All language subtitles for Lost.Worlds.S01E06.Hitlers.Supercity.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-BurCyg_track3_[eng]

[music playing]

NARRATOR: On the outskirts
of Berlin stand traces

of the Super City that
Adolf Hitler planned.

Forgotten and abandoned, they
are what remains of his attempt

to build a new world capital.

Hitler may have been responsible
for more death and destruction

than any individual in
history, but he didn't only

want to destroy.

He wanted to build, to
remodel his country according

to his own vision, and this
new city would be the project's

showpiece.

ED MCCANN: And there's nothing
like this that has ever

been tried or achieved.

Nobody has ever replanned,
rebuilt a whole city

in this way.

NARRATOR: Hitler planned
to create buildings bigger

and better than anything
that had gone before.

A domed hall so large
that the Eiffel Tower

could be fitted inside it.

A stadium that would
hold 400,000 people,

but his dream was
never fully realized,

and it died with him at
the end of World War II.

Only now, after six
decades of research

and using new computer
graphic technology,

is it possible to recreate the
city that Hitler had intended

for his people.

This is Hitler's Lost World.

[music playing]

Germany, 1933, a nation
made bitter and weak

by the loss of World War I.
Its people suffer the hardship

of economic depression, and
Adolf Hitler sweeps to power

with the seductive
promise of a new future.

A future where Germans
will take their rightful

places as the
leaders of the world,

as the greatest military power.

Hitler will rebuild
their nation.

He will create a new world
capital on the side of Berlin.

He will call it Germania.

And throughout
his career, Hitler

will use buildings to symbolize
Nazi supremacy to stake

a claim on a place in history
and as a means of presenting

his carefully created
image to the world.

Hitler needed a man
to make it happen.

He chose Albert Speer, an
architect only 28 years old.

It would be Speer's job to
bridge the gap between Hitler's

dreams and the reality
of construction.

PAUL JASKOT: His youth
was an important factor

because he could, in that sense,
become a kind of apprentice

to Hitler, that is he
could build what Hitler was

imagining.

NARRATOR: Their partnership
would survive until the very

last days of Hitler's life.

Together, they
embarked on a campaign

deliberately to
create buildings that

would intimidate and overwhelm.

That campaign began not in
Berlin but in southern Germany,

the old Nazi heartland.

The city of Nuremberg
would become

post for the Nazi
party's annual rallies.

Speer designed a venue where the
party faithful would celebrate

the cult of their leader.

Today, the site is
derelict and overgrown.

A memory of a shameful era.

But Speer's vast, open
arena is still here.

It's the size of 12 football
fields enclosed by 36 stone

towers.

At one end stands the
Zeppelin Tribune, the platform

where Nazi leaders would
address uniformed ranks of party

members.

The platform is 1,300 feet
long and 65 feet high.

60,000 people sat here to watch
parades and military displays

in the field below.

Speer based his design
on a stunning piece

of classical Greek architecture,
the Pergamon Altar which

had been transported
brick by brick in 1913

to Berlin's main museum.

By echoing its
construction, Speer

was claiming that the
Nazis could rival anything

in history.

PAUL JASKOT: This monument had
a series of steps going down it,

and then also a large
colonnade behind it.

Originally, there was a very
large colonnade behind us here.

NARRATOR: But Speer didn't
just copy what he saw.

He set out to improve it and
make it appeal in his own time.

By extending the staircase
and adding stepped seating,

he made the Tribune much larger
than its ancient inspiration.

It took three years to build,
and when it was finished,

it was crowned with a
20 foot tall swastika.

Historian Paul Jaskot
walks the corridors

beneath the speaker's platform.

PAUL JASKOT: We're
standing inside

of one of the only remaining
structures built by Albert

Speer, the Zeppelin Tribune.

What you're seeing here is the
lobby space that was probably

used as a preparation
area for party officials

before they would go up and
speak at the Tribune stands

above us.

NARRATOR: Officials would
walk out to address tens

even hundreds of thousands
of people at the rallies.

[non-english speech]

The surroundings were designed
to convince the audience

that they were part of
something momentous.

The walls of this lobby
are faced with marble.

The floor is polished granite.

The ceiling is covered with a
golden swastika design mosaic.

And yet Speer's most imposing
work here at the Nuremberg

rally site was a
one-off spectacle

created not with stone
or metal but with light.

At the 1934 rally, he used light
to bind the masses together

by enclosing them inside
one huge outside space.

Visible from up
to 60 miles away,

lights filled the sky,
reaching 25,000 feet.

It was said to be like
a religious experience.

The beams created what
would become known

as the Cathedral of Light.

This rare footage
captures the moment

when the beams of
134 searchlights

converged in the sky
above the Zeppelin field.

PAUL JASKOT: Speer used them to
create a effect of a community

in the sense that they
surrounded the entire Zeppelin

field so thousands of
people and then the lights

would form above your
head, and it would give you

the sense of being inside
although you were outside.

NARRATOR: The success
of the Nuremberg rallies

persuaded Hitler that the
city needed a new indoor home

for the party's
mass conventions.

He decided to build the
Congress Hall, where

up to 60,000 followers
could gather to hear him

and his henchmen speak.

This would be a completely
new type of building.

Again, he took inspiration
from the classical world.

This time the Colosseum
of ancient Rome.

PAUL JASKOT: Hitler often
talked about outdoing

Rome both architecturally and
in terms of its military power.

NARRATOR: The Colosseum
is 500 feet wide.

Hitler's hall would
be 200 feet wider.

The architects were
told to mimic its design

and to use not modern concrete
but only the finest granite.

Hitler wanted prestige.

He wanted buildings that
would last 1,000 years.

We're in the lower arcade
of the Kongresshalle.

It has a tier exterior, and it
is built out of solid masonry.

What we're seeing here is the
facing of that masonry interior

which is made out of
very, very hard granite,

and it's also a very
fine-grained granite

so it was a very expensive, very
high prestigious kind of stone.

NARRATOR: Although the
exterior of the Congress Hall

exudes prosperity and
success, the interior

was never completed.

The onset of war meant the
inner walls and foundations

lay crumbling and neglected.

Paul Jaskot goes in search
of what would have been.

I'm standing in the interior
of what remains of the Congress

Hall.

There would be bench seating
centered on a podium where

the party leaders or
Hitler would speak.

At the top of the hall
would have been a colonnade.

And then the hall would have
been capped by a ceiling which

had a very large skylight
bringing the natural world

inside.

NARRATOR: The roof is missing,
not collapsed or bombed,

but never built. As war loomed,
it became more important

for the German state to deploy
its resources elsewhere.

The builders never returned
to complete the job.

Now, engineering experts
wonder whether Hitler's plans

for this building could
ever have been realized.

ED MCCANN: This would have been
200 meter spanning structure.

There was no column
support inside,

and it's questionable whether
they could have done that

at this time, and we can
certainly do it today.

NARRATOR: Now, using
computer technology

based on the original
plans, we can finally

reveal how the
Congress Hall would

have looked if Hitler's
engineers had completed

their task.

Here, Hitler would
have delivered speeches

from a central pulpit to
a crowd of over 50,000.

Speer and Hitler had
defined the blueprint

for what they planned to build.

Structures that would
not just impress but

overwhelm those
who entered them.

The next phase was to
demonstrate this power

to a global audience.

Germany would host
the Olympic games,

and Hitler would have
Speer design a new stadium.

It would be bigger than
any built before or since.

In 1934, work began on the
largest stadium in Europe.

This stadium hosted
the 1936 Olympic games

and marked Hitler's arrival
on the international stage.

It was the next step in his plan
to rebuild and rebrand Germany.

Located five miles from
the center of Berlin,

it would focus the world's
attention on Nazi Germany,

and its growing strength.

The stadium would cost the
equivalent of one quarter

of a billion dollars.

Two tiers of seating would
hold 110,000 spectators,

but Hitler's engineers
were given just three years

to complete it.

They fear that the
amount of work involved

meant the stadium would not be
ready in time for the opening

ceremony.

Hitler would not take
no for an answer.

An innovative
solution was needed.

The builders decided to sink
the floor of the stadium

and place the lower seating
tier below ground level.

Concrete construction was only
needed for the upper tier not

for the lower tier.

NARRATOR: This would drastically
cut the construction time.

But more than that,
it appealed to Hitler

because it echoed the design
of the arenas of ancient Rome

which also had sunken floors.

He continued to meddle in
other aspects of the design.

Werner March, the
stadium's architect,

had planned an ultramodern
glass facade for the building's

front.

MATTHIAS DONATH: When Hitler saw
these drawings, he get angry,

and he forced March
to change the plans.

He want no glass
elements in the stadium.

NARRATOR: Hitler
wanted the building

to have a classical design.

He demanded the facade
be covered with stone.

PAUL JASKOT: Stone
was really significant

to Hitler because
of its prestige,

because of its permanence,
and because of its use

by previously powerful regimes.

NARRATOR: This was to be more
than just a sports arena.

It's true function was as
a monumental advertisement

for Nazism.

An opening was left in
the stadium's west end.

It gave a direct line of
sight to a bell tower.

The Fuhrer Tower.

It's overshadowing
presence would

be a constant forced
reminder of Hitler's power.

In fact, throughout the
games, his secret police

used it as a vantage point
from which to watch the crowd.

When he attended in person,
Hitler sat with his men

in a VIP box like a Roman
emperor sitting in judgment

over a contest
between gladiators.

And he choreographed
an opening ceremony.

For the first time,
a flaming torch

was carried from
Greece's Mount Olympus

to light a beacon
in the stadium.

A ritual which continues today.

Few realize that it
was a Nazi innovation.

The athlete who carried
the torch through Berlin

still remembers the effect
this had on the crowds.

[non-english speech]

The mood was fantastic.

I can tell you that much.

There were hundreds of people
standing on the streets.

I was thrilled.

It was just an honor
to run with this torch.

NARRATOR: The Nazi
message was clear.

They were the natural
inheritors of history's greatest

civilizations.

But not everything at the
games went to Hitler's plan.

Although German athletes
topped the medal table,

the star of the 1936
games was Jesse Owens,

an African-American athlete.

[non-english speech]

Well, Jesse Owens was the hero
amongst all the participants

and the spectators.

He was a personality
who stood out

from all the other athletes.

NARRATOR: Hitler ignored
the inconvenient fact

that the hero of the games
was a man he thought racially

inferior.

He called the Berlin Olympics
a great victory for Nazism.

The international community
had threatened to boycott

the games, but they had been
won over by the spectacle they

witnessed.

The stadium had done its job.

Hitler was delighted, and
his response was immediate.

Work was to start straightaway
on another stadium,

the German Stadium.

It was to be even bigger.

The stadium was meant to
be an even greater expression

of Hitler's claims
for world domination.

Just as the world was
going to be dominated

by the political
will of Germany,

so too would other
aspects of life,

including sports, for
example, be also centered

in the new peacetime empire
of a German-dominated world.

NARRATOR: Hitler chose to build
his new stadium in Nuremberg,

site of his earlier
triumphal rallies.

This man-made lake
marks the spot he chose.

It is the only trace
left of an attempt

to build a stadium
for 400,000 people.

Our investigators
pieced together

what it would have looked like.

PAUL JASKOT: Behind me
was the original location

of the German stadium.

What remains of that is the
hole dug for the foundation.

This stadium was
a building website

at least up until the
early stages of the war.

NARRATOR: Engineer Ed McCann
doubts that the building as

planned would have been viable.

There's 400,000 people
got to use this thing.

They've got to get in and out.

They've got to be
organized so that they can

get to their seats, be
served with hot dogs,

use toilets, and
all the rest of it.

As the stadium gets bigger
and bigger and bigger,

the queue times get longer
and longer and longer.

NARRATOR: Architect Speer
was aware of the scale

of the challenge.

The highest point of
the stadium would be

300 feet above the arena floor.

Although elevators were
planned to take spectators 100

at a time to the
top three tiers,

engineers were concerned
about visibility.

It was important
for them to know,

for example, whether you could
see so far below from such

a high stadium that had
never been tried before.

ED MCCANN: It's the same thing
that influences stadium design

today.

I mean, if you get too far
away, there's simply no viewing

experience whatsoever.

NARRATOR: Speer's solution was
to build a full-scale model

of a section of the seating.

By placing 60 workers
in the top tier

and checking their
lines of sight,

he could satisfy himself
that a stadium of this size

was viable.

Construction could begin.

The stadium would cover
24,000 square feet.

Four times the size of
the Olympic stadium,

and it would be finished with
red granite personally selected

by Hitler.

His demands went far beyond what
the engineers could provide.

The granite itself
for the German stadium

required four times
the yearly output

of the entire German
granite industry

merely to cover its facade.

NARRATOR: Hitler believed
that once Germany became

the global power, every
Olympic games would

be staged in his new stadium,
but it was not to be.

The project was suspended as
the country's resources were

diverted to war and
weapons production.

The site was abandoned.

The foundations
filled with water.

Today, a lake is all that
remains of Hitler's scheme

to build the world's
largest stadium.

But now,
computer-generated imagery

can reveal what the finished
stadium would have looked like.

Yet to Hitler, this was
just a side project.

His main focus was
always a new capital.

He would tear down
Berlin and replace it

with an invention of his own.

What he called the
world capital, Germania.

In Berlin, Hitler planned
his most ambitious project.

He would replace this
city with a new capital.

A world capital.

He called it Germania.

He intended it to be the
Nazis' greatest achievement,

but Germania was
never built. Now,

deep in Berlin's
official archives,

our investigators hunt for
clues to what Hitler's dream

city would have looked like.

It's the same with
all great dictators.

They want to demonstrate their
great power with architecture.

And with Hitler, he
wanted to show the world.

NARRATOR: Blueprints
reveal ambition

on an extraordinary scale.

PAUL JASKOT: It was the visual
tip of the iceberg for a very

extensive restructuring of
the entire social, political,

and economic order.

NARRATOR: Hitler
detested Berlin.

A place he considered
decadent and depraved.

PAUL JASKOT: He
pointed to Berlin

as a city that was not
emblematic of the power

of a real Germany.

Particularly, he talked about,
for example, Jewish department

stores as being a
sign of sickness.

Architectural
sickness, but also,

of course, political
sickness of the regime.

NARRATOR: Although Hitler
had been elected leader

by the German people, in fact,
only one in four Berliners

had voted for him.

Now, he was in control,
he would make them pay.

His monuments would be built
on the rubble of their homes.

A model from the time reveals
Hitler's vast ambition

for the new city's layout.

It would require over 60,000
apartments to be bulldozed

and more than 100,000
people to be made homeless.

Planning started in 1936, and
as it moved into construction,

Speer was given
unprecedented freedom.

PAUL JASKOT: As inspector
general of building,

Speer was not only independent
of the state in many ways,

but he was also in charge
of huge bureaucracy.

This was dozens, if not
thousands of people.

NARRATOR: Central
to Hitler's plans

was the building of the Reich
Chancellery, part palace, part

administrative center.

A lavish setting where he
could impress visitors.

PAUL JASKOT: The Reich
Chancellery was all

about showing a very dominant
Hitler to foreign dignitaries

and foreign diplomats.

NARRATOR: Speer had 12 months
to construct this building.

It would take 4,500 men working
around the clock in three

shifts.

They finished with
just two days to spare.

Today, nothing remains
of Hitler's headquarters.

Allied bombing destroyed all
traces of the chancellery.

Modern apartments
stand in its place.

Berlin historian,
Tony Le Tissier,

takes us to the site of
Hitler's former power base.

We're walking westward
along Fuhrerstrasse

and we've just come
to a bend in the road.

And from this point onwards,
extended Hitler's new Third

Reich Chancellery, which
was opened in January 1939

having taken only one
year to construct.

NARRATOR: To celebrate
the chancellery's opening,

Hitler hosted a dinner for
foreign ambassadors and VIPs.

Those guests were met by
an extraordinary sight.

They found themselves in
a stunning reception room

at the end of which
stood doors 17 feet high.

These doors opened onto a
hall decorated with mosaics.

But even this was not the
building's grandest feature.

TONY LE TISSIER: From
the end of this building

to the next building we come
to, was the center section

of Hitler's Reich Chancellery.

This gallery which
confronted it was

based on the idea of the Hall
of Mirrors of Versailles.

But Hitler wanted it
bigger and better.

So it was nearly 500 feet long.

NARRATOR: Hitler insisted the
floors be kept highly polished.

It was said he wanted
diplomats to practice

moving on a slippery surface.

The focal point of the building
was Hitler's office, adorned

in red leather and swastikas.

The office, indeed
the whole building,

was designed to
exude Hitler's power,

to be a fitting headquarters
from which he could preside

over the German Reich.

Although none of
it survives today,

we can use the
latest 3D technology

to reveal how the finished
chancellery looked.

Although as the
administrative center

it was the most important of
the buildings in Germania,

the intention was to fill
the city with other far more

impressive structures.

And Speer was responsible.

Now, one of Hitler's most
trusted men and promoted

to the position of
armaments minister,

he found himself presented
with ever greater challenges.

Hitler's ambition
was only increasing.

And the development of
his vision for Germania

reflects that.

On a visit to Paris, he had
greatly admired the city's

neoclassical monuments.

He particularly liked
the Arc de Triomphe.

And typically, he
wanted one for himself.

His triumphal arch,
however, would

be twice as high and four times
wider than the one in Paris.

It would stand at the
center of his city,

and it would weigh 25 times
more than the Arc de Triomphe.

A weight of two and
a half million tons.

This was the part of the
design that most worried Speer.

Berlin, what was to be
Germania, stood on swampland.

In central Berlin, his
response still stands.

The derelict remains
of an experiment

to discover whether
Hitler's arch would simply

sink into the ground.

Massive blocks of
concrete and steel

were erected where the
arch was meant to stand.

Known as the GBK, short for the
German for load-bearing body,

they exerted a pressure
of around 11,000 pounds

per square foot.

Architect Michael Richter
investigates the test site.

We are standing
in front of the GBK.

The Schwerbelastungskorper.

An attempt to see if the
Triumphal Arch planned by Adolf

Hitler could have stood.

NARRATOR: Speer's engineers
worked to a simple formula.

If the block sank no more
than 2 and 1/2 inches,

it was safe to build the arch.

Inside lies the forgotten
chamber where the experiment

was monitored.

MICHAEL RICHTER: We are now
entering the upper measuring

chamber.

Here is where the actual
measurements in the GBK

were carried out.

And from this upper
chamber, it goes even deeper

into a further room.

NARRATOR: Deep inside the
GBK lies a hidden shaft.

Below this hatch
are testing rooms

used by Speer's engineers.

This is the central shaft
that runs across three levels.

It's 30 feet deep,
and at the end,

there are four chambers where
the measuring devices used

to be.

NARRATOR: The chambers below
contain pressure gauges

to monitor the
GBK's sinkage rates.

The engineers monitored the
towers subsidence visually.

Here on this pillar there
stood an optical measuring

device that was aimed at
the point outside the GBK

through this pipe comparing
the height of the object

outside with this
water level indicator

in the upper measuring
chamber to determine

the sinkage of the GBK.

NARRATOR: The
ingenious experiment

proved the Berlin soil was
too unstable for the arch.

The attempt here showed
that it would have been

impossible to build
the Triumphal Arch

without fortifying the ground.

The GBK sank by more than seven
inches between 1941 and 1944.

NARRATOR: Still, Hitler would
not accept his arch could not

be built. He
instructed his people

to continue looking
for a solution.

The GBK is still sinking today,
and although Hitler's engineers

continued with their work,
the arch was never built.

Now, by investigating the plans
and using state of the art

technology, we
can finally reveal

how it would have looked.

Hitler and Speer were not
deterred by this failure.

They set about
their next project.

The biggest of all
Germania's buildings.

The Great Hall.

It would be the
city's centerpiece.

It would be crowned with a dome
so big some said it would have

its own clouds and rainfall.

Its design would test
the bounds of what

was possible in
construction, and it

would demand the
ruthless brutality which

had become the Nazis' hallmark.

It would use slave labor.

In 1936, Hitler unveiled plans
for the most ambitious of all

his building projects.

A vast, domed space
called the Great Hall.

The Great Hall was
the absolute focal point

of the north-south axis.

It was a gigantic building
which had by far the largest

dome in the world at the time.

NARRATOR: It was intended
to be the most important

of all of Germania's buildings.

A symbol of greatness.

It was to be Hitler's
engineering masterpiece.

Land was cleared, workers
hired, digging began.

Unlike most of
Germania's buildings

designed by architects,
the Great Hall

was designed by Hitler himself.

He looked to one of antiquities
most famous monuments,

the Pantheon in Rome.

He had seen it in 1938.

He was impressed, but his own
hall would have to be bigger.

What's really
important to remember

is that the scale is so much
more gargantuan in the Great

Hall.

The Pantheon was already
a large, dome space,

but the Great Hall
was so much bigger.

NARRATOR: Engineer Ed
McCann assesses the plans

for the Great Hall.

ED MCCANN: This isn't
just two or three times

bigger than the Pantheon.

This is eight times as
wide as the Pantheon.

Two and a half times the
length of a football pitch.

You could fit two Saturn
V rockets in there

and still fly around the
top in a small helicopter.

This is just an enormous
space, and nothing like it

had been done before then.

And in fact, nothing like
it's been done since.

NARRATOR: The Great Hall was
to symbolize Hitler's mastery

of the world.

At its highest point would
stand an imperial eagle.

It would hold in its claws
not the usual swastika,

but the world.

The dome represented the
vault of the sky spanning

Hitler's global empire.

The interior would mimic
that of the Pantheon.

There would be a large
niche in the main wall.

It would contain a 78-foot
statue of the imperial eagle

perched over a pulpit.

Three tiers of seats would
surround a central arena.

Around these would be 100
pillars three stories high

reaching to the
coffered ceiling.

The building was intended to
hold up to 180,000 people.

Looking up, they'd have seen
a roof that rose almost 1,000

feet above them.

And the intention was to
build it all from granite.

Some experts have questioned
whether Speer could have built

a structure of such
colossal dimensions.

Engineer Ed McCann has
made calculations based

on the existing blueprints.

ED MCCANN: This dome
would have weighed

in excess of 200,000 tons.

That's about 500
fully-laden jumbo Jets.

And in order to see whether
he was even vaguely right,

we took his drawings
and our understanding

of what he tried
to do and bunged it

into one of our modern
structural engineering

packages.

Rather to our
surprise, found out

that it could more or less be
made to work as he imagined it.

NARRATOR: Even though
technically possible,

the scale of this building
would have brought problems.

It was suggested that the
condensation from the breath

of 180,000 people would
rise to the top of the dome

and then, cooling, fall as rain.

To Ed McCann, the
proportions of the dome

would have rendered it not
magnificent but ridiculous.

This is an absolute
parody of the Pantheon.

I mean, he's taken a very
adjusted form and balanced

form, structurally
rational diagram,

and turned it into an
overblown, top-heavy, inflated

in every sense of
the word solution,

and I really don't
like it at all.

I think it's irrational
in structural terms.

It's hideous in moral
terms, and it really

doesn't do any justice
to its inspiration

insofar as that
was the Pantheon.

NARRATOR: This project would
never get beyond the land

clearing phase, and Speer's
plans would ultimately

be thwarted by war.

But evidence lies
all around Berlin

of how far he would go to make
Hitler's vision a reality.

Outside the city lies a center
for the production of building

materials.

It reveals the
truly brutal nature

of Hitler's quest for glory.

It is part of the concentration
camp, Sachsenhausen.

Germania was meant to
be built on slave labor.

Sachsenhausen was the
prototype concentration camp,

built in the shape
of a triangle so it

could be controlled from just
one machine gun emplacement.

In 1938, it expanded to
incorporate a new brickworks.

A harbor was built so the
camp's enormous output could

be carried into the center
of the city by canal.

Speer had signed a contract
with the SS for all the bricks

that Sachsenhausen
could produce.

Given that Sachsenhausen
was near Berlin,

it was meant to be a
major provider of bricks

for the rebuilding efforts.

NARRATOR: For the
camp's inmates,

the brick production
line, the Klinkerwerks,

was the most feared
assignment of all.

HORST SEFERENS: The brickworks
were feared by the prisoners

because it was a
punishment unit,

and the conditions here were the
worst in all the working units

of the camp.

Single prisoners and
groups of prisoners

were sent here to
the Klinkerwerk

to be killed by the brutal
conditions of working here.

So you can say that the
Klinkerwerk was something

like a death camp for
the concentration camp

Sachsenhausen.

NARRATOR: Camp
survivor, Adam Konig,

recalls the conditions there.

First of all, the winter
was very hard, was very cold.

We didn't have
appropriate clothing.

There was little food too.

It was a bad job, yes.

And as a young boy
at that time, I

thought that must be like hell.

NARRATOR: The slave workforce
had to grow to meet demand.

By 1944, 3,500 people
were being worked

to death in the brickworks.

The Klinkerwerks were
the largest brickworks

in whole Europe at that time,
and tens of thousands of bricks

would be produced
here every day.

NARRATOR: Hitler
and Speer's ambition

depended totally on
their willingness

to sacrifice countless lives.

Then the outbreak of war
brought them a new challenge.

Allied air raids
came to Germany.

They threatened to destroy
all Hitler and Speer had built

so far.

So Speer began a
new set of tests.

He wanted to make
his city bomb proof.

In 1941, Europe
was a battlefield.

World War II was raging.

The Third Reich was a military
state geared for conquest.

Adolf Hitler and his
architect, Albert Speer,

are planning a new world
capital to be called Germania.

They had built the Olympic
stadium and the Reich

Chancellery.

They planned a Great
Hall, another stadium,

and vast Triumphal Arch.

A whole new city.

But allied bombs
threatened their dreams.

So they embarked upon
a series of experiments

to establish how to make
their city indestructible.

Still today, it's possible to
find evidence of the tests they

conducted.

In a secret forest location,
one hour's drive outside Berlin

lies what was once a
restricted test site.

Surrounded by rubble,
these four towers

are the last traces
of a covert project

to create bomb-proof
building materials.

MICHAEL FOEDROWITZ: The local
population called this site,

Berlin settlement, but
this was a prohibited area,

and nobody had access
to this site, nobody.

NARRATOR: So in 1941,
Speer and his engineers

started to identify which
structures and materials were

most resistant to bombardment.

They had this idea to develop,
to design, air raid shelters

integrated in normal
dwellings, and they

want to know how they have to
build it, if they are bombproof

or not.

NARRATOR: Their
experiments were simple.

They built towers
then subjected them

to varying types of assault.

MICHAEL FOEDROWITZ: The kind of
ammunition which was used here

includes all calibers of bombs
and grenades, machine guns

and cannons, and maybe they
were checking rockets as well.

NARRATOR: The engineers
developed techniques

to reinforce walls.

They braced concrete
with steel rods.

500 yards from the towers
stands a lonely piece

of wall nearly seven feet
thick and 20 feet high.

It still bears the signs
of impact from a rocket.

These tests had two purposes.

To determine how
thick a wall had

to be to withstand an
allied rocket attack,

and to find out how fast a
rocket would have to travel

to penetrate such a wall.

No written evidence
remains of these tests.

The detailed records
of their results

have been lost or destroyed.

But it's clear that the
Nazis had the technology

to build structures that
could survive a direct hit.

They knew how to build
effective bomb shelters.

The only problem was
the time it would take,

and the cost in
materials and labor.

While Hitler pushed ahead
with his dream of creating

the perfect city of Germania,
the priority for his engineers

became defense and survival.

The order was given to create
over 1,000 bunkers and six

antiaircraft towers for Berlin.

Ultimately, there were only
enough spaces in the shelters

for 10% of the
population, and yet

200 million cubic meters of
reinforced concrete were used.

Today, beneath the
streets of Berlin,

are the remains of the vast
complex of underground bunkers.

Few of the commuters who use
this metro station every day

realize that a perfectly
preserved air raid shelter

exists below them.

This shelter was built to
accommodate 1,400 people.

But during the bombings,
almost 5,000 people

crammed into these rooms.

As you can see, in every
room here we have a sign,

and the sign tells
us how many people

are allowed to be in the room.

Here is 20 person.

But during the air raids,
more and more people

tried to get safe inside
of bunkers, and so in here,

in this room, there are
sometimes more than 60,

70 people.

NARRATOR: There was no
ventilation system, no air

shafts, citizens
faced suffocation,

and the threat of gas leaks.

Sometimes they would have
to evacuate the bunker

in the middle of an air raid.

The electricity supply
was often interrupted

plunging the shelters
into pitch darkness.

The engineers used a
drastic and toxic solution.

People were meant to find their
way by the dim glow emitted

by phosphorus paint.

During the air raid,
the light fails often

and so you have to be prepared.

You see, in a dark bunker,
you don't see anything,

and therefore, this whole room,
and many rooms inside here,

were painted with
phosphorus color.

You can see how it works.

NARRATOR: As the
people of Berlin

were forced to retreat below
ground, so was their Fuhrer.

Hitler's personal bunker was
sealed by the Soviet Army that

captured it.

But from blueprints and
eyewitness testimony,

we can recreate the place
where he spent his last days.

Rochas Misch is one of the last
survivors of the Fuhrer bunker.

When he entered it as
Hitler's bodyguard,

he was assured that
it was impregnable.

The bunker was dead.

Everyone whispered.

I was afraid.

I had a neighbor, and he told
me that he was there when

the bunker was built. He
told me it had been built

so it could not be blown up.

So afterwards, I was content.

NARRATOR: The bunker
was almost bomb proof.

Its walls and ceilings
were 13 feet thick.

ROCHAS MISCH: It was not
a bunker for a living in.

It was an air raid shelter to
protect people during a bombing

raid.

There was no conflict in there.

Nothing.

Such small rooms, just
100 to 130 square feet.

NARRATOR: The occupants were
safe from air raids at least,

but conditions were harsh, and
they could not escape the fact

that above them the
war was being lost.

Hitler's world
shrunk to a warren

of chambers, a concrete tomb.

Above him, allied
bombs and shells

destroyed Berlin,
killing any possibility

that his fantasy
city of Germania

would ever be realized.

The Hitler-Speer partnership
that had begun 11 years earlier

with such ambitious plans
had ended in absolute defeat.

Although it's since
been modernized,

the Olympic Stadium in
Berlin is the only one

of Hitler's buildings that was
completed and survived intact.

The Zeppelin Tribune was all
but destroyed by allied bombing

and left to rot.

The Congress Hall
was never completed.

Hitler's headquarters,
the Reich Chancellery,

was bombed and eventually
removed brick by brick.

And the building sites of the
German Stadium, the Triumphal

Arch, and the Great
Hall were all abandoned.

The architectural
dreams for Berlin,

and the ideological
dreams of Germania

were, of course, a disaster.

They resulted in the
almost total destruction

of many German cities,
including Berlin, as well as

the absolute downfall
of the state.

NARRATOR: Hitler finally took
his own life on 30 April, 1945,

knowing that the war was lost
and that Germany was in ruins.

Hitler's architect,
Albert Speer,

was arrested,
tried, and sentenced

to 20 years in prison.

He died a free man
in London in 1981.

Had their dream been
realized, the city of Berlin

would be dominated by
the grotesque monuments

like the Great Hall
and the Triumphal Arch

that they had built to
glorify the Nazi regime.

Berlin would have
been made the capital

of a Nazi controlled world,
and every major city would have

been rebuilt in its likeness.

[music playing]