All language subtitles for World.War.II.In.HD.Colour.S01E09.1080p.BluRay.x264-iFH.en

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1944. And on the Eastern Front,

Hitler's forces
were being pushed

back towards the German border.

But Germany was about
to face a new threat.

In the west, Allied forces
have been preparing

for months to open a new
front in Northwest France.

Training for it was
well underway.

But it was an attack that
Hitler had long been expecting.

His problem was knowing when

and above all where
it would come?

The stage was set for
one of the greatest

battles of World War II, D-Day.

The Allied landings along the
Normandy coast of France.

Since the early years of the war

Britain's prime minister,
Winston Churchill,

had always been certain
that at some point

an Allied invasion of Northern
Europe would be necessary.

The only questions were
when, where, and how?

To test the waters, British
forces had already

mounted a number of
practice operations.

In December of 1941,
British commanders raided

the Vaagso islands off the
coast of Nazi occupied north.

It was an attempt to
probe German defences

and tie down Hitler's
troops in the north.

A fish oil factory
and coastal defences

were blown up before the
commanders withdrew.

Eight months later,
Canadian and British troops

were sent in to mount
a more ambitious raid

on the French port of Dieppe.

It too was designed
to test the defences

and also to provide combat
experience for the Canadians.

But this time it
was a catastrophe.

As the landing craft
approached the main beach

they were met by withering fire.

Those troops that made it ashore

were immediately pinned down.

Behind them, the
supporting tanks

became bogged down
in the shingle.

Few managed to scale
the sea wall.

Over 3,000 Allied soldiers
were killed or taken prisoner.

Britain had learnt
an important lesson,

never attempt a direct assault

on a German occupied port.

Equally importantly,
the Dieppe disaster

reinforced the
British view that an

invasion of Europe
could not be rushed.

Churchill understood it would
require careful planning.

Eventually in April 1943, at an
Allied conference in Washington

Churchill and the U.S.
president, Franklin Roosevelt,

agreed upon a date.

D-Day, or Operation
Overlord as the seaborne

invasion of France
was formerly called,

would take place in
the summer of 1944.

But by now the Germans were
preparing for it in earnest.

Since the winter
of 1941 they had

been building an Atlantic Wall.

It was a massive series
of fortifications

running along the European coast

from Denmark to the
Spanish border.

Gun emplacements have been

constructed at likely
landing sites.

Beaches have been mined and
covered in barbed wire.

Obstacles have been placed in

strategic places to
block landing craft.

Hitler had boasted,
"I am the greatest

builder of fortifications
of all time."

In the summer of 1942, in the
wake of the Dieppe attack,

work on the Atlantic Wall
had been stepped up.

Hitler had also
ordered an increase

in troop numbers in the region.

The German overall
commander in the west,

Field Marshal Gerd
von Rundstedt,

had been given 15
further divisions.

But the Western European coast

stretched for some 2,000 miles.

He didn't have the numbers
to man the entire length.

Von Rundstedt faced a
difficult decision:

Where should he position
his over-stretched

forces to maximize their effect?

The question lead
to bitter arguments

inside the German leadership.

Von Rundstedt proposed
holding a large force

of panzers in reserve
northwest of Paris.

He could then send it
in against an invasion

once he knew where
it was happening.

But the hugely respected
field marshal, Erwin Rommel,

commander of the troops
covering the sector

from Holland, along
the French coast,

to the Loire had a
different view.

Rommel's concern was
Allied air power.

He'd seen it first hand when
he'd fought the British

in North Africa and it had
left a profound impression.

He feared that any
counterattack would

be broken up by
Allied aircraft long

before it could go into action.

Rommel had also inspected
Hitler's Atlantic Wall

and found much of it wanting.

It had forced him to the
conclusion that the best

place to position the
panzers was as close as

possible to the most
likely landing sites.

That way an invasion
could be immediately

pushed back before
it got a foothold.

Hitler compromised.

Rundstedt was given a
small force he could

hold in reserve, though
Hitler himself would have

the final say as to
when it could be used.

The rest of the additional
troops were scattered

along the entire
Atlantic Seaboard,

in accordance with
Rommel's wishes.

It would turn out to be the
worst of all the solutions.

There were neither
enough reserves,

nor enough tanks near the coast.

But in the autumn of 1943,
none of this was clear.

In Britain the Allied
planners were also

grappling with the
problem of location.

Where was the best
place to land?

Their chief planner,
General Frederick Morgan,

quickly realised there were
two principle options,

the Pas de Calais and Normandy.

The Pas de Calais was
clearly the favourite.

It offered the
shortest sea crossing.

And it offered the shortest and
most direct way to Germany.

But it was also the
most obvious route

and Morgan was sure the
Germans were expecting it.

So, he decided to
wrong-foot them

Morgan would land in Normandy.

It was the beginning of a
huge gamble on which the fate

of hundreds of thousands
of soldiers would depend.

In the autumn of 1943,
Allied photo reconnaissance

aircraft swept over the
beaches of Northern France.

It was part of a huge
planning operation,

for the seaborne
invasion of Europe.

The fortifications
of the Atlantic Wall

were monitored by the
French Resistance.

Men crept ashore to
collect sand samples

to test whether armoured
vehicles could be landed.

Northern France became
the most reconnoitred

coastline in the
history of warfare.

It soon became
clear, any landing

would need some kind
of port facilities.

But the disaster at
Dieppe had shown

that it was too
dangerous to attempt

a direct assault on a
German occupied port.

Britain's planners
were forced to come up

with an ingenious alternative.

Giant, hollow, concrete boxes
were constructed in Britain

that could later be towed
to the French coast.

There they would be suck to
form an artificial harbour.

They were known by their
code name, Mulberries.

The Mulberries would
be supplied with

fuel by a pipeline unwound from

giant reels and dropped
on the seabed.

It would run for
a hundred miles.

The pumping station
on the Isle of Wight

was disguised as an
ice cream parlour.

But the raid on Dieppe had also

revealed a second problem,

How to get the first wave
of troops off the beaches

and through the German
fortifications?

The man told to
solve that question

was General Percy Hobart,
one of the pioneers

of armoured warfare.

Hobart came up with a series
of ingenious devices.

The troops called
them "the Funnies".

They included such
extraordinary machines

as flame throwers
and floating tanks.

Flail tanks for clearing mines.

The bobbin for laying firm
paths across sand of shingle.

An armoured ramp for
climbing seawalls.

The fascine carrier
for tackling ditches.

And the bridging tank
for wider obstacles.

That left just one problem,

How to stop the
Germans rushing in

overwhelming
reinforcements before

the Allies had
established a foothold.

The answer was to keep them
guessing until the very

last moment, as to where the
invasion would take place.

Operation Bodyguard
was a massive

and complex deception campaign.

German double agents
in Britain now began

sending back to Germany,
huge amounts of

carefully coordinated
false information.

This emphasised that
the main landings

would be in the Pas
de Calais, although,

a faint attack might be
launched in Normandy.

To muddy the waters
still further,

the Allied military created
a fictitious army unit,

the so-called First U.S.
Army Group or FUSAG.

It was stationed, very
obviously, in Kent,

bang opposite the Pas de Calais.

The man in charge of
it was a pistol toting

U.S. general, George Patton,
who had been removed

from action in Sicily after
slapping shell shocked soldiers.

Patton was rated by the Germans

as the Allies best
attacking general.

Just the man they
expected to command

the invasion of Western Europe.

Basher-five-two, this is

basher-one-one on alpha.

Radio transmissions mimic

the wireless traffic of an army.

For the benefit of any
Luftwaffe reconnaissance

aircraft flying over
Britain, the fields of Kent

were filled with
inflatable tanks

and carefully faked track marks.

There were dummy aircraft
made of wood and canvas.

Harbours along the
Kent coast were

filled with dummy landing craft.

There were even
troops, though these

were in reality, backup units.

In late 1943 the
Allies appointed

U.S. general, Dwight Eisenhower,

as Supreme Allied Commander

for the invasion of Europe.

British general, Bernard
Montgomery, would be

in overall command of the
initial assault troops.

D-Day was fixed for
the 5th of June 1944.

Two months before the landing,

Eisenhower launched an
elaborate air offensive

to disrupt German
links to the coast.

Once again, it was
carefully planned

to give the impression
the Allies target

was the Pas de Calais region.

As the date of the
invasion approached,

Allied troop numbers in England
reached over two million.

They were supported by
more than 3,000 tanks,

and 12,000 aircraft.

The Germans were well aware
an invasion was imminent.

But they had been
completely taken in by

the Allies phony
preparations in Kent

and were convinced
the most likely

landing spot was
the Pas de Calais.

Everything seemed to be
going the Allies' way.

The troops were briefed.

Then the weather
turned against them.

Rain lashed down,
visibility was poor,

and the channel was storming.

Nevertheless, on the
4th of June 1944

the assault troops boarded
their landing ships

and the amount of more than
5,000 vessels set sail.

But the rain continued
to lash down

and later that day the
invasion had to be postponed.

The ships returned to port
and the assault troops

faced a nerve shredding wait.

Early the next morning the
military leadership met again.

The naval commanders
were keen to go ahead.

But the air chiefs
were doubtful.

They worried the
visibility would still be

too poor to provide
effective air support.

After a long silence
Eisenhower looked up,

"Let's go." he said.

Operation Overlord, the greatest

seaborne invasion
ever, was underway.

D-Day had begun.

At 1:15 in the morning
of the 6th of June 1944

British aircraft towing gliders

arrived over the coast
of Northern France.

Then the gliders were released

and plunged down to
capture vital bridges

over the Caen Canal
in Eastern Normandy.

The Allies had launched
their great gamble

to invade Hitler's empire
in Western Europe.

50 miles to the west, U.S.
paratroops came

down around the village
of Sainte-Mère-Église.

There was a fierce firefight.

But three hours later the
village was in U.S. hands.

One of the most
crucial battles of

World War II was underway.

An hour later, horrified
German sentries

along the Normandy
coast saw a vast

armada appear out of the mist.

They had had no warning.

The Allied fleet had sailed
undercover of darkness.

Moreover, Allied counter
measures had confused

the German radar into
believing the main

weight of the attack was
approaching the French coast

further east at the
Pas de Calais.

Allied warships off the
Normandy coast now began

pounding the German
defensive positions.

Wave after wave of
aircraft swept overhead.

Undercover of the bombardment

assault troops headed
for the shore.

But as they closed
in German artillery

and machine guns opened fire.

A number of the landing
craft were hit.

Others fell foul of
underwater obstructions.

But at 6:30 in the
morning the first

waves of troops hit the beaches.

At the far western end the U.S.
4th Infantry Division

came ashore near, at what
they called, Utah Beach.

Within two hours it
was linking up with

the U.S. paratroopers who'd
landed at Sainte-Mère-Église.

Next door at Omaha Beach
it was more difficult.

The beach was a defenders dream,

with high cliffs and
few ways inland.

As the U.S. 1st Infantry
Division waited ashore

they were mowed down by
German machine guns.

To make matters worse,

the American's amphibious
tanks were swamped.

The troops were
trapped on the beach.

Disaster was looming.

But finally, a few
of the soldiers

managed to scale the cliffs.

Against all the
odds the Americans

hung on to the beachhead.

Further east, in the centre
of the landing area,

Britain's 50th Infantry Division
came ashore at Gold Beach.

They too met savage fire.

But now the British
deployed their Funnies.

The troops were
soon moving inland.

At the adjoining landing
spot, Juno Beach,

the Canadian 3rd
Infantry Division

faced a similar situation.

Here too, Britain's
Funnies were vital

in helping the troops
off the beach.

Finally, on the far left
flank at Sword Beach

the British 3rd
Infantry Division

met only patchy resistance.

Within hours its commanders
had linked up with

the glider-borne troops
at the Caen Canal.

By early afternoon
the Allies had

successfully established
all of the beachheads.

The timing of the
invasion had caught

the Germans completely
by surprise.

They'd expected the
Allies to wait

until the weather had cleared.

Rommel, the operational
German commander for

the whole of the
Northwest French coast,

had taken the opportunity
of bad weather

to visit his family in Germany.

His immediate subordinate
in Normandy and Brittany,

General Friedrich Dollmann,
was over a hundred

miles away taking part
in a war game exercise.

Only the overall
German commander for

the whole of Western
Europe, Field Marshal

Gerd Von Rundstedt,
was at his HQ.

But he needed Hitler's
permission to move

his panzer reserves
to the battlefield.

However, Hitler was asleep

and his aides wouldn't wake him.

It wasn't until midday
that the Fuehrer

finally learned
about the invasion

but he didn't take it seriously.

He was still convinced the main

attack would come in
the Pas de Calais.

Normandy, he believed,
was just a fake.

Finally, in the late
afternoon when the scale of

the invasion was
becoming all too clear,

Hitler unleashed his reserves.

But they were too far away to
provide immediate support.

Despite stubborn
German resistance

the beachheads
around Utah, Gold,

and Juno, and Sword were secure.

Only at Omaha was the
situation more precarious.

Here German resistance
had prevented

the U.S. troops moving
more than a mile inland.

By nightfall on the 6th of
June over a hundred thousand

Allied troops had been
landed in Normandy.

It had been an
extraordinary feet of

planning, ingenuity,
and courage.

The first day of the Allies
great gamble had paid off.

But it was just the beginning,

now they had to build
up, break out,

and push on into Europe.

As the second day dawned

on the greatest seaborne
invasion ever attempted,

thousands of Allied
troops had broken out of

their beachheads and
were moving inland.

But they found the Normandy
countryside hard going.

The patchwork of woodland
and small fields provided

ideal terrain for German
tanks and machine guns.

The Allies suffered
heavy casualties.

Allied air power provided
crucial support.

When von Rundstedt's panzer
reinforcements arrived

they'd been so depleted by
the air attacks that they

were unable to mount a
major counterattack.

The German reinforcements
were also hampered by

French Resistance fighters,
operating behind German lines.

They ambushed troop convoys
and blew up bridges.

As a result the Das Reich
SS-Panzer Division

took over two weeks
to make a journey

which should have lasted
a mere three days.

It's troops took
out their fury on

the French civilian population.

The village of Oradour-sur-Glane

and it's 642 inhabitants
were wiped out.

After four days of fighting
all the Allied beachheads

were finally able to link up.

But they had still only managed

to penetrate 10 miles inland.

Eventually six days
after the landing,

the British commander,
General Montgomery,

launched a major assault
on the strategically

important town of Caen.

The British 7th
Armoured division,

the Desert Rats, advanced.

But it's spearhead ran into
four German Tiger tanks.

The Allied Sherman tanks
were completely outclassed.

Their guns were outranged
and their shells

unable to penetrate
the German armour.

They were particularly
vulnerable because many ran on

petrol fuel and were liable to
burst into flames when hit.

The Germans nicknamed the
Sherman "the Ronson",

after the cigarette lighter or
macabrely, "the Tommy Cooker".

In less than five
minutes more than

10 British tanks were destroyed.

The attack on Caen stalled.

Outmatched by the German tanks,

the Allies relied on air
power and artillery.

But it wasn't enough, the
Desert Rats retreated.

Caen remained in German hands.

Meanwhile, further west, U.S.
forces advanced on

the equally important
port of Cherbourg.

It would take them nearly ten
days to get close to them.

They weren't helped
by the weather.

During the first
week of the invasion

it had been relatively
calm and supplies

and reinforcements had
poured in through

the Mulberry
artificial harbours.

But now the weather turned.

Gales swept the English Channel.

The U.S. Mulberry harbour
at Omaha was destroyed.

The other Mulberry in
the British sector was

badly damaged and put out
of action for several days.

The flow of
reinforcements slowed.

It meant the port
of Cherbourg was

an even more vital objective.

As the U.S. forces
now approached it

the German garrison resisted.

There was fierce house
to house fighting.

It would take the Allies a
week to secure the city.

But the port had been trashed
by the fleeing Germans.

It would take a
further month before

it could be brought
back into service.

Meanwhile, Montgomery launched
another assault on Caen.

But the storms had turned the
field into a sea of mud.

Low cloud meant air
support was impossible.

To make matters worse,
the newly arrived

elite German II SS Panzer Corps

was thrown into the
defines of the city.

After four days the British
were again forced to halt.

Then, as the clouds cleared,

nearly 500 Allied bombers
devastated Caen.

British troops fought their
way into the north suburbs.

But the ruins ideal defensive
positions for the Germans.

Allied casualties mounted.

And after 48 hours the attack
was, yet again, called off.

Three weeks later Montgomery
tried for a fourth time.

The plan was to capture the
remaining German strongholds

and then push on south,
deeper into France.

After two more days of fighting
the city was finally won.

The way now seemed open
for the British tanks

to move south,
deeper into France.

But the Germans
were waiting with

their large force of panzers.

The British advance
stopped again.

The Americans in
the west however,

were having an easier time.

The fighting around
Caen had sucked in

the majority of
German defenders.

As the American forces
prepared to thrust further

into France, they faced
only scattered opposition.

The scene was set for the Allied
forces to breakout at last.

At 9:30 in the morning of
the 25th of July 1944,

over 1,800 Allied aircraft
carpet bombed a four mile

stretch of the German front
line, south of Cherbourg.

It was the beginning
of Operation Cobra,

the U.S. breakout into France.

The German defenders
were stunned

by the size of the assault.

So too were some of the U.S.
soldiers.

The plan had been for the bombers
to fly in from the east,

parallel to the U.S.
front line, to minimize

the risk of bombing
American troops.

But most of the aircraft came in

over the top of the U.S. lines.

Bombs fell short.

Over a hundred U.S. troops
were hit and killed.

Yet, despite the ferocity
of the bombardment,

when the U.S.
forces later picked

themselves up and moved forward,

they found to their
astonishment substantial

numbers of German
troops had survived.

The survivors mounted a
stubborn resistance.

As fighting raged it looked
as though the Americans

would fail to break
through the German lines.

But then the German
defences crumbled.

The next morning U.S.
tanks broke through

and moved forward
into open country.

There was now almost no
German resistance left

and the Americans quickly
pushed deeper into France.

The hill town of Coutances fell.

Then the crossroads
town of Avranches.

As the Allies pressed
forward they were helped

by change and confusion in
the German high command.

At the beginning of
July, three weeks after

the D-Day landings,
Hitler dismissed

the German Commander-In-Chief,
Field Marshal

Gerd von Rundstedt,
for defeatism.

Von Rundstedt had made
little attempt to hide his

belief when Germany faced
an unwinnable struggle.

He was replaced by Field
Marshal Gunther von Kluge,

fresh from the Eastern
Front but with little

knowledge of
Northwestern France.

Two weeks later, Rommel,
the second most

senior German officer
on the front was

severely injured
when his staff car

was strafed by a
British fighter.

Then, with the Nazi command
already in confusion,

there was an assassination
attempt on Hitler's life.

On July the 20th 1944,
a disillusioned,

aristocratic war hero,

Colonel Claus Schenk
Graf von Stauffenberg,

planted a bomb in
the planning hut at

Hitler's headquarters
in East Prussia.

Four officers were killed,

but Hitler was sheltered
by a heavy, solid oak

conference table and escaped
with only minor injuries.

The plot was swiftly
and brutally put down.

Von Stauffenberg
was shot and his

principal collaborators
put on trial.

They would later be hanged.

Hitler put a brave
face on and visited

some of the wounded
in hospitals.

But it hardened still further

his distrust of his
senior officers.

He would, despite his many
earlier misjudgements,

demand even greater control
over events on the battlefield.

Back in France, General
George Patton,

back in charge of a
real fighting force,

ordered his troops to fan out.

They took Rennes, Mayenne,

and headed for Le Mans.

They were now
moving round behind

the German forces still
battling it out with

the British and
Canadians near Caen.

With the Americans to their
south and the British

to their north it seemed
the German forces

in Normandy would be surrounded.

Hitler issued his usual
order, that there

should be no retreat, but
as the Allies squeezed in

on them the Germans
began to flee.

They were remorselessly
harried by

Allied aircraft and artillery.

The casualties were appalling.

Finally, on the 20th of August
1944, the Allied forces

moving in from both the
north and south, met up.

The so called Falaise
gap, named after

the nearby French
village, had been closed.

Large numbers of
Germans were trapped.

Over 10,000 more Germans caught

in the Allied pincer died.

A further 50,000
were taken prisoner.

The German Army in Western
Europe was in chaos.

Meanwhile, far to the south,

on the French Mediterranean
coast near Caen,

there was a second Allied
seaborne invasion.

U.S. troops came ashore
virtually unopposed.

They were helped by paratroopers
from the free French Army,

men who had escaped
from German occupied

French territory in
Europe and North Africa.

The landing had always been
opposed by the British,

who regarded it as a diversion.

But the United States
had long regarded it

as an essential part of clearing
the Germans out of France.

The troops were greeted by an
ecstatic civilian population.

It was soon advancing rapidly
up the Rhone valley.

Lyons was liberated on
September the 3rd 1944.

10 days later they reached Dijon

and made contact
with Patton's forces

advancing from Western France.

German units stationed
across the region fled.

In barely three weeks
of headlong advance

the Allied invasion of Europe
had liberated most of France.

That left Paris, where
French Resistance fighters

now rose up against the
German occupation.

There seemed little to
prevent the Allied onrush

from continuing to
the German border.