The Secret Science of World War II - Full Documentary

in the crucible of world war ii germany's most brilliant scientists raced to create an arsenal of terrifying new weapons of mass destruction a stealth-like transatlantic spacecraft called the silver bird an invisible death ray straight out of science fiction rockets flying saucers even an atomic bomb seventy years later long secret nazi files reveal the classified blueprints for these and many other devastating wonder weapons they are the masterworks of a desperate quest to terrify america and their allies win the war and rule the world for a thousand years april 1945 the war against germany is at an end and the third reich emerges victorious [Music] hitler's flight to new york is escorted by supersonic jets and greeted with german victory celebrations like those in occupied france [Music] state ceremonies are staged theatrically to heighten the historic moment a nazi salute from the statue of liberty new york is in ruins with only just enough left standing for a victory parade to wall street [Music] it is the ultimate nightmare of how world war ii could have ended thanks to hitler's own dream team of hundreds of scientific masterminds rocket science superstar verner von braun engineer mathematician and physicist irene breth aerospace engineer oygan zanga even a nobel prize winning nuclear physicist werner heisenberg through the 20s and 30s the the germans technologically were very very interested in rocket development science development tech this sort of really advanced aerospace development really became a german forte that the other nations around the world were really lagging behind from this now defunct top-secret high-tech german complex thousands of brilliant engineers physicists chemists and their staff are generously funded from the nazi treasury provided with the most modern laboratories in europe and ordered to develop the deadliest armaments the world has never seen the delta-winged lippisch p13 a vertical takeoff roto-winged warplane half a century ahead of its time a flying aircraft carrier and the zilber fogle the silver bird a supersonic sub-orbital spacecraft capable of bringing the blitz to broadway [Music] they could have launched a one-way attack on america ditched the bombers uh in the ocean dropped a handful of tons on new york perhaps we certainly didn't have any any defenses that would have stopped them silverbird never leaves the drawing board but today questions still remain how do german scientists leap so far ahead of their enemies what's the science behind these machines and how close does the genius of nazi science bring adolf hitler to the brink of victory [Music] in the early stages of world war ii hitler's blitzkrieg races across a helpless europe [Music] germany is the first modern nation to wages so heavily that science and technology are the fast lane to world domination [Music] hitler probably was very significantly influenced and impacted by dramatic you know weapon systems the germans tend to have a philosophy of quality over quantity and they felt that the superior quality would turn the tide and that was really an extension of of hitler's mentality hitler uses science to conceive test and in some cases deploy a fascinating and frightening series of firsts [Music] from highly advanced long-range ballistic missiles to jet fighters the first to enter the war said to overpower the allies propeller-driven aircraft to an early stealth designed monoplane straight out of star wars decades ahead of america's b2 stealth bomber even kamikaze bombs for a pilot's one-way flight the allies are ill-prepared the american missile development programs during the war were very very primitive in comparison to what the germans had already achieved on this small remote island off the baltic sea is a top-secret complex of laboratories and airfields [Music] here nazi scientists trial the world's first cruise missile [Music] just one of the wonder weapons and development of the baltic super lab the sleepy seaside town of penamunda is the location the nazis choose for their most secret science it will become the birthplace of the jet age and the space age the cradle of the wonder weapons the pinabunda location was kind of ideal because it was a really remote part of germany uh you're close to the baltic ocean that you'd launch rockets into and you wouldn't have necessarily the problem with somebody you know stealing the technology and then getting out to the west the existence of panumundus satellite town is a strictly controlled state secret complete with futuristic apartment blocks for the scientific elite but it's also a concentration camp for the expandable prisoners who live work and die here as slaves when they are too weak to continue they are murdered lest anyone reveal hitler's scientific secrets penimundus scientists are not slaves but their welfare and that of their families hinges on cooperating with the nazis private trains carry engineers and physicists to the self-contained metropolis of metalwork power plants and proving grounds panamunda becomes the nazis los alamos and their cape canaveral 1943 germany the allies pummeled the nation in a hail of bombs but adolf hitler still believes in victory the nazis plan an arsenal of terrifying new weapons of mass destruction with capabilities and range so far advanced not even america will be spared [Music] hitler entrusts his propaganda minister to rally the german people toward victory and revenge [Applause] [Music] joseph goebbels coins these terms vengeance one and vengeance ii and the idea was that they would be effective to counter the american air offensive and the british air offensive the vengeance one or v1 is a revolutionary liquid-fueled pulse jet capable of flying 360 miles an hour on autopilot launched from ski ramps or from beneath a flying aircraft the v1 bursts into action a sophisticated gyrocompass feedback system guides it toward its target the v1 gets nicknamed the buzz bomb for the loud noise its jet engine creates an odometer tracks its pre-programmed distance at which point the v1 is designed to take a steep power dive but in early use the dive cuts off fuel flow and kills the engine sudden silence becomes a off to impending doom of the 8 000 bombs launched 2300 penetrated british defenses most of them falling in the london vicinity the propulsion roar of the flying bomb the world's first cruise missile reigns fire and ash on britain in 1944 and 45 terrorizing london with thousands killed and tens of thousands injured hundreds of homes hospitals and public buildings were hit they fell in crowded streets during rush traffic hours but new deep shelters built for this emergency were put to use and saved the lives of thousands of people only one life was lost for every three bombs launched few of the robot bombs resulted in fire but the great concussive blasts of vengeance weapon number ones exceeded anything london had experienced part technological masterpiece part military triumph [Music] hitler's secret science is paying off but there's one big problem with the big bang accuracy [Music] to target and destroy allied bases with troops and convoys somebody would have to fly this bomb while hitler promises the nation that his rockets will turn the war engineers at a pilot seat and crude controls to the v-1 creating the reichenberg a german kamikaze aircraft hundreds were built but none ever see combat they were difficult to fly putting a pilot would have ensured some small amounts of damage but the potential the airplane in terms of its top speed of its range and its endurance of its ability to get to a target these were not essential war winning weapons decades later the original plans for the reichenberg resurface in a private archive in this small bavarian garage hitler's secret science is coming back to life as several wonder weapons are rebuilt or reconstructed here from museums [Music] the bavarian builders find welded seams of inconsistent quality suggesting that some were done by skilled technicians others by exhausted concentration camp prisoners this restored relic is still capable of flight all it lacks is the volunteer to fly it [Music] for hitler's secret scientists no concept is too futuristic no propulsion system or wing design too bizarre some will fly some will fail many live on in the war zones of the 21st century and in a strange twist of history one of hitler's most brilliant scientists will survive the fall of the third right to become an american hero 1943 germany's national socialist party announces vengeance weapon v-1 that a v2 is also planned so from the nazi secret complex at panamunda engineers give birth to the space age from the ground up via a brilliant young physicist dr verner von braun and his a4 rocket ultimately named the v2 the v2 the vengeance weapon to werner von braun it was an artillery piece that would land somewhere in england and kill some englishmen but that was really not his point his point was proving aerodynamics the power the thrust the cooling all of the things necessary to take him one more step into space he wanted to see man in space it was a consuming passion his engineering ideas were what drove him von braun has given his own laboratory and team of experts at a time when rocketry is little more than a schoolboy hobby in the united states ultimately he creates the world's first long-range ballistic missile the unstoppable v2 retaliation rocket [Music] in september of that same year 1944 the germans also began their firings of the vastly superior v2 which was powered by a real liquid fuel engine military rockets in a rudimentary form had been used for centuries but their propulsion was by the use of gunpowder in this new era it was the germans who realized that the liquid fuel rocket could be put to military use that it could be given impressive range and great destructive power the german focus on advanced technology completely changes the capabilities of science and warfare they not only took a toll of more than 9 000 casualties they also had a devastating psychological effect for unlike the buzz bomb the v2 fell without warning he had a speed of 3 300 miles per hour and it could not be intercepted by fighter aircraft or brought down by anti-aircraft artillery according to boyne von braun's focus was more on the science than winning the war all that mattered to him was solving the aerodynamic problems the problems of control the problems of uh burn all of the things that are inherent in a ballistic missile not as a weapon but as a means to get into space but defiance of the furore is not an option for any german scientist and neither is the suggestion of defense the real impact on the outcome of the war was in an area that the germans really failed to develop and that was really the defensive technologies you had to be very politically correct as a nazi or else you'd be in trouble that meant you couldn't have weapons that were seen to be too defensive that might indicate that the war was being lost but the truth for germany was that the war was being lost 1944 u.s warplanes attack a nazi convoy of trucks carrying the one wonder weapon that might have made a difference had it ever been deployed the typhoon the world's first defensive ground-to-air missile designed to augment nazi efforts to shoot down allied bombers the one thing that germany could have done by 1943 if they had properly concentrated their resources was to concentrate not on a v-2 to hit great britain but on a series of anti-aircraft missiles to knock down any bomber that comes over it so they could have created an effective integrated air defense system [Music] the typhoon's first field tests were conducted at station 4 in panamunda in 1944 [Music] it's revolutionary and economical a simple steel tube about six feet long filled with a mix of nitric acid and synthetic fuel [Music] able to travel over 6 miles in just 14 seconds over a million are planned for production by 1945. but that didn't happen it was clearly beyond their capacity to do they were absorbed with they thought they had either won the war or then they were absorbed with maintaining the wars to as long as to keep themselves in power as long as possible they never concentrated their resources they never allowed the people who might have done these things to get together and do them there was too much suspicion there was too much party politics this computer simulation shows how the defensive typhoon rockets mobile shooting base will look when rebuilt a secret science artifact that perpetuates the wonder weapon mystique today [Music] these craftsmen are building just one typhoon not the millions germany dreamed would cleanse the sky of allied bombers ultimately it's the ingenuity of nazi weapons not their numbers that propels the world further faster and higher than anything ever seen [Music] nazi secret files reveal war machines so futuristic that it's hard to believe they were spawned in our grandparents time powered flight is less than 30 years old when hitler seizes power yet within months the blackboards and blueprints of his third reich are bursting with incredible designs before the war is over germany will produce a series of aeronautical firsts that remain the basis for many air and spacecraft today the errado 234 the world's first operational turbojet bomber and the most advanced jet of its kind the arado was the second of the airplanes that reached production employing the junkers yumo004 engine and it was just a very lightweight clean streamlined airplane that put a lot of pilot duties on the pilot had to be the bombardier the navigator and the gunner but it was effective was easy to fly and and uh relatively easy to maintain so it it served in small numbers and was airplaned that any country would have been proud to fly [Music] even earlier there were the many marvels of munich born doctor alexander lipisch who designed a series of delta wing gliders in the 1930s that eventually led to the introduction of the rocket-powered interceptor messerschmitt me163 comet and the better known messerschmitt me 262 the world's first operational jet fighter able to outrun any allied aircraft by as much as a hundred miles an hour it is considered the most advanced german craft to actually make it into combat a lot of the things that they were trying to do were things they were driven to do with the invasion of france the germans were faced with a situation in which their territory was more and more confined so thoughts began to turn to vertical takeoff aircraft and so they wanted rocket fighters that could ascend vertically to attack the american squadrons because they didn't have time to take them off and have a regular fighter plane climb to this end nazi dream machines include the falkwolf rotary jet with liquid fueled rockets at the tips of its triple propellers designed to take off vertically then fly like a plane but the most incredible vertical lift weapon of all is thought to be hidden in the secret hangers at panamunda a nazi ufo an article in german news magazine de spiegel later reveals the secret invention rudolf shriva plans for the ss from neighboring czechoslovakia the piloted shriver fluke chrysler nearly 50 feet in diameter with three impulse jets on a rotor inside a circular fuselage this ufo was never built [Music] but further clues to a flying saucer surface here along alpine forests and streams at a castle in upper austria a disc shaped propeller-like invention using the principles of matter transformation and energy flow to create a fuelless engine based on the natural turbulence created by swirling water or air york schauberger says that his grandfather's concept for a totally new propulsion system turned rumors of a ufo into reality [Music] in the early 1930s victor schauberger is intrigued by the ability of fish to swim upstream inspired by this natural phenomenon he devises a silent vacuum-powered engine to generate thrust without combustion a revolutionary unit for airplanes to be pulled rather than pushed forward he calls it the rapism the repulsion or repulsing in german was meant to be a some kind of reaction chamber there are some transportations would take place with the molecules that are sucked into this chamber [Music] even today the austrian would be ahead of his time in world war ii his invention is right on course with hitler's quest for wonder weapons against his will victor schauberger is forced into the very heart of nazi science working inside a weapons lab staffed by slave labor there is no weapon-like thing with this repulsion it's only meant to be some kind of propulsion system and not a weapon itself but elsewhere deadly innovation is in full swing among the top secret correspondence between nazi officials and german air force colonel schruter strons there's a clue about a wonder weapon that's rumored to have the power to kill heal and even help find oil the colonel repeatedly offers his ambitious proposal to the armed forces in the last desperate days of the third reich the ss decides to support the project his brainchild is the stuff of science fiction a wonder weapon that can pierce the thickest armor or send enemy planes crashing down from the sky a test is to be conducted at a secret location crates are unloaded at night so no one will be alerted to the classified operation the crates contain valuable metals and a geiger counter to measure radiation [Music] dawn march 1944 the colonel takes off for the test area if the weapon works you'll receive unlimited financial support colonel shooter stranz is the only man who knows the exact details of the tests to be run a quarry in the middle of the forest in the hearts mountains documents don't reveal the secret of what it looks like only that its canon-like front-end shoots out an invisible ray colonel shooter stranz has invented an x-ray beam using the technical knowledge available at the time it might have looked like this despite shortages caused by the war nazi scientists still have access to valuable metals and measuring instruments which were by now extremely rare a trial run claims that the weapon shoots out a bolt of radiation that can be detected up to 25 miles away the ss and kernel strands are successful but then mysteriously the file is closed the special unit is disbanded in october 1944 with no explanation to be found to this day shrouded in secrecy hitler's science straddles the border between fact and fiction but one of the fuhrer's quests is beyond dispute it is the most desperate and decisive race of all who will be the first to build an atomic bomb [Music] 1943 the scientists continue their work at the secret city on the baltic [Music] the tide of war continues to turn against the third reich in the east the german army is turned back at stalingrad hitler's invasion of russia collapses into panic slaughter and retreat and in the west british pilots record the first aerial images of the panamunda factories and rocket launching buildings british bombers pound the complex targeting the dormitories where hitler's scientists and engineers live hundreds are killed to a certain extent pina monde never totally recovered they lost a lot of key personnel scientists research equipment pina mundo's production is moved underground to mountain fortresses and remote mines safe from allied blockbusters [Music] elsewhere stuttgart germany 1944 nazis plot the ultimate weapon to win the war an atomic bomb a team of german scientists attempt to unlock the secret of nuclear fission to produce electric power half a world away physicists at los alamos new mexico are on the same quest using the radioactive uranium of the american west to set off the world's first nuclear weapon but the germans have their own atomic genius nobel prize winner werner heisenberg heisenberg and his team call themselves the uranium club but the german army has other plans for the atom smashers [Music] in early 1945 neither the u.s military nor researchers know anything about the state of nuclear capability in germany a secret u.s project codenamed operation also is established to find out if the german atomic bomb project exists outside the city of stuttgart beneath a castle in heigerloch also's agents discover an atomic reactor in a stone cellar [Music] and uranium cubes hidden in a field nearby they take the evidence back to the united states for further investigation [Music] months earlier at this same medieval castle clandestine shipments of heavy water a key ingredient to nuclear power arrive here from nazi occupied norway despite valiant attempts from the norwegian resistance to prevent it from ever reaching germany a secret code reveals the amount of deuterium inside each transferred barrel deuterium an isotope of hydrogen makes water about 10 percent heavier the nazis plan to combine this shipment of heavy water with the cubes of uranium to begin the nuclear age on every front from stealth technology to nuclear power hitler's push for scientific success is fueled by the nazi dream of a global rife a german empire lasting a thousand years where a massive railway system connects maine power centers from siberia to moscow paris and berlin berlin the capital is to be renamed germania [Music] the dominant high-tech centerpiece of a new world order [Music] but by march 1945 the dream is fading fast and hitler is growing desperate with allied forces closing in on germany only a wonder weapon can save the third reich but at the trinity site in the new mexico desert it's america who proves the power of the atomic [Music] bomb what the allies were very much interested in when the war was at its end was what about the german atomic bomb how um far did they come this was the final question and so they decided to put the 10 leading atomic scientists together in farmhole near cambridge and and then there and farmhole they were backed and and the outcome was that obviously the germans first had no atomic bomb and second had also in the end not the clue about the function of the atomic bomb but what about the nazi wonder weapons that did come to pass and where did they live on today the world's first cruise missile first long-range ballistic missile first guided surface-to-air missile [Music] first anti-ship missiles even the world's first closed circuit tv the world's first operational jet fighter and jet bomber [Music] aerodynamics in germany there were a small group of people who are very very advanced and there is some sort of a special genius about it countless designs years ahead of their time secret sites wholly dedicated to science backed by propaganda boasting german money and fearful enemies how could hitler's plan for wonder weapons fail in germany virtually everything was a secret so this any science was a secret it's hurt the germans more than it hurt us they also had a very very confining security system and so there was not the cross feed that you get in a good scientific community you had enthusiasts building dreams but without adequate resources you had people making decisions about resources who had no idea about the projects and at the top you had hitler making the final decisions on many things upon which he had only partial information such controlled secrecy slowed wartime production to a devastating degree the germans ultimately produced about 1300 mb262s of which they got 300 in combat and at the time we were putting a thousand bombers in a thousand fighters over germany in a day the third reich nurtures hundreds of deadly inventions but to roll them out and win the war they'd have to prioritize a mere handful of wonder weapons and mass produce these by the thousands thankfully they lacked the production methods materials and the management required at germany focused on defense more strategically chosen her ammunition and greatly increased production of these specific weapons the outcome of the war might have been very different i would have made invasion in 1944 very difficult probably problematic it made probably an invasion put off until 1945 and it's even conceivable that the war might have ended with the first atomic bomb being dropped on germany instead of upon japan but that didn't happen [Music] 1945 the nazi dream is finally destroyed by allied bombs [Music] hitler and his adjutant himmler commit suicide at the nuremberg trials the nazis face their own death sentence the entire world now learns of the unspeakable horror of concentration camps and the depth of hitler's dark dreams of domination dreams that would reach far beyond europe attacks on america had been planned since 1939. in this inventive german newsreel the nazis focus abundant long-range air power on the united states as part of the planned america bomber project [Music] i had the germans been able to develop and deploy their their america bomber program they bring the war to the mainland of the united states i think it might have had some impact on american strategic doctrine [Music] especially if these bombings had been nuclear [Music] i mean the only the only result the german air force could achieve was to send a handful of very long-range bombers over the atlantic and to drop say a dozen tons of bombs on on new york or washington none of the german vengeance weapon programs and certainly not the american bomber would have had any chance of its intended effect without a nuclear weapon in the end adolf hitler never sets foot in new york but the head of hitler's secret science program does cross the atlantic and changes the course of history [Music] in 1945 as american and soviet troops closed in on berlin rocket genius verner von braun and a small group of his most loyal associates must choose their destiny surrender to the russians take cyanide or align with the allies [Music] they choose america and von braun immediately is put in charge of the nation's infant missile program [Music] the white sands testing grounds in new mexico where font brown works on a new rocket and accomplishes his space dream after all [Music] escaping from the dark shadows of penamonda the creator of the deadly v2 spends the rest of his life in loyal service to his new country thanks to von braun america wins the space race and puts a man on the moon [Music] tranquility we copy you on the ground you got a bunch of guys about to turn blue we're breathing again thanks a lot that is probably the principal achievement of the pina mundo mines [Music] warner when brown is undoubtedly the most significant american rocket engineer of the century many would say is the most significant rocket engineer of the world so with the german scientists and knowledge that was brought back to the united states in the 1940s and early 1950s you can make a very strong case and nobody really disputes it but there's almost a direct line from pinamunda to the moon through werner von braun yet rockets aren't the only descendants of hitler's secret science in the 1950s after decoding thousands of captured nazi files the united states air force performs classified flight tests of airframes that bear an eerie resemblance to the incredible dream machines on the runways and drawing boards of panamunda the flying wing can carry a larger load faster farther and with greater economy than conventional airplanes of similar size and power you men indeed can see the flying wing in operation without saying the plane of tomorrow is flying today had it been in peacetime perhaps if the war had not come on and they made the same effort you would have seen german jet airliners before you'd have seen british jet airliner the piloted futuristic deadly space shuttle named silverbird designed by german engineers singa and brett is never built but today's space shuttle and almost all modern rocket engines still use principles of its design parallel to von bound's work with the v2 and the type of fuels that he used in the v2 combustible fuels those engines were used subsequently in the united states and by bell and others ultimately the much more sophisticated variations of them would even appear for example in the ex-15 [Music] to this day the rocket-powered high-altitude x-15 still holds the world record for the fastest speed ever reached by a piloted aircraft taking mankind to the edge of outer space with every flight [Music] there's no argument that germany had some of the most talented weapons designers on the planet at the time but they were failed by their leadership hitler really strongly hoped and believed that his scientists were going to develop a nuclear weapon even without atomic energy the nazis reached unprecedented heights of scientific advancement all in the name of war i think we're fortunate that you know the the german inability to collate and focus its programs and having an impact on the allied strategic bombing campaign is really a silver lining for democracy [Music]

Channel: Extreme Mysteries

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Keywords: bbc documentary, full documentary channel, full documentary, full documentary 2022, full length documentaries, documentary history, world war ii, janson media, world war, world war 2, world war 2 documentary, free documentary, documentary film, germany ww2, full documentary movies, world war documentary, ww2 documentary, second world war, world war 2 movies, wwii movies, best documentaries, WWII Bombers, World War 2 Bombers, bombers of ww2, World war 2 movie, ww2 movie

Id: -KsDT0W6T2o

Length: 44min 37sec (2677 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 20 2022