All language subtitles for The Great Martian War 1913-1917.Mister.X.en

these fields
were the bloody arena

for the most terrible
conflict in human history

In 1913, an alien
invasion shook the world

and hurled it into an
unimaginable future.

The next four years
of ferocious combat

has forever marked this ground
as the land of the vanished.

We were fighting monsters.

There was life
beyond our planet.

It went completely
against everything

I'd been raised to believe.

I'm standing feet away
from this huge dome,

the cockpit sticking out of the
earth like a half-closed eye.

No one had fought a war
remotely like this one before.

An entire
generation of young men,

all of them vanished.

I'll never stop hating
them for what they did.

2013 is the hundredth

anniversary of the outbreak
of the Great Martian War -

a conflict unequalled
in devastation

and often mired in controversy.

But the lost legacy
of a forgotten hero,

unearthed only last year

might just ignite the
biggest controversy of all.

My great grandfather,

he died about nine years
before I was even born.

He was Anishinaabe man,
traditional man,

and he kept to himself,

so I never really knew
much about him at all.

Lafonde's great grandfather Gus

was a First Nations
Canadian soldier.

His youth was spent fighting
on the Martian front line.

His final years were spent
in this remote cabin.

The things that
are inside of that cabin

have been there for years

It changes everything -

everything we know
about the war,

and everything that we
know about the enemy.

What Kim found in
her great grandfather's cabin

may shed light on a dark warning

from our alien invaders.

And for this man,

it's both a blessing
and a curse.

Historian Lawrence Hart
has spent his entire career

attempting to decipher
the alien texts

recovered after the war

the so called 'Martian code'.

He believes Gus Lafonde'
obsessive study

has cracked the code

and finally given a voice
to the alien invaders.

I have been intrigued

by the mysteries of this
impenetrable alien text.

And though a lot of
people have tried,

no one has been able to break
what they call the Martian code.

For Hart,
the revelations hidden

within the Martian texts

cast the invasion in
a shocking new light.

They confirm a threat
he has long suspected.

On its 100th anniversary

we expose the truth behind
the Great Martian War.

We finished it.

We killed the bastards..

But I don't know.

When I close my eyes...

I don't feel it's all over.

Here is where it all began -

London's Herne Hill observatory.

Through this telescope,

on the night of the
24th of June 1913,

astronomers observe a
mysterious speck of light

close to the planet
Mars and moving fast...

towards earth.

Two days later,
the world would change forever.

An enormous shockwave,

emanating from a
single blast point,

is felt all across Europe

War historian and broadcaster

Duncan Mitchell Myers
takes up the story.

It soon became apparent

where the shock had been
most strongly felt...

in the Bohemian Forest.

This forest at
the centre of the blast

is deep within
the German Empire.

Relations between Germany
and its European neighbours

have been tense for many years,

and with the observations from
Herne Hill going unreported,

everyone jumps to a very
dangerous conclusion.

This looks like the beginning

of the rush to war
that everybody's been expecting.

The Kaiser angrily
denies German responsibility.

He orders his troops
into the Bohemian Forest

to uncover the truth.

The men enter the
area on July the 3rd.

They never return.

No one in Europe
knew what happened

to the expeditionary party,

and no one knew that
in the heart of Europe,

this was created -

an eight mile wide
impact crater.

No one knew until the
morning of July the 9th,

when a telegram was received

in all the capital
cities of the world,

and it was from Berlin.

His Majesty the Emperor,

in the name of God,
the Fatherland,

and the German people,

begs the assistance of
his brother nations.

Germany is under attack by
assailants not of this earth.

A ten year old,

to find out that
monsters are for real,

that they come from
somewhere up there,

or somewhere in the dark...

You don't feel safe ever again.

Most of all was the fear
that more would come for us,

and do here what
they did in Germany.

We woke up with that
thought everyday.

Within days,

there is carnage across Germany.

It was totally unstoppable.

With frightening ease,

one by one the
great cities fell.

The name that most
endures is Munich,

which was the first to be hit.

Munich was home to
14 year old Arnold Töckelt.

He and his brother Bernie were
among the first civilians

to endure the full horror
of an alien attack.

Daylight came,

I got out of the rubble,

and there was no dead bodies,
nothing to see.

And my brother was nowhere.

Vanished.

Within four days,

civil society in Germany
has essentially collapsed

The alien invasion shows no
sign at all of slowing down,

and people in other
European countries

realized that they have to act,
and fast.

With Germany ravaged,

and her entire army missing -
presumed dead -

Britain helps forge
a grand alliance

between the surviving
nations of Europe.

On July the 20th,
speaking for all the Allies,

King George the Fifth
declares the world is at war,

and calls for all able-bodied
men of planet Earth to enlist.

The call is answered -

Britain and its
colonies lead the way.

Among the recruits from afar
is bombardier Hughie Logan,

of Calgary, Canada.

For Hughie,
going to war will mean

parting from his new bride,
Clara.

We started going together

when we were 15.

We got married at 18 -

the same year they came.

And I shipped out for Europe.

The troops shipped from Halifax.

I made her two promises
before I left.

First promise -

two girls, one boy.

That's what we were gonna have.

And the second promise wa

I'd write to her as
often as I could.

So that's what I did.

For Hughie and the thousands

of volunteers like him,

there is hope and determination.

But for those left behind
it's a different story.

He was my dad,

and I didn't want him to go.

I was hanging onto
his leg 'cause I knew,

I absolutely knew,

that the monster would
come for him, too.

They had to pull me
off him in the end,

one finger at a time.

And now I can't even
remember his face.

It's a month since impact

and humanity is mobilizing.

Little is known of the origins
of the alien invaders,

but as the speck of light
that signalled their approach

was first seen beside
the red planet,

the enemy gets a name...

The Great War against th
"Martians" has begun.

It is four weeks since
impact in the Bohemian Forest.

An alien invasion force has
annihilated much of Germany

and is pushing across Europe.

Halting the Martian advance
is the Allies' immediate goal.

In London,

50 feet below the
Palace of Westminster,

a command centre is established

and plans swiftly laid.

The chief curator of
the Martian War Museum

and these preserved war rooms

is Alexandra Banham.

As the alien force

crossed the German border
into France,

it was right here
in front of this map

that the joint chiefs of staff

ordered the tiny British
Expeditionary Force

and the French
standing army forwards

to hold the line here
along the western banks

of the Moselle River.

Among those awaiting
the terror of the alien attack

is a young English
stretcher bearer -

William Payne.

His diary contains some of
the earliest description

from the Martian battlefront.

It is a complete,
personal account

of the entire war,

and it is undoubtedly one of
the most important artifacts

in this museum's possession.

You can see that the dat
is August the 2nd, 1913.

Dawn.

Through the mist,
towering shapes emerged

not creatures, but machines.

I whispered to God for mercy,

and in response,
our artillery exploded to life.

Within moments of this
opening Allied barrage,

the alien army responds.

We cannot hold them.

Our lines are torn to pieces.

Our guns are useless.

Hell was not beneath us

it has fallen from the sky.

We must fall back.

The soldiers give these giant

fighting machines a name

Herons.

There were two component
to these machines

that became immediately
apparent to the Allies -

Firstly, they were entirely
protected by an energy shield.

This was the first
introduction that we had

had to the many uses of
dark energy particles.

The second was a slow firing,

immensely destructive
energy cannon.

It was used to
destroy defences,

to cause chaos,

but mainly to flush men
out into open view.

Each Heron is
shrouded in a toxic cloud

Combat troops are soon
issued with gas masks,

but civilians must make d

with crude,
home-made versions.

For frontline soldiers
like Jock Donnelly,

protection came at a price.

Well, you can't see a thing.

And you can't talk to anybody -

it's just you.

You're sitting
alongside 50 other guys,

but you're alone.

There's nobody.

At the feet
of the lumbering Herons

are battalions of
smaller machines -

their attack dogs.

They rampage the battlefield
by the thousands.

Fast and merciless
killing machines,

these bring death
at close quarters.

This was their
infantry division,

and they were quickly
named the Iron Spiders.

And they were wielding
a weapon from here -

you can see it reconstructed -

that was like nothing
that had ever been seen.

These were the
"ribbons of death".

They snare us, entwine us

stab us, skewer us,
strangle us,

tear us in half still alive.

The worst were the night raids.

The Spiders would sneak across
the no man's land

and hover over us,

and the ribbons would descend.

I knew we couldn't move,

because any movement
would be certain death

when the Spiders are around.

They were ripping
the Allies to pieces,

whole cavalry battalions
were tossed aside.

The very front itself was in
a chaotic fighting retreat

right across France.

On the 19th of August,

General Sir John French
wires Downing Street,

and he tells them that the
alien force cannot be stopped,

that Paris will fall,

the continent is lost,

and the only thing
Britain can do

is prepare for
imminent invasion.

That same day,

Europe is given one last hope.

An unexpected messenger

arrives at
Allied Field Headquarters

His news may be
the saving of Paris

and perhaps the entire war.

He is a corporal in the
army believed destroyed

in the first week of the war.

His communique states,

"Though the
Fatherland has fallen,

the German Army has not,

and we are on our way".

It is signed by
Count Paul von Hindenburg

So he issues an
absolutely unprecedented

Mobilization Order directed
at every living German,

telling them that they
must make their way

as fast as possible -
"blitzartig" -

lightning fast
is the word he uses -

through Belgium,
south towards Paris,

to sweep in and reinforce

the increasingly
desperate Allied line.

Germans head for
France in huge numbers.

Among them is young
Arnold Tockelt,

who had survived Munich
and now craved revenge.

And we marched and marched

until we finally reached
the Belgium border

and we received an embrace from
there I will never forget.

They gave us flowers...

They looked after the wounded,

and fed the hungry,

and the Belgian men joined us

and became our brothers.

Over the next few days,

wave after wave of German
troops join the Allied line,

and by August 29th,

the alien army
had come to a standstill

and a communique
arrives upstairs

stating that the
attack had been halted.

The Germans had saved the day

with the now famous
"Hindenburg manoeuvre".

A plan originally
conceived years before

by Count von Schlieffen

to conquer France,
rather than save it!

It's one of the most
audacious manoeuvres

in the whole of
military history.

Now that the
alien advance is stopped

the Allies regroup and prepare
to go on the offensive.

The offensive actions
of the autumn of 1913

were aggressive,
large-scale artillery barrages,

followed by
mass infantry assaults -

what the Allies were trying to
do was outflank the alien army,

and of course press home
the advantage in numbers

There was a real belief here
that, at this point,

victory could be
achieved by Christmas.

Waves of new
recruits are arriving daily.

Among them is a minister'
daughter from South Wales

Nerys Vaughn.

Her post-war account of
life at the Martian Front

"Anthem for the Vanished,

would come to embody the
fate of a generation.

How did it
feel, heading for war?

Well, it wasn't a
single emotion -

it was the most
tantalizing cocktail -

excitement, fear, hope,

dread, longing, calm,

but together they created the
most powerful feeling of all.

For the first time,
I felt my life had meaning.

Another young volunteer

was also
disembarking in France.

He was corporal Gus Lafonde,

of the Canadian
Expeditionary Force,

a First Nations soldier proud
of his Anishinaabe heritage

and eager to serve.

Gus's war would turn boy to man.

He drew on legends from
his warrior ancestors

to try and comprehend
the unimaginable horrors he saw.

This takes him deep
into enemy territory -

uncovering dark secrets
of the Martians.

A lone voice
lost in the horror.

Yeah, exactly,
that's exactly who he was

Over two months,

hundreds of thousands
of enlisted troops arrive

hoping for victory by Christmas.

But hope soon turns to hell.

Not one of the offensive

of the autumn of
1913 was successful.

Every attack was repulsed

And the Allied casualty list
just got bigger and bigger,

along with something else -

the battlefront itself is
now of an unprecedented size.

And it was growing,

and growing, and growing.

It's about to get worse.

Out in the dark,

the Allies encounter a third
type of alien machine,

and confront the grisly mystery
of their 'vanished' comrades.

By early December,

the vast Martian Front
slices Europe in two.

Herons and Spiders are
holding their line,

repulsing every Allied attack.

A mass of human dead

wrapped in the wreckage of war

litters the battlefield.

But as the sun sets,
the horror rises.

A third alien war machine

crawls out into the
gloom of no man's land,

and begins its work.

It was the threat
of what these machines

were doing during
the hours of darkness

that occupied the thought
of so many of the men.

Not one of us can sleep

not when those fiends ar
moving beyond the wire.

The mere thought of them

of what they're doing
to our dead and wounded,

fills every living
man with dread.

The men called them lice

and there were thousands
and thousands,

and thousands of them.

We could hear the
noise from the lice

coming behind us and cleaning
the ditches for their harvest.

The men at the front believed

the vile purpose of the
night-prowling herds of lice

is to harvest the dead.

Dawn breaks -

The lice retreat
like a black tide.

And everything is gone!

Every shell,
every last shard of battle,

and every one of our dead

My fallen brothers are taken.

Their bodies stolen.

For food?
For fuel?

We hardly dare imagine why

but this is why those
devils are here.

They came for us.

Back at the home front,

entire streets begin receiving
telegrams from the war office

informing them their men
are missing in action.

These missing men become
known as "the vanished"..

It was the first telegram

I'd ever seen.

It said there'd been a battle,

and that he was missing.

That was it.

Oh, my poor mum,

they might just as well
have taken her, too.

'Vanished' is what he was

By now, Gus Lafonde has been

on the front line
for three months.

His duty is to scout
the enemy lines.

But his passion for his
Anishinaabe heritage

pushes him much further
than mere duty.

Unlike his comrades,

Gus ventures behind
the enemy lines,

and into the monstrous
alien camp itself.

Here, he begins to count coup.

In Anishinaabe culture,

a warrior could
prove his courage

by the form of counting coup,

and it was a way
to defeat the enemy

without actually killing them.

The highest form
of counting coup

was to sneak
into the enemy's camp

and to steal something
without being harmed,

without being noticed.

And that's what
Gus began to do.

Gus's ghostlike
scouting behind the alien lines

puts him into frighteningly
close contact

with the Martian army.

For him, each coup is a window
on the aliens' secrets.

This ledger book
is how Gus counted his coup.

There's a sketch of the exact
coup that he had taken -

it's all documented -
it's absolutely amazing.

From this collection of

curious alien markings
and artifacts,

Gus is constructing a key -

a key that Lawrence Hart is now
using to crack the Martian code.

As Christmas 1913 approaches,

the war's influence is being
felt around the world.

In the United States,

although President Wilson
is resisting

committing forces to the front,

American business is eagerly

supplying munitions
and machinery.

Never were the transatlantic
shipping lanes so busy -

a marked contrast to affairs
on the Martian Front.

By December 1913,

all activity on the line
has come to a complete stop -

both Allied and alien.

Their earthwork systems
had gone completely silent,

and everything remained that
way until Christmas night.

It was a rumble.

I felt the mood
change all around me.

We saw a light,
a flashing light,

and it's just like
it says in the song -

"Like a diamond in the sky."

This was the Christmas
star of 1913.

All along the lines,

scores of these objects
begin to be seen,

and then later that nigh

there are tidal disturbances.

There's flooding
in coastal areas.

And then three days later

something much,
much worse happened.

The war has
moved beneath the sea.

The Christmas lights
were colossal machines

launched from deep within
Martian-occupied Europe.

Now moving freely through
the shipping lanes,

these submarine monsters

begin to starve the Allies of
their most vital supplies -

a crippling,
potentially fatal blow.

Throughout 1914,

the savage conflict rages

Desperate refugees flee
the shattered cities.

Victories are
bought at huge cost,

then stolen back within days.

Other than terrible losses,

we'd achieved next to nothing.

And slowly but surely,

the notion of a swift
victory had died.

The sea war intensifies.

The July 1914 sinking of an
American passenger liner

openly divides public
opinion in the United States.

President Wilson remains adamant

that while the Americas
are free of Martians,

US troops stay home.

But former president
Teddy Roosevelt

demands "action this day.

Roosevelt gets th
permission of Congress

to raise a volunteer force to
fight on the Martian Front.

But Wilson use
his presidential powers

to stop the troops shipping out.

Now Roosevelt is enraged

He travels the country
to drum up support...

It works...

Two weeks later,

the presidential
veto is withdrawn

and a small volunteer
force, "the Frontiersmen,

sails for Europe.

And Roosevelt waves
them off from New York harbour.

I didn't see him.

He didn't see him.
I saw him.

And yeah, he waved us off,

and it was really gung-ho.

I mean this was, you know,

images of San Juan Hill
all over again.

Yeah, bully for him.

Yeah. So we imagined,

as we left on the boat, we thought, "Boy,
this is going to be a great adventure.

We're going to go over there, and
beat the hell out of these guys,

and come home heroes."

Heroes -

and it didn't quite
work out that way.

But we were eager -
eager to go.

In autumn 1914,

corporal Gus Lafonde finally
pushes his luck too far

and is severely injured.

Lawrence Hart believes an entry

Gus made in his notebook
while recovering

shows he had spotted
a Martian strategy

Allied command had missed

Here it is -

here's what he wrote -

"Ki gii baadenmigoome
mi shaa miigaadying."

That's Anishinaabamowen.

The phrase that
Corporal LaFonde

wrote in his diary describes
a type of battle strategy.

Now, in fencing,
we call it a faint -

it's a false attack,

or it could be a false retreat -

and it's to make the
enemy act the way

you want the enemy to act -

to deliberately look weak
or to even seem to lose,

in order to gain a later
more important victory.

Gus Lafonde has worked
out what no Allied general had -

that the Martians
were deliberately

losing battles in 1914
to entice the Allies

into ever larger
offensive campaigns.

These so-called experts

that held the lives of
millions in their hands

didn't have a clue.

Why is it vital to
acknowledge this?

Because of what they
decided to do next.

By 1915,

the Chiefs of Staff

were under huge pressure
to deliver a definitive victory.

At this point,

their only strategic
advantage was manpower,

and so they planned
to make fuller use

of that than ever before

The Allies plan -

a simultaneous attack along
the entire Martian line.

The aim was to stretch

the alien army's resource
past breaking point,

and then to decisively penetrate

and then overrun
the enemy defences.

With this great push,

looming aerial reconnaissance
units and French spotters

deliver disturbing
news to their masters -

legions of Martian
reinforcements

are moving towards France

The success of an
all out offensive

is now in grave doubt.

The Allied command
is in a difficult situation,

but to do nothing,

and just let the alien
reinforcements arrive,

well, that would
have been madness.

They had to make a decision
- they had to act quickly.

A controversia decision is made

to bring forward the
push by one month.

The war at sea
had already compromised

their ability to move troops,

and equipment they
deemed necessary.

And now they wanted to move
the attack from June to May -

Total, utter folly.

And so the
push is launched early -

I believe you were on
the front line itself

that first day?

Yes, with the 4th
Newfoundland Regiment.

We were expecting casualties,
of course,

but that day,

endless waves of men
went out over the top.

I've never been so
frightened in my life.

My heart just jumped
right out of my body.

These were horrible,
horrible, horrible things

And you were scared
to death to think

that they were going to get you

and tear you to ribbons.

They had no rules at all

We saw almost nothing,

but we could hear it
all while we waited -

the guns, the shells,

the deafening machines.

But through all that noise,
we could still hear the screams,

and we just stood there,
waiting.

But nobody came back.

Not a single wounded man
for me to help.

Did you know that
on that first day,

over 850,000 men went out
into those fields,

and at the end of
the day they were all gone?

After three weeks,

the High Command calls
the push to a halt.

In that time
3 million men had vanished.

They had no
idea how their actions

were actually aiding and
abetting the aliens.

They had no perception

of what Corporal
Lafonde had realized.

They had no clue.

The terrible news of the push

reached Gus in hospital.

As the scale of the
disaster became clear,

the normally analytical
pages of his notebooks

are scrawled with sketches
of an all-consuming monster.

The creature he drew is from
Anishinaabe mythology -

a wendigo.

This is a wendigo,

and its sole purpose is to
take as much as it can -

and it will stop at nothing.

For the wendigo,

the bigger it gets,
the more it wants to eat

Lawrence Hart believes

that Gus's wendigo
sketches are further proof

he had deduced the
central Martian tactic -

that they were relying
on Allied command

to make mass attacks,

with the lice deployed to
harvest and directly fee

the alien war machine.

What if the formation
of this enormous Front

was part of their grand scheme?

What if it was the surest way
to get exactly what they wanted?

The abject failure of the push,

and the relentless consumption
of men and resources,

had cast doubts upon
the Allies' leadership.

The government back in
Britain is finished.

They were in an
impossible situation.

No one had ever fought a war
remotely like this one before.

Something had to change.

The catastroph of spring 1915

forces a change of
government back in Britain.

Younger, more progressive
minds demand a fresh approach.

To address the technological
imbalance between the two sides,

a new goal emerged -

to lay hands on
alien technology,

and then to harness it

and to turn it back
against the enemy.

But that was easier
said than done.

Capture a Heron.

That was the plan.

At St. Jans Cappell,
on the French-Belgian border,

tunnels are dug in secret all
the way under the Martian line.

Crammed with
tons of explosives,

the blast is
designed to take down

one of the Martians'
ultimate killing machines.

This mission impossible would
hinge on an elite force

of 3,000 men racing in to
salvage the downed Heron

before Spiders arrive.

Hughie Logan was
one of those men.

Oh, it was an honour
to be selected.

No doubt about that,
a great honour -

And it was absolutely
terrifying.

We were scared to death.

They hope to destroy

a 5-mile section of the alien
line in a single blast.

On the 1st of July 1916,
at exactly 7:00 AM,

the dawn silence is shattered.

The blast just knocked
the wind right out of you

They said they could fee
it all the way in London

At least one Heron is down.

But could it be
successfully retrieved?

3,000 men will have to
go tearing across 400 yards

of blasted,
shattered fields of mud.

I pulled myself up,

grabbed the sides
of the ladder,

climbed up and
over the parapet.

Where the ridge had been

there was this
enormous cloud of dust

expanding across no man's land,

and a single mass of men was
running straight into it.

And when the two came together,

the men were gone, engulfed.

We're moving forward,

and then a shape appeared
and then another one.

And up ahead,
there's guys' voices shouting,

"We got two of them!
We got two in the blast.

I can't believe it.

I can't believe what we've done.

I'm standing feet away
from this huge dome,

the cockpit sticking out of the
earth like a half-closed eye,

but then I see something moving,

something moving
fast towards us,

coming straight at us.

Spiders.

There are two of them,
and then there was four,

and then three more came
and seven of them, right

And then I'm thinking,
"Jeeze. It's all over."

With the Herons down,

the Spiders have
lost their masters.

And the war takes
an unexpected turn.

There was no attack -

then one of them
starts moving slowly,

and the ribbon starts
moving and spiraling up.

All of them are doing
the exact same thing.

And they just stayed
that way the whole time.

Then we realize it's
a gesture of surrender.

They've surrendered.

I looked and I saw coming
out of the dust cloud

the two Heron cockpits carried
by those seven machines.

The surrendered
Spiders are helping the Allies.

They are carrying
the Heron cockpits

back to the Allied line.

Dear Clara,

remember that race
I wrote you about?

Well, I got the gold Bluebell -
in fact we all did.

We won more than we
ever hoped to.

News of the
triumph quickly spreads.

And when the captured
Heron cockpit is opened,

at last the people of Earth
know the face of their enemy.

Those stupid newspapers...

they said that we
should be less scared

now we know they're
no bigger than us.

Well I think they're wrong!

Almost disregarded alongside

the creature in the
Heron cockpit

are the first of
many alien texts.

They are sent to
the code breakers,

as all attention turns
to the unopened Spiders.

Transported to Roundway Down
Experimental Station in Britain,

scientists and soldiers prepare

for their first encounter
with a live alien.

Of course there
was no encounter -

For the soldiers positioned
here directly underneath,

they were the first
to see clearly that,

unlike the Heron cockpits
there was no pilot inside

In fact, there was nothin
discernibly living at all

This unexpected
mystery is followed

by the gravest of discoveries -

one that would finally reveal
the fate of the vanished,

and damn the
High Command's entire war plan.

It begins when Roundway Down

deduces the composition
of the alien machines.

This piece is a piece

of Heron cockpit,

and these pieces -

from two of
the seven surrendered Spiders -

They're all made from
metals and alloys

which are abundant on earth -

iron, steel, lead,

copper, tin.

In other words,
Roundway Down realized

that the majority of
the alien war machines

had been built after
they had arrived.

And that was when
the activities

of the Martian lice
on no man's land

began to make a
dreadful new sense.

The long-held
belief that the lice

are harvesting the
bodies of the dead

is silenced by
a shocking truth.

In fact, all along,

there had been something of far
greater worth to the aliens -

the thousands of tonnes
of shells and bullets

and materials of warfare
that we had been depositing

on the fields of the
Front every single day.

The aliens build
their killing machines

with metals carried into
battle by the Allies.

Well, every shell I ever fired

only ever made them stronger.

With this realization,

the true fate of the millions
of missing soldiers -

"the vanished" -
was finally understood.

Here's the truth -

and the truth is much worse

than the rumours about th
human rendering factories

and the alien food stores

and that's this -

They were still there
out in those fields -

crushed, eviscerated,

ground into the mud.

All the while the lice
were swarming around

and they were foraging for
what they truly valued -

and that was the lead,
the metal,

the steel to make even bigger
and greater machines of war.

And then we learnt
what really happened.

They weren't taken away
by the Martians at all!

They were still there,
in that mud.

They were crushed
and churned up!

And all they wanted
was the metal!

I'll never stop hating
them for what they did.

These corridors under

the Combined Allied
Commission for the Vanished

bear mute witness to the
sheer numbers who died.

Look in each of these boxes -

34 files -

each file is a human life
lost in the war,

and there are
27 miles of corridors.

This is the
lowest moment of the war

Humanity is staring
into the abyss,

but Roundway Down
are about to discover

an alien secret that could
turn the tide of the war...

Across Europe,
the mood is dark.

But at Roundway Down,
there is a breakthrough.

In analyzing the
surrendered Spiders,

the element that
enables and powers them

is examined in detail.

To the perplexed scientists,
it's nothing short of a wonder.

This liquid
element which powers

all movement and weaponry
in the Martian machines

is like nothing
previously observed.

An organic metal capable
of self-replication

and what we can only
term as awareness.

As we investigate it responds
and appears to work with us.

Though impossible to classify,

we have given it a name
victicite.

The discovery is a lifeline.

The order immediately goes out

to turn the wonder
material victicite

back against the aliens.

There were profound
philosophical questions

to be asked about victicite -

its nature,
its properties -

but all that was
left by the wayside.

Why?
Progress was being made!

A first wave of
victicite-based war machines

are soon rolling
off the assembly line -

including an all terrain
fighting vehicle

called a landship.

They are swiftly tested,

made front line ready,

and in October 1916, deployed.

Prematurely, as it turned out.

At Douchey, les Mines,

we were hasty,
and it ended in failure.

But it was an
encouraging failure.

We had successfully engaged
the alien for a while

and it was his overwhelming
superiority in numbers

and really bad
battlefield conditions

that proved too much.

So there was ground
here for real optimism.

Faced with weapons

made using their
own technology,

the Martian strategy shifts.

All along the Front,
attacks intensify.

The aliens are no
longer nurturing war.

They're going for
outright victory.

Then, on November the 5th

Allied command's worst
fears are realized.

Near the
northern tip of the line

in the Netherlands,

a single Heron breaks
through to the Channel ports.

This is the stuff
of nightmares -

After three years,

the moment everyone
in Great Britain

has been dreading has arrived.

Well, there is chaos
here in Command Centre.

It's low tide in the Thames,

so the navy can't give chase,

and the small force that
was originally assigned

to protect the
British mainland,

the Home Air Defence Squadron,

it was critically depleted.

There are just two pilots

within striking
distance of London,

testing new
victicite-based weaponry

British aces Edwin Sinclair
and Gregory West.

They are immediately scrambled.

As the invader advances
up the Thames estuary,

warnings spread
throughout London,

and anti-alien batteries in
Regent's park take up position.

Now most people flee
westward, away from the danger,

but thousands of people,

with no conception of
the danger they're in,

choose to line the embankment.

The police are
issued with rifles.

But as they attempt to
drive the crowd back,

a silence suddenly falls as
a shape heaves into view.

And there it is.

Do I run?

Do I hell!

I run straight at it!

The new
weaponry stalls the Heron

but it's not enough.

And it's here that it fires

a single shot at
Sinclair's plane,

and as we all know,

the shot misses and
strikes Big Ben.

But help is on the way..

A third aircraft is coming in.

It has followed the
path of the Heron

all the way from
the Dutch coast.

In the cockpit is a young
Hungarian aristocrat,

Count Laslo Andrazovski,

and he is about to become the
most famous man in Europe.

I saw him give the signal
to the other two,

and they came in behind him,

and he leads 'em straight
down to the bastard.

Gotcha!

The expertly coordinated fir

had broken through
the Heron's shield.

Count Lazslo's first
visit to London

would become
the stuff of legend.

And as for the brief footage
of the falling Heron,

that would be replayed
again and again

throughout the entire world.

It was of immense value
for public morale.

Of greatest importance,
of course,

was what happened
in the aftermath.

The London
crowd, baying for blood,

descends on the fallen Heron.

Then we are runnin'
onto the bridge,

and there's fire and all
sorts falling on top of us,

but we don't care,

'cos we're so busy
tearing at the cockpit.

And I want to do it, too

because I want the same
as they want,

I want to be
the one that finds him

and rips him out
of the wreckage!

Then there's a surprise.

I see him and he's alive!

Wriggling like an eel on a hook

and then he sees me
and he's scared.

I know he's scared of me

And then the police come
racing through on their horses

and we're all forced
back on the bridge.

The mounted
police clear the crowds

and escort the living alien as
it is rushed to Roundway Down.

But within minutes
of its arrival,

the Martian pilot is dead

Any initial disappointment
vanishes during the post-mortem,

because here Roundway Dow

make their key discovery
of the entire war,

and it's immediately
classified "Most Secret"

The autopsy
reveals the alien died

from infection by an animal
virus called glanders.

It was caught through contact
with the police horses.

Now at Roundway Down,

the race is on to
replicate the virus

and create a super weapon

The code name of the
weapon is Trojan Horse.

It couldn't come soon enough.

After three
years of crippling war,

the Allies have found a
virus lethal to the aliens.

But the Martian attacks are
intensifying on land and sea.

The troops at the front cannot
hold them off much longer.

They seemed indestructible.

I remember one of them -

There was this guy next to you,

and then this foot comes
down and crushes this guy

like leaves on the sole
of your boots.

I mean, how do you fight
something like that?

We needed something,
and we needed it fast.

As the line continues to fray,

the Aerial
Reconnaissance Division

sights large numbers of
alien machines moving west.

There is no time to lose

In January 1917,

a solemn report is delivered
to the Allied leadership.

It is wit
the heaviest of hearts

we must conclude within
the next six months

the total breakdown
of our defensive line

on the Martian Front
is a certainty.

Just nine days
after this statement

predicts the fall of Europe,

three American naval
destroyers returning to New York

are sunk off
the gulf of Mexico.

You do know there
weren't any actual

sightings of alien machines -

just distress signals
and garbled messages

about coming under attack

Allied U-boats did have
a range of 5,000 miles -

more than enough
to be in those waters.

Look, I'm not saying the
were in those waters.

All I'm saying is that

they could have been
in those waters.

Aliens or Allies,

the debate still simmers as to
who was behind the attacks.

What is certain is hysteria
took hold on American streets.

Roosevelt's pro-war supporters
besieged the White House.

Wilson has become

the lamest of
presidential ducks.

This can come to
only one conclusion,

and it's an unprecedented one.

Woodrow Wilson resigns,

Roosevelt is sworn
in as US president,

and on the 17th
of February 1917,

America finally enters th
war against the Martians

Within months,
the volunteer "Frontiersmen",

now hardened veterans,

see their conscripted American
countrymen arriving in France,

at the rate of
12,000 men a day...

That was a good thing.

They were finally coming

Yeah, nice to see them.

Mazel tov!
What took you so long?

You know,
I'm serious -

I mean, what took them so long?

We'd been in this thing
for three years already.

With this massive injection

of troops from the States

Allied command prepares
for the end game.

The Allies are
playing all their cards here.

This is it now.
This is all or nothing.

Immediately after
the Westminster alien's

death from infection,

Roundway Down begins

mass-producing
the glanders virus.

They must now deliver
the weapon to the enemy.

The risks to humans
are uncertain,

but for High Command,

there is no alternative
to biological warfare

on the Martian Front.

In the summer of 1917,

rumours of an Allied secret
weapon are spreading fast,

infecting the men with hope.

It hardly seems possible

but I feel it like
a fire inside me.

After four years of losses -

four years of blood, of agony,

of endless murder -
we can win.

They had developed
a secret weapon.

So you know, alright -
bring it on.

We're ready to go.

No one knew what it was,

but we believed that
it could help us win.

The days tick by,

and the alien army
continues to reinforce.

Roundway Down are struggling
to mass-produce the virus.

With no sign of a new weapon
at the Front, hope fades.

Each day there were a million
Spiders creeping closer,

and then every day we're saying,
"Okay, where's the weapon?"

They were only
50, 40, 30 miles away,

and still nothing.

And then we were told

that we were going into
battle in three days,

and now there was
no feeling at all,

'cause we knew nothing's
coming to save us.

Nothing.

It was a terrible realization.

There was no answer -
just disillusionment.

That's all -
utter disillusionment.

Desertions were occurring
up and down the Allied Front,

as well as several mutinies

which had to be
forcibly put down.

I had it. I left.

I knew this was my last time,

I would not survive.

I had this feeling
that my time was up.

I was a soldier for four years,

and yet from now and forever,

I'll be a deserter.

Only the elite few know

Operation Trojan Horse
is finally ready,

but its success is dependent
on a mass assault.

It's vital the
troops are rallied.

Field marshal Sir Douglas Haig

issues a
special order of the day

Many amongst us are tired.

To those, I say hold firm.

Ultimate victory is
within our grasp.

With our backs to the wall,

and believing in the justice
of our cause,

each one of us must
fight on to the end.

The safety of our homes and
the freedom of mankind alike

depend upon the conduct
of each one of us

at this critical moment.

Haig's words hit the mark

The line rallied.

Order seemed to restore itself -

even though very few
remained in any doubt

as to their probable fate

The night
before the last offensive

William Payne leaves his
diary in a field hospital

The final entry is addressed

to the young nurse
he had long admired.

You bestow a million kindnesses

upon men you know not

and never see again.

Perform one more for another -

keep this safe
as if it were my heart.

At 7:00 AM
the following day,

the largest military offensive
in human history begins.

The secret weapon is ready,

and the means to
carry the infection

to the aliens is in place

Great herds of glanders-infected
horses are waiting,

massed in vast pens
along a 50-mile line.

These unwitting weapons
of mass destruction

are tended by
volunteer wardens...

like Hughie Logan.

I'd never seen so many
horses all together -

nobody had.

And that was just our station.

Success requires an
attack to draw the Martians in,

followed by a surprise retreat,

which will lure the alien
towards the horse pens.

The entire attack is focused

on one 50-mile section.

This is the greatest
concentration

of troops ever seen.

The entire army is throw

against the alien legion

The results are predictable.

The Allies take
horrendous casualties,

barely holding the line.

Then the order goes up

to pull the trigger
on the secret weapon.

They suddenly turn

and begin a full retreat

The Martians give chase,

annihilating everything and
everyone in their path.

This has become a rout.

And it is exactly

what High Command
had hoped for.

The triumphant aliens,

charging after the
retreating troops,

are heading right where
the Allies want them.

The whistles sound and th
wardens open the gates,

sending thousands
of infected horses

stampeding through the
ranks of retreating soldiers

towards the Martians.

We had to drive the horse
back towards the line.

We lined up at
the back of the pen

and we shouted at them,

screamed at them, hit them.

And I was glad I was
wearing my gas mask,

because I didn't
want them to see me.

And once they panic,

they'll all go in a herd
even the old cart horses

They'll get the scent
in their nostrils,

and they'll follow, too,

and that's what happened

Bang!

Away they went at full gallop,

right into that fury, that hell.

The infected
horses are engulfed

by the alien advance.

To the soldiers on the ground,

this action seems both
horrific and futile.

The alien force resumes

its pounding action
towards the coast,

without any clue that the fatal
blow has already been struck.

And that the day and indeed the
entire war are finally ours.

Operation Trojan
Horse has delivered.

The invading army never
reached the coast.

Within days and within hours,

the Herons come to a
complete standstill.

In each of the cockpits,

the lone pilot is rapidly dying.

The symptoms are
always the same -

frothing at the mouth,

grossly swollen
respiratory tract,

and in their single lung,
a fatal accumulation of fluid.

Simply put, they drowned

Two day later,

the Allies proclaim
victory around the world

Victory, but a victory
won on the hardest terms.

Two million were lost.

Now, let me be quite
clear about that -

that's two million that Allied
command were willing to lose.

It was an immense price,

but it was the price
that was necessary

in order to induce the deep
systemic infection of the alien

that was needed for us to win.

In the immediate
aftermath of the war,

the infected horses and
millions of refugees

struggled to survive in the
ruins that was once Europe.

In the squalor,
the glanders virus spreads.

As it does, it mutates,

and soon becomes
an airborne contagion

that easily infects the
mass of susceptible humans.

Over the next five years

the death toll
from "Martian flu"

would reach 100 million.

One casualty is
young Clara Logan.

She died in 1920.

It was nearly the end of it.

She was one of
the last it took.

She was 23.

Was it me?

Was I one of the guys
that brought it back?

Maybe.

I didn't know.

I still don't know.

All I knew was...

she was gone.

As Europe begins
to put itself back together,

the Martian nest sites reveal

their immense
stockpiles of victicite.

The contents of
the alien nest sites

were the biggest,

and most valuable
prize of all waiting for us.

Vast quantities of victicite
presented humankind

with enormous possibilities.

The products of victicite

become a vital part of
the modern world.

This organic metal,

with its ability to
perceive and respond,

opens up a
technological gold rush.

I'm constantly surprised
at the number of our visitors

who just don't seem to realize
how many aspects of modern life

can be traced right back
to the Martian war -

So many advancements
that we've made

in telecommunications,
in science and engineering,

and in medicine -
even in travel.

They can be traced right
back to this time, to them.

Kim Lafonde
has grown up in a world

that has prospered through the
widespread use of victicite.

But the key to the
Martian code she uncovered

in her great grandfather's cabin

is set to question the
benefits of this progress

Kim may have lifted
the lid on a warning -

the invasion is not over.

My family, at some point,

we forgot my great grandfather.

I was born nine
years after he died,

and 21 years later,

I came here and
opened up that trunk.

The things that he
learned about the war,

those things survived.

They remain in this book

and they were here
for me to find.

In his study
of these notebooks,

the historian
Lawrence Hart believes

that Gus's Anishinaabe heritage

granted him a unique
perspective

on the alien symbols,

and led directly to the
cracking of the Martian code.

Hart has completed the work,

and applied it to the
collected alien texts.

To his surprise,

many appear to be very
personal writings,

even laments.

These are not unlike our letters
and diaries written by our own.

Now, this symbol here

is the most common symbol
translated in the texts.

We find it over and
over and over again.

And the nearest word
I can translate is this

But most extraordinary

is the text recovered fro
the Westminster Heron.

Hart is convinced it wasn't
trying to obliterate London,

but offer a warning.

These are some
of the key symbols

that make up the text.

Now this first row here

the alien describes himself

as a warrior that
represents all warriors.

Now here, he says that
he has been deceived,

like we will be deceived

Hart believes
that the deception

described by the Westminster
alien is that their race

was itself once invaded,

and infected by a parasite -

the same parasite that drove
them to invade Earth in 1913 -

to infect us.

The text goes
on to recount how,

a long time ago
in their history,

their planet was invaded
by an alien species

whose technology was powered
by this symbol here -

a thriving metal
that feeds on life.

The strange metal material

described in this translation
Hart believes is victicite.

Victicite has long
been recognized

as a form of life
in its own right.

So ask yourself this -

What is a form of life

that takes possession
of another species,

that modifies its host behaviour

to dispense itself in
even greater numbers?

What else if not a parasite?

But that is precisely
what victicite is.

If Lawrence Hart is right

and the aliens were
infected carriers

forced to spread the parasitic
victicite across the galaxy,

then what next for us?

Now it's our turn to stand

at the gateway to the stars.

It's our turn to reach
out to the void of space

and our turn to carry and spread
the parasite yet further.

How can you win a war, when
with every blow you land,

you're only making
the enemy stronger?

This one was for
the last offensive.

It's says "bravery",
but I say it was crazy -

because I'd have to
be crazy to go back.

We just volunteered!

And do you know the
first thing we learned

when we were in the army?

Never volunteer for anything.

Two girls, one boy.

That's what we're gonna have.

My whole life since then...

I've been waiting for
them to come back...

But I don't know...

I don't believe they ever left.