Original subtitles

I'm James Holland, and one of the things that's always really fascinated me

about the Second World War is the interplay between man and machine.

In this series, I'm going to go inside the Nazi war machine.

Travelling across Europe, I'll explore the extraordinary machines they produced

and uncover rare archives to understand who built them, how they evolved, and

why their technically brilliant designs were militarily flawed.

The magnificent fighter planes no rookie could fly.

You know, the first time you fly a Messerschmitt 109, you just have to take

leap of faith.

The power of the pandas. If I had come up against this, I would have been

terrified. But I'm about to learn one of the biggest cons of them all.

The weapon that couldn't cope with mud or sand.

Wow, it's got so little kick on it. And you hit the target, I'm proud of both of

you.

The U -boat that were floating bomb.

That was a suicide command.

Absolute horror.

A journey through the heart of the Nazi war machine.

In this episode, I'll uncover the truth behind Hitler's fearsome Panzer arm.

This actually did not really represent reality.

and reveal the Nazis' passion for over -engineering.

How many gears have we got here? You've got over 60 gears in there.

60? That's insane!

Whilst in the middle of a world war.

To begin my investigation into Nazi land warfare, it seems only right that I

should start with the Panzer Division.

This wasn't just tanks, but a massive formation of motorised infantry,

and reconnaissance vehicles.

For Adolf Hitler, the Panzer Division was his key to victory.

I'm starting my journey at the Tank Museum at Bovington in Dorset to explore

origins of this terrifying fighting force, and I'm meeting up with historian

David Willey.

It's amazing, David, isn't it, how when people are talking about the Blitzkrieg

years, the first part of the war, they always talk about the Nazi war machine,

don't they?

And yet, in terms of Panzers, this is one of the most prevalent.

Yeah, the Panzer II is the most numerous tank the Germans have in 1940 when they

invade France, Belgium and Holland.

And as a tank, when we look at it, you know, it's not that impressive.

Standing at just over six feet tall, it really did look pretty inoffensive.

It was armed with only a 20mm cannon and a single machine gun, had armour of

35mm at its thicket and weighed less than 9 tonnes.

Panzer I and Panzer IIs, in essence, were training tanks for the German

military. They wanted to go to war with the Panzer IIIs and Panzer IVs. They're

starting to build those, but there's not many of them.

And Hitler, in essence, jumps the gun for the German military.

War caught Germany's manufacturers on the hop, even by the launch of the

Blitzkrieg in May 1940.

They only had 627 Panzer IIIs and IVs, but three times as many Panzer IIs and

IIIs.

This was a very different reality from the mighty Panzer Army propagated by

Hitler's spin doctor, Joseph Goebbels.

the last two weeks in August, the German armies moved toward the Polish border,

where they assembled 70 divisions, many of them armored.

From a military standpoint, the Poles were hopelessly outclassed by their

predatory neighbors.

The Nazis, 5 ,000 modern tanks.

Poland, 600 nondescript tanks.

The key thing is that the Germans emphasised their success with that

in 1940.

That's what we see in all the propaganda movies. That then ends up emphasising

the importance that the Germans have about the tank, and it slightly hides as

well that background of it's only a small part of the German army, and it's

also a small part of their military effort.

At this early stage of the war, The German army was relying not just on the

Panzer II, but also on the tanks they had captured in the occupation of

Czechoslovakia.

Very soon, the Panzer II became completely obsolescent.

But there were other tanks that also became outmoded, not least the T -38,

was Czech -built but captured when Nazi Germany absorbed Czechoslovakia into the

Third Reich.

And although these T -38s and Panzer IIs were used in the Blitzkrieg years,

Soon there was another role that could be used for them, because all sides were

realising, as the war progressed, that actually you could use tracked vehicles

for other purposes. You could use them as mobile artillery.

So with the T -38s, which had a perfectly good track and wheel system,

perfectly good engine, you whip off the turret, put an anti -tank gun on

instead, and suddenly you've got something completely different, and

Marder.

Don't be fooled by its origins.

The Marder is an artillery piece, but because it's mobile and tracked, it was

become a key ingredient of the Panzer Division.

Nearly double the size of the Panzer II, it had a four -man crew and an open

rear firing compartment.

Well, John, I've got to say, this looks very promising.

It's a good vehicle.

Would you like to see her in the flesh? Yes, please.

I've unearthed a restored Marder 3 in a farmhouse in Kent.

Look at that, the big reveal.

Oh, goodness me.

I've seen some action, hasn't it?

The man behind this mammoth restoration project is John Phillips.

She's come together very well. Hasn't she, John? Very pleased with her.

They're an amazing concept, aren't they? Because, you know, if you look at this

as a tank chassis, which is what it originally was, that's pretty small,

it?

Obviously, what the Germans are doing, they're going, OK, well, T -35, T -38,

Czech -built tanks.

I mean, the T -35s and the T -38s, that's what Rommel was using in 1940 in

Blitzkrieg on France. That's right.

In his 7th Panzer Division.

Yeah. But obviously, as the war progresses, they become obsolete. You

those anymore. They're not big enough. They're not powerful enough.

But hang on a minute. We've got all these chassis. Let's use them. That's

principle behind it, isn't it? Yeah, evolution.

So basically this is a mobile anti -tank gun? Yes, the crew would have dug a

scrape up to here, hidden it, and then just left the gun above ground, fired a

couple of rounds off and then scarpered.

Look at that, first go!

What's the technology like? I mean, how easy, how complicated?

This is a pretty basic chassis using springs rather than torsion bars.

But because this is such a simple design, the wheels could be taken off.

them, you know, with one wheel missing and still quite happily travelling

And easy to maintain then, I guess. Very easy, yeah, yeah. There's a few grease

points here. You take these out and the grease nipples in there. So, yeah, very

easy to maintain.

Lovely design, very clever.

And this is a Pak 40, isn't it? Which, to the uninitiated, is a 75mm gun.

And obviously the 75mm, that refers to the diameter of the shell that's fired.

Correct. The whole point about an anti -tank gun is you want it to have high

velocity. You want it to pass through the air incredibly quickly.

And that's what you get with this Pak 40.

The Marders were the first step in expanding the strength and distance of

high -powered anti -tank gun.

Removing the tank turret and replacing it with the fixed Pac -40 made them much

more maneuverable on the battlefield.

Can we have a look at the back here?

Yes.

This just comes down, does it? Yeah.

So I suppose the brilliant thing about this is that rather than having to have

separate truck and...

tow a vehicle, unlock it, unhitch it, get it out, put out the forks, all the

rest of it. It's just here. You go forward, you fire. You move back, go to

different place. It's just...

It's such a sort of logical development, isn't it, for the anti -tank gun?

It's very good. And also, these rounds, they would have had racks along here and

that side. The only reason they're not there is for ease of access, but they'd

have carried as many as they could get in the machine.

So they were self -sufficient.

The only problem is they're a bit vulnerable at the top here. There's a

original bullet holes here. Yeah, yeah, isn't that amazing?

It's amazing how much we discount the anti -tank gun.

You know, we really do. It's just not on our radar.

And tank destroyers, self -propelled guns, assault guns, all those sort of

things, we're just so obsessed with Tigers and Pampers and Panzer IVs that

kind of forget there's this whole other range of weaponry which the Germans are

developing in the war.

The Marder gives you an insight into how the German army could adapt and come up

with some ingenious solutions.

But it's one thing to sit in the back of this marder, but another to drive it.

And so I've got to give it a go.

OK, James. Yes.

The driver is very simple.

Yep. Basically, you've got...

The throttle and clutch.

Throttle on your right foot, clutch on your second foot. Yep, got that here.

Yep. Clutch here. Then you've got two levers, and basically the levers just

a brake.

So if I pull the right hand thing, that'll start swivelling that way?

right. You'll turn to the right and left, left.

Very simple.

You've already sucked it out. You'll be fine.

Yeah.

Okay. Right.

Right. Shall I start her up? Push the button, and you're ready to rock.

OK, I'm pressing that, it's not happening. Oh, hang on, it might be

on, let me just have a... Oh, I've turned the ice laser.

Yeah, it's just been...

Under

pressure, the Germans did adapt to the changing patterns of war by using all

materials they had available.

OK, give it a throttle.

That's it, lovely.

Perfect.

But one of the reasons I found it so easy to drive was because it was

by the Czechs, not the Germans.

Whatever the strengths and weaknesses of the Panzer II and the Marder, one of

Hitler's most effective weapons remained his propaganda machine.

His camera crews were careful to film only Nazi machines and relentless

firepower.

Through Poland, through Holland, through Belgium sped the German war machine.

It's every operation timed. It's every movement rehearsed a thousand times

before.

Only steel could challenge steel.

And of steel there could not be enough.

But the next generation of panzers would be altogether much bigger and more

powerful and most definitely designed and built in Germany.

In 1941, Hitler launched his attack on the Soviet Union and the German army

found itself in a front that was far larger and with far harsher conditions

anything they'd faced before.

Gambling on taking Moscow by early fall, the Germans had timed their attack to

take full advantage of the summer weather.

But they had not counted on savage Russian resistance.

And by September came fall rain.

Flowing the Nazi advance.

Their new enemy also came with new weapons, and not least this, the T -34,

with its sloping armour and its big 85mm main gun, far outclassed anything the

Germans had in their Panzer arm.

So the Germans know that the Russians have tanks, but they're just shocked by

the size and scale of it, aren't they? Yeah, Hitler later actually said that

line he comes out with, or purportedly comes out with, which is saying, if I

knew how many tanks the Russians had, I wouldn't have invaded.

What I don't think they picked up on is, number one, the quality, the underlying

strength of the T -34 tank, and the other side of it as well is just the

numbers. And so that causes a real shock to the German military.

Guderian sets up a special panzer commission, and off they go to the

Front to seriously look, how are we going to answer this problem?

One of the potential answers is, let's copy the tank directly.

They seriously think of drawing up plans. Reverse -engineering a T -34.

Exactly that, to put into production.

Being the Germans, they have to go one better, we can do something better than

this, and that tank becomes the Panther.

Standing at just under 10 feet, it was the largest German tank created to date.

The Panther incorporated many of the Soviet tank's unique features, like the

sloped armour, but with a thickness of 100mm.

It housed a 75mm gun, with two MG34 machine guns to support it.

It weighed a staggering 45 tonnes.

If we compare that to the 26 tonnes of the T -34, this was a terrifying

opponent. But this is substantially bigger than the T -34.

Yeah, you're looking at... You're talking about one -upmanship. You are.

actual requirement sounds quite sensible when they start. The problem so often

with the German military is Hitler intervenes and always insists on either

bigger guns, thicker armour as part of the process.

and inevitably, because of the situation that's going on, certainly on the

Eastern Front and in other campaigns as well, this need to suddenly leap further

ahead is pushing the German military, who at times are thinking, hang on, do

really need this stuff?

Actually, if it's an order from Hitler, you are going to go about doing that.

So with the panther, what happens is they try to use some common sense. They

a long -barrelled 7 .5 -centimetre high... velocity gun on, and because

a new gun now we're looking at, this gun has greater penetration with an armour

piercing round than the traditional 88mm we think of. And this tank is all about

that gun.

Of course, the greater the size, the greater the complications.

Come and have a look at this, because this is a prime example of where you see

not only the complexity that goes into a late war German tank, but

Also, one of the problems the Germans got, you have to be well trained to be

able to change gears effectively.

And famously, the first or second gear on a Panther is one of those ones where

if you get it wrong, you can mess up some of that gearing. And the problem

you look at the size of this, that means basically the whole of the top of the

front of the tank has to be taken out. So this is then taken out by crane,

lifted out to repair.

And if you go back to, again, if we want to think of comparisons,

Look at the American Sherman. You unbolt that front section to gain access so

it's easy to be able to remove that gear. Yes, but the other thing about a

Sherman is it's a manual gearbox of four gears forward, one reverse, and it

couldn't be more simpler. And you put your foot on the clutch and you move the

gear stick.

I mean, how many gears have we got here? You've got over 60 gears in that case.

60 different actual pieces of machine metal in terms of actually those gears.

That's insane, isn't it, for a combat vehicle?

And yet, in essence, what you're really trying to say is they both do the same

function. Right. So why have the German military decided to go down this route

as opposed to perhaps going for the simplicity to make numbers?

If you've got 60 different moving parts, but there's a machined metal in there,

I mean, and you're a new recruit and you're driving, I mean, your story about

changing from first to second can actually just crash the whole gearbox.

analogy I often use is you can drive your family car around the block here at

Bovington faster than you can drive a Formula One car because the level of

training you need to be able to use that paddle gear shift.

and all that other technology in a Formula One car, unless you've had

training, training to get to that right standard, you are not going to be able

to go as fast in that car as you would in your own car that you get familiar

with.

In contrast to the Nazis, the Americans, recognising that the majority of their

troops were civilian conscripts, tried to make the driving experience as close

to that of a domestic automobile as possible.

Now, in the Second World War, you're looking at a generation that they were

very, only a few families would have had a motor car.

Of course. So everything you're learning about here is from... And particularly

in Germany, where... Where the motor industry is not as big, despite

It seems to me that as the war progressed, though the tanks are

panzers are getting bigger and more sophisticated, and at the same time, the

qualitative standard of those who were expected to drive them is actually

getting lower.

So how well equipped were these new recruits to drive the Panther?

While I'm at the Tank Museum, I'm heading to their research rooms to

some very revealing documents from German prisoners of war.

So all sides in the Second World War were constantly analysing their

trying to upgrade it, trying to improve it, and really going into it in some

detail. What I've got here is a document between the 21st Army Group, which is

the British and Canadian forces in northwest Europe, and there's lots about

their own equipment and trying to get that better, but there's also a bit at

back on statements by German panzer crews, prisoners of war.

And what's really interesting, this was taken on...

the 26th of July, so this is back in the summer during the height of the

Normandy campaign.

And it says here, on the Panther especially, a large proportion of crews

into action after a comparatively short period of training.

A large number of drivers had had only 10 days training on the Panther, and

as little as 10 hours.

I mean, as we know, the Panther is an incredibly complex piece of equipment.

It's very difficult to drive, it's very difficult to operate.

That is just not enough.

This is a big problem for the Germans, because they've designed a very complex

tank, but haven't adequately trained the crews.

But this didn't stop them producing equally complex variants of the Panther.

Oh my goodness, look at that. That's not something you see in the back of most

barns.

I'm now at the World Foundation in Kent, where they house a unique collection of

German armoured vehicles, all in working order.

The one I really want to see is the German Army's mighty Jagdpanther.

They had a Panther tank, and that had a big enough chassis to house a much

bigger casement on top rather than a turret. And with a bigger casement, you

could have a much bigger gun. In fact, you could have the really highly

powerful, high -velocity 88mm Pak 43 anti -tank gun. The other advantage

about having a casement on a tank... rather than a rotational turret, is you

don't have to have all the mechanisation and hydraulics that are needed for a

rotating turret, and also you don't need key supplies like ball bearings, which

by this stage of the war were in really short supply.

When you did that, you got the Jagdpampfer.

Weighing 45 tonnes, it could reach speeds of 45 kilometres per hour.

The 100mm armour protected its five -man crew, but what really gave it its

impact in the field was its massive 88mm high -velocity gun.

I'm going to take a look inside with the man responsible for getting this beast

back up and running, Mike Gibb.

Well, Mike, I've got to say, this is absolutely incredible.

This is what I would have seen if I was a crew member coming into this first

time. This is what I'd be looking at.

Correct. It's all kitted out exactly as it was. You've got the share and fan

row, as it's called, the bunny ear binoculars over there. Right. Which is

you would be standing as the commander. You would be the eyes of the crew.

Because if you look at it, there are not that many places that you can look out

here. You've got the right in the front where the driver sits. He's looking

through a letterbox. But he's looking through the letterbox.

from inside the house with the actual cage with all the mail sitting inside it

because your face isn't right against it. No.

And you're looking up and out with a periscope. So as a driver, you can see

literally nothing. Yes, with him, he's reliant on you as a commander telling

where to go.

So you've got that machine telegraph.

The commander's here. I'm sticking my head out or I'm ducking down.

Yes. And this is basically go forward, go left, turn right. Correct. Stop.

Simple as that.

Simple as that. And every time you move that, He's got the equivalent. He's got

the equivalent, which is a sliding scale mechanism on his dashboard with mirrors

exactly what you're saying.

You've also got settings.

for adjusting the steering mechanism, which are actually behind the instrument

panel in front of the driver. Right.

And you've got to go in there. You can't see what you're tightening up. You've

got to do it all by finger touch. By feel. Yeah, correct.

And what would happen more often than not is unless you've actually been in

thing on a regular basis, unless you've actually checked your hydraulic pressure

and everything else, you have, and you haven't got your settings right, you

can't steer.

It really is tough.

But, I mean, look at this gun. I mean, you know, the 88 is an enormous gun and

one of the most powerful anti -tank guns of the war. But, I mean, what about the

recoil here? The recoil here is terrifying.

You've got your recoil guard here on the side. Now, if the guy is not in good

communication with his gunner, he can't hear him, okay, the guy fires, the time

that you are taking your arm out, you can lose your arm.

Don't you find it just absolutely incredible that they go to so much

and detail on little things, and yet that's such a big, important one. I

suppose, though, if you think about it. I mean, look after the crew, surely.

No, that's true. But then if you look at where the development of vehicles like

this, starting off, you know, the Panzer I with your two machine guns, and

moving to something like that in the question of, what, four or five years?

Yeah. So the development was enormous, but they simply did not, they weren't

really thinking about things like this.

They should never have gone down the road of producing something like this

because of problems with the engine, problems with the steering, the cost.

I would say at the end of it all, a bit of a waste of time.

Magnificent waste of time.

It's clear after examining the monstrous Panther and Jagdpanther tank destroyer,

the bigger is not always better and came at a grave cost.

The Third Reich spent the entire war consumed by perfecting its appearances.

Nowhere is this more evident than in their magnificent staff cars for the

top brass.

I think most people assume that a panzer division is just stuff full of tanks,

but actually it's a unit of a broad range of vehicles.

What's clear to me, though, is that no matter what the vehicle, nearly all of

them were massively over -engineered and involved the mismanagement of

materials.

The Nazis never knowingly stinted on luxury.

Their staff cars, built at a time of ever -shortening resources, simply

common sense.

But you can't deny they were magnificent feats of engineering.

So there you're looking at an off -road luxury car.

So these are like the Bentleys of their day.

This was the equivalent.

These were generally issued to your...

Field Marshals or your divisional commanders who'd achieved something

spectacular.

This is a limited edition version of the Hawk Kraftwagen 21 command car built in

Dresden. These particular cars were custom built with a specially designed

chassis and heavy armour, making them expensive, complicated and difficult to

drive. Only 36 were built.

So at a time where they just cannot afford that kind of reckless...

squandering of resources. And they're doing it.

And this was then put, this was put together.

Look at that.

You're talking about a vehicle, this particular one didn't serve in North

as we thought it did originally, but a vehicle just like this, the one that was

actually Erwin Rommel's, served in Africa.

On the 21st of June 1942, General Erwin Rommel, the Desert Fox.

achieved his greatest victory, crushing the British Eighth Army and capturing

Tobruk in northeast Libya.

The British were forced to flee back into Egypt.

For his efforts, Hitler rewarded him with a field marshal's baton and a

luxury staff car.

Think of this type of luxury in the middle of a desert or combat situation

just ridiculous.

I mean, this is just smooth as glass.

Shut the door in the old way. Just bang it shut.

This is a very, very sturdily built luxury off -road car.

All the seats are made of leather. The detail is absolutely incredible.

The seat work, the leather, was all done by a specialist, as what you've just

been holding here on the door.

It was all done. Now, for what should have been a very rudimentary off -road

vehicle, just to ferry a field marshal or a general around, it's just

ridiculous. Isn't it just?

And a V8 3 .8 -litre engine to take one guy.

So you've got a driver and then you have the commander.

And most of these guys loved standing in the back and holding on to that bar and

taking the flute.

It's just that lack of prioritizing that the Germans go in for, isn't it?

What you do see with the Allies is that, by and large, they're using their

resources that they do have in the best possible way.

I mean, there's obviously certain things you could query.

But with the Germans, you just see them repeatedly making the same mistakes over

and over and over again, which is too much attention to detail.

No thought process. No thought process.

And bonkers things like this.

It's just a pointless record. And the engine, by the way, the engine is the

engine as you have in the armoured car series.

Right. So why not build another armoured car with a V8 3 .8 litre engine, then

build one of these?

Needless to say, Hitler himself had access to an impressive array of luxury

vehicles. Even for mundane trips to inspect the railways, the Fuhrer had to

arrive in style.

One such car was the magnificent six -wheeled Mercedes -Benz G4.

It's a perfect example of the supreme engineering and design detail for which

the Germans were rightly famous.

But it came at a price.

I've a big day ahead with an opportunity to get the lift of a lifetime in one of

three surviving examples of this spectacular car.

It lives in the Sinsheim Technology Museum, just an hour south of Frankfurt.

Well, look at that. That is absolutely stunning, isn't it? And what a beast.

It's enormous.

Whoa.

God, look at the condition of it.

And there you are, the big six wheels.

Oh, my God, I've been so excited about this. It's absolutely incredible.

Well, when you think of these cars and parades, it's always with the roof down.

So, yeah, now this is looking more like it, isn't it?

It feels really kind of off -road luxury, I suppose.

Which is exactly what it was, but incredible to think this was built in

See, look at that.

Oh.

Jorg is taking me for a spin in this very special machine.

Now worth an estimated 10 million euros.

There's no better man for the task.

as he spent his career as a mechanic, painstakingly conserving these rare

vehicles.

In many old cars, they make the front for the driver and co -driver very

They make it small because the driver is not important.

No. So they have more space at the rear.

It's an odd and quite uncomfortable experience for me to sit where Hitler

that.

But I'm not going to lie.

I reckon I could get used to it.

Perfect.

Brilliant. Thank you.

Well, Jörg, this is quite something.

It's a beautiful machine, isn't it? Very big and very heavy, the whole car.

And I was really struck when we were driving about how smooth it was. I mean,

you felt high up, you felt you're in a big car, but it felt very, very smooth.

Yes. So is it a four -wheel drive?

Yes, only in the rear axles.

And the rear axle has something special when you are offside in the mud. Yes.

And the wheels are turning.

Yes. It blocks by himself.

Just automatically?

Yes. And so you can go better through the mud and grass and things like that.

mean, that's incredible technology for the 1930s. Yes. It's really special for

that car.

And in terms of luxury, high, high quality engineering, this is as good as

it gets, isn't it?

For that time.

you have a lot of features here inside the engine it has 5 .4 liters

110 horsepower wow it's a big boy so it's

got hooks in here god this is a little bit to get to isn't it you can open and

then bring it here inside Yeah, how do you bring it here? Oh, yes.

It's very heavy. You can feel it. How many steel is on the car?

Isn't that beautiful?

Very special. Look at this.

Leather down here.

Yes. And why is there this gap here? What's this about? I think because the

is so big. Yes. And you have a space between the body. Yes. And the front

part of the body.

And you have in the off -side a little bit turning from the car.

It's incredible.

Here is the seat.

Yes. And you can bring the seat up.

Oh, really?

You just lift it up? Pull it back.

Yes. Ah, so you're standing.

Bit of a security risk, perhaps.

Yes, but there are a lot of people can see you. Yes.

The G4 was originally designed in 1934.

But Mercedes improved it for the Nazis in 1938.

The upgrade included rear -facing spotlights to be used to temporarily

unauthorized drivers who followed too closely.

It also featured an ingenious early door -locking system.

You talked about the security for the people at the back. They have bags for

pistol.

I mean, you know, gosh, I can't begin to tell you how comfortable this is. I

mean, I could, you could drive me to Hamburg, no problem in this. Even if I'm

only going 60 kilometers an hour, I'd be very happy.

I mean, really, it's a lot of leather, a lot of luxury.

Yes. It's a statement, isn't it? It's saying, I'm powerful.

I'm in command.

The Mercedes -Benz G4 really is a stunning example of German engineering,

its exceptional craftsmanship housing technology far in advance of its time.

on the other hand, it was never designed to win a war.

The size and complexity of Germany's armoured fighting vehicles have dazzled

popular imagination.

In books, films and even comics, Panzers have played a starring role.

But I'm about to learn one of the biggest cons of them all.

that Nazi Germany wasn't really all that mechanical at all.

For Hitler, imagery and spectacle were the key ingredients for projecting the

power of the Nazi war machine.

But to truly convince the world of their strength, the Nazis needed a machine to

make them legendary.

With the German army checked on the Eastern Front, by 1942, a new monster

was vital.

We're back at the tank museum in Bovington to look at what became the

infamous German tank of them all.

With this machine, they hoped to turn their fortunes around.

I'm talking about the Tiger tank, one of the Goliaths of the German army.

It stood at 10 feet tall and weighed 51 tons, with thick 120mm armour.

For armament, it had two machine guns, but also housed the largest gun of any

German tank at that time, with a high -velocity 88mm.

Well, I've got to admit, if I'd been an Allied soldier and I'd come up against

this, I would have been absolutely terrified. I mean, look at it. It's got

massive gun. It's enormous. It's full of armour. That is just a death -ringing

machine, isn't it?

And of course, it's amazing how much this has come to symbolize the kind of

Nazi panzer might. I mean, when we're thinking of panzers in the Second World

War, tanks in the Second World War, the Tiger is almost certainly what we're

thinking about. And yet, you know, we have to stand back from that and we have

to look at it afresh and look at it a bit more objectively.

And, you know, you can just start with the tracks. They're so wide, they don't

actually fit.

on the continental loading gauge of the railways that the Germans were using.

And because the Germans have so little fuel, the railways are really important.

They're the glue that keeps the whole thing together. So what they have to do

they have to transport their tigers by rail, but they actually have to change

the tracks.

So they have to lift this little side bit up, take this bit off, take off the

tracks, put on travel tracks.

And then when they get close to where they want to be, to the front line,

they've got to do it all again in reverse.

And then you just think about the transmission on this thing. You know,

a six -speed, semi -hydraulic, pre -selector gearbox designed by Ferdinand

Porsche. It sounds complicated.

It was complicated.

And you imagine putting a raw recruit into that. It's like putting someone

just passed his driving test into a Lamborghini Contest. You know, grinding

gears, and of course the whole thing breaks down.

So yes, it is big. Yes, it is scary.

It certainly has the fear factor, the psychological factor.

But only 1 ,347 of these beasts ever built.

But 49 ,000 Shermans.

So once again, Hitler had the technology, he had the fear factor, but

have the resources, and he didn't have the numbers.

Though his tanks ultimately failed him, his propaganda machine was still working

overtime. The Third Reich was hiding a secret.

Back at the Weald Foundation with Mike Gibb, I'm discovering that the vast

majority of German soldiers were dependent on very different means of

throughout the entire war.

So, from one extreme to the other, Mike. Yes.

This is coming back to the reality of German transportation during the war.

It looks like something that would have come out of the 19th century.

Yeah, I mean, if you told me this was at Waterloo, I'd have believed you. Yes,

this is the Second World War.

It's called a Pannierwagen. This was the prime method of German transportation

in World War II. In fact, 85 % of their transportation was actually delivered in

this way.

These horse -drawn carts came with their own complications.

Not least, how to feed all the horses pulling them.

Remember, there was one railway line at that time, right? One railway line into

Russia. And each horse had to be fed 20 kgs of fodder.

Every single day.

So the majority of supplies that were going through in those days was for the

horses.

But it is amazing. I mean, you know, you think German army used one and a half

million horses in the First World War, but they used two and a half million in

the Second. I mean, two and a half million. That's correct.

And remember, we were totally mechanized by the outbreak of the Second World War

in comparison to the Germans.

While the German war machine was still largely horse -drawn, in Britain, the

mechanised industries were booming.

By 1939, there were 14 people to every motorised vehicle in the UK.

In Germany, by contrast, that figure was 47 people per vehicle.

So despite having Mercedes, Porsche, obviously, BMW and all those makes that

we're still so familiar with today, you know, they were...

super luxury items. And of course, the problem you have is that if you don't

have a very automotive society, that means you don't have lots of factories

building them. It means you don't have lots of workshops repairing them.

You don't have lots of people who know how to drive them. You've got no

mechanics. You can't just click your fingers and go, right, I want lots of...

And then you invade Russia with 2 ,000 different types of vehicles.

Most of which are stolen.

most of which have come from Poland or have come from the British Army after

Dunkirk. You're now having to translate all those or having to get them

translated because you can't read French, you can't read Polish, you can't

British, or English rather.

And every single one has a different distributor cap and rotor arm. Yes, so

you've got a parts problem. And that's exactly what these guys were contending

with. The Germans used 135 divisions for the invasion of France and the Low

Countries.

But incredibly, Only 16 of those were mechanized.

And that's where it comes back to that conventional wisdom.

Yes, that's right. Drawn from those comics, the Commando comic, the Battle

Picture Library, the War Picture Library, the Victor manual, of us just

imagining tanks.

We never saw horses in those. I can't remember seeing everything a horse in

those. No, it's absolutely true. And one of the main reasons for that is

because... Early part of the war, they had a lot of propaganda. It was

obviously, they were very successful at that. The Nazis, that's something they

could do incredibly well.

The Nazis alone assembled a striking force of 30 panzer divisions, 70

divisions,

140 infantry divisions.

All their victorious armies, they sent in with vast numbers of film crews and

cameras, stills cameras and all the rest of it. And it was verbose to take

pictures of people's horses.

And that's why we have a problem when we're trying to explain this to people.

They simply don't believe you, because that public narrative, it's so

entrenched.

Then, even worse than that, if you move on to the machine next door here, this

is called the infantry car.

This person pulling this doesn't take 20 kgs of fodder, it's you and I.

Right. And you pull something like this, which either carries machine guns,

carries mortars, carries ammunition. So your machine gun doesn't slot in here?

Yes. The barrel? Yes. The stock?

Yep, I can see that. And you think now this would be pulled all the way from...

Germany. Germany to the outskirts of Moscow.

It's crazy.

But that's what they did.

But again, it defied that narrative that we were brought up with.

Absolutely.

Nazi Germany might have had the most feared army at the start of the war, but

was utterly reliant on horsepower and handcuffs to get them through Europe.

The Germans spent the war furiously trying to develop weapons that would

them the edge.

Ultimately, though, they were too complex, too inefficient, and too few in

number to be at all decisive.

By May 1945, the Third Reich had been crushed.

And it was here on this rather lovely hill southeast of Hamburg that German

commanders surrendered to the British.

On the 4th of May 1945, after 2 ,073 days of war, after the longest European

war in 130 years, the northern German army surrendered unconditionally to

Marshal Montgomery on Lunenburg Heath.

Field Marshal Montgomery.

He signs not only for himself, for his armies, for England and her allies.

He signs also for all those who ever marched with him and fell at a hundred

barricades, who died for all of us, that with peace we may build a wiser world.

For all the technical brilliance of the Germans, giant tanks and powerful guns

had not been enough in a war that had become increasingly industrialized.

Nazi Germany has simply been unable to keep pace.