A clearing in the woods, Compiegne, France. German Honor Guard at attention, and their band plays. French Government plenipotentiaries, General Charles L.C. Huntzinger,Ambassador Noel, Rear Admiral Maurice R LeLuc, Air Corps General Georges Parisot, and Air Corps General Jean-Marie Joseph Bergeret, accompanied by German Quartermaster General , Lieutenant-General kurt von Tippelskirch, and German Colonel Thomas, walk towards a railroad car. Adolf Hitler and Hermann Goering are seated at a table. Following behind their German escorts, General Huntzinger salutes Hitler and the German delegation, with Admiral Le Luc, at his side. View of General Keitel's hands holding document as he reads preamble to the Armistice Agreement. View of three German bombers in flight.
The London Blitz. Sections of London ablaze from German bombing during Battle of Britain. US President Franklin Roosevelt signing H.R. 1946, Lend-Lease legislation in World War II. View of last page of H.R.1946, signed by Sam Rayburn, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, and by President Roosevelt. United States sends war material to England. 'USA' written on Lend-Lease boxes being loaded on lorry after arrival in Britain. Huge crates of Lend-Lease war materiel on railroad flat cars pulled by locomotive. Smoke rises up from the engine. 'Machine tools, BULLARD, Bridgeport Conn.' written on crate in transit.
Crowds gathering around parliament during tense period on eve of British entry into World War II. Film opens showing several Well-dressed women political campaigners outside parliament, carrying placards for Churchill. They walk quickly through the crowd gathered there. London Bobbies trying to maintain order, urge several women with children to move back. View of the area thronged with people. A large group standing at the gates of the old palace yard, Palace of Westminster (Houses of Parliament). Several Bobbies are among the crowd. Blurred camera view from rapidly moving vehicle passing crowds gathered all around the area. Crowd gathered at the St. Stephens entrance, Houses of Parliament. The Evening Standard Newspaper front page displayed on a lamp post by vendor, reads: "Americans Told to Leave Britain." Closeup of equestrian statue of King Richard I, the Lionheart, at Parliament (Palace of Westminster).
Film opens showing animated map of the Finnish Front during World War 2. Two Finnish women are seen search the horizon with binoculars and keeping a log of some kind. Uniformed Finnish men and women ride with supplies on sleighs pulled by tractors. A group of them are seen at an outdoor field kitchen getting a meal. Women take blood from a uniformed Finnish woman volunteer donor. Women lined up in a wooded area are being decorated by a Finnish officer. A large number of Soviet prisoners of war (some showing minor wounds bandaged) is directed up a hill to begin work on defensive positions. Some carry long logs. Closeup of some prisoners passing the camera. Prisoners shoveling sandy soil and carrying building materials.
Members of a U.S. 7th Army tank-infantry team takes time out during NATO "Exercise Monte Carlo" to sample fresh baked local German bread. They surround a soldier who carves large slices from a loaf and distributes them to team members. The troops are seen chewing the bread. Another loaf being cut. Two tank crew members sit atop their tank while they eat bread. Infantrymen clamber aboard the tank.
Opening scene shows French Nieuport biplanes in aerial combat with German airplanes in World War 1. Many are engaged in a massive dogfight. One aircraft is seen hit and falling toward the ground. Next, two French aircraft are seen returning to their base. They fly over a hangar where a crashed airplane sits with tail in the air. Near the hanger are several airplanes in various stages of maintenance. Mechanics are moving one. An airplane taxis in front of the hangar. Scene shifts to closeup of a Lafayette Escadrille Indian logo painted on a metal structure. Scene shifts to a formal award ceremony for some pilots and crews. Their squadron members are lined up behind them in front of a line of aircraft. The view is from behind a formation of French soldiers with rifles, rendering salutes. Next, French soldiers parade on the airdrome, led by a military band. At this point the scene phases out as a fireball is superimposed on a map of Europe, signifying World War 2. Adolf Hitler is seen in closeup near the Eiffel Tower, when he visits Paris, France following its occupation by German forces in 1940. Several views of German troops marching along the Avenue des Champs-Élysées and through the Arc de Triomphe. Closeups of some German soldiers in the ranks. Scene shifts to North Africa, in 1942, as American troops make an unopposed amphibious landing on the coast, in Operation Torch. Several landing craft are seen and troops ashore. A Dodge 3/4 ton WC-51 army truck, with half of its hood open, makes its way through the surf as it leaves a landing craft.
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