A mob, seeking revenge against Fascist leaders, fills a city square. They pound on steel gates of a government building. Soldiers and police attempt to protect various persons from the mobs. Others are unprotected and suffer beatings and death. Bodies of Benito Mussolini and his Mistress Clara Petacci are seen hung upside down by Italian Partisans in Milan, Italy, on 28 April 1945. Scene shifts to image of postwar occupying powers, United States, Soviet Union, and Great Britain, whose flags are displayed in the center of a conference table during the Third Moscow Conference. Principals signing agreements, in November, 1943, providing, among other things, for lawful and orderly trials of war criminals, following World War 2. Seen signing are: Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov; U.S. Secretary of State, Cordell Hull; and British foreign Secretary, Sir Anthony Eden. View of General Dwight D. Eisenhower, leading a contingent of American wartime Generals on a mission to document Nazi atrocities at liberated German concentration camps. Closeup of a man directing local German citizens who were forced to observe the horrors of the camp. Closeup of an oven used to dispose of bodies of victims. Dead bodies of concentration camp victims strewn in a heap. A room filled with documentary evidence to be analyzed and used in war crimes trials. the body of German General Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg , and of Heinrich Himmler, both of whom committed suicide. A hand holding cyanide capsules. Body of Leipzig City Council deputy mayor Dr. Ernst Kurt Lisso slumped over his desk, following suicide. Body of his daughter, Regina Lisso also a suicide victim. Nazi war criminals being rounded up by Allied military.One being carried on a stretcher. Another, a German officer, is taken into custody. Next, Josef Kramer, the Commandant of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp is seen under guard by a British soldier. British soldiers guarding the court room of the second Belsen trial, convened by the Allied occupational forces, in the Gymnasium building of Luneburg. View of the courtroom with defendants wearing numbers. Closeup of numbers 1 and 2, Josef Kramer, and Fritz Klein, respectively. View of Allied military officers sitting in judgment. Closeups of women defendants, including Irma Grese (number 9) and Elisabeth Volkenrath (number 11). Camera pans around the courtroom.
German soldiers climbing over a crash-landed B-17 bomber of the USAAF 96th Bomb Group, 337th Bomb Squadron, with tail number 42-3353. Its props are all bent and skin is peeled off its rudder and horizontal stabilizer. (This aircraft, named "Tar Fly," was hit by flak on September 9, 1943, and crash-landed west of Evreux, at Beamont-Le Roger, France. Two crew were killed and 8 taken as prisoners of war.) Smoking wreckage of an Allied aircraft in a field with two dead fliers lying on the ground about 50 yards away. Engines of a downed U.S. aircraft. Numerous views of wrecked American and British airplanes. Sign painted on one piece of wreckage reads: "When I go sightseeing in Tokyo, Tojo's gonna be my Ricksha Boy!" Piles of scrap alumunum from crashed airplanes piled up at a railroad siding, where German workers load it into rail freight cars. German army workers using tools to dismantle parts. Sequence shifts to a Messerschmitt Bf 109 that lands in a field. German airmen run to greet the pilot, who steps from the cockpit and describes some aerial maneuvers to a surrounding audience. Next, German ace, Adolf Galland is seen discussing tactics with other pilots. Several camouflaged Me Bf-109s lined up on a grass field, where ground crews are repairing and maintaining them. Closeups of German pilots climbing into cockpits of planes. Ground crews hand crank their starters. Next sequence shows Focke-Wulf FW-190 aircraft taxiing and then making a formation takeoff from grass field. Then an Me-Bf-109 is shown right after takeoff. FW-190s and Me-109s buzz the field. (World War II period)
Formations of B-24 Liberator bombers are seen in flight, headed for Ploesti, Romania, on August 1, 1943, during World War 2. Next, vertical columns of bombs are seen falling from the planes. Animated map of Europe shows Romania and Ploesti. It show paths of oil from the Ploesti oil fields to Germany. (Narrator states Ploesti provides 30% of Axis oil.) Map show path of 9th Air Force bombers from Libya to the Ploesti oil fields. Scenes shift to captured German films from 1944, showing the fires and destruction resulting from the constant B-24 raids. Huge black clouds rise from the area. Firefighters rush to combat flames. They direct streams of water on the conflagrations. (Commenter states: "Delayed action bombs prevented firefighters from rushing in, until too late.") Nighttime views of large fires and heavy smoke from 6 of Ploesti's 7 refineries ripped wide open. Film advances to August, 1944, showing Ploesti with the fires out, following Rumania's capitulation. Next, with some fires still burning, King Michael I of Romania, tours the site with military officers. They walk amidst the debris. Smoke rising near a rail marshaling yard. Against a background of dense smoke rising, a Slate is displayed showing the cost to the United States of the Ploesti raids, as 300 bombers and 3000 American airmen were lost.
"The Guilty." Animation depicts person being hanged. View of an angry crowd on a road. People beat captured German soldiers and collaborationists. Mob of Italian partisans in Italy raising dead bodies of Mussolini and others up to hang from their heels in public after their execution. Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and British Foreign Secretary Sir Anthony Eden signing the Moscow Declaration in November, 1943. The declaration is signed to preserve the authority of law in Europe and to ensure fair and orderly trials for war criminals. Next scene shows Allied soldiers at a liberated Concentration Camp near the end of World War 2 in Europe. Military jeeps in the background. Military photographer takes pictures as officials arrive to tour the concentration camp. Man opens a crematorium oven, revealing bones of a corpse inside. Pile of dead victims of a concentration camp. Elevated view of a room full of documents that are in review for war trials. Officials search documents to identify war criminal suspects. Nazi officers and officials who committed suicide are shown, including a German admiral, the body of Heinrich Himmler, and the bodies of the Mayor of Leipzig and his wife. War criminals being summoned for the various war crime trials. Scenes from the Belsen Trial in September 1945, held in a Lüneburg gymnasium, to decide the fate of German guards and SS officials from the Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. A defendant being brought to trial on a stretcher. Soldiers guard the court room. View of defendants including many women SS-Gefolge members. German Commandant Josef Kramer during his trial, and German doctor Fritz Klein beside him. The court trial underway for the war criminals. Guilty war criminal brought to the gallows to be hanged, black cover placed over his head and he is hanged. View of dead bodies of concentration camp victims. View of a crowd amassed at a hanging execution of several German officers, possibly in the Soviet Union.
Allied invasion of Normandy, France during World War II. U.S. General Joseph McNarney, Deputy Chief of Staff at a desk as he outlines the importance of June 6, 1944 the day Allied forces attacked the Germans in Normandy. He speaks about the decision to knock down the Nazis first and then the Japanese during the World War. He says that the invasion of Normandy was planned in November 1943. He also states how General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe, planned and executed the invasion. He also speaks about how the U.S. Army Air Forces and the Royal Air Forces aircraft bombarded the coasts of Normandy prior to the D Day invasion. Past events show American soldiers getting onto landing crafts in England as they leave for the invasion. The soldiers aboard the ships in the English Channel. The soldiers read the Bible and comics, sleep and cook aboard the ships. On June 5th , 1944 the ships head towards Normandy for the invasion. In England gliders carrying paratroopers take off from an airfield to bombard the German positions in Normandy. British soldiers receive ration and work on motorbikes. TNT (trinitrotoluene) charges being prepared by soldiers tasked with demolition duties. British soldiers check their guns and other weapons prior to the invasion. Jeep and artillery being loaded onto aircraft.
U.S. Army Air Force armorers ride atop bombs on trolleys, being pulled by a tug on an airfield in England during World War 2. Airmen gather around a bomb as one writes in chalk, "To Schicky (referring to Hitler family, Schickelgruber) this is only the start, Love, L.E.Z." Views of Airmen rolling bombs on carts under a B-17E aircraft. View from inside a B-17 as ground crews look up through open bomb bay doors. B-17 combat crewmen walking and riding bicycles, to attend a mission briefing. Inside the assembled aircrews are briefed by a British RAF officer, who says, "We're going to work. The target is XZ 462." He goes on providing details to be followed by aircrews. The crews leave the briefing room. Next, B-17s are seen taxiing out for takeoff. The lead aircraft is "Yankee Doodle" piloted by Brigadier General Ira Eaker. Another is "Stinky." Next is "Little Skunk Face."And the last one "Berlin Sleeper." Ground crews watch as the B-17 bombers take off and assemble into formation overhead. Views from inside a B-17 as bombs fall and its gunners fight off German fighter planes. Bombs seen falling and exploding on the ground and raising clouds of smoke. Glimpse of gunners firing at attacking German aircraft. Narrator states there is anti-aircraft fire all around them, that jolts the aircraft. The B-17s assemble in formation for the flight home. Back at the base, some wait atop the tower for the returning aircraft. General Ira Eaker, Chief of the U.S. VIII Bomber Command, steps from a returning aircraft, and greets Major General Carl Spaatz, Commander of the 8th Air Force. Final scene shows Brigadier General Eaker, smoking a cigar and surrounded by civilian and military reporters. ( Note: Reportedly, the B-17 "Stinky" crash landed in Athenry Co Galway Ireland on the 15th January 1943 with General Jacob Devers and a party of other Generals onboard, but none were injured and and all arrived safely at 2AM the same day, in Belleek, Northern Ireland.)
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