Bulgaria joins Axis powers in March 1940 during World War II. Bulgarian delegate signs a document to join Axis. German aircraft taxis at an airfield. Prime Minister of Bulgaria Prof. Dr. Bogdan Filov debarks and shakes hands with Foreign Minister of Germany Joachim von Ribbentrop. Band plays group walks past honor guard.. Ribbentrop, Filov, and Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs Galeazzo Ciano take seats at a conference table. German and Bulgarian signatories sign. Ribbentrop and Filov shake hands. German Chancellor Adolf Hitler and various delegates shake hands. Hitler speaks to Filov.
Nazi Operation Barbarossa (Invasion of Soviet Union during World War II). A map of Eastern Front. Flare goes up in dark. The silhouettes of troops in dark. Artillery fire and burning target in East Prussia. Troops raise a barricade at a border post. German troops move cautiously forward. Explosion occurs in a building
A visit to a Camp Near Minsk, Belarus. Head of the Schutzstaffel (SS) Heinrich Himmler visits Minsk and a concentration camp near Minsk. Himmler with group of German officers, including Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, Karl Wolff, Otto Bradfisch (Leader of Einsatzkommando 8, Einsatzgruppe B, possibly Hans-Adolf Pruetzmann and Hermann Fegelein. Minsk streets. Himmler greets small line of uniformed men and salutes people on balcony. His car leaves city. Himmler seated in a car, Bach-Zelewski far right, gestures to local woman wearing kerchief. Himmler and others including Wolff and Bach-Zelewski walk through field of cut wheat, talk to young boy who answers. Himmler looks at front end of Russian farm equipment and walks past houses being built. Car leaves huge compound serving as SS/SD headquarters. Drives through Minsk, views of destruction. Outside town, walks into wire enclosed compound, met by German officers. Walks along wire on other side of which are many Soviet prisoners, talks to one prisoner and inspects camp, accompanied by Karl Wolff and others. (World War II period).
Documentary film 'The Jet Engines' about the develpment of an American jet airplane, with help of the British who provide General Electric Company with a prototype engine developed by British RAF Group Captain Frank Whittle. A B-17 aircraft taxis and takes off from the runway. Vehicles carry U.S. Air Forces officers and civilian engineers to an airfield where a man stands with a gun next to a U.S. Army Air Forces B-17 Flying Fortress aircraft. The visitors look at cargo containers being offloaded from the aircraft. They contain a prototype British Whittle turbojet engine. Scene shifts to meeting of executives of the General Electric Company with U.S. Army Air Forces officers. They look at schematic of the Whittle engine. GE officials commit to building an American turbojet engine to power U.S. Air Forces airplanes.
U.S. Air Force officers consulting with General Electric executives about production of an American turbojet airplane engine, a month before receiving a prototype Whittle engine from Great Britain. Workers are selected for the project. Views of the GE plant at Lynn, Massachusetts. Project manager, Donald F. Warner, is seen at the Lynn MA factory discussing modifications from the Whittle design to correct problems with impellers and other parts.Views of affected parts. Person being fingerprinted as part of security actions.
German diplomats being expelled from the United States. They arrive at LaGuardia airport prior to their departure by ship. Seen are Captain Fritz Wiedemann, former German consul general in San Francisco, and Dr. Johannes Bacher, former German consul general in New York. The men smile and talk to the press on the airport ramp. Their baggage being unloaded from the plane.