Operation Barbarossa: The Largest Invasion In History | Battles Won And Lost | Timeline

[Music] every battle is both a victory and a defeat it depends which flag you fly in every theater of the Second World War battles won and lost determine possession of territory of resources and of the strength to go on fighting for some of the battles it was the victory that most influenced the future course of the war for others it was the defeat this is the story of the battles won and lost that decided the outcome of the greatest conflict in history the Second World War was conflict on an unprecedented scale its battles set new marks for the sheer size of forces deployed and for the power of their weapons in this episode we include the story of the first battle at sea in which enemy ships never sighted each other and we start with the largest army ever to march when Germany launched its invasion of the Soviet Union it is one of the questions that puzzles people about the Second World War why did Hitler attack the Soviet Union but the answer is fairly obvious because he thought he could win this was not just some war for him this was the war for him he said that the enslavement of Slavic population the this Lebensraum in Austin living space in the East is crucial for the German nation because we do not have any resources he is aware that he is in a long war with the Western Allies there's no real view to how that can be concluded and then at the same time if you're Hitler you're looking at your great ideological enemy in the East Bolshevism so he thinks if I bring this forward and if I can destroy them in a short sharp operation I my last ideological rival in Europe and I am able to access all of the raw materials I need to go on fighting this conceit of global war as Hitler said this is a colossus are on clay feet we will just have to kick in the door and the whole building falls down well that never happened the German assault on Russia by every measure was an astonishing success until it stalled from June 1941 until it was gripped by the Russian winter the German offensive Operation Barbarossa was a long and victorious forward search and it was mighty this is the largest invasion in history and it is the single most important war Germany has in the Second World War from the 22nd of June 1941 there is never less than 75% of the German army employed anywhere but fighting in the east the invasion consisted of 3 million men 600,000 vehicles and about the same number of horses it seems extraordinary that such an offensive could come as a surprise but it did not to many people but to the one who met it Joseph Stalin refused to believe that Germany would default on the non-aggression pact until the artillery open fire he believes also that before there's any kind of invasion of the Soviet Union it will be first preempted by some kind of offer from Hitler and since no offer has ever been made he believes he's still got time this is a fool's errand and he is going to receive something like 90 warnings of this impending invasion and he will dismiss all of them the front more than 2000 kilometers of moving military would extend to over 3,000 as the attack progressed 151 German divisions moved 40 divisions from axis partners including Finland Romania Italy Hungary Slovakia and even a Spanish volunteer division completed the order of battle the storm broke ground knock Austin the thrust to the east on June 22nd 1941 these are some of the 180 million people against whom Hitler had just turned his war machine and they fully understood what that meant the same as for Britain and her other allies blood toil tears and sweat Soviet army groups were known as fronts seven fronts faced West three German army groups carried the main weight of the assault group north von Leeb group center von Bach and group south von Rundstedt Soviet command and control was in disarray bridges were left intact in 24 hours spearhead armored units have pushed the front line 80 kilometers into Soviet territory the German plan was not particularly original or unpredictable group north thrust for Leningrad Group center with half the German armored drove on Minsk aiming for Moscow and group South pushed through the Fertile Ukraine which was the living space the Lebensraum that Hitler had promised the German people the basic Barbarossa plan is predicated on border battles they have set up the German army into what is essentially two armies we have on the one hand Panzer groups mobile highly maneuverable very aggressive given the lion's share of the other just ik and Luftwaffe support and then we have the rest of the German army the objectives of Panzer groups are to break through the Soviet front to enact large-scale encirclements and then crush those Soviet armies defending the border this is the Western military districts within some 2.7 million men the idea is if we destroy of that number of men and all the associated equipment with it we must be able then to just advance into the rest of the country Guderian's 2nd Panzer army led the charge out of Army Group center in front of the perianth front marshal yeremenko the force split units one north to meet third Panzer army units general Hoth looking south the maneuver encircled Soviet troops and formed the Bialystok and Minsk pockets trapping the third and tenth armies which surrendered on June 30th this was blitzkrieg at its best the world gave Russia another six weeks two hundred and ninety thousand prisoners 2,500 tanks and fifteen hundred guns fell into German hands 3rd and 2nd Panzer army units pressed on in a parallel advance that encircled an even larger force creating the Smolensk pocket which held out until August 9th 310 thousand prisoners 1st Panzer army at the 11th army both from Army Group south and meanwhile surged together crossing the river Boog and creating the human pocket which fell on August 8th 100,000 prisoners were to attempt a morality CBS key granite Libra sonic buddy system at inaudible metallurgical eternity on evaluation the each new variety who know whose lucrative terms of Guderian on the italki we didn't answer polish television about the give or take the advance was remorseless when Kiev fell on September 19th six hundred thousand prisoners 2500 tanks and a thousand guns fell into German hands and Guderian could now rejoin groups enter in the drive on Moscow by the beginning of December these victorious battles had seen almost two million Soviet soldiers taken into captivity their armor and their air fleet destroyed part of the secret to German success in 1941 is not their superior operational capabilities it's the fact that the Soviets and themselves making catastrophic mistakes so for example we have these two battles at the beginning we have the Battle of Minsk we have the Battle of Smolensk and these are crushing defeats for the Soviets but they are costly to the Germans they're costly to the Germans in the single most important area Germany and her allies had lost dead wounded or missing almost 400,000 men and 40% of her armor that means the one thing that the German army has to end the war in the east the Panzer groups are suffering so many losses as to preclude the possibility of a knapping a single thing they must do they can win battles they can seize ground and capture prisoners of war but they can't break Soviet resistance the determination of the russian soldier to defend his homeland never faltered the immense resources of the great land Empire meant that despite huge losses the number of red army divisions increased and a new general took over command of the front his name was Kyoji Zhukov the result the Germans conquered land and lost the campaign for the Russian tactics kept the main bulk that their armies intact and made a long war inevitable instead of that quick decision the Germans sought Barbarossa was planned to be a quick war but the truth is that the Germans could never reach what they had in mind so that meant that they're trapped in the East the German schedule had slipped because infantry could not keep pace with the tanks and vehicles could not advance as they wished on the bad Russian roads now winter joined the battle the chance of victory had passed [Music] every battle is both a victory and a defeat in a way the Battle of the Coral Sea was different it was a battle that both sides could argue they had won the Japanese by pointing out that the American fleet had been forced to retire the Americans by observing that the battle had forced Japan to indefinitely postponed its proposed invasion of New Guinea it was also a battle that is indelibly written into the history of naval warfare the first battle between carriers the aircraft carrier kingpin of the Pacific Naval War a war in which aircraft whether land-based or carrier born have dominated the scene the Dutch East Indies had surrendered on March 9th the day after the first Japanese troops had landed on New Guinea their intention of reaching the capital Port Moresby over land had been frustrated by stubborn Australian resistance Japanese success in their advance on Port Moresby would have brought the war right up to and almost certainly into Australia so these boys who have beaten the Japs and driven them right back across the mountains and down to Pune have done very well indeed intercepted Japanese cables made it clear that the plan was now to take Moresby from the sea sailing from rebel to approach the target from the south they had broken the Japanese codes they knew the Japanese were moving to poor Mosby than you the intention was to capture Port Moresby and they knew that the Japanese transport ships would be accompanied by carriers they didn't know how many they didn't know which carriers but they rightly assumed that the Japanese wouldn't just send transport ships and escorted and the Americans moved to counter that by shifting carriers of their own into the area Admiral Frank J Fletcher flying his flag aboard the carrier Yorktown was ordered by the man with overall command of the Pacific Theater Admiral Chester Nimitz to rendezvous with the carrier Lexington and assumed command of both carriers and their Task Forces Nimitz had a much smaller fleet than the enemy and he was determined to use it where the policy the rendezvous happened on May 1st 1942 [Music] on may the 4th the Port Moresby invasion force sailed from rebel the main Japanese strike force assembled round the carrier's shikaku and zou ikkaku entered the Coral Sea on May 5th sailing towards the invasion fleet whose escort included the carrier show halt warfare with which no one was familiar for no one had experienced it now entered the pages of military history one of the important things in the pre-war period was the Americans had really throughout the 1930s done a lot of experimentation at sea with their carrier aircraft and the aircraft carriers to really understand the capabilities that they could unleash and they had developed techniques for long-range surveillance long-range attack this was mirrored to a lesser extent by the Japanese as well so that was an important element Battle of the Coral Sea is a battle that contains a lot of firsts in terms of was the first battle where ships hadn't seen each other in conduct of that battle though ship-borne radar could register incoming aircraft it was not effective in scanning distances across the sea without such projected vision or any of the other technologies of today to reveal the position and purpose of an opposing fleet both Japanese and American forces were obliged to rely on reconnaissance aircraft spotting the quarry and reporting its position is a vast area they had very limited reconnaissance ability it was basically aircraft searching for the enemy and then when you've worked out where they were having the available resources to strike at them this was before the days of GPS so the aircraft was estimating positions cloud cover could obscure formations apparently flying in concentrated formation on a general daring line it appears the Japanese planes on their outward flight passed over the allied carriers without clean b-17s flying out of Australia located sho hole on the 6th but failed to hit their target but the sighting was enough to convince Fletcher that the invasion fleet was making for the jihad passage a channel between New Guinea and the small Louisiana archipelago he said course Admiral in Louie in overall command of the Japanese 4th fleet countered by ordering the invasion force to turn away from a jihad passage until Admiral Takagi's strike force could deal with Fletcher on May 7th aircraft from Takagi's strike force scored the first hit crippling the oiler Neosho Fletcher sent a mixed American Australian cruiser squadron to meet the invasion fleet at the passage which distracted in oye from what Fletcher was doing with his carrier's aircraft from one of them Lexington spotted the carrier sha hole and sank her late in the afternoon Japanese aircraft launched against the American carriers but failed to find them on their return they were attacked by TF 17 and ones got down twenty-seven went on the sortie only six returned by midnight a New Year's situation one carrier sunk more than 20 aircraft lost forced him to postpone the invasion for two days on the morning of the 8th the decisive phase of the battle arrived the two carrier forces located each other within six minutes the US reporting the Japanese at Oh 8 to 15 the Japanese sighting their enemy at Oh 8 22 the thing to bear in mind about the Battle of the Coral Sea was that both admirals were faced with often the requirement to make a split-second decision about when to launch a carrier strike package in which direction and so on really on the base of incomplete information incomplete data about where the location is and Composition the first American attack was launched just before 11:00 and succeeded in the first wave in damaging Shikoku which unable to launch or recover her planes was forced to withdraw the Japanese attack on Lexington and Yorktown went in about 20 minutes after the Americans had first launched Japanese aircraft located and torpedoed the Lexington which was forced to withdraw and was later abandoned Admiral Sherman was reported to be the last man to leave the Lexington before she sank our country can well be proud of the performance of the officers and men of the Lexington this is an air war and there's nothing it will stop a determined air attack the traditions of the Lexington will live on she was a grand ship those of our manifold the returned the world will not forget at the end of the battle the Americans had lost the Lexington had the Yorktown damaged and so Admiral Fletcher signaled to General MacArthur that he had to withdraw at the same time the Japanese which had lost one small carrier and another damaged had decided to do exactly the same thing the emitter is fixed that could be seen as at all but it was firmly a victory for the Americans for the first time the Japanese juggernaut had been stopped and that was a huge thing on the 20th of January 1942 Japanese troops entering from neutral and then forcibly allied Thailand invaded Burma now Myanmar which was part of the British Empire and stood on the road to that empires brightest jewel India by May 20th British forces had been pushed back across the border into India and nationalist Chinese troops operating in support of the British had withdrawn across their frontier the British retreat was agonizing it was carried out over hundreds of miles of largely difficult terrain and often terrible weather on roads clogged with hordes of refugees and mostly the equipment had to be left behind so at the end of 1942 which is the eve of the ericone campaign the Japanese are occupying most of Burma the Japanese would continue to occupy Burma until August 1945 and this first offensive the ericon offensive would not turn the tide this was a battle that the Japanese won Florida pot from Vanna where after a fresh Japanese attack our troops are being grimly holding on to their new positions on the Aragon front water on the other confront is on a comparatively small scale at present and he may not assume bigger proportion still after the monsoon but it's of very great importance just the same the 14th Indian division the longest-serving unit of any in the British Army in the entire war would advance into the Attic on now reckoned state across the border with India this was principally diversionary the main attack would be an amphibious assault on ICAP but no sooner had they started to prepare for the plan they had to abandon it there were not enough landing craft while the British developed a new strategy the Japanese abandoned theirs they had been instructed by Tokyo to prepare a three-pronged advance into India but consideration of the terrain and their resources caused them to reject the order by November general Erwin commanding the British forces had a new plan he had built up a supply depot at Cox's Bazaar from which the Indian 14th was to advance down the thinly defended my you peninsula what he wanted to do was carry out a limited advance of about 150 kilometers down the moyu peninsula to the island of our cab in the coastal province of erican which have bartered India and therefore the lines of communication would be short for the British and long for the Japanese a cab was important because there's an airfield there from which British bombers could reach Rangoon and that figured in British plans for the reconquest of Burma rain held up the start of the offensive and the 14th did not begin its advance until mid-december three months after the first proposed start date the Japanese fell back to a defensive position the long door Booty dong line it fell after only a day and the Indian division advanced in two columns one Brigade following the east bank of the Nile River this Brigade was checked at rutted Ong and across the mouth of the Mayo assaults on done bike were similarly repulsed here the attackers encountered a well-prepared defense with bunkers that withstood mortar and artillery fire the British called up tanks to deal with the bunkers but the Japanese knew that their 55th division was enroute to reinforce and relieve them attacks supported by the newly arrived tanks went in at the start of February but these failed in the face of stubborn defense that held on until the new troops entered the battle the Japanese 55th under general Roga began its attack on March 7th first targeting the brigade facing Rutter dome which was obliged to retire the fifty-fifth crossed the mayor on March 24th and was now pressing on all elements of the British force which began to pull back another dispiriting retreat in which a lot of the equipment had to be left for hire and this Eric an offensive which was intended in part to raise morale after the catastrophic retreat in 1942 from Burma really didn't do anything at all if anything morale plummeted further on April 15th the man who would ultimately lead his troops to victory in Burma Bill's slim assumed command of all troops in the Aragon the Japanese is a tough enemy and much must be done before he will admit defeat by mid-may the Hmong door booty dong line was back in Japanese hands and shortly afterwards the British were virtually back at their start place the campaign cost the British about five thousand men Japanese about three thousand but a lot of those were lost to disease it showed the need for better training and above all the need to create Esprit morale a sense of optimism and confidence and these things happen in large part when general Slim takes over what is the 14th army in August 1943 he knew that he cannot sit in the frontier all the time and he had to go this healing of the withdrawal from Burma has taken as a personal stretching fine and the feeling was that he must get a chance certainly the deputy that they are no better than us Eric on may have been a failed campaign but the appointment of slim and reorganization of the army that resulted would finally turn the tide removing the Japanese threat to India and ultimately driving them out of Burma with huge forces involved on the Eastern Front after Barbarossa it is easy to class the fighting in North Africa as a sideshow it was not control of the North African littoral meant control of the Mediterranean and ultimately the Suez Canal the Persian Gulf and oil at the beginning of 1940 tune in order to secure this important asset erwin rommel was on the move On January 19th two transports had landed 45 tanks at Benghazi this gave him almost 230 tanks he was facing 150 British but as usual British Armour was widely dispersed the fourth Indian was holding Benghazi which Rommel had evacuated as soon as the freighter had unloaded and the British 7th Armored was refitting in Tobruk Rommel was falling back on his supply lines so as he withdrew his ability to supply himself got better that his forces were reinforced and so once he felt himself there then able to recommence the offensive the British would not in a particularly strong position they now worked the far end of their own supply line their forces were strung out the overall position for the British forces in North Africa was quite weak the war in the desert has been a heartbreaking business for commander and troops end of the story remains yet to be told On January 21st Rommel attacked he had three Africa Corps and seven Italian divisions [Music] muhr sbrega quickly fell to the 21st panzer division with 15th Panzer on its right sweeping the British out of wadi freg the two divisions converged on Agadir bia which fell on the 22nd with part of the british 1st armored trapped at ant alert and losing 70 of its tanks by the 25th the offensive had taken masseuse and 1st armored had lost more tanks Rommel now turned towards Benghazi on the 27th of January Rommel ordered part of his force to hook towards McKee British forces countered by moving forces to support miquellee but Rommels action had been a feint which the British had swallowed exposing Benghazi at the time romuald served in some ways as an excuse for the breach forces why are we getting defeated it's because we're finding a Superman not because tactics are poor our equipments poor our leadership hasn't quite got his act together Benghazi fell on the 29th the Indian 4th doing well to extricate itself from the trap and take part in the withdrawal to the Gazala line that those involved dubbed the Gazala gallop because know what you give me the orders he has a thing for yourself they'll be rotated to take control we were disarray the Eighth Army developed a strong defensive position at the Gazala line where Rommel almost out of fuel and now facing the British in numbers called a halt because I love hugging fight polish New Zealanders Australians South Africans Indians Free French that was alive as Katara Rommels - his tactics his self-belief had produced a smashing victory the German forces were again rampant the British being forced to fall back and Raoul now was reinforced and greater strength than he had previously and there's almost a sense of desperation in some regard but a new British commander general Montgomery did not panic Rommels - had cost him dearly in material and fuel and when Montgomery would substantially built-up forces launched his offensive it was clear that the balance in North Africa had tipped decisively Montgomery launched his offensive in North Africa in October and the first American troops landed there in November when the two forces linked North Africa was secured an Allied planning turned to the European continent and at the Casablanca conference it was decided to take Sicily before advancing on to the Italian peninsula and further on to the mainland of Europe it was to be called Operation husky it was agreed that two armies patterns u.s. seventh and Montgomery's British 8th under Eisenhower as supreme commander would land side-by-side on the south and southeast coasts of Sicily the island was defended by the Italian 6th army under general gue Tony the 6th included two cracked German divisions a garrison of 230,000 men to be opposed by 115,000 British and Empire and 66 thousand American troops in the original landings in North Africa more than 500 transports per convoy for the invasion of Sicily the number is unknown but the landing craft were on time to the minute on the 10th of July troops began to land British forces along the southeastern corner of the island and west of them on the southern coast the Americans the landings were preceded by an airborne force but that went poorly with parachute troops scattered and unable to consolidate positions and those of the glider 469 released too soon fell into the sea the amphibious landings went well partly because Goods only planned to allow the landings draw the invaders in Two Sicilies difficult terrain and then counter-attack others had the pleasure of landing in duct ducks of course are the famous amphibians arf landing crafts are flooring the American 1st and 45th came under counter attack from a force that included the Hermann Goering Panzer Division but beat this off and the move inland began the British were to move up the East Coast for Messina to cut off axis retreat Patton would move west and north protecting Montgomery's flank but the advance through the island turned into an undeclared race between the two forces to be first to reach Messina by the 23rd Patton had reached Messala on the western point of the island and was driving for the capital Palermo which fell the same day on the left flank as well the other running of Sicily was rapidly becoming an accomplished fact two days after the fall of Palermo the fascist Grand Council in Rome arrested Yves duche benito mussolini who had been leading italy since 1922 german paratroopers rescued him from captivity in Italy and a German plane flew into Hitler's headquarters the main weight of axis resistance was now being felt in the east as the defenders became compressed falling back on Messina and escaping to the mainland on August 3rd Italian formations began their evacuation the German divisions being deployed as the rearguard in front of Messina American forces now executed to hooking operations to leapfrog along the north coast after the second on August 11th the Germans began to embark from Messina British troops had by now bypassed Mount Etna and were also closing on the vital port American troops entered Messina on August 17th it had taken a little over five weeks for the island to fall and that was a battle one Hitler in response to Mussolini's fall had ordered new divisions into northern Italy and joining them in the fight for the peninsula would be the divisions from Sicily for by the time the Americans entered Messina the town was empty of enemy troops they had escaped and that too was a sort of victory finally let's look across with the Allied troops to Italy the German so called Dunkirk was made across only two or three miles of sea by the same token that's all that separates our forces in Sicily from axis mainland the point worth noting by the axis there have been countless battles but those in the category of truly decisive are relatively few those that can be said to have held history on the battlefield and watched it pivot on the outcome by 1944 the Axis powers so manifestly unable to compete with the industrial output and manpower resources of the Allies were bound to lose the war but how and when they lost was in dispute planning for the second front had been underway since April 1943 the Germans were waiting and the Allies were trying to be sure that they had the resources and they could achieve the surprise they needed the big question for both sides was where were they going to land and how are the Germans going to deal with the landing yes these are the principled leaders responsible for planning and directing that grand assault by British and American forces which everyone hopes may prove to be the knockout blow their work involved masses of men and materiel and depended on secrecy all sorts of deceptions were employed to encourage German belief that the invasion would attack the Channel ports or the Somme estuary for every bomb dropped on Normandy three were dropped elsewhere [Music] there were more than one choice for the landings in France Normandy in fact wasn't the nearest place to the United Kingdom ports but it had certain advantages the peninsula was viewed as being something that could be taken over there was the port of Chevelle which was viewed as being potentially able to be used as a major important for bringing supplies so it was whole raft of factors which combined to make it the best place to go the greater part of the south coast region of England to a depth of 16 kilometers was declared a military zone villages were evacuated and the assault formations practiced for the invasion this is just one incident in recent United States army invasion exercises stern preparations for the grand assault upon Europe behind them the follow-up assault forces were encamped we were just waiting loading and unloading when we started to load tanks it's when we said mmm this is it there wasn't anything mentioned as far as going for an invasion oh there was a lot of ships I was amazed at the efficiency of it all and we were told which number landing craft we would be on so we were going down hundreds and hundreds of vehicles they said oh you know you're on land across 59 I don't know her that in fact every we got their incomes ranakar 59 quite extraordinarily efficient Eisenhower in supreme command had an anglo-american team of meteorologists to advise him and they warned against the 5th of June at the original date but gave the go-ahead for the 6th so Eisenhower gave the order for the invasion the order was headed the tide has turned I hope to god Eisenhower said I know what I'm doing facing the invasion in overall command was fun run stead in command of the forces opposing the landing Army Group B was Irvin Rommel though on d-day itself Rommel was absent on leave it was his wife's birthday the Germans had less tanks for the defense of France in 1944 than they had marshaled for its conquest in 1914 but they had the fortified Atlantic wall which had been Hitler's idea and which extended over 2,000 kilometers and boasted 12,000 bunkers and burn steps and disagreed about how to use these in placements nobody knows who won the arguments but we do know the results the invasion Armada comprised 700 warships their role was both air defense and Shore bombardment [Music] 2700 ships supported the landing they carried the supplies that reinforcements and the infrastructure that would make the landing sustainable above them the Allied airforces flew thousands of aircraft the operational radius of the Spitfire had been a decisive factor in picking the landing zone the Germans could meet the Allied aircraft with only 170 serviceable machines if you have air superiority and you're conducting a battle on land you have a tremendous advantage over your opponent 21st Army Group general Montgomery sailed from ports along the British coast assembling an immense Armada from departure points scattered from Cardiff in the West to Felixstowe in the east 5,000 ships all gathering together to make the invasion into Normandy it was a sight to see you know on a horizon seeing all these ships they look like a little dots getting bigger and bigger and then merging into Normandy Beach the invaders landed on a 90 kilometer plus stretch of five beaches along the Normandy coast the u.s. 1st army general Bradley landing on Utah and Omaha beaches the British second army general dempsey landing on gold Juno and sword the u.s. 82nd and 101st airborne landed behind Utah the British 6th airborne behind sword to guard the exposed eastern flank of the British it was calculated that of the airborne troops dropped on the night of June 6th up to 75% landing at the wrong locations took no part in the early fight lesson was driven home but more navigation aids were badly needed but gliders must be landed at slow speed but some type of air brake was necessary to decrease the rate of descent of gliders going into small field the Germans in anticipation of an airborne landing had flooded fields into which the paratroopers splashed Rommel had thirty four divisions opposing the landing but many were facing the wrong way most were under strength and some were feeble units comprising exclusively men with stomach complaints from dawn five allied divisions came ashore the first the u.s. fourth Infantry Division landed 1800 meters from its target due to a strong current but fortuitously that swept it to a weakly defended position the fourth landed 23,000 men on d-day and took only 197 casualties it was a different story on Omaha and we couldn't hit Omaha Beach in its entirety so we had to lower the ramp as much as we can and everybody had to go into the water a lot of the people were gear went down and some of them perished Omaha Beach was dominated by cliffs from which for much of the day the US 1st and 29th divisions were pinned by intense fire the swimming tanks had been launched prematurely and many founded and were swamped leaving the infantry without cover by day's end 55,000 had been landed but at a cost of more than 4,600 casualties the third Beach left-to-right was gold where the British 50th division landed supported by the Apes armored brigade 3rd Canadian division landed on Juno where it met particular difficulty with underwater obstacles and rough water by nightfall it had made contact with the British 50th on its right the final beach was sword where the British 3rd division landed successfully the perhaps inevitable general confusion the mass of men and machines and the contrasting levels of success created an opportunity for the defenders initially wrong-footed and slow to respond to redeploy the Germans were caught by surprise by the actual timing in their tank and bear in mind that they weren't sure where the Allies would come ashore or whether they would let the Allies come ashore in sufficient numbers and then attempt to have a mass attack particularly using their or a concentrated armor the 21st Panzer Division took a firm grip on calm denying it to the Allies for whom it had been a d-day objective as June 6th war on units began to extend the perimeter away from the beaches short and in some places well short of the proposed target line but beginning to move into the villages on or behind the coast the advance continued it means hard fighting as the Germans are desperately trying to delay the advance while they bring up adequate reinforcements every day brings news of fresh Nazi troop concentrations and every day our strength is being built up to this Eternia beginning it was late afternoon before Hitler gave permission for the deployment of two Panzer divisions that had been held in reserves at the end of June the 6th he was still not fully convinced that the Normandy landing was the real invasion rather than a feint but it was no feint within 24 hours it was clear that they had got ashore got far enough inland and consolidated sufficiently that they had a basis to keep going the battle was not yet won but it was beyond doubt a battle that could not now be lost d-day meant that the Germans days were absolutely numbered

Channel: Timeline - World History Documentaries

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Keywords: History, Full Documentary, Documentaries, Full length Documentaries, Documentary, TV Shows - Topic, Documentary Movies - Topic, 2017 documentary, BBC documentary, Channel 4 documentary, history documentary, documentary history, world war 2, world war ii, world war, world war two, nazi germany, adolf hitler, united kingdom, united states

Id: d9vuxteqAis

Length: 49min 15sec (2955 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 08 2020