World War 2 scenes following the Gran Sasso raid or Operation Eiche: The rescue of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini by German paratroops under the command of Otto Skorzeny, in the Apennine Mountains. A German soldier speaks over the radio. A tower on a hill. Otto Skorzeny salutes Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Skorzeny helps him from a mountain cable car. Soldiers wave and bid farewell to Mussolini as he boards a light German Fieseler Fi 156 'Stork' reconnaissance aircraft. The aircraft in flight. German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler and Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano greet Mussolini as he gets off from a German Junker transport in Germany. Hitler, Mussolini and other officers. An official hugs and greets Mussolini. Hitler guides the Italian leader to his car. Soldiers give the Nazi salute. The two leaders get into the car and leave. German officers and soldiers welcome Hitler and Mussolini on arrival at Hitler's headquarters. The meet with numerous Nazi officials. They get into a car and leave. Mussolini meets more Nazi officers and officials. They greet Mussolini with the Nazi salute. Mussolini boards the German Junker. Hitler waves as the plane takes off for Italy.
Planning of bombing raids on Emden, Germany by U.S. 56th Fighter Group in England during World War II. Presentation of awards to pilots including the DFC (Distinguished Flying Cross) to United States Army Air Forces Captain Gerald W. Johnson after the mission. Past events show an officer at a desk talking over a telephone. Officers marking bomber route and locations of AAA (Anti-Aircraft Artillery) on a wall map. Major General William Kepner pointing to the map. Teletype operators sending and receiving message. Personnel reading messages, marking routes on a wall map, setting up a room for briefing and making phone calls. Pilots relaxing, gathering around a blackboard as orders of flight are assigned.
Planning of U.S. 56th Fighter Group in England for a bombing raid on Emden, Germany during World War II. An officer unveils a mission map, rechecks a route and messages. He checks a report with a weather officer. Personnel looking at a map of Holland and marking a route on the map.
Planning of a bombing raid on Emden, Germany by U.S. 56th Fighter Group in England during World War II. Personnel arriving on bicycles and jeeps enter a briefing room. The personnel being briefed by group commander Colonel Hubert Zemke and others at a map. The personnel attending the briefing.
Devastation and death in the Soviet Union after attacks by Nazi Germany during World War II. People mourn the death of Russian civilians. Corpses of Russian atrocity victims frozen in the snow. Women bend and weep over the dead. View of corpses of burned children in a building. Girls who had been sexually and physically assaulted by the German soldiers are escorted across a snowy courtyard, weeping. Bodies of murdered Soviet citizens hanging from poles after they resisted the Nazis. Soviet citizens and soldiers recite a pledge to revenge the Nazis.
Flare is fired from control tower and B-17s of the U.S. 351st Bomb Group begin taking off from their base at RAF Station Polebrook, England, on a mission to Germany during World War 2. The B-17 aircraft fly off in formation. View inside one B-17, as crew goes on oxygen, as they climb through 10 thousand feet. Sky filled with formations of B-17s. U.S. P-47 fighter escort aircraft of the U.S. 487th Fighter Squadron (352nd Fighter Group) at RAF Station Bodney, take off to accompany the B-17s part way. Gunners inside a B-17 are alerted to German fighters at 3 O'clock low. They are identified as the American P-47 escorts. Squadron of U.S. P-47s seen in flight. B-17s and escorts pass over the enemy coastline. They being to encounter flak which can be seen as Black clouds.