Original subtitles

This summer marks the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War and

the beginning of a period that saw two of the deadliest conflicts in our

history.

It's a chance to remember those who died for their brothers, for their country,

and for the freedom we enjoy today.

And it's a chance to honor the courage and bravery of all those who stepped

forward and answered the call to serve.

Men like my grandfather, who marched through France as a member of Patton's

army.

Women like my grandmother, who worked on a bomber assembly line while he was

gone.

So as we listen to the stories of leaders like Roosevelt and Churchill,

let's also remember the citizens whose names will never appear on monuments or

in textbooks, men and women who stood firm in the face of evil and, in the

years since, have taken their rightful place in history.

May their sacrifice never be forgotten.

What's a gig?

Gas!

Gas mask in snow!

Snow!

My mask! It doesn't seal!

My beard!

My beard!

It doesn't seal!

My mask! It doesn't seal!

Over a 30-year period from 1914 to 1945, more

than 100 million people will die in the bloodiest conflict the world has ever

seen.

But it all began in the slums of Vienna.

At age 25, Adolf Hitler is a poor loner and aspiring artist,

struggling to survive.

Both his parents are dead, leaving Hitler truly

alone in the world.

He was a lost soul.

He wanted to be an artist, but he couldn't get into the art school.

And he ended up living in a flop house.

Left without any means of support, his only way to make money is selling

paintings around town for next to nothing.

Hiller didn't have a plan B when he was rejected. He just didn't know what to

do, so he started to drift.

He had very little money. He was living in a hand-to-mouth existence.

He had no clear aim in life at all. He was, in a sense, waiting for something

to happen.

Before long, a chance event 450 miles away will change

everything.

June 28, 1914.

An assassin takes down the Archduke of Austria-Hungary.

The murder ignites a deadly conflict that quickly erupts into war.

From the tangle of alliances, two sides emerge.

Britain, France, and Russia become known as the Allies, while Austria-Hungary,

Germany, and the Ottoman Empire form the central powers.

Filled with a patriotic sense of urgency, men on both sides rush to join

the fight.

For Hitler, it's the opportunity he's been waiting for.

He quickly rushes to enlist.

He tried out for the Austrian army. He failed the physical. He wasn't

considered strong enough to carry a rifle.

Rejected by his own country, Hitler turns to the German army, who is

accepting almost anyone.

as they work to build the largest fighting force in the world.

Germany has finally given Hitler what he's always wanted.

A place to belong.

I think that the decision to enter the military for most people is not a

decision to serve.

It may be in a very general sense, but it's more often because something else

is motivating you.

throughout august of 1914 hitler trained as a private in the german army

well the german army was considered to be the finest army in the world it was a

massive force well equipped well trained and very well led and

hitler was swept away being part of the german army was something that hitler

deeply loved

The structure of training transforms Hitler into a devout German soldier.

Hitler joins one and a half million Germans marching towards the French

border and the unified Allied forces.

In the history of warfare, armies this large have never met in combat.

6,000 miles away, America has nothing to do with the war in Europe.

They're in their own war with Pancho Villa.

The Mexican revolutionary is carrying out violent attacks on US citizens along

the southwestern border.

But he goes too far.

Villa and his men seize an American mining train, brutally killing 16

innocent Americans, leaving the US military no choice but to take action.

Nearly 5,000 American troops cross the Mexican border to take down Villa.

But fighting a guerrilla force with a traditional army is next to impossible.

One army captain is determined to find a different way.

His name is George S. Patton.

Patton's ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War. They fought in the

Civil War. He grew up wanting to be a military hero.

He has a reputation for being smart, tough, and for being ruthless.

But he had another quality that's essential in military leadership.

He understands the power of technology, and he doesn't want to fight with

cavalry and with horses.

He's looking for a new technology that will change the nature of the

battlefield. So the car is fairly new.

If you strap a gun to a car, you've got a new instrument of warfare.

What Patton doesn't know is that he's about to revolutionize warfare.

I think Patton knew only one direction and that was forward.

He had a lot of charisma.

He was a very colorful leader.

I thought he was very egotistical.

And that's fine as long as you translate that into good leadership.

but maybe a little bit over the top.

Almost immediately, Patton is able to put his plan into action.

And he launches a surprise raid on Pancho

Villa's camp.

Faster!

The bandits are no match for Patton and his noble army.

And by the end of the fight,

Three of Via's men have been killed, including his second-in-command.

The first use of motorized warfare by the United States Army is a huge

success.

And for Patton, it's the first step in his rise to greatness.

Half a world away,

Two massive armies collide on the battlefield in

the first major war with modern technology.

When you look at World War I, it's about machine guns and, you know, all of these

sorts of new killing mechanisms.

It's the beginning of the 20th century as a tech era. This is not men on

horseback anymore.

This is a motorized war.

The advanced weaponry turns the conflict into a slaughter.

230 men are killed each hour.

One death every 15 seconds.

Really the machine gun probably did more than anything else. They found that if

they dug even shallow trenches and used machine guns, a small number of troops

could stop a large attacking force.

And then both sides started to dig trenches. And so they were locked along

this line, the Western Front, which was this extraordinarily complex set of

trenches that didn't move very much either way.

The trenches covered 25,000 miles.

Laid end to end, they would circle the globe.

The area between the trenches is so deadly, it's known

as No Man's Land.

Among the German soldiers stationed in the trenches along the Western Front,

is Adolf Hitler.

But even after months on the front lines, Hitler's still seen as an

outcast.

Hitler was regarded by the other troops as something of a loner, something of a

rather peculiar eccentric person who kept to himself.

But what Hitler lacks in popularity, he makes up for.

in blind ambition.

Hitler's role as a messenger was

actually considered perhaps the most dangerous task in trench warfare.

Running from trench to trench, exposing himself to enemy fire, the mortality

rate for messengers was quite significant.

FUUU-

The Germans are retreating. Adolf Hitler's been injured.

And he has this encounter with Private Henry Tandy, a British private.

Tandy has Adolf Hitler in his sights, and even though he's a trained

soldier, he can't bring himself to pull the trigger.

If Tandy had pulled the trigger,

Adolf Hitler would have died on the battlefields in World War I, and the

whole course of human history would have been changed. He's one of the great what

-ifs in history.

The world wars have begun, with Britain, France, and Russia squaring off against

Germany and the Central Powers.

Modern weaponry is causing mass devastation on battlefields.

And tens of thousands of soldiers are now living in overcrowded trenches.

Very soon after the war began, both sides realized we can entrench, and the

other side can't move us out.

They can move us...

backwards a little bit, but only at horrendous cost.

And as a result of this, the war just bogged down in the muds of northern

France.

But in London, one man is convinced he can break the stalemate.

Born into one of the wealthiest families in Britain,

He's risen through the ranks at unusual speed to become the head of the British

Navy.

His name is Winston Churchill.

Churchill had the most enormous self-confidence, and it's easy to see

why that was the case.

He was the son of Lord Randolph Churchill, who was a brilliant

politician. And so Churchill, from the very young man, saw himself almost by

divine right as playing a leading role in politics.

Churchill forms a bold plan that he's certain will change the Allies'

fortunes.

He, even at that point, considered himself a strategist.

And he looked for ways to break the stalemate in Western Europe rather than

just to get more armies and more artillery. And it actually is fairly

thoughtful. What if we could send the fleet to the south, into the Black Sea?

Resupply the Russians?

Yes, exactly.

There's no way.

Yes, there is.

Through Gallipoli.

Gallipoli.

No. This is our way in. With all due respect, we are here to provide

information. This is what we are doing.

A lot of the people Churchill worked with thought he was a man of

contradictions, a maverick, a loose cannon.

He was known as someone to watch.

His friends would say someone to watch because he's very talented. And his

enemies would say someone to watch because he's dangerous.

The Gallipoli Peninsula is heavily guarded by the Central Powers.

Churchill's plan is to blast through the narrow strait, pushing through to

Russia, and allowing the Allies to launch an overwhelming attack from the

east, opening up a second front against Germany.

If it's successful, the Allies will be able to turn the tide of the war and

crush the Central Powers.

More than 100 warships set sail for what will be the largest amphibious invasion

the world has ever seen

People

often ask me what's the most difficult decision you've ever made it's always

the decision

of sending men into battle and the worst part of it all is the night that the

battle begins because you know you just launched something and you know that

within a few hours you will start getting calls from the battlefield from

your commanders out in the field that will tell you how many young men have

died

yes

They're halfway up the straits. They should have broken through by now.

They'll make it. Four ships sunk.

Another burning.

Losses were to be expected.

The fleet is requesting permission to turn back.

They are to press on at all costs.

This is war.

Gallipoli, I don't think, could ever have worked.

The troops who stormed ashore were met by a hail of machine gun fire and

artillery, and the casualties were appalling.

The invasion is a devastating failure.

56,000 Allied troops are killed, and nearly 200,000 are reported

injured or missing.

Almost no ground is gained.

And the supply route to Russia remains closed off.

I think Churchill's credibility after Gallipoli was certainly called into

question.

Warfare is not a science.

The one thing you do know when you commit to warfare is it's going to be

horrible.

The public is outraged by the carnage.

Someone will have to take the blame.

It's over.

The plan was sound.

Excuse me?

The plan was sound. All we needed to do was keep...

I'm afraid your services as First Lord of the Admiralty are no longer required.

I'll expect your letter of resignation in the morning.

When Churchill was let go, he thought his career was over, finished.

And that wasn't melodrama on his part, and he could be melodramatic. It

appeared that it would be finished.

It's hard to imagine Churchill being humbled by something like Gallipoli, but

he was chastened.

He thought, never again.

The next time, if there's a next time, and it didn't look like there would be,

I'll do it right.

Defeated and humiliated, Churchill's career is all but ruined.

He's offered a desk job, which he turns down.

He knows if he's ever going to redeem himself, he needs a new path.

So Churchill does the unthinkable.

He enlists in the British Army and heads straight for the front

lines.

While Winston Churchill looks for redemption, Germany looks to capitalize

on its victory at Gallipoli, devising a plan to eliminate the Russian threat

once and for all.

The Germans load a secret weapon onto a heavily guarded train headed for Russia.

It's a weapon that promises to destroy their enemies from the inside out.

That weapon?

is Vladimir Lenin.

Lenin is the leader of Russia's communist revolutionaries, hell-bent on

toppling the Russian Tsar.

For the past 10 years, he's been in exile in Switzerland, until Germany

sends him home on a train, along with over $10 million to fund his revolution.

The Germans decided that they would take this enormous gamble and bring Lenin

back to Russia to bring about a revolution to get Russia out of the war.

That's about as radical a step as you can take.

When Lenin gets to Moscow, he's greeted by an old friend.

Six times he's been exiled to Siberia. And six times he's escaped.

His name?

is joseph stalin comrades comrades

let me show you to your place reunited the two played right into

germany's plan as they begin to plot an armed rebellion over the next few months

lenin and stalin recruit a massive workers militia using the 10 million

dollars from the german government

They quietly amass a stockpile of weapons.

Until they are ready to make their move.

I have arranged to take the train stations and the telephone

communications.

And the palace guard.

Many of our sources say they are sympathetic to our cause.

Our timing has to be perfect.

the communists stormed the winter palace toppling the russians are the

soviet union is born

this

is just the beginning comrades

just days later

lenin signs a decree it takes russia out of the war

the german plan works bringing them one step

closer to victory europe is at war

and in a bold move the central powers have ended the fighting on the eastern

front sending exiled revolutionary vladimir lenin back to russia

where he sees control of the country

and took the Russian army out of the fight.

Germany can turn its attention to the other allies, and one of the countries

now forced to fend off the new wave of German soldiers is Italy.

Italy joined the fight in 1915 and now must face the full might of the German

army for the first time.

Tens of thousands of troops are rushed to defend the Italian border in the

Alps.

Among them is a sharpshooter named Benito Mussolini.

Before the war, Mussolini is an anti-war activist. He's a journalist. He's pretty

much a pacifist.

The time spent defending Italy's border makes Mussolini hungry to return Italy

to greatness.

Mussolini becomes a very different person than he was before the war. His

whole attitude toward his nation and his role in it changes.

He develops this hyper sense of nationalism, this real pride in his

country.

The horrors of war.

have transformed mussolini into a ruthless killing machine a trait he'll

take back with him to rome six hundred miles

to the north in belgium the british army digs in

Since the beginning of the war, nearly 400,000 British soldiers had been killed

just to be replaced by new arrivals.

Among the new recruits is a man battling back from the biggest failure of his

life.

Winston Churchill.

Churchill took responsibility for everything he ever did in his life.

He never passed the buck.

He was humbled, humiliated by Gallipoli, and he had to do something, and he put

himself in harm's way and volunteered to go to the trenches.

It was a very dangerous thing to do.

Move! Go!

Sir.

Second platoon lost its main trench. Get me the multitude from the west reserve

now You

get

the hell scared out of you first of all

First time I got shot at was,

hey, this isn't the game.

This is for real. This guy really missed me and he killed somebody else. But

tomorrow he'll try to kill me.

As we say in the military, that opens your nostrils.

With British casualties escalating, Churchill was quickly promoted.

and discovers he has what it takes to lead men into battle.

For a man of Churchill's ambition, it's the first step towards redemption.

In his heart, what Churchill always wanted to be was the great warrior, the

great hero.

Here he was, commanding a mere 800 men.

Whereas he dreamed of directing the battle destinies of millions.

The fight seems unending.

Until Germany unleashes a secret weapon.

The fight between the central and allied powers has become the bloodiest war in

human history.

By 1917, nearly 7 million British, French, and German soldiers have been

killed.

It was a war of attrition.

You had to kill as many of the enemy as you could so you could possibly advance.

Chemical warfare just enabled that in a very horrific way.

England and France are growing desperate for a way to alter the course of the

war.

So they look to the one country that could finally tip the scales.

in their favor.

Until now, President Woodrow Wilson has kept America out of the war.

Wilson recognized that the American people did not want to get involved in a

war, particularly if it's a war far away involving people and for causes that we

had nothing to do with.

Frankly, the American people did not see themselves at immediate risk.

But with hostilities escalating, a peaceful solution seems less and less

likely.

And Wilson's advisers urge him to begin preparing military forces.

Among them is the 35-year-old Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin

Delano Roosevelt.

Mr. President, I recommend an immediate allocation of more funds to our naval

resources if we want to maintain military preparedness.

Wilson found himself being drawn closer and closer to war.

In the spring of 1915, the British line of the Lusitania was sunk, and on board

were over 100 Americans. Now, this was a big deal.

Until this time, it had been a European war, but now in this European war,

Americans were getting killed.

American resentment grows against Germany.

And on February 26, 1917, it finally reaches a boiling point.

Mr. President, I think you should look at this right away.

The United States intercepts a secret telegram from Germany.

intended for the Mexican government, containing a shocking proposal.

The Germans are offering to fund a Mexican invasion of the United States

that would allow the country to reclaim the border states of Arizona, New

Mexico, and Texas.

The German ploy was preoccupy America with the war with Mexico, and therefore

you'd keep them out of Europe. Well, this incensed a lot of Americans, and

rightfully so.

The U.S. government releases the contents of the secret message, and

almost instantly, anti-German protests erupt all across America.

The Zimmerman telegram was one of the stupidest things the German government

ever did.

Texas didn't care about the war in Europe. Now, all of a sudden, the

Germans are trying to return Texas to Mexico.

Enough with Germany. They need to be taught a lesson.

President Wilson signs the declaration of war in April of 1917.

Germany's plan to keep America out of Europe completely backfires.

The Americans may finally be ready for war, but their military isn't.

The U.S. has a standing army of only 100,000 men, while the German army

has 4.5 million.

The United States hurries to build its military, and those few with fighting

experience are rushed to France.

George S. Patton has been presented with a huge challenge.

To command a battalion of American men using the latest form of military

innovation.

The tank.

Some American generals were really resisting the tank because they didn't

want to get rid of the horse cavalry.

George Patton understood the power of the new technology of mobile and armored

warfare, and he invested a lot in that.

The tank is already being used on the Western Front, but with little success.

It runs out of gas too quickly, gets stuck in the mud too easily, and its

sheer size makes it difficult to incorporate in military maneuvers.

But where others see an insurmountable challenge,

Patton sees a chance to prove that his tanks can break the stalemate.

I think innovation comes between the ears.

It's not about the gizmo. It's about how you think about using technology and so

forth. You have to give credit to people like Pat that experienced World War I,

that had been thinking about how to employ new things.

Patton knows the stakes are high.

But with his battalion of tanks,

he's determined to win the war.

Or die trying.

The war rages in Europe.

As the Allies fight to hold their ground against Germany and the Central Powers,

in a sprawling system of trenches.

Things are ugly in World War I.

Europe was staggered, exhausted, many cities in rubble, starvation disease

were widespread.

You know, the Red Cross couldn't even keep up with what was going on.

If you were the Allies in Europe, you needed the reinforcements.

new energy, new blood.

To aid in the fight, the Allies recruit a new country to their side.

Following their long-awaited entry into the war, America is ready to make its

presence felt.

Their first major offensive is an attack on the Western Front.

hoping to force the Central Powers out of their trenches and drive them out of

France.

They're armed with a secret weapon of their own, a battalion of lightweight

tanks.

Under the command of Colonel George S. Patton. In a column, we're going to go

down the main road.

Don't let anyone know we're coming.

Move it on.

Yes, sir.

Patton is testing his new strategy. He's leading this new form of weaponry, the

tank. So it's an important battle for him to prove that tanks are valuable on

the battlefield and also to establish himself as an important military leader.

For Patton, everything in his career has led up to this moment.

George Patton had grown up to be a soldier. It was his identity.

And so in the First World War, he is in his element.

The night before the planned invasion, Patton can't sleep.

Tanks are still unproven in warfare, and Patton knows he can't leave anything to

chance.

He slips out of the trenches totally unprotected, deep into the heart of no

man's land.

He's scouting a route to ensure his machines won't get stuck in the mud.

I think when you look at someone like George Patton, he used intelligence

well, but I think the best thing he did was he turned intelligence into action

very quickly.

George Patton's tendency was for action.

Because he was aggressive, for him it worked very, very well.

On September 12th, 1918, Patton and his forces sweep.

onto the battlefield from every angle

and

the germans hit back with everything they've

got

but

all of Patton's intelligence is paying off

and his tank brigade begins to break down the German line.

Soldier! He's on the left flank! Now!

Yes, sir!

General, Charlie Company is advancing.

Inquisition on the ridge!

Yes, sir! Keep moving! Keep moving!

Lieutenant George S. Patton, 1st Tank Brigade.

Brigadier General Douglas MacArthur, 42nd Infantry.

General, sir, they need you at the front.

All right, boys, let's move up.

Patton and MacArthur, here they are in St. Miel, and they meet on the

battlefield for the first time in the midst of artillery shells all around

them. You have these two men who are going to play such an important role in

shaping the future of the 20th century.

And they have no idea what history has in store for them.

MacArthur is from a long line of military men.

His father was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in the American Civil

War.

No less is expected of his son.

Douglas MacArthur would lead attacks walking out into no man's land with a

swagger. He was embodied with not only tremendous ability, but also tremendous

self-confidence.

From an early age, he was different.

He was special.

I don't want to say anointed, but he may have thought he was.

The two West Point graduates will be allies and rivals for decades.

I don't think there's any question that a leader who has experienced war and

what it means to be in battle, if you're a military commander, that experience is

invaluable.

How you try to ensure that in the midst of all that chaos and the killing that's

going on, that you keep your eye on the mission that has to be accomplished.

That's not easy to do.

The two men lead the Allies to victory as the German line crumbles.

And for the first time, the Central Powers are on the run.

Just 240 miles away,

Years of trench warfare have transformed Adolf Hitler from a directionless loner

to a hardened soldier.

Hitler has escaped death twice.

And it's left him a changed man.

Hitler didn't feel at this time, during the First World War, that he was a man

of destiny at all.

What he did feel was a sense of belonging and a sense of commitment.

And that, I think, made him braver than he might otherwise have been. He felt he

was fighting in a really important cause, the cause of Germany.

Hitler's ideology takes root on the front lines.

He begins to believe in Germany's superiority over the Allies.

And is now certain he can withstand anything the Allied forces throw his

way.

The gas attacks.

are endless.

To Hitler, they've become almost routine.

But this time, it's different.

The Allies hit the Germans with a deadly new form of chemical warfare.

Mustard gas.

It lingers in the trenches for days and attacks both the respiratory system and

the skin.

Mustard gas affects the central nervous system. It creates mustard-colored

blisters on the skin. It blinds people.

It strips away the mucous membranes. It's incredibly painful and

debilitating. And since it had no odor, by the time you realized that you had

inhaled it and it was on your skin, it was too late.

After three years of bloody war, the stalemate in Europe has been broken.

The United States has joined the fighting.

giving Allied armies the needed boost.

And driving the Germans back to their original defensive line in northern

France.

But the German army remains powerful, meaning the Allies have to act fast.

Brigadier General Douglas MacArthur is seeking every tactical advantage.

Military leaders are human beings that are remarkably different in personality

and background.

Every so often, someone crosses the constellation of military leaders a

little bit like a shooting star.

And Douglas MacArthur did that.

MacArthur learns of a surveillance photograph of German trenches along the

Western Front that reveals an undetected gap in the German line.

Where others see an unbreakable defense, MacArthur knows he can exploit that

weakness.

Intelligence is essential, and the more you can get, the better.

but at the end of the day it's your instinct as a senior person the reason

we're wearing stars or have these elevated positions is we have

demonstrated over the years our ability to have an instinct that works macarthur

is determined to break through the line and surround the germans in their

trenches supported by george s patton and his

battalion of tanks

In the fall of 1918, the Allies launch an all-out attack.

And what will come to be known as the Hundred Days Offensive.

Boosted by MacArthur's men and Patton's tanks, the Allied armies become the most

dominant fighting force the war has ever seen.

Both of them had big egos.

But there's no doubt that both of them were brilliant on the battlefield.

Good, keep advancing!

MacArthur was an extraordinarily talented and effective military leader.

Fire!

Patent for what he was asked to do, which was trying to break out of the

trenches.

There's probably nobody better.

The Allies relentlessly attacked the German line from every direction.

After months of fighting, the Allies finally break through,

putting the mighty German army on the run.

Finally,

with no other option, tens of thousands of German soldiers lay

down their guns and surrender.

you look at the great leaders these are men who understood the most important

resource they had available to them to fight a war not the weapons not the

planes not the tanks it's the soldiers who get it done and leadership is all

about inspiring your soldiers to achieve a decisive win

after

four years of continuous fighting

and 37 million casualties, the two sides agree to a ceasefire.

When the world is shaking and rearranging itself, as it does after

great events like the end of a war,

there are a whole range of different emotions. The first is exhilaration, a

very personal feeling, exhilaration at being part of an event that is changing

the world.

And there's never much time to look back.

There's always a lot to look forward to.

While most of the world celebrates the end of the fighting, some,

deep in the heart of Germany, refuse to accept defeat.

Hitler is wounded in a gas attack.

at the very end of the war. And he was then hospitalized, temporarily blinded.

While he was in hospital,

he was then told that Germany had lost the First World War.

And that's a crucial turning point in Hitler's life.

In Hitler's worldview, it was always dead or alive.

Win or total defeat.

For him, surrender was something un-German. You are a coward somehow if

you surrender.

Hitler took the surrender personally.

A personal, destructive blow to himself.

He also took it as a mission.

A mission in life to avenge and rectify this surrender.

After four long and bloody years and 37 million casualties,

the United States and the Allies have finally claimed victory,

forcing Germany to surrender.

But while the fighting has stopped, the pressure is now on the Allied leaders to

come to an agreement, preventing war from ever breaking out again.

As negotiations to secure the peace get underway in France,

massive crowds greet the world leaders,

including United States President

Woodrow Wilson.

Woodrow Wilson was the first president of the United States to spend anywhere

near six months outside this country.

He felt that for him to send anyone else to negotiate the peace, it would not

have been as well done.

Wilson said, whatever happens with the settlement of this war, if it goes well,

give me credit. If it doesn't, blame me.

The leaders gather at the Palace of Versailles, but one country not invited

to the table is Germany.

Gentlemen, please, please sit down.

If we can start by considering the points before we discuss any of the

individual ideas.

The main thing that Woodrow Wilson wanted to accomplish at Versailles was

defanging Germany, not allowing them to develop a huge war machine again.

This was what the victors all wanted to see happen. But as negotiations get

underway, Wilson quickly realizes that each country has come to the table with

their own agenda.

There were these national leaders who had different views of what they wanted

out of the Paris Peace Conference.

They had led their countries through this brutal, bloody, long war.

And Wilson waltzes in with the Americans just at the end. So they had to listen

to him.

And Wilson could be kind of persuasive, but not that persuasive.

As negotiations drag on for months, the talks fall apart.

And one allied nation feels completely cut out of the negotiations.

Japan entered the war in 1914.

contributing thousands of troops and millions of dollars to the war effort.

They come to Versailles with one goal, to be treated equally.

But Allied leaders completely ignore Japan throughout the proceedings.

And for Japan, it's the ultimate insult.

The Japanese, who'd been on the winning side, get this slap at the peace

conference. So the Japanese became...

alienated from the United States and from the Western powers.

And it was a fairly straight line from there to the belief that if we're gonna

get any respect, it's gonna be by fighting our way to respect.

The attention shifts from Wilson's plan for a lasting peace

to a plan focused on punishing Germany, forcing them to pay for the devastation

they've caused.

The reparations that were demanded of Germany were astronomical.

It was a matter of, we're going to squeeze as much out of Germany as we

can. Well, there were some on the American side who said, we are making

the next war inevitable.

Wilson worked against that. Wilson wanted.

a somewhat more reasonable peace.

And he wanted the Germans to feel that they had a stake in the continuation of

the Versailles system. The problem with the treaty as it was finalized was

Germany had no stake in that system. It had every interest in overturning the

system.

Despite Wilson's best efforts, he is unable to convince the other allies to

buy into his plan for peace.

After six months of intense negotiations, the Allies finally have a

treaty.

But the final agreement is far from the fair and equitable plan Wilson had

originally hoped for.

The losers, Germany principally, they were there.

They didn't get to speak. They weren't asked to contribute.

They were basically...

They had a gun put at their heads, figuratively, almost literally, and

said, you're going to sign on the dotted line. It was very much a victor's peace.

The victors dictated the terms of the peace.

They made out like bandits.

Europe is finally at peace.

But while most of the world celebrates,

Germany is ordered to pay the Allies over $80 billion, the modern equivalent

of nearly half a trillion dollars, a debt they won't pay off until 2010.

As a result, the government quickly goes bankrupt, leaving millions of Germans

impoverished.

The economic devastation completely transforms the country and its people.

Germany immediately is struggling with a question of survival.

For ordinary Germans, the war did not end in November 1918.

For ordinary Germans, the battle for survival, the daily struggle for food,

the effort to find shoes and clothing stretched on into the 1920s.

As the anger and starvation spread, tensions rise throughout the country.

Germany is in a state of near civil war.

The left and the right are fighting each other in the streets.

Paramilitary groups clash.

Germany is a country divided against itself.

When World War I came to an end, this is not a treaty.

This is an armistice that will probably last 20 years.

Meaning, we have not really defeated the German spirit.

We have not really solved this problem.

The fighting stopped.

The Treaty for Peace is signed at Versailles.

And for the first time in over four years, Europe is at peace.

While celebrations erupt around the world, Germany is in a state of unrest.

And many are convinced that the peace won't hold.

Among them is Winston Churchill.

Having just returned to England from the front lines, he sets out to re-establish

his political career, narrowly winning re-election to his old seat in

Parliament.

There were a lot of doubts about Churchill. He seemed erratic in his

judgments. His decision in respect of the Gallipoli campaign had disastrous

consequences.

But it was in war that he proved his leadership credentials.

And that's what transformed him.

Churchill returns to government, convinced the German threat hasn't gone

away.

After leading his troops to victory in France, Brigadier General Douglas

MacArthur is given one of the most prestigious positions in the armed

forces. Will you be late again?

No, sir! Superintendent of the Military Academy, West Point, where he

immediately gets to work.

preparing american soldiers for combat in case the peace fails

240 miles away

at his tank academy in camp mead maryland colonel george s patton ready

is also training the next generation of american soldiers hey and

like macarthur he's betting the ceasefire won't last fire

In Italy, one man sees the end of the fighting as an opportunity.

Benito Mussolini returns to his job as a newspaper journalist, but the country he

fought to protect is now in disarray.

The Italians came out of the war on the winning side, but failed to gain the

territory they'd expected to gain.

And there's a sense of outrage about this amongst Italian nationalists, a

sense... almost that italy's lost the war despite being on the winning side

mussolini uses his newspaper to convey his view of a new italy that under a

strong leader the country can regain the glory of the roman empire he believes he

can be that leader the man who returns italy to greatness

He soon brings his anti-government views to a new medium,

radio.

We have actually been at war since we lifted the flag of our revolution, which

was then defended by a handful of men against the Masonic, democratic,

capitalistic world.

Mussolini was a man of strong words. He liked the idea of... overthrowing

existing institutions he favored the use of violence to do this

to make his vision a reality mussolini forms

a band of disgruntled former soldiers called the blackshirts who

terrorize his political opponents and begin preparing for an armed revolution

in a matter of months Mussolini has launched a movement

that is about to change the fate of Italy.

Lance Corporal Adolf Hitler.

Sir.

Sit down.

So you're looking for work?

Yes, sir. I'm ready for duty.

I understand.

Unfortunately, I have nothing.

Nothing? There is no work.

The war is over.

There has to be something.

After all I've done, after all I've given.

There is a new political group in town.

The German Workers' Party.

We need to find out more about them.

What their intentions are.

Yes, sir.

It's hard to not stand out.

The Versailles Treaty caused the economic conditions which gave rise to

extremism.

You find in history that when the economy is terrible, that it gives rise

to all kinds of different extremist organizations.

Hitler is assigned to infiltrate the German Workers' Party, one of many anti

-government organizations that have formed in the wake of the treaty.

For months, he attends secret meetings held at undisclosed locations

throughout the country.

Sign the way our army.

The Versailles Treaty is not my treaty.

As if nothing had happened.

As if we are forgotten.

But Hitler soon realizes there are radical nationalists intensely loyal to

the fatherland, and many of them harbor extremist views of German superiority.

Views that are no different from his own there was never really an effort to deal

with all of the damage that had occurred during world war one

failure to do that i think is what ultimately

produced the seeds for hitler and nazism germany as a

whole is dead it has nothing left in its heart

There are riots on the streets.

There's no Germany left to fight for.

Germany must break apart.

It is only through this that we can survive.

No Germany.

Yes, there's nothing left to fight for.

There's nothing left to fight for are the famous last words of every turncoat

in the history of warfare.

The weak among us turn to such excuses and abandon all pride and hope when it

is only unity that separates the victors from the defeated.

Clearly you have stopped fighting.

But we are still fighting Germany's great war.

Our war for what we deserve.

A united Germany.

A strong, proud Germany.

Germany is a sleeping giant.

And once we rid our nation of the spineless frauds among us, and alongside

the criminals of Versailles, we will once again know greatness.

After four years of war, a tenuous peace holds.

But anger and resentment are spreading.

And shots are about to be fired again.

Adolf Hitler leaves the German army to fully devote himself to the anti

-government Workers' Party.

His popularity and fiery rhetoric make him stand out in the group.

And he's promoted to the head of propaganda.

The National Socialist Party!

Under Hitler's leadership, membership in the National Socialist Party quickly

expands as Hitler experiences his first taste of real power.

There are many reports from fairly early on about

Hitler's charisma as a speaker.

And he gradually came to realize that he was indeed a powerful speaker, far more

powerful than anyone else around, and began to use that as an asset.

To cast all Germany under his spell, Hitler needs an image that will burn

into the minds of millions.

Nowadays, we'd call it a logo, of course.

It was designed personally by Hitler, and it may be that he put some of his...

artistic impulses into this the essential part of it ultimately went

back to india but it was taken up as a symbol of racism and anti-semitism

combined with the red background for socialism and the red white and black

colors for the old kaiser white

While Hitler is still in the early stages of his revolution, Benito

Mussolini has already amassed an army of followers and is ready to take Italy by

force.

For seven days in October of 1922, in a massive show of his

popularity,

Mussolini leads a march of 30,000 blackshirts into Rome.

With the people behind him, Mussolini and the blackshirts storm the royal

palace, forcing the king of Italy to hand over control of the government.

Mussolini came to power in Italy in 1922.

His successful march on Rome was eased by the process of expanding

ego and adulation by the people around Mussolini and then eventually most

of the public opinion in the country.

This is a dangerous process.

In just months, Mussolini has been transformed from a newspaper journalist

to the most powerful man in Italy.

600 miles to the north,

Adolf Hitler is watching everything Mussolini has done.

And he wants that same ultimate power for himself.

So he amasses an army of his own.

Hitler does seem early to have been

very impressed by Mussolini and indeed by the March on Rome.

His rise to power was modeled on what the Italian fascists had done in Italy.

On November 8, 1923, Hitler leads the Nazis into a Munich beer hall,

where top government officials are meeting.

Hermione is dead, and you have conspired to kill her.

You have crushed her with your incompetence.

You have bled her with your corruption.

You have profaned her by consorting with the degenerate peoples.

No more!

The revolution has begun.

as we give birth to a new Germany.

You watch him, and you think of how Adolf Hitler was able to do that, to get

other people to follow him.

I think it was partly because he could persuade people that that was a good

thing to do, and partly because people were intimidated by it.

After storming the beer hall Hitler leads the Nazis into the streets to take

the city by force But unlike in Italy

the German police are prepared

The National Socialist Party has taken over the government!

Unlike Mussolini, Hitler's attempt to seize power is a failure, and

he's arrested and charged with treason.

He spends his time in prison, plotting his next move.

To gain followers and to spread his message, Hitler creates a

manifesto, the heart of which is a radical plan for world domination.

What we must fight for is to safeguard the existence

and the reproduction of our race and our people.

Coming up on the World Wars.

The fighting may have stopped, but the war isn't over.

Out of a great global depression, a new generation of leader emerges.

We must reverse the Treaty of Versailles. Let these chains be burst

asunder.

While some are desperate to maintain the peace.

None of these people, General, want me putting money towards the next war.

Others rise from the ashes, looking to reignite the great global war.

Hitler is far more dangerous than anything we've ever faced before.

From every city, every town, every village,

we will annihilate them.

And as the fighting breaks out again, It's not a request.

It's a damned order.

The fate of mankind hangs in the balance.

It's time to end America's debt once and for all.