Title card says “Erprobungsstelle der Luftwaffe Karlshagen” (“Test site of the Air Force Karlshagen” in English). “Flakzielgerät 76 Trick 5.1. 1944” (“Anti-aircraft target device 76 trick 5.1.1944” in English). Animation demonstrating how a V-1 rocket, an early cruise missile developed in Germany during World War 2, is launched from a launching catapult ramp. Sectional view of launch ramp, also known as a Walter catapult. Piston for the launch ramp is installed. V-1 rocket is attached to ramp. Cross sectional view of ramp shows hydrogen peroxide (T-Stoff) mixing with sodium permanganate (Z-Stoff) to produce the steam for launch. The steam pushes against the piston to propel V-1 up the ramp. Piston falls away after launch. V-1 animation shows configuration for launch from an airplane. V-1 attached to bottom of plane ready for launch.
Title card says “Erprobungsstelle der Luftwaffe Karlshagen” (“Test site of the Air Force Karlshagen” in English). “Flakzielgerät 76 Schnittautnahmen 9.2.1944” (“Anti-aircraft target device 76 cut recordings 02/09/1944” in English). Close up rear view of Walter catapult showing piston insertion point at Air Force Karlshagen in Germany during World War II. Rear underside view of V-1 glide bomb horizontal stabilizer, showing elevator actuation.
View from above, of the surrounding walls and courtyard of a prison in Rheinbach, Germany. Ground view inside the prison yard, where German civilian Matthias Gierens is being escorted to the gallows by U.S. military police, and accompanied by a German Catholic priest, on June 29, 1945. They ascend the gallows and final charges and sentence are read to Gierens. Next scene shows bodies stacked up at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp operated by Nazi Germany. Scene returns to the gallows, and a hood is placed over Gierens' head. View of Allied army officer witnesses, in formation, at parade rest. Noose is placed over Gierens' hood. View of a a bird flying overhead, trapdoor opens, Gierens drops, and noose tightens. Next is an unrelated scene of several German soldiers being executed. They are seen hanging from four gallows in a line in a public square while a large crowd, possibly Soviet citizens, looks on. (Notes: Regarding the execution of Gierens in the opening scene: German civilian Matthias Gierens was a 37 year old railroad worker. He was executed for the August 15, 1944, murder near Priest, Germany, of a downed American airman, who was later identified as U.S. Army Air Forces 2nd Lieutenant Lester E. Reuss. Gierens and three other German civilians, Peter Kohn, Peter Back, and Matthias Krein, were convicted on June 2, 1945 in Ahrweiler, Germany, of the murder. Their trial was the first Allied trial in Germany of civilians charged with a war crime.)
Germany and Japan defeated in World War II. The defeat of Germany is celebrated in United States. Scenes represent the life of a typical Japanese soldier: a flag is raised to celebrate his birth; boys in uniform play war; troops sack Nanking; and in1944 he is killed to attack over harbor in America. In a dramatization, a soldier with an American machine gun is killed. Dead Americans. American soldiers honor their dead comrades covered with United States flag.
A group of passengers waiting to go on board the American ocean liner SS Washington, standing at the port of Le Verdon Sur Mer, Bordeaux France. Passengers leaving France shortly before its fall to Nazi Germany are shown inspected for passport and searched before boarding. A car being hoisted onto the ship. View of the clock tower and loading areas at the port of Le Verdon Sur Mer (subsequently destroyed by Nazi Germany later in the war, in November 1944). Captain Manning standing on the bridge. View of ship SS Washington pulling away from dock. June 1940.
Undersecretary of War, Robert Porter Patterson, Sr. speaks about a report from the General staff outlining the needs for combating Germany and Japan in World War 2. He cites Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily, as an example of what will be needed. He continues to narrate in the background as an animated map appears showing the buildup of supplies and Allied forces in North Africa; Allied air forces flying 60 thousand sorties over Sicily and, the direct amphibious assault using 3,200 vessels. Map also depicts opposing forces of 12 (“unwilling”) Italian Divisions and 3-1/2 German Divisions. View of Allied troops carrying some of their 31 thousand casualties on stretchers from field ambulances. Allied medics attending to the wounded. Some are seen lying on stretchers in a row on the ground near a wall. Interior of a field hospital where surgeons and other medical personnel treat the wounded. Animated map shifts to Europe with Germany at its center, showing , in contrast to Sicily that was only an “outpost,”, the heavily fortified perimeter of Axis controlled areas; the axis industrial might; and the disposition of 300 German Divisions (mostly on the Eastern front) defending the region. Next, the map illustrates Japan’s defended regions in the Pacific Image returns to Undersecretary Patterson i n his office, speaking of the Allied offensives planned for next year (1944), and emphasizing their challenge and difficulty. Scene shifts to General Jonathan Wainwright and his garrison at Corregidor, in the Philippines, surrendering to Japanese forces in 1941. Japanese military camera pans over the Americans being taken prisoner. Other Americans and Filipinos are seen being marched together under guard. Scene shifts to classic views of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941. View of Japanese soldiers executing two Chinese civilians in 1937. Dangling bodies of persons hung by Nazis during Operation Barbarossa in Russia, in 1941 A Russian soldier comforts a little girl as he escorts her across a snowy landscape. Time bomb left by German forces retreating from Naples, Italy, in 1943, blows up a Post office building . Views of damage to building and bodies of victims. American Military Police assisting a victim. American soldiers carrying an injured civilian on a litter. Scene shifts to British Foreign Minister, Anthony Eden, Soviet Foreign Minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, and U.S. Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, entering a hall in the Spiridonovka Palace, during the 1943 Moscow Conference in Russia. Close-up of the American, Soviet, and British flags on a table. View of many delegates seated around the table. Close-up of Molotov, Eden, and Hull signing conference document.