout Germany.

The campaign would start with a skull and crossbones

printed on the cigarette packet."

Christa Schroeder.

- [Narrator] Hitler is driven by the notion

that he will only be granted a short life.

(ominous music)

- [Voiceover] My personal last will and testament.

Berlin, May the 2nd 1938.

"In the case of my death,

I dispose that my remains be buried

in the right-hand temple of the Eternal Guardhouse.

My coffin should resemble the others.

That my entire estate be left to the party.

To Fraulein Eva Braun, Munich,

a lifelong allowance of 1,000 marks per month.

To my sister Angela, Dresden,

a lifelong allowance of 1,000 marks per month.

To my sister Paula, Vienna,

a lifelong allowance of 1,000 marks per month.

To my stepbrother Alois Hitler,

the lump sum of 60,000 marks.

To my trusted Julius Schaub,

the lump sum of 10,000 marks

and a lifelong monthly pension of 500 marks.

I appoint the Master of the Treasury

as executor of this testament.

In the case of his death, Martin Bormann."

Adolf Hitler.

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] "He has managed to captivate his people,

using a mystical band

that is not even dependent on the National Socialist Party

that helped him into power.

I often have the opportunity to experience this,

indeed, in all social circles."

Robert Coulondre,

French Ambassador to Berlin, 1938 and 1939.

(people clapping)

- [Voiceover] "Troppau lies near the German border.

Whenever we came up to the border,

several in the group broke away,

ran across the border line, and kissed the German earth.

Later, I learned that these children were ethnic Germans

who were raised to love Germany."

Ruth Elias, Czech Jew.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, September the 12th 1938.

"In the evening, we heard the close

of the party convention in Nuremberg.

Adolf Hitler called on President Benes,

if the Sudeten Germans are not protected,

we know what we have to do.

God preserve the existing peace."

(stately music)

Diary, Tuesday, September the 27th 1938.

"Hitler spoke to the German people last night.

If Benes doesn't accept his offer,

we'll move in on October the 1st.

That means war."

Diary, Wednesday September the 28th 1938.

"Tomorrow, a meeting in Munich

between Hitler, Daladier, Chamberlain, and Mussolini."

Diary, Friday, September the 30th 1938.

"The negotiations in Munich have had a happy ending.

The Czechs have to pull out of the Sudetenland tomorrow.

Hitler, our prince of peace."

Henrietta Schneider, housekeeper, East Prussia.

- [Voiceover] "The genius of the Fuhrer

and his determination not to shrink even in the face of war

have again achieved victory without the use of force."

Alfred Jodl, Major General.

- [Voiceover] "In spite of the harshness and ruthlessness

I thought I saw in his face,

I got the impression that here was a man

who could be relied upon when he had given his word."

Neville Chamberlain, British Prime Minister,

letter to his sister.

- [Voiceover] "On Monday, November the 7th 1938,

the stateless 17-year-old Jewish boy Grynszpan

goes to the German Embassy,

demands to speak with one of the councilors,

is taken to the Duty Councilor Vom Rath, and shoots him.

Grynszpan describes the motive for the act

as wanting to take revenge for his fellow believers

for the Polish Jews forced out of Germany.

Walter Tausk, German Jew, Wroclaw, diary.

- [Voiceover] "In Munich, the failed putsch of 1923

was celebrated with great pomp.

The SS marched through all over the city.

The radio announced the death of the diplomat."

Edgar Feuchtwanger.

(speaking in foreign language)

(dignified music)

(speaking in foreign language)

(pompous music)

(speaking in foreign language)

(singing in foreign language)

(fire crackling)

- [Narrator] Following a traditional march

to the Feldherrnhalle,

at a social evening of NS party leaders and old comrades,

Joseph Goebbels announces the death of Ernst vom Rath.

- [Voiceover] "I go to the party reception

in the Old Town Hall.

Very busy.

I report the matter to the Fuhrer.

He orders."

- [Voiceover] "Withdraw the police.

The Jews should for once feel the people's anger."

- [Voiceover] Joseph Goebbels, diary.

(fire crackling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, November 1938.

"In the night that brings the news of the death,

a pogrom breaks out all over Germany.

All the synagogues are on fire.

Windows are smashed in all the Jewish shops,

the wares destroyed.

Apartments are broken into.

Thousands of Jewish men are arrested

and locked up in concentration camps."

Kathe Kollwitz, painter and sculptress.

(rain splattering)

- [Voiceover] "When that segment of the population

that had not taken part, either as police or SA,

awoke after the fatal night

and saw the destruction that had taken place,

a sequence unfolded that its instigators had not expected.

An unmistakable deep sense of depression and shame

seized the public.

People said, 'I'm ashamed to be a German.'"

Rudolf Bing, German Jewish businessman, Nuremberg.

(thunder cracking)

(lively music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, December the 6th 1938.

"A boycott has been issued against Jews

throughout the Reich.

The ban against Jews in Berlin applies to all theaters,

cinemas, cabarets, concert and lecture halls,

museums, fairs, the radio tower,

the Deutschlandhalle and the Sportpalast.

In addition, all outdoor and indoor swimming pools,

as well as from Wilhelmstrasse and Vossstrasse

to the Reich Monument and the Zeughaus."

Erich Ebermayer, writer.

(audience cheering)

- [Narrator] Harassed by the Nazi authorities,

around 120,000 German and Austrian Jews

succeed in leaving their homeland

by the beginning of the Second World War.

(jaunty music)

(wind howling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, January the 1st 1939.

"A new year.

Ah, may it be a year of peace."

Thea Sternheim, art collector and author.

- [Narrator] On the 13th of February 1939,

Hitler tells a few confidantes that he intends

to take action against the Czechs in mid-March.

German propaganda is adjusted accordingly.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin,

March the 14th 1939, nighttime.

"Foreign broadcasters are reporting

that the Czechoslovak President Hacha

arrived in Berlin today and was received by Hitler.

Does this mean war after all?"

Erich Ebermayer.

(triumphant music)

- [Voiceover] "In the meantime,

I dealt with the transcription

of the statement of just a few lines, reading,

the Czechoslovak President has declared

that he has trustingly placed

the fate of the Czech people and country

in the hands of the Fuhrer of the German Reich.

The Fuhrer accepted this declaration

and expressed his intention of taking the Czech people

under the protection of the German Reich

and guaranteeing them autonomous development

of their ethnic life suited to their character."

Paul-Otto Schmidt, interpreter for Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "For three hours,

Hitler conducted a discussion

with the President of Czechoslovakia.

We all knew that it was about war or peace.

Suddenly the door opened.

Hitler rushed out and proclaimed."

- [Voiceover] "So people, good news.

Hacha has signed the agreement.

I will go down as the greatest German in history."

- [Voiceover] Christa Schroeder, Hitler's private secretary.

- [Voiceover] Letter to Elisabeth Wagner,

March the 15th 1939, evening.

"The Fuhrer drove to Prague at four o'clock this afternoon.

He is staying at Prague Castle.

In the morning, there will be a parade.

His dream is thus fulfilled."

Eduard Wagner, Artillery General.

- [Voiceover] Secret report

to Ambassador Jozef Lipski in Berlin.

"Everyone is awaiting further steps from Hitler.

It is generally assumed that after the annexation of Memel,

he has to move on to the settlement demands with Poland,

primarily the takeover of Danzig and the Corridor.

The solution to these questions will meet with understanding

and recognition by the German people."

Feliks Chiczewski, Polish General Consul.

(bell ringing)

- [Voiceover] Letter to his wife, Vita Sackville-West,

April the 20th 1939.

"There is a break in the crisis, which makes me uneasy.

That is one of the worst things with this tension.

If Hitler doesn't do anything, we all become uneasy,

and if he does do something, we all get frightened."

Harold Nicolson, member of Parliament, National Labor Party.

(mellow music)

- [Voiceover] "The summer was winding down.

The weather was warm and sultry,

and Danzig's numerous cafes, beer and wine gardens

were filled with Germans enjoying themselves

despite all the talk of imminent war.

It was difficult to conceive of such folks going to war

or causing war to break out over them."

Williams Shirer, correspondent

for the Columbia Broadcast System in Berlin.

- [Voiceover] August the 13th 1939, Obersalzberg.

Paul-Otto Schmidt, interpreter of Adolf Hitler.

"Hitler was completely set on war."

- [Voiceover] "The British are guilty of everything.

The Poles have a serious lesson to learn.

The democracies are inferior to Germany

and will never fight."

- [Voiceover] "Was the recurring key note

of the German dictator's speeches.

The next day, the Italian Foreign Minister Ciano

was received at the Berghof.

Hitler spoke the following sentence at this event."

- [Voiceover] "I am firmly convinced

that neither England nor France

will enter into a general war."

(ominous music)

- [Narrator] On August the 19th,

Kathe and Erich Heuser from Leipzig

begin their honeymoon with a canoe trip on the Oder River

in Upper Silesian Raciborz.

They take Erich's camera.

For 12 days, the newlywed Leipzigers paddle down the Oder.

During this time, Adolf Hitler propels the continent

into a world war.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Paris, August the 19th 1939.

"Announcement of a German-Russian Nonaggression Pact."

Thea Sternheim.

- [Narrator] At the end of July, on Hitler's approval,

Foreign Minister Von Ribbentrop

and State Secretary Von Weizsaecker set the foundations

for an agreement with the Soviet Union,

which also includes the partitioning of Poland

and the Baltic states.

Hitler is in a hurry because he believes autumn rains

will prevent a motorized war in backward Poland.

- [Voiceover] "On August the 19th,

Stalin accepted Hitler's offer with both hands

after Hitler had suggested splitting the Baltic

into spheres of influence.

I noted, but if Ribbentrop travels to Moscow,

it means Russia is inviting Hitler to invade Poland."

Ernst von Weizsaecker,

Secretary of State at the Foreign Office, memoirs.

- [Voiceover] Telegram to the German Chancellor,

Herr A. Hitler.

August the 21st 1939.

"I thank you for your letter.

I hope that the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact

will be a turning point and a serious improvement

in political relations between our countries."

J. Stalin.

- [Voiceover] Addressed to the commanders in chief

of the military,

August the 22nd 1939.

"It was becoming clear to me that a dispute with Poland

might take place at an unfavorable time.

Here is the basis for this finding.

It depends essentially on me, on my existence,

on my political ability.

For it is a fact that probably no one

will ever have the trust

of the entire German people as I do.

In the future, there will probably never be a man

who has more authority than I.

My presence, therefore, is of great value,

but I can be eliminated any time

by a criminal or by an idiot."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "Suffocatingly humid days

full of fear and expectations.

Very calm, now only a few cars,

but trains, trains almost without a break,

whistling shrilly.

You can't do anything, can't think,

can't feel anything other than no war."

Marie Luise Kaschnitz, author, notes.

- [Narrator] On August the 30th, Kathe and Erich Heuser

reach the delta of the Oder River

and Szczecin, the harbor.

Government cruise liners are anchored here,

placed under the protection of the Red Cross

as hospital ships.

Two days after the honeymooners arrive in Szczecin,

the Second World War begins.

Erich Heuser becomes a soldier on September the 1st.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Wednesday, August the 30th 1939.

"In the afternoon, troops equipped for war

passed for hours heading for the border.

Poland has declared mobilization."

Henrietta Schneider, East Prussia.

- [Voiceover] Private war diary, General Franz Halder.

"Demands of the Fuhrer on the military leadership.

Destruction of Poland equals

elimination of its living power.

It is not about achieving a specific line or a new border,

but about destroying the enemy.

The means are of little concern."

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "It is disturbing to see the amount

of responsibility that he bears and accepts."

Eduard Wagner. (ominous music)

(gunfire banging)

- [Voiceover] Message from Commander

of Westerplatte Peninsula

to Polish Navy Headquarters in Gdynia,

September the 1st 1939, 4:50.

"At 4:45, the armored cruiser Schleswig-Holstein

opened fire on the Westerplatte with all its guns.

The barrage continues."

(gunfire banging)

Henrich Zukarski, Major of the Polish Army.

- [Voiceover] Morning, 10:00 am, Reichstag session.

"Hitler appears deadly serious,

for the first time in field gray uniform.

Members of Parliament rise silently,

and Hitler speaks without notes,

describing the events of the last days.

Then comes a sentence."

- [Voiceover] "Since 5:45 am, we have been returning fire."

- [Voiceover] Rudolf Jordan, provincial NSDAP leader.

- [Voiceover] Address before the Reichstag,

September the 1st 1939.

"I have once more put on that coat

that was most sacred and dear to me.

I will not take it off again until victory is secured,

or I will not survive the outcome."

- [Voiceover] "In the early hours,

4:00 am of September the 3rd,

I was accordingly instructed by His Majesty's government

to arrange for a meeting

with the Minister for Foreign Affairs at 9:00 am.

I accordingly handed the final ultimatum

from His Majesty's government to Dr. Schmidt

at precisely 9:00 am,

pointing out that unless satisfactory assurances

were received by His Majesty's government

before 11:00 am British summertime

of the suspension of all the German forces from Poland,

a state of war would exist between our two countries

as from that hour."

Neville Henderson, British Ambassador to Germany.

(bells tolling)

- [Voiceover] Paul-Otto Schmidt,

Chief Interpreter of the Foreign Ministry, experiences.

"Then I took the ultimatum to the Chancellery.

Hitler's most prominent people

were gathered in the room in front of his office.

'What news?' asked anxious voices.

I answered with a shrug, 'School's canceled, '

and entered the next room

where Hitler was sitting at his desk,

while Ribbentrop stood at the window.

I remained some distance from Hitler's desk

and slowly translated the ultimatum

of the British government.

When I finished, there was total silence.

Hitler sat as though turned to stone,

just looking straight ahead.

After a while, he turned to Ribbentrop."

- [Voiceover] "What now?"

- [Voiceover] "Ribbentrop replied with a quiet voice."

- [Voiceover] "I suppose the French will issue

an identical ultimatum within the hour."

- [Voiceover] "As my job was now finished,

I left and told those waiting outside,

in two hours, a state of war will exist

between England and Germany.

Goering turned to me and said."

- [Voiceover] "If we lose this war,

then may heaven have mercy on us."

(somber music)

- [Voiceover] War diary, September the 13th 1939.

"The Fuhrer's motorcade roared by.

We saw our Fuhrer.

He was going to the front."

Gerhardt Ent, soldier, Flensburg.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] Some 16,000 members

of the German Armed Forces die,

and 30,000 are wounded in the Polish campaign of 1939.

Sources report 68,000 dead

and 130,000 wounded on the Polish side.

Tens of thousands of Polish civilians are killed

in the course of the five-week conflict.

(fire crackling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, September the 28th 1939.

"Warsaw has finally fallen.

Mountains of corpses have to be removed.

The Russians are marching into Poland

and are moving up to an agreed demarcation line.

Scattered Polish divisions

are leading a heroic desperate struggle."

Rudolf von Auvensladen, Captain, 16th Tank Division.

(majestic music)

- [Voiceover] "The next day in Warsaw,

troops paraded in front of Hitler.

The Lantschner brothers filmed him.

I was standing near Hitler

and saw how the troops looked at him, mesmerized.

Without exception,

they appeared ready to do anything for him.

If he were to give the order, they would die for him."

Leni Riefenstahl, director and actress.

- [Voiceover] "Fuhrer spoke at length and in detail

about the ongoing incorporation

of the former provinces of Posen and West Prussia.

The social strata thought to be racially valuable

could be Germanized.

In principle, they would have to look racially pure

and have the right hereditary disposition.

A special cultural heritage group would be created.

Here, language would be the most important factor.

He said he wasn't interested in the Polish intelligentsia

as they were the supporters of Polish nationalism."

Gerhard Engel, Army Adjutant to Hitler,

memoirs in diary form.

- [Voiceover] "At lunchtime on May the 9th,

we left Berlin in great secrecy

and traveled at first light towards Hamburg.

Turned the train around and arrived in Ahm at 3:00 am.

Under a beautiful starry sky,

we went by car to the command post

to the Fuhrer's headquarters,

the Felsennest or Rocky Eyrie."

Wilhelm Keitel, Supreme High Commander

of the Armed Forces, memoirs.

"In the first armed forces report at noon on May the 10th,

I had recorded the sentence,

the Fuhrer has personally taken over supreme command

of the German Army operating in the west.

I wrestled with him for half an hour

over the approval of this publication.

He declared he wanted to remain anonymous

and not diminish the glory for the generals.

I did not let up, and in the end, he gave in."

Wilhelm Keitel.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "Hitler took the credit

for the success of the western campaign."

Albert Speer, memoirs.

(horn blaring)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Friday, May the 10th 1940.

"Now the war has really begun.

Chamberlain has stepped down and Churchill replaced him.

One bad person's left, and a much worse one has come."

Henrietta Schneider.

(solemn music)

- [Voiceover] "Thus, then, on the night of the 10th of May,

at the outset of this mighty battle,

I acquired the chief power in the state.

I cannot conceal that I was conscious

of a profound sense of relief.

I felt as if I were walking with destiny

and that all my past life had been but a preparation

for this hour and for this trial."

Winston Churchill, "The Second World War."

- [Voiceover] May the 23rd 1940.

"We've done it.

The Air Force is destroying the English on the beach.

I was able to persuade Hitler to stop the army.

The Fuhrer wants this to be a lesson for them."

Hans Jeschonnek,

Chief of the General Staff of the Air Force

to Erhard Milch, State Secretary of the Aviation Ministry.

(ominous music)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Friday, June the 14th 1940.

"News at one o'clock at night.

Paris occupied by our troops without a fight.

Flag raised for three days."

Henrietta Schneider.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "France offered a ceasefire on June the 17th.

I've never seen Hitler as happy as on that day."

Heinz Linge, valet to Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "France's peace offer was submitted to him

while he stood surrounded by his officers.

He slapped his thigh in a lively gesture.

We were to one side and observed the scene

that Walter Frentz also filmed."

Christa Schroeder, "He Was My Boss."

- [Voiceover] Heinrich Hofmann, photographer.

"Keitel, who was carried away by an outburst of emotion,

coined the fatal phrase."

- [Voiceover] "My Fuhrer, you are the greatest

military commander of all time."

(crowd cheering)

(stately music)

- [Voiceover] Franz Halder, Chief of the General Staff.

"Part of Hitler's growing self-deification

after the first military successes

involve believing it himself."

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "Hitler was at the height of his power.

He was the master of Europe."

Gustaf Mannerheim, Field Marshal of Finland.

(singing in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] "Germany had air supremacy over Europe

An invasion of Great Britain seemed to be in the offing."

Ernst von Weizsaecker.

- [Voiceover] "A stay of a few days in the English capital

was all that was needed

to recognize the difference between London and Paris.

Here, no one was considering capitulation."

Julius Deutsch, Austrian Socialist of Jewish descent,

in exile, memoirs.

- [Voiceover] "It was only after France

had been flattened out

that Britain, thanks to her island advantage,

developed out of the pangs of defeat

and the menace of annihilation

a national resolve equal to that of Germany."

Winston Churchill.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Saturday, July the 20th 1940.

"Hitler spoke in the Reichstag.

Made an offer of peace to England."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] Memoirs in diary form,

November the 4th 1940, Reich Chancellery.

"An unpleasant meeting at headquarters

attended by Goering, Von Brauchitsch, Keitel.

Due to English and other press reports,

Fuhrer for the first time doubts the successes

of the Luftwaffe and the strike figures.

Fuhrer visibly depressed.

Have the impression that he doesn't know how to proceed."

Gerhard Engel.

- [Voiceover] The Fuhrer and the Supreme Commander

of the German Army.

The Fuhrer Headquarters.

Absolutely top secret, for officers only.

Nine copies, second copy.

Order number 21, Operation Barbarossa.

"Even before the end of the war against England

the German Army has to be prepared

to overthrow Soviet Russia in a quick campaign,

Operation Barbarossa.

The bulk of the Russian Army in Western Russia

should be destroyed in bold operations

via tank pincer movements

in order to prevent the withdrawal of strong combat units

into the expanses of the Russian interior."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] Memoirs in diary form,

December the 18th 1940.

"The order for Barbarossa has been issued.

The Army Supreme Commander has ordered us to find out

whether the Fuhrer wants armed engagement

or is just bluffing.

In my opinion, Fuhrer himself

still doesn't know how to proceed.

He hopes the English will capitulate

and doesn't believe the USA will enter the war."

Gerhard Engel.

(vehicles rumbling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, June the 9th 1941.

"There's a big operation here.

The streets are full of military of every kind

on their way to the border."

Henrietta Schneider, East Prussia.

- [Voiceover] "When he decided on the eastern campaign

in the summer of 1941,

he told Eva Braun he had to travel to Berlin

for a few days."

Christa Schroeder.

(stirring music)

- [Voiceover] "When Adolf heard the music of Wagner,

he was transformed.

Then he lost his fierceness.

He became quiet, flexible, manageable.

The unease disappeared from his face.

What had moved him during the day vanished."

August Kubizek, childhood friend.

- [Voiceover] "Wagner's music became second nature to him."

Ernst Hanfstaengl,

until 1937, Head of the NSDAP Foreign Press Bureau.

- [Voiceover] "He loved the Wagner opera the most.

Other than that, symphonies by Beethoven and Bruckner

or songs by Richard Strauss.

Of the light entertainment pieces,

he appreciated 'The Bat' and 'The Merry Widow.'

Bormann proved his musical knowledge

just by changing the records."

Heinrich Hoffmann.

(jaunty music)

(singing in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] "It was almost always the same repertoire

that Hitler had them play.

The only popular song Hitler allowed

was the 'Donkey Serenade, '

which often concluded the concert."

Gertraud Traudl Junge, Hitler's private secretary.

(triumphant music)

- [Voiceover] "You'll be hearing that a lot

in the near future.

It'll be the victory fanfare for our Russian campaign.

Very like it."

Adolf Hitler to Albert Speer,

after listening to the first pass

of "Les Prelude" by Frans Liszt.

The Russian Fanfare, June 21st 1941.

(birds chirping)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Saturday, June the 21st 1941.

"Wild rumors are coming from the border."

Henrietta Schneider.

(foreboding music)

- [Voiceover] War diary of the Army Group North,

June the 22nd 1941.

"Beginning of the invasion, 3:05 am.

The entire front of the army group crossed the border."

Robert Freiherr von Griessenbach, Major.

- [Voiceover] "Is he mad, this Hitler?

He could have allied himself with England's Chamberlain

against Communist Russia

or with Communist Russia

against the Anglo-Saxon capitalist world.

But he invaded both.

Yes, he is mad, thank God."

Klaus Mann, "A Life's Report."

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Christa Schroeder.

"It all began so promisingly.

In the first two days in the Wolfsschanze,

we experienced the boss standing in front

of a large map of Europe

and pointing to Moscow, saying.

- [Voiceover] "In a few weeks, we'll be in Moscow.

There's no doubt about that.

And then I'll raze Moscow to the ground.

I'll build a reservoir there.

The name Moscow has to be erased completely."

- [Voiceover] Wilhelm Keitel,

Chief of the Armed Forces High Command,

to Field Marshal Fedor von Bock

on July the 25th 1941.

"The speedy collapse of Russia

is vital for German interests

since Russia cannot be subjugated.

The Fuhrer was concerned about this situation

and asked worriedly."

- [Voiceover] "How much time do I have left

to finish off Russia,

and how much time do I still need?"

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Russia, Army Group South, letter, 1941.

"It is our war,

not as the enemy propaganda likes to call it, Hitler's war.

They don't know that Hitler is one of us,

a soldier like us.

We know that he would do everything in his power for us.

That gives us unlimited trust.

The Fuhrer leaves no comrade in the lurch,

and when he doesn't help,

it's because there was something more important."

Horst Rocholl, regimental doctor from Kassel.

(wind howling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, October the 10th 1941, 11:30 pm.

"It's snowing in Russia now,

something we can't deal with well."

(soldiers laughing)

Eduard Wagner, Quartermaster General.

(solemn music)

- [Voiceover] "There is a winter, you know, in Russia.

For a good many months,

the temperature is apt to fall very low.

There is snow, there is frost, and all that.

Hitler forgot about this Russian winter.

He must have been very loosely educated.

We all heard about it at school, but he forgot it."

Winston Churchill.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Thursday, December the 11th 1941.

"Around three o'clock we listened to the Fuhrer

from the Reichstag.

The war with America is also official now.

The Fuhrer will make sure everything turns out well."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] "When the German Army,

surprised by the terrible winter of 1941-42,

got stuck in the Russian ice and snow,

Hitler was frequently depressed.

But as before, he hoped for a quick victory."

- [Voiceover] "There is only a very thin veil

that we have to penetrate.

We have to be patient.

The Russian resistance will not hold."

(gun bangs)

- [Voiceover] Christa Schroeder.

- [Voiceover] "On December the 17th, I visited the generals

commanding the 14th and 47th Tank Corps,

as well as the Seventh Army Corps

to again learn about the condition of the troops.

The three generals reported

that the troops were beginning to have doubts

about the high command.

Black ice making all movement difficult.

The Russians are prepared and equipped for winter,

and we have nothing."

Heinz Guderian, Colonel General.

(wind howling)

- [Voiceover] Franz Halder, war diary,

December the 17th 1941.

"Midnight, summoned to the Fuhrer."

- [Voiceover] "Disengagement is out of the question.

The enemy has only made deep incursions in a few places.

Setting up a rear echelon is illusionary.

The front is suffering in only one respect.

The enemy has more soldiers.

He has no more artillery.

He is much worse off than we are."

- [Voiceover] Adolf Hitler, oral order to Army Group Center,

December the 16th 1941.

"Commanders, unit leaders, and officers,

I had to take personal steps to force troops

to engage in fanatical resistance to hold their position

without regard to enemy breakthroughs

on the frank or in the rear.

Only with this kind of warfare

can we gain the time necessary

to get reinforcements from the homeland and the west

that I have ordered."

(gunfire rattling)

- [Voiceover] Diary, January the 11th 1942.

"How meek our military communiques have become."

Friedrich Kellner, court employee, Laubach, Hesse.

(explosion banging)

- [Voiceover] "But the burden of work

and increasing concerns

from setbacks in the course of the war

eroded Hitler's health.

From the winter of 1941-1942 onwards,

Morell monitored him day and night.

In the end, Hitler began having mysterious injections

almost every day."

Christa Schroeder.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Berlin, March the 3rd 1942.

"The hallmarks of the situation.

Further erosion of the German forces in Russia.

Slow further deterioration

of the economic and food situations in Germany."

Ulrich von Hassell,

diplomat and member of the German Resistance.

- [Voiceover] From Rostov-on-Don.

"Several waves of retreat roll through our area

in this summer of 1942.

The oil tanks are opened. Wheat fields torched,

all so that they wouldn't fall into the hands of the enemy.

On August the 3rd 1942, German scouts surface on motorbikes.

Within three days, German troops moved into Privolnoye.

Soviet troops are scattered.

But beyond Nalchik, barrier units worked

to carry out Order Number 227 from Stalin.

'Not one step back.'"

Mikhail Gorbachev, schoolboy.

- [Voiceover] War diary, July the 30th 1942, Day 404.

"In the bow of the River Don, west of Stalingrad,

the Sixth Army of Army Group B

is engaged in a fierce battle,

and the situation is at present unclear."

Franz Halder.

- [Voiceover] "I wanted to come to the Volga,

to a specific place and a specific city."

Adolf Hitler, addressed to the traditional gathering

in the Munich Burgerbraukeller,

November the 9th 1942.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "On September the 11th,

I was ordered to report

to the front line staff under Khrushchev.

They told me to take over the 62nd Army.

My orders were defend Stalingrad.

After I accepted the order,

Nikita Khrushchev asked me, 'How do you see this?'

I said, 'I understand the order very well.

I try to carry it out.

Either I defend Stalingrad or I die doing so.'

I got in the car and drove to Stalingrad."

Vasily Chuikov, Lieutenant General,

"The Stalingrad Protocols."

(men laughing)

- [Voiceover] "The high point of the war had been reached.

Something unimaginable overpowered the wildest dreams.

The North Cape, Pyrenees, Sahara, and Volga

formed the boundaries of a sphere of influence

created overnight.

For sure there were bigger empires,

but this one included Europe and its nations.

There was no reason for joy.

You knew what lay ahead for us

because the disproportion of forces was obvious."

Rudolf von Auvensladen, Army Captain, diary.

(gunfire rattling)

- [Voiceover] "We knew that Hitler wouldn't stop

and would keep throwing military forces at the front.

But he sensed that it was not a battle for life

being fought here, but rather a battle to the death."

Vasily Chuikov.

(gunfire rattling)

- [Voiceover] "I feel entitled to demand

that every German soldier should sacrifice his life."

Adolf Hitler to Heinz Guderian

on December the 20th 1940, 3:30 pm.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Sunday, November the 8th 1942.

"The Fuhrer spoke from the Munich Hofbraeukeller.

He laid into the war criminals again.

The Americans landed in Algiers during the night."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] Dr. Theo Morell,

Adolf Hitler's personal physician.

Diary, December the 15th 1942.

"Patient day.

Sleeping badly because of the military situation.

Profundol."

(wind howling)

- [Voiceover] "Up until the very end,

the soldiers believed Hitler's promise

that he would get them out of the encirclement.

I knew that this was a terrible lie."

Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven, Major,

flown out of the Stalingrad siege.

(gunfire rattling)

- [Voiceover] Interrogation protocol

of prisoner Hermann Strotmann,

Lieutenant Adjutant of the First Battalion

of the 79th Panzergrenadier Regiment,

born 1918 in Muenster, Catholic.

"Men reached the limits of their endurance,

and this limit was reached on February the 2nd.

We surrendered spontaneously.

Around six o'clock in the morning,

I was told that Russian tanks had arrived.

I began to cry, walked out of the shelter,

and laid down my weapon."

(menacing music)

- [Voiceover] "At what point is one allowed

to view the war as lost?

As I see it, very late."

Albert Speer, "The Kransberg Protocols."

- [Voiceover] "His mother went to Mass

with little Paula every Sunday.

I can't recall that Adolf accompanied

his mother to church once."

August Kubizek, childhood friend of Adolf Hitler in Linz.

- [Voiceover] "Hitler had no emotional connection

to the church.

He thought the Christian religion was an outdated,

hypocritical, people-ensnaring institution."

Christa Schroeder, Hitler's private secretary.

- [Voiceover] "If the people think I'm a religious man,

that cannot hurt."

Adolf Hitler to photographer Heinrich Hoffmann.

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] "I can say with certainty

that even before my departure,

I learned about Hitler's intention

to liquidate patients with incurable diseases,

not only incurable mental patients, in the event of war.

His reasoning was that these would be

unnecessary mouths to feed."

Fritz Wiedemann, personal adjutant

of the NSDAP to Adolf Hitler

until January the 19th 1939.

(projector rattling)

- [Voiceover] Memoirs in diary form,

August the 8th 1939.

"Today we witnessed something cruel.

Bouhler and Bormann showed Hitler

the euthanasia film, 'Unworthy Life.'

It deals with the life and behavior

of incurable mental patients in a number of sanatoriums.

There was a long discussion afterwards.

The Fuhrer had a really harsh attitude.

If he had such a child,

he would request that it be put out of its misery,

not least for the sake of fellow humans."

Gerhard Engel, Army Adjutant to Hitler.

- [Narrator] For many of Adolf Hitler's crimes,

no documents exist

that verify his direct and immediate responsibility.

It is different with the centrally organized killing

of the mentally handicapped, referred to as euthanasia.

Some time in early October 1939,

Adolf Hitler signs a backdated order

for September the 1st, the day of the start of the war.

With his signature, he authorizes Philipp Bouhler,

the Chief of the Fuhrer's Chancellery,

and Hitler's young personal physician, Karl Brandt.

- [Voiceover] "Reichsleiter Bouhler and Dr. Brandt

are entrusted with the responsibility

of extending the authority of physicians

so that patients who, on the basis of human judgment,

are considered incurable

can be accorded mercy killing after a definitive diagnosis."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "One day, we were surprised by a report

that a euthanasia operation was underway in Swabia.

Family members received the ashes

with the official notice that the beloved deceased

had unfortunately died quite suddenly of pneumonia

or from an infectious disease.

Through faulty communication of such condolences

and sometimes double deliveries of urns,

unrest was created among the population and the clergy."

Reinhard Spitzy, Austrian member of the SS and NSDAP.

(people chattering)

- [Narrator] The Bishop of Muenster,

Clemens August Graf von Galen,

finds the courage to deliver a frank opinion in public.

(church bell ringing)

- [Voiceover] Sermon in St. Lambert's Church, Muenster,

August the 3rd 1941.

"So now we must expect that poor, defenseless, sick people

will be killed sooner or later.

Do you or do I only have the right to live

as long as we are recognized as productive by others?

If it is legitimate

to kill unproductive members of the community,

then woe betide our brave soldiers who return home from war

with serious battle wounds as invalids.

If the principle that man is entitled

to kill his unproductive fellow man

is established and applied,

then woe betide all of us

when we become aged and thus unproductive."

Clemens August Graf von Galen, Bishop of Muenster.

- [Narrator] Von Galen's brave protest

is based on concrete critical points and is successful.

The conflict between the Hitler regime,

the Bishop of Muenster, and other public critics

is settled only partially.

Hitler suspends the largest part of the euthanasia program

for more than a year

after more than 70,000 people had been killed.

In less conspicuous forms,

the euthanasia program was reintroduced

to sanatoriums and nursing homes

and practiced right up to the end of the war.

- [Voiceover] "The Fuhrer called me

into the Reich Chancellery at 4:00 pm today.

To start with, he spent a whole hour

describing the campaign in Poland.

'The Poles, only a thin Germanic layer.

Underneath that, dreadful stock.

The Jews, the worst that you could possibly imagine.

Only a master's heavy hand could rule here.'"

Alfred Rosenberg,

Director of the Foreign Policy Office of the NSDAP.

(traffic clamoring)

- [Voiceover] "Two days later, I went to the Warsaw Ghetto.

A brick wall about eight feet high

had been built around the entire desolate area

from which all the Aryans had been evacuated

and into which than 400,000 Jews had been forced.

The entire population of the ghetto

seemed to be living in the street.

There was hardly a square yard of empty space.

As we picked our way across the mud and rubble,

the shadows of what have once been men or women

flitted by us in pursuit of someone or something,

their eyes blazing with some insane hunger or greed.

Frequently, we passed by corpses

lying naked in the streets."

Jan Karski, courier of the Polish Underground.

- [Narrator] For a long time, researchers and prosecutors

searched for a definitive written order from Hitler

for the murder of European Jews.

Such an order from Hitler

on the Final Solution of the Jewish Question

obviously doesn't exist.

- [Voiceover] Service calendar, Heinrich Himmler,

Himmler's lecture notes.

"Fuhrer Headquarters, Fuhrer, Wolfsschanze,

July the 18th, 1941, 4:00 pm.

Jewish Question, exterminate as partisans.

Restructuring of the Waffen-SS."

- [Voiceover] "In any case, I'm totally convinced,

even without written proof,

that the extermination of the Jews

goes back to a specific order from Hitler

because it's unthinkable that Himmler and Goering

would have carried this out without his knowledge.

Nicolaus von Below, Luftwaffe Adjutant to Adolf Hitler.

- [Narrator] Immediately after the invasion

of the Soviet Union by the Wehrmacht,

the 3,000-man death squads of security police

and the Reich Security Service

begin their killing operations.

The political responsibility lies with Hermann Goering,

to whom Hitler has transferred

the coordination of Jewish policy.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "If I am asked

whether I knew about the shooting of the Jews,

I have to say that I received an order

to attend the shooting of Jews as a spectator.

I remember that we had to be

at the shooting site at 8:00 pm."

A navy captain, Liepaja.

(singing in foreign language) (upbeat music)

- [Voiceover] "Around noon, an old man from Lower Saxony,

Colonel Scherr, visited me.

Among the things he talked about

that were especially horrible was the shooting of Jews.

He'd been told by another colonel,

Tippleskerch, I believe."

Ernst Junger, Captain, Paris, diary.

- [Voiceover] "I saw a long deep ditch.

SS men and Latvian police in plainclothes wearing armbandsú

were standing beside it.

The terrain was overgrown with bushes,

and the ground was sandy.

(gun banging)

We watched about 1 1/2 hours of the execution.

During this time, three to four trucks

were brought in from the city to the shooting site.

Then the victims were driven like cattle

from the truck to the ditch.

Each time, five had to march in single file into the ditch.

The shooting took place under the command of the SS.

The victims stood facing us.

I can remember exactly

that after the salvos, the victims collapsed."

A navy captain, Liepaja.

- [Voiceover] Letter to the SS and Latvian Police Chief.

Commander of the Riga Police Force.

January the 3rd 1942.

"The execution of the Jews

carried out in the timeframe of the report

is still the talk of the local population.

The fate of the Jews is deplored numerous times,

and at the moment, you hear few people

in favor of their elimination.

Among other things, there is a rumor circulating

that the execution was filmed."

SS and Police Chief, Liepaja.

- [Voiceover] Memoirs in diary form.

"A grim, gloomy mood.

Fuhrer had a long discussion with Himmler,

and afterwards there was the usual

corresponding atmosphere."

Gerhard Engel.

- [Voiceover] "Hitler never told me anything

about the treatment of the Jews.

In foreign policy, the subject only arose

when the Jews were to be deported

from some country or other."

Franz von Sonnleithner, NSDAP member,

after 1939, Legation Councilor in the Foreign Ministry.

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] Adolf Hitler,

address to the traditional gathering

in the Munich Burgerbraukeller,

November the 8th 1942.

"You will recall the Reichstag session at which I declared

if Judaism imagines for a moment

that it can bring about an international world war

for the extermination of the European races,

the result will not be

the extermination of the European races,

but the extermination of the Jews in Europe.

I was always derided as a prophet.

Countless numbers of those who laughed at the time

are no longer laughing today.

Those who are still laughing now

will perhaps not be laughing much longer."

- [Voiceover] Danziger Vorposten daily newspaper,

May the 13th 1944.

"Jewry records major losses in other regions of Europe.

The core areas of Jewish settlement that we found in Poland,

like those in Warsaw and Lublin,

have today been neutralized.

The settlements of 1/2 million Jews in Hungary

are currently being dealt with in a similar fashion.

Thus, in these countries alone,

five million Jews have been eliminated.

In other European countries,

longstanding state measures against Jewry

are also increasing."

Wilhelm Loebsack, Provincial NSDAP Propaganda Director

in Gdansk, West Prussia.

(train rattling)

- [Voiceover] "During the military briefing

around autumn 1944,

the Reich Press Chief Dietrich

came up with an English report.

In this newspaper article, it was alleged

that the Russians had taken a German concentration camp

by the name of Majdanek.

Pictures showed racks

on which a large number of combs could be seen,

well-laid out, as foreigners expect to see

in a German institution.

The text said that people had been exterminated here.

Dietrich presented the press report to Hitler.

We stood there with baited breath to hear what he would say.

The answer was swift."

- [Voiceover] "Those are the hands of Belgian children

chopped off during the First World War.

It's nothing but enemy propaganda."

- [Voiceover] "I believe that I have quoted

Hitler's statement correctly.

In any case, we were all relieved."

Franz von Sonnleithner,

after 1939, Legation Councilor in the Foreign Ministry.

(soldiers chattering)

- [Voiceover] "On the third day of the war,

I was wounded near Grodno.

When I came to, there were many wounded

lying on the ground.

We were at the mercy of the German soldiers.

After a while, those who could move were driven onwards.

My comrades grabbed me under the arms

because those who fell down were immediately shot."

Dmitri Dmitrienko.

- [Narrator] Since February 1938,

Adolf Hitler has been the Supreme Commander of the military.

In this capacity, he's responsible

for the mass killings of Soviet prisoners of war.

Whereas one to 3% of Anglo-American prisoners die,

some 50% of Red Army prisoners perish.

Of the roughly 5.3 to 5.7 million Red Army soldiers

in German captivity,

2.5 to 3.3 million die.

Estimates vary.

- [Voiceover] "Only the gravediggers were given food.

The camp was set up in a dense forest, a pine forest.

We scratched the bark off with a nail

and fed ourselves that way.

After a while, the whole forest had been eaten."

Boris Sheremet.

- [Narrator] Army command is fully aware of the situation

and condones the starvation of Soviet prisoners.

In November 1941,

when the Chiefs of Staff of the East Armies

tell the Quartermaster General

that the armies need Soviet prisoners as laborers,

but that these are starving in camps, he states.

- [Voiceover] "Prisoners of war who do not work

have to starve.

Working prisoners of war can, in some cases,

be fed army provisions."

Eduard Wagner, Quartermaster General.

(rain splattering)

- [Voiceover] Letter to Wilhelm Keitel.

"The fate of the Soviet prisoners of war

is a tragedy of huge proportions.

The large majority of them have starved

or died from exposure to the weather."

Alfred Rosenberg,

Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories.

- [Voiceover] Wilhelm Keitel,

Chief of the Armed Forces High Command.

"Such doubts belong to soldierly concepts

of chivalrous warfare.

Here, we are dealing with the destruction of an ideology.

For this reason, I approve and support these measures."

(soldiers chattering)

- [Voiceover] "I keep hearing

that Hitler could not have known about everything.

This is sheer nonsense.

I know from personal observation and remarks by Hitler

that he knew everything."

Heinz Linge, valet to Adolf Hitler.

(dog barking)

- [Voiceover] "Up until 1940, Hitler looked younger

than he was in reality.

After that, however, he aged rather quickly.

Up to 1943, he looked his age outwardly.

Later, his rapid physical deterioration was obvious."

Professor Dr. Hanskarl von Hasselbach,

Deputy Attendant Doctor to Adolf Hitler.

(dog panting)

- [Voiceover] "The death of a human being

didn't bother him at all.

He saw people as the links in a long chain,

and he considered the first link to be himself.

Children were, in his eyes, only the potential

by which the greater or smaller living space of a people

was measured."

Christa Schroeder.

(upbeat music)

- [Voiceover] "The soldiers that I met

were not followers of Hitler

and only served the Fuhrer unwillingly,

but all approved of war

as an indispensable phenomenon of life.

The war is the ultimate exertion that you cannot dodge.

This picture was deeply ingrained in them."

Wilma Schtoem, journalist and writer.

- [Voiceover] Diary, Monday, July the 26th 1943.

"Mussolini has resigned.

He's said to be ill.

Last night, Hamburg, Essen, and Kiel were bombed again."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] "While I endeavored

to establish worthwhile targets

to Hitler and the general staff of the Air Force,

our enemies launched five big attacks

on only one major city, Hamburg.

Although this action contradicted

all tactical considerations,

it had catastrophic consequences."

Albert Speer.

(fire crackling)

- [Voiceover] Diary of fighter pilot Hans Ahrens,

born 1921,

killed in action February the 21st 1944.

"That first night of terror on July the 25th

will remain unforgettable for us

and the majority of all Hamburg residents.

Personally, I'm glad that I experienced it all.

As a soldier, it led to an ultimate resolute hatred

of our enemy."

(fire crackling)

- [Voiceover] Letter to Gayog Zimmerman,

soldier in Norway, from his mother.

Hamburg, July the 28th 1943.

"Dear Gayog, we are still alive,

but Hamburg de facto no longer exists.

No house left standing.

Just mountains of rubble.

Entire streets blocked.

Dead bodies not salvaged.

Impenetrable smoke and fumes and fires

still burning everywhere.

Disintegration is in progress.

No police anymore, nothing.

Hamburg is lost forever."

Magdalena Zimmerman.

- [Voiceover] "When I traveled to the Baden

from Babelsberg, I met an acquaintance on the train.

He'd experienced it all in Hamburg

as an anti-aircraft soldier.

It smelled so strongly of corpses

that you couldn't get the stench out of your nose.

Leaflets were dropped over Hamburg

with quotes from the war speeches of Hitler and Goering,

without any comment."

Erik Kessner, writer, war diary.

- [Voiceover] Hamburg, July the 30th 1943.

"My Hanele, words can't express

what we're going through here.

A government that cannot protect its women and children

is simply criminal.

My Hanele, if I could only hear one word

from you and Gayog, your mother."

Magdalena Zimmerman.

- [Voiceover] "When he traveled to Bavaria to the Berghof

or the Fuhrer Headquarters,

then he went by train and at night with blacked out windows

so that he wasn't faced

with the devastation from the bombing raids."

Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven, Captain.

- [Voiceover] "During the entire war,

Adolf Hitler never once visited a bombed city."

Albert Speer.

- [Voiceover] Dr. Theo Morell,

Adolf Hitler's personal physician.

Diary, September the 23rd 1943, 8:15 pm.

"Examination after dinner.

Strong flatulence, spasms from agitation.

Stomach shows increased fat formation.

Prescribed a diet."

- [Voiceover] "He admired Morell and his art

and was, in a sense, dependent on him and his medication."

Albert Speer.

(tense music)

- [Voiceover] New Year's Proclamation, 1944.

"The year 1944 will make hard and heavy demands

on all Germans.

The monstrous events of the war

will come closer to crisis this year.

We are fully confident that we will endure."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] Diary, May the 27th 1944.

"An impression of an increasingly destroyed Berlin.

Devastating.

At the same time, Berliners are sitting in the sunshine

on chairs amid the rubble and debris on the esplanade

as if it were peacetime."

Ulrich von Hassell, diplomat and member of the resistance.

- [Voiceover] Diary, May the 9th 1944.

"Patient A.

Tension headache, left side.

Legs trembling due to agitation.

Invasion imminent but where?"

Dr. Theo Morell.

- [Voiceover] "The plutocratic world of the West

can undertake its threatened landing attempt

whenever it wants.

It will fail."

Adolf Hitler, order of the day to the Wehrmacht.

(ominous music)

- [Voiceover] "Hitler was told of the landing

on the morning of June the 6th.

He expressed relief when he received the first report

and said now it would be possible to beat the enemy."

Nicolaus von Below, Luftwaffe Adjutant to Adolf Hitler.

(gunfire rattling)

- [Voiceover] "The conviction of the Germans

that we would not attack in the weather then prevailing

was a definite factor in the degree of surprise we achieved.

In the Omaha Sector, an alert enemy division, the 352nd,

which prisoners stated had been in the area

on maneuvers and defense exercises,

accounted for some of the intensive fighting

in that locality."

Dwight D. Eisenhower, US General,

Supreme Allied Commander, Europe.

- [Voiceover] Heinz Linge, valet to Adolf Hitler.

"Among Hitler's habits,

which despite our efforts couldn't be remedied,

was that he kept asking what time it was,

above all, during the war."

- [Voiceover] "I principally only ever stop

at five past 12."

Adolf Hitler in November 1942.

- [Voiceover] "On July the 20th 1944,

I'd received the order to prepare

for the move of the operations unit

from Mauerwald to Zossen, south of Berlin.

It was a hot East Prussian summer's day.

Mauerwald was located just 20 kilometers away

from the Wolfsschanze

where Stauffenberg's bomb exploded around 12:45 pm."

Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven.

- [Voiceover] "I remember thunder

combined with a brightly flashing flame.

At the same time, thick smoke.

After a few seconds of complete silence,

I heard someone call.

It was probably Field Marshal Keitel."

- [Voiceover] "Where is the Fuhrer?"

- [Voiceover] Heinz Buccholz,

stenographer in the Wolfsschanze Headquarters.

- [Voiceover] "There were agitated calls for a doctor.

A bomb exploded, nothing happened to the boss,

but the hut was blown sky high."

Christa Schroeder.

- [Voiceover] Heinz Linge.

"When I arrived, I saw Hitler,

who looked at me inquiringly with big eyes

and stared at my troubled face.

With a calm smile he said."

- [Voiceover] "Linge, someone tried to kill me."

(crowd cheering)

- [Voiceover] Diary, Friday, July the 21st 1944.

"The radio broadcast details of the attack.

The bomb was planted by a Count Von Stauffenberg.

Around one o'clock, the Fuhrer spoke

to prove that he had survived.

What would have happened if the Fuhrer had died?

The war would be over,

and there would be revolution in Germany."

Henrietta Schneider.

- [Voiceover] "His confidence,

his faith in victory, and his assurance,

but also his power consciousness and delusions of grandeur

now exceeded all boundaries of reason."

Traudl Junge, Hitler's private secretary.

- [Voiceover] Personal war diary, October the 7th 1944.

"Morning briefing.

Beginning of the attack on East Prussia and Budapest.

Long discussion with Goering.

Station 12 heavy anti-aircraft batteries immediately

to protect the Fuhrer's headquarters.

Keitel for relocating to Berlin.

Hitler against it."

Werner Kreipe, General of the Aviators,

Chief of Staff, Luftwaffe.

- [Voiceover] "In the first days of November 1944,

we moved out of the Wolfsschanze

because the Russians were close by."

Traudl Junge.

(train rattling)

(cannons booming)

- [Voiceover] "Germany was under intense pressure.

At the end of 1944, weapons production fell sharply.

Trapped in the east, southeast, south, and west,

Germany was strategically encircled

and could not break free.

Nevertheless, Hitler took one ultimate measure

after the other.

The Nazis suppressed without mercy

the slightest opposition to the regime.

It was clear to us

that Germany was mobilizing its last forces,

but at the end of 1944,

Germany was still able to defend itself

and put up serious resistance.

Its military still consisted of around 17.5 million men,

of whom 5.3 million were fighting troops."

(explosions booming)

Georgy Zhukov, Commander in Chief,

First White Russian Front.

- [Voiceover] "At just 19 years old,

Walter was also killed in action.

I was sitting on the roof of our house

that had been damaged in another bombing

when I saw the postman bring the death notice.

My aunt called through the house, 'Walter has fallen.'

The death of my brother was a deep shock for me."

Helmut Kohl, schoolboy.

- [Voiceover] Speech to division commanders,

December the 12th 1944

in Adlerhorst near Ziegenberg, Hesse.

"If we suffer a few more really hard strikes,

then this artificially maintained common front

can suddenly collapse at any moment

in a huge clap of thunder."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "Hitler revealed the following

to a very limited circle of listeners.

Due to a noticeable weakness of any new forces

in the Eifel region,

he had decided to start the attack from there.

The target had to be Antwerp."

Siegfried Westphal, Major General,

Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief West.

(tense music)

- [Voiceover] "On December the 16th 1944,

General Bradley came to my headquarters

to discuss ways and means

of overcoming our acute shortages in infantry replacements.

Just as he entered my office, a staff officer came in

to report slight penetrations of our line.

It was through this same region

that the Germans launched their great attack of 1940."

Dwight D. Eisenhower.

- [Voiceover] "German tanks have been spotted

north of the city of Luxembourg.

Rundstedt has ordered the tanks

to advance through the Ardennes in nearly the same place

as the Germans penetrated in May 1940.

They're heading in the same direction again

to the channel coastline towards Antwerp

and ordered to stop the Allies using the port

through which their main supplies come."

Stefan Heym, Corporal of the US Army, writer.

- [Voiceover] "It was my opinion that it was necessary

to play Hitler's last card to maximum effect.

As a gawker, I tried to get as close as possible

to the front.

The troops pushing forward were in a good mood

because low-hanging clouds prevented any aerial activity.

I was worried that the weather would brighten up."

Albert Speer, memoirs.

(tanks rumbling)

- [Voiceover] "As long as the weather

kept our planes on the ground,

it would be an ally of the enemy

worth many additional days."

Dwight D. Eisenhower.

(ominous music)

- [Voiceover] "Our last major offensive in the West

with 300,000 men

that was so gloriously successful at the start

failed in the end thanks to 10 days of radiant sunshine.

The Anglo-Americans were thus able to deploy

their overwhelming air superiority."

Leon Degrelle, Commander of the Walloonian Waffen-SS.

- [Voiceover] "The Allies had expected

to reach the River Rhine by Christmas at the latest.

The Ardennes Offensive prevented that.

But how many men lost their lives

due to this senseless delay?"

Walter Rowland, industrialist,

Commissioner for Tank Production

in Ministry of Armaments and War Production.

- [Voiceover] Rudolf Jordan,

provincial NSDAP leader, Defense Commissioner,

December the 25th 1944.

"When we were sitting together one sunny morning,

tears appeared in my wife's eyes.

'Where will we be at Christmas next year?'

This was the question asked by the mother of our children,

the question of the family's fate.

This question would be asked

in the house of the provincial leader

and everywhere else in Germany.

I was frightened because I felt

that the answer was no longer convincing,

but I had to remain the same person,

Hitler's deputy, the spokesman of German hope until the end.

I know today that it was the belief in a miracle."

(people chattering)

- [Voiceover] "In the days after Christmas,

it was clear that the expected success

would not be achieved.

At the end of the year,

the offensive had to be seen as a failure."

Nicolaus von Below.

(gloomy music)

- [Voiceover] Adolf Hitler at the end of December 1944

to his adjutant Nicolaus von Below.

"I know the war is lost.

Their superiority is too great.

I hope you first put a bullet in my head now.

We will never capitulate, never.

We can perish, but we'll take the world with us."

(fire crackling)

(speaking in foreign language)

- [Voiceover] December the 31st 1944, Luxembourg.

"You sat there with a half empty glass in your hand

and listened to the hoarse voice

with the unmistakable accent.

Two or three times, the speaker almost lost his voice,

and he also got his words mixed up,

but that was always the case when he got excited.

It was significant that his throaty bellow

no longer wanted to work that New Year's Eve."

Stefan Heym, Corporal of the US Army, writer.

- [Voiceover] Adolf Hitler,

last radio address to the German people,

January the 30th 1945.

"Thus, I now appeal to the entire German people

to gird themselves

with a yet greater, stronger spirit of resistance

until we can again, as before,

put on the graves of the dead of this titanic struggle

a wreath inscribed with the words,

'And yet you were victorious.'

I therefore expect every German

to fulfill his duty to the utmost,

to make every sacrifice that will and must be required."

(pensive music)

- [Voiceover] February the 13th 1945.

"The model of Linz is finally finished.

The extensive model

of the development of the Danube riverbanks

was now set up in one of the large brightly-toned basements

of the new Chancellery.

When I led Adolf Hitler into this room,

he stood for a long time just looking

as though overwhelmed by the general impression.

I moved the spotlight

to the position of the sun's rays in the afternoon.

Now he was presented with the perspective

of how his city on the Danube would look in his retirement."

Hermann Giesler, general building inspector

for the redevelopment of the city of Linz.

- [Voiceover] "Not a day went by

when the government quarters were not attacked.

When a bomb exploded nearby,

the bunker lying in the groundwater swayed noticeably.

The light began to flicker,

so Hitler raised his voice as if in a dream."

- [Voiceover] "That was close.

Those bombs could have hit us."

- [Voiceover] "He was noticeably fearful

and didn't feel safe."

Christa Schroeder.

- [Narrator] In mid-March 1945,

Hitler transfers nearly all of his activities

to the bunker under the Chancellery.

Since then, he rarely sees daylight.

- [Voiceover] "Sometime in mid-March,

Eva Braun arrived at the Reich Chancellery.

Hitler tried his best to get her to go back to Munich,

but she made it clear that her place was at Hitler's side

and no one would be able to change her mind."

Rochus Misch, telephone operator in the Fuhrer's bunker.

- [Voiceover] "April the 20th 1945 was always referred to

as the date of the last photos and film segments

of Hitler and the delegation of the Hitler Youth.

This is not true.

They are, in fact, from a different reception

of a delegation by Hitler.

This took place on March the 20th 1945."

(boys laughing)

Artur Axmann, leader of the Hitler Youth.

- [Voiceover] "It was between 3:00 and 4:00 am

on April the 11th 1945.

Suddenly cries were heard.

They grew louder and louder.

We stumbled outside to discover the cause.

'Look, the gate!' somebody shouted.

The crooked swastika had disappeared.

Something white fluttered on the flagpole.

The delightfully victorious minute

for which our German comrades had waited

4,453 days and nights was finally there.

In the evening, an American infantry unit arrived."

Thomas Giefer, German Jew, prisoner in Buchenwald.

- [Voiceover] April the 12th 1945.

"It will not be pleasant listening.

I propose to tell you of Buchenwald.

We reached the main gate.

The prisoners crowded up behind the wire.

There surged around me an evil smelling stink.

Men and boys reached out to touch me.

They were in rags and the remnants of uniforms.

Death had already marked many of them,

but they were smiling with their eyes."

Edward Murrow, radio correspondent for CBS News.

- [Voiceover] "On April the 21st,

our troops reached the Berlin Autobahn Ring.

This success created favorable conditions

to totally enclose the fascist capital."

Vasily Chuikov, General.

- [Voiceover] "That day, I saw Hitler only briefly.

The boss could still not believe

that the Russians were at the gates."

Rochus Misch.

- [Voiceover] Szczecin, Mecklenburg.

"Around 11:50 pm, Hitler calls.

He gives a short lecture on the situation

and concludes with the words."

- [Voiceover] "You will see.

The Russians will suffer the biggest defeat,

the bloodiest defeat in their history

before the gates of Berlin."

- [Voiceover] Karl Koller,

Chief of the General Staff of the Luftwaffe.

- [Voiceover] April the 22nd 1945.

"This date marks the end of the Third Reich for me.

The German Wehrmacht capitulated on May the 8th 1945,

but on April the 22nd, a Sunday,

Hitler capitulated."

Rochus Misch.

- [Voiceover] "On April the 22nd,

we attended the status report

at the usual time in the afternoon.

I recognized immediately that clouds as heavy as lead

were hanging over the room."

Wilhelm Keitel,

Chief of the Armed Forces High Command, memoirs.

- [Voiceover] "I have already reached my decision.

I won't leave Berlin again.

I will defend the city till the end.

Either I lead the fighting around the capital of the Reich,

or I perish with my soldiers in Berlin

and die in the battle for the symbol of the Reich."

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "During the status conference,

which had been loud and turbulent,

Hitler had finally uttered the magical sentence

and since then repeated it to everybody

who crept around the bunker disbelievingly."

- [Voiceover] "The war is lost."

- [Voiceover] Rochus Misch.

- [Voiceover] Gertraud Traudl Junge.

"In the small anteroom, Hitler stands motionless.

In a distant and commanding manner, he calls out."

- [Voiceover] "Get changed at once.

In one hour, an aircraft will come

and take you to the south.

Everything is lost, hopelessly lost."

- [Voiceover] "Eva Braun walks up to Hitler,

takes both of his hands,

and says, smilingly and consolingly,

as if talking to a sad child."

- [Voiceover] "But you know that I'm staying here with you.

I will not be sent away."

- [Voiceover] "Hitler's eyes begin to light up,

and he does something that no one has ever witnessed,

not even his most trusted friends and aides.

He kisses Eva Braun on the lips."

(dog barking)

(solemn music)

- [Voiceover] "The German Army dissolved before our eyes."

Winston Churchill.

- [Voiceover] "Gloom and doom began to spread

throughout the bunker."

Artur Axmann.

(explosion banging)

- [Voiceover] "The Fuhrer comes up to me,

shakes my hand, and asks."

- [Voiceover] "Have you rested a little, my child?

I'd like to dictate something, get the shorthand pad."

- [Voiceover] Gertraud Traudl Junge.

- [Voiceover] "My private will and testament.

As I did not consider that I could take the responsibility

of contracting a marriage during the years of fighting,

I have now decided before the closing of my earthly career

to take the girl who after many years of faithful friendship

entered the practically besieged city of her own free will

in order to share her destiny with me as my wife.

At her own desire, she goes as my wife with me into death.

What I possess belongs,

in as much as it has any value, to the party.

Should this no longer exist, to the state.

Should the state also be destroyed,

no further decision of mine is necessary."

Signed Berlin, April the 29th 1945, 4:00 am,

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] April the 30th 1945.

"I had close contact with Mohnke,

the Commander of the Citadel.

Mohnke was often with the troops on the front line.

(explosion banging)

On April the 29th, he reported to Hitler that to the north

the Russians were a short distance away

from Weidendammer Bridge,

to the east, in Lustgarten,

to the south near Potsdamer Platz and the Air Ministry,

and to the west in Tiergarten.

That was only a few 100 meters from the Chancellery.

When Hitler asked him."

- [Voiceover] "How long can you hold out?"

- [Voiceover] "He answered, '20 to 24 hours at the most.'"

Artur Axmann.

- [Voiceover] "On April the 30th 1945 around noon,

Bormann told me that Hitler's decision was now firm.

Then Hitler said to me that he would now shoot himself

and that Fraulein Braun would also take her life.

The bodies were to be buried.

He assigned me to make the necessary arrangements."

Otto Gunsche, SS Adjutant to Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "My political testament.

I die with a happy heart

in the face of the immeasurable deeds and achievements

of our soldiers at the front, our women at home,

the achievements of our farmers and workers,

and the efforts, unique in history,

of our youth who bear my name.

Above all, I oblige the leaders of the nation

and those under them

to scrupulously observe the race laws

and to offer merciless opposition

to the poisoner of all peoples, international Jewry."

Issued in Berlin

this 29th day of April 1945, four o'clock am,

Adolf Hitler.

- [Voiceover] "There cannot be the slightest doubt

that Adolf Hitler took his life

in the Fuhrerbunker of the Reich Chancellery

in Berlin on April the 30th 1945,

with his own hand, namely by a shot in the right temple."

Cause of death, District Court Two, Berchtesgaden,

December the 8th 1956.

- [Narrator] Valet Heinz Linge

reports the hour of his death as 3:50 pm.

He says he noted this time

from a grandfather clock in the anteroom to Hitler's office.

Adjutant Otto Gunsche cites his final hour as 3:30 pm.

He said he'd looked at his watch.

(people chattering)

(lively music)

- [Voiceover] "It was not disloyalty,

but rather his suicide

that put an end to Hitler's organization.

He and his organization were one and the same,

and thus it ended with him.

This man who rose out of nothing

had offered himself to Germany

at a time when it was longing for a new magnet.

He formulated a doctrine

based on a mixture of fascism and race theory.

The totalitarian system

allowed him to act without restraint.

The mechanization of the military

gave him the trump cards of lightning attacks and surprise.

All of this led to repression,

and that, in turn, led to these crimes."

Charles de Gaulle, memoirs.

(ominous music)

(somber music)