Question marks on screen. Reconstruction of the buildings and denazification in Berlin, Germany after World War II. A factory in Germany. A farmer leads a horse to plow a field. Men at a farm cultivate crops. The wreckage of the IG Farben plant. Men speaking to Hermann Göring. The trial of Norwegian leader and Nazi collaborator Vidkun Quisling. The rail goes on for the criminal. People burn Nazi books and pamphlets in a bonfire. A man burns a pamphlet with a photo of Adolf Hitler. The people stand around the burning books. German civilians read a poster on a wall. General Dwight D. Eisenhower of the United States, Marshal Georgy Zhukov of the Soviet Union, and Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery of the United Kingdom sign a joint agreement. The three of them stand together. The United States Capitol building. Chongqing National Government building in No. 232 Renmin Road, Chongqing (Chungking), China. The Big Ben in London, United Kingdom. Aerial view of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France. General Francisco Franco saluting to marching soldiers in Spain. The delegates including United States President Harry S. Truman, General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Joseph Stalin, and UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill seated around a table during the Potsdam Conference in 1945. They discuss the problems. A close up view of Truman looking into some documents. Stalin smokes a cigarette. The delegates discuss problems. The funeral ceremony of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The soldiers fire guns. President Harry S. Truman attends the ceremony. Churchill salutes from a moving vehicle. Women voting in the United States. Truman gets off an aircraft. Delegates in the Potsdam conference. Newspaper headlines read Russian declares war on the Empire of Japan in 1945. The first atomic bomb explosion over Hiroshima, Japan. The newspaper headlines about the war. Truman, Stalin and delegates at the Potsdam Conference. Soldiers advancing in the battlefield. A flag of the United States and people celebrate the victory. Newspaper headlines feature the surrender of Japan.
July 16, 1945, with President Truman and his party enroute to Berlin Germany, prior to the "Big Three" conference at Potsdam. President Harry S. Truman is seated in right rear of open car. Secretary of State, James F. Byrnes sits next to him in the center, and Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy, Personal Chief of Staff to the President, is in the left rear seat. U.S. Army Brigadier. An Army Major General stands beside the car speaking to the occupants. Brigadier General Harry H. Vaughan (wearing sun glasses), long time friend and aide to the President, steps close to the car. Scene shifts to the President and his party, standing in a moving vehicle, as they review troops of the 2nd Armored Division, standing in front of their tanks, M10 Tank Destroyers, and other armored vehicles. The President and Secretary Byrnes remove their hats and hold them over their hearts,while military officers render hand salutes as they pass the colors. Views from vehicle passing the formation.View from ground of Presidential party at attention with flag of the 17th Battalion displayed. A Lieutenant from the 17th Armored Engineer Battalion reads a citation and Brigadier General John Howell Collier, Commander, 2nd Armored Division, unfurls unit citation ribbon, that President Truman then ties to the Guidon of Company E, 17th Armored Engineer Battalion. As President Truman reportedly described the event in his diary: "We reviewed the Second Armored Division and tied a citation on the guidon of Company E, 17th Armored Engineer Battalion. General Collier, who seemed to know his stuff, put us in a reconnaissance car built with side seats and no top, just like a hoodlum wagon minus the top on a fire truck, with seats and no hose, and we drove slowly down a mile and a half of good soldiers and some millions of dollars' worth of equipment -- which had amply paid its way to Berlin." (World War II period).
Soviet troops firing field artillery in streets of Berlin, Germany, late in 1945, during World War 2. Closeup glimpse of a Soviet woman tank crew member. Glimpse of Russian tank firing at building. Glimpse through window of building as tank fires across the street. View downward of Soviet infantry running through street below. Another tank firing. Soviet infantry soldier advancing through fire and smoke. A tank crew member carrying a wounded comrade over his shoulder, past several T-34 tanks parked in the background. A tank burning. Medic tends head wound of the injured tank crewman. More views of infantry running through the rubble filled streets. Animated map showing the pincer movements of Soviet forces closing in from outskirts of Berlin toward its center. Glimpse of Soviet soldier scanning across the city with optical equipment. Camera pans across smoke filled city showing the ruins of the Reichstag Building and anther large damaged building. More views of artillery firing in street. A knocked out tank. Huge smoke clouds billow from a shelled building. Infantry scramble over rubble. German civilians hiding in a garden. A Soviet soldier helps a very old German man out of the remains of a building. Soviet machine guns rake the front of a building, causing pieces of it to fall to the ground. An old German woman wanders along a city street. A Soviet ROKS flamethrower is fired from the window of a building creating fire on a building across the street. Infantry run past the burning building. During a pause in fighting, a Soviet female soldier washes the face of a male soldier. An artillery field piece firing in the street. A wounded Soviet soldier with bandaged head, fires a captured German Panzerfaust anti tank weapon. Four Soviet soldiers carrying a wounded on a litter, run through past the camera.
Combat footage filmed during the Soviet invasion and Battle of Berlin, Germany during World War 2. Smoke rises from damaged bridges and railroad lines. Ruined buildings of Berlin in aftermath of Soviet air and ground attacks. Piles of captured German weapons. German police officers and soldiers being taken as prisoners of war. Surrendering German troops march along a street. Grafitti on building wall says "Surrender - No." White surrender flags hang from windows and balconies of buildings. (These are contrasted by edited insert of German swastika flags covering the facades of buildings in the past.) German General Helmuth Weidling, commander of the Berlin Defense Area leads other Gernan officers from a bunker in the city, following their surrender to the Soviets on May 2, 1945. Large number of surrendering German soldiers marching, while General Weidling and other Berlin Defense Area officers quietly watch as their troops march past, as prisoners.
This film is a scattering montage of World War 2 scenes from 1939 through 1945. Part of an agreement between Nazi Germany and Yugoslavia is shown in English. It is dated June 1, 1939 and ostensibly signed by Adolf Hitler. Next, German Ju 87, Stuka dive bomber aircraft are shown peeling off from formation, on April 6, 1941, to attack Yugoslavia. Bombs bursting on the ground. Closeup of a Stuka airplane in a dive, making its characteristic whine, and dropping bombs. Bombs exploding just outside some concrete walls. German infantry running along railroad tracks and entering backyard of house in a village. German soldiers observing from overlooking hill; climbing over rubble; and marching along a road toward a village. Animated map showing German invasion areas early in World War II, extending through most of Europe and into Norway, by 1941. Animated map shows further invasions into France, Belgium, low countries, the Balkans, and Eastern front towards the Soviet Union. Map highlights Tokyo, Rome, and Berlin. Delegations walking in hall of Reich Chancellery in Berlin, to sign Tripartite pact, on September 27, 1940. The group is led by by Count Galeazzo Ciano (Italian Foreign Minister, and Mussolini's son-in-law); Joachim von Ribbentrop, Germany's Foreign Minister and Japan’s Ambassador Saburō Kurusu. The diplomats are seen, next, standing near a table as Adolf Hitler enters rendering Nazi salute. He shakes hands with Count Ciano and Ambassador Kurusu. Hitler is seated to watch the proceedings. Von Ribbontrop is seen signing for Germany. Next scenes show German armored units heading East in Operation Barbarossa (June of 1941). A sign identifies the town of Eydtkau (Eydtkuhnen) on the German-Lithuanian border. German armor and artillery moving eastward. German troops destroying international crossing barriers. German troops firing siege guns. Montage with glimpses of German battle scenes showing tanks, guns, rockets in action with attendant explosions, fires, and destruction. Formations of German warplanes in flight, including Junkers Ju-52s that carry troops, including paratroops. View from above of Junkers Ju-87 Stuka dive bombers in formation. Battle of Britain scenes, with view of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, England (which miraculously survived the Blitz). The Tower Bridge in London, seen through a haze following blitzkrieg. German Junkers 87 Stuka dive bombers peeling off from formation to attack. British anti-aircraft searchlights shining beams skyward. Diving bombers illuminated by the lights. Anti-aircraft guns firing. Nighttime scenes showing gunfire flashes, explosions, tracer bullets and fires in London. British fire brigades fighting fires in London buildings as some collapse from the German bombing during the so-called "Blitz." Scene shifts to Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, as a Japanese bomb explodes on a U.S. Navy warship. The USS Arizona billowing smoke and listing as it succumbs to Japanese bombing. Another view of the Arizona sinking. Smoke rising from Battleship Row, at Pearl Harbor. Glimpse of postwar Nuremberg trial.
Documentary titled 'Deutschland Erwache' recounts Germany's wartime experiences. Explosion seen as the Nazi Swastika emblem is blown up on top of the Zeppelintribüne (at Zeppelinfeld) at the Nazi party rally grounds in Nuremberg in 1945 by the U.S. Army. Following explosion, the pieces from the destroyed emblem fall from the sky. Montage shows: German Prisoners Of War (POWs) marching; Ratification of the German surrender documents (from surrender two days earlier at Reims) held at Soviet headquarters in Karlshorst, Berlin, Germany on May 9, 1945. German officers present include Colonel-General Hans-Jürgen Stumpff from the Luftwaffe, Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel as Chief of Staff of OKW, and Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg as Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine. They are seen entering room and signing documents. View of Keitel signing the surrender document. Soviet Russian General looking at surrender documents. General Eisenhower, General Montgomery and others shown in brief glimpses. Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill at Yalta. Aerial views of heavily bomb-damaged cities in Germany, including wrecked German cities of Cologne, Nuremberg, Hamburg, and Berlin. View of Brandenburg gate in background and rubble of bombing in foreground as two people carry a stretcher down the street. A wrecked street sign for the Unter Den Linden lies on the ground partially covered in mud. Ground level views of smoking ruined buildings in Berlin and a few German citizens walking on the streets following Battle of Berlin. Views of dead German soldiers on a battlefield. German soldiers helping to carry and tend to wounded and bandaged German soldiers. Large group of German citizens gathered in a public square.