二战纪录片 World War II Documentaries

Spring 1944. A German armored division is speeding towards Normandy. Like all soldiers of the Reich, they know the battle they are about to enter will be decisive. But this division is different. The troops are just 17 years old. Conditioned to kill, they will inflict hell on the Allied troops who had just landed on the Normandy beaches. And in doing so, they would break all accepted rules of warfare and humanity. These teenage soldiers left a trail of blood in their wake, executing both prisoners of war and civilians. They pledged to lay down their lives for Hitler. They were the product of a totalitarian logic. How can a group of teenagers be turned into a killing machine? Deutschland heil! Of the 20,000 soldiers in what became known as the Baby Division, some of them became war criminals. Those who have agreed to speak openly about their role using their true identity reject this title. But all of them did follow the ruthless path which step by step turned them from a bunch of teens into a fearsome killing machine. A two-year indoctrination in evil. The story of this teenage division begins at the start of 1943. This is a key moment for Hitler. After four years of war, Germany has lost millions of soldiers. The Fuhrer knows that a decisive battle against the Allies will soon commence in the West. He is in desperate need of fresh blood to reinforce his armies. Among the SS, the Third Reich's elite political soldiers, led by Heinrich Himmler, some officers come up with a radical suggestion. Future soldiers can be found in the ranks of the Hitler Youth, formed in 1936 to indoctrinate children and teenagers in Nazi Germany. They propose to create an SS division entirely composed of young recruits, 20,000 soldiers, all 17 years old. In a letter to the Hitler Youth leader, Himmler wrote that the Fuhrer was thrilled and asked for an advertisement for volunteers. The propaganda was well targeted. Posters went up in towns across Germany with a slogan directly appealing to its youth. You too. I saw those posters. You too. They spoke to your sense of honor. Why don't you join the Waffen-SS too? That's the meaning of you too. Erich Biswau is among those who responded to this appeal. He had been groomed for this all his young life. He grew up under Nazism and its glorification of the German people. Age 14, he learned to march in step as part of the Hitler Youth. At 17, his idol Hitler had just called him to arms. That's how we were brought up. We are the German people, afraid of no one. That is also why, in the end, I volunteered for the Waffen-SS. The first stage of indoctrination is seduction, and it worked its magic on Erich just as it did on his parents, the generation which brought Hitler to power. But the adults no longer have any say over the fate of their teenage offspring. A new law gives the SS the right to enlist 17-year-olds who volunteer for its ranks. While my father was somewhat proud, my mother was not happy at all. But they couldn't stop me. The first recruits embark on training in the spring of 1943. From that moment on, they are no longer children in a family, but members of an elite fighting force. Their fond farewells, played out in front of the cameras like a cheerful departure for an adventure, would serve to feed the propaganda machine yet more. So far, recruitment numbers among Germany's youths are falling well short of the 20,000 soldiers the SS need. The Nazi leadership will have to find alternative methods and enroll youngsters who are rather less willing. Where seduction isn't working, they try cunning. Hans Baumann fell into the trap. He had not planned to sign up for the Waffen-SS, the military arm of the SS, but one can be naive at 17. The police launched the recruiting campaign. So I went. And I said, hello, I would like to join the police. And they answered, if this is your wish, then you must first serve for four and a half years in the Waffen-SS. I thought, okay, sure, I'll do that. It was bait to attract the youth. Kriegsfreiwillige der Hitlerjugend. On May 29, 1943, Himmler inspects the first contingents. This unit of youngsters will soon become known as the 12th SS Panzer Division. Reichsführer SS Himmler rief den jungen Freiwilligen zu, ihr werdet wetteifern in Treue und Anständigkeit, in Mut und Beständigkeit und in der Haltung eurer Herzen. On this day, the teenagers are still living out their dream. They have been dressed in uniforms and lined up just like real soldiers. But it's only now that their transformation will actually begin. A year from now, they will have become wolves. To carry out this metamorphosis, the Nazis have a formidable tool, the Waffen-SS training centers. These youths have just entered the realm of brutality. It is the first step on a journey of no return. Our trainers were diehards. And they put us to the test. We really hated them. They had this wonderful tradition. They'd fill our backpacks with bricks. It sure did weigh a bit. I think we screamed out the worst curses ever. Eberhard Wenzel follows in the footsteps of his father, who had joined the SS. Upon arrival, he discovers a regime where harassment is the rule and where any sign of weakness is mercilessly punished. Lie down. Stand up. Crawl. After a few hours, we looked like wild boar. Filthy. With mud caked everywhere. Soaked. No matter the weather. Still today, I don't know how I managed to get through it. What these young recruits don't know is that this harshness is part of a carefully calibrated strategy on the part of the Nazis, subjected to daily bullying and aggression, the teenagers will end up like their tormentors. Indoctrinated and fanaticized, the apprenticed soldiers gradually adopt the firmly held belief that hatred for, and a will to destroy one's enemy, is the only way to wage war. Their minds and bodies are no longer their own. The SS has been training its members like this for years. It is the trademark of this elite corps, renowned for its combativeness, its loyalty, and its cruelty. But in this instance, the indoctrination machine is not as effective as usual. Nazi theory is not proving so easy to apply to a group made up solely of youngsters. The teenage mind has its own way of functioning, and one of its characteristics is to challenge authority, sometimes to the point of total rejection. We had a suicide in Berlin. One of our comrades shot himself, because he could no longer bear all these ordeals. Six months after the arrival of the first recruits, SS reports find that the physical condition of the young men is below average, and the division is not operational. The intrepid and valiant army of adolescent Aryans which Himmler dreamed of remains elusive. In the fall of 1943, the SS is at an impasse, and must desperately find a new method to build up the 12th Panzer Division. November 1943. In Berlin, Hitler is growing impatient. The promised creation of this Waffen-SS youth division has not lived up to expectations. And rumors of a massive Allied offensive are growing. The Fuhrer issues an urgent order. A danger looms in the west. The Anglo-Saxon landing. To that end, I hereby order to accelerate the supply of armament of the 12th SS Division. The 12th SS Panzer Division. An armored division made up of very young soldiers and equipped with the best possible weapons to act as the front line of defense to halt the Allied advance. That is the project. The countdown has begun. While the panzers of the 12th Division are being assembled, SS officers have a problem. They must find a way to shape these youths into an army in which every soldier is prepared to fight to the death. One of the men entrusted with this task is Kurt Mayer, a leading figure among the Waffen-SS. He has tasted combat on all fronts. Holland, Greece, Russia. His battleground feats are the stuff of legend. He is a role model for the young troops who know him by the nickname of Panzer Mayer. Panzer Mayer was a hothead. He wasn't someone who sat behind a desk and gave orders. He led from the front, as they say. In German, we say an adventurer. A soldier who strikes without asking how or why. He just hits. That was Kurt Mayer. Kurt Mayer and the other 12th Division leaders adopt a surprising tactic to subdue these rebellious teenagers, opting for a softer approach. They issue orders for instructors to employ a radical change in behavior. From one day to the next, the iron grip is relaxed. Disheveled clothing and less closely cropped hair are now tolerated. Even bullying becomes less commonplace, an unprecedented state of affairs in the Waffen-SS. It was more relaxed. There was more team spirit. When the relationship is warm and full of goodwill, the soldiers feel it. It's the same thing as between a parent and a child. Kurt Mayer realizes that these teenagers, having been taken from their families, lack emotional ties. He states this clearly in his post-war writings. Officers should recreate a family-like relationship. And they should be mentors to their young soldiers. A degree of affection, it was thought, would overcome fear. The officers become protective older brothers. The youngsters become submissive. They just had to say, do this, then do that. And we did it. No questions asked. Because we truly cared about these model men. We weren't just pretending. Winter 1944. The SS have won. And the young recruits are now marching to the orders of a particularly cruel breed. One year earlier, on the Ukrainian front, Kurt Mayer razed a village, ordering his men to slaughter the inhabitants. 872 were killed. The idol of these youths is a war criminal. And he is now in charge of 20,000 loyal followers. The Nazi regime now gives them what all disciples dream of, an initiation rite. They told us that being sworn in was when half-soldiers became whole. Yes, I was proud. For this key turning point in their engagement, the youths are inducted into the Holy of Holies in SS mythology, a mass of the Black Order. With its Nazi flags, its dark uniforms, and the symbolism of Gothic lettering, the whole macabre staging is designed to make sacrifice seem like a noble goal. The teenagers take the oath and now wear the distinctive insignia of the elite corps they joined, that of the SS warrior. They wear a skull on their caps and have their blood group tattooed on their arms. A nurse cleaned it with a bit of alcohol. Then a male nurse stamped you with it. It was a little piece of wood with sharp points sticking out. It took just a few seconds. This is a precaution in case a transfusion is required on the battlefield, but one that only the Waffen-SS employed during the Second World War. Blood type A. The teenagers are branded for life with the seal of the Waffen-SS. Spring 1944. It is time to head into combat. The 12th Waffen-SS Division is ready. With its 148 panzers and 330 armored vehicles, it is one of the best equipped units in the Third Reich, and by far the youngest. Hitler's gamble has paid off. From their training camps, the regiments of the 12th SS all converge on the coast of northern France, where the Germans are expecting an Allied landing. Along the way, the SS officers will have the chance to test the loyalty of the young soldiers they have trained. On the way to the French coast, where the Allies are preparing to invade, some of the young wolves of the Waffen-SS 12th Division have the opportunity to show what they are capable of. Several hundred make up a reconnaissance battalion, advancing by train to fulfill their mission. Night has fallen when they arrive in the village of Asque, northern France. It is April 1st, 1944, at 10.45 p.m. A bomb explodes on the rails in front of them. No soldiers are wounded in this attack by the French resistance, and yet the villagers will pay with their lives for this affront to the Panzer Division. Karl Munter is one of the young SS troops who took part in the massacre. In 2018, German journalists tracked him down. I was in the train, and I told my superior what had happened. He told me, take a few soldiers, and go clean up the street. Clean up the street meant even inside the houses. Clean up. The tone has been set. Karl Munter and his comrades in arms carry out their orders. They round up the men in the village and take them to the place of execution. 25 years after the events, in 1969, survivors of the Asque massacre recount the horrors they witnessed. There were four or five of them. There was a big one, and a 17 or 18-year-old kid. At that moment, he shot me in the head, and the other one shot me in the balls. They finished the wounded on the ground. There were even two near the wall. We came to finish them off with a revolver shot. And at each corpse, a kick, a punch, and a kiss. That night, the adolescents trained by the Waffen-SS, confident they are acting on good grounds, murder 86 civilians, all men age 15 to 74. Even several decades after, Karl Munter says he was only carrying out orders. When I arrest civilians, they'd better stay calm. If they run off, they must not have a clear conscience. As a soldier, I have a duty to shoot. It's their bad luck to have run into me. The shocking event shows how tightly the young soldiers have embraced Nazi ideology. One of them even recorded his jubilation in the regiment's logbook. You want goosebumps? Come spend the night and ask. Success guaranteed. The 12th Division officers are equally elated. They now have proof that their team unit is ready to face the enemy. On June 6, 1944, at 6.30 in the morning, the D-Day landings begin on the Normandy beaches. General Montgomery, who has scored a number of victories over the Germans a year earlier in North Africa, is commanding the land forces, over 150,000 soldiers from across the Allied armies. He puts the Americans on the Western Front, heading for the Cotentin Peninsula. And he assigns two strategic objectives to the Anglo-Canadians to the east, the city of Caen and the airfield at Carpiquet. At this point, Montgomery gives them 24 hours to achieve these goals, but he does not know who he is up against. In the opposite camp, Kurt Meyer has positioned his 20,000 young men northwest of Caen to defend the city. On this 15-kilometer-wide strip of land, the Battle of Normandy will play out between two men experienced in warfare, one of whom is in command of several thousand apprenticed soldiers. The day after D-Day, Canadian forces advance towards Caen without meeting any opposition. Meyer has set up his headquarters in an abbey on high ground from where he observes their progress. He orders his soldiers to hide their tanks on the edge of the village of Autie. The trap is set. The teenagers prepare for their baptism of fire. They have dreamt of this since childhood, eagerly awaiting this moment ever since they finished training. Now they will have their first taste of real war. On June 7, 1944, the day after the Allied landings, the teenagers of the 12th Armoured Division of the Waffen-SS give the Canadians a demonstration of their firepower. Then it is the turn of the foot soldiers. For the past eight months, these young Germans have been groomed for combat. In Autie, they are now unleashed. We stopped the attack there. At that point, the Canadians had suffered huge losses. They already wanted to pull back. During the fighting in Autie, the Canadians lose 400 men. The young wolves of the 12th SS Division stop the Allied advance in its tracks. They have more than lived up to the expectations of their superiors. After their first victory, the teenagers take captured enemy troops back to their headquarters. There they see the grim face of their idol, Kurt Mayer. A hardened veteran of the Eastern Front, Mayer gives no quarter. He orders his young troops to execute the prisoners. And those who did not receive this order, today acknowledge that they were simply lucky. It was a war crime, no doubt about it. But if I had been given the order and said no, I would have been severely punished, even shot. It was impossible to refuse an order. This meant that anything that was ordered was done. I am glad not to have found myself in that situation. Even today, I still wonder what I would have done. On the 7th and 8th of June, 1944, around 100 prisoners of war are executed by the teenagers. Fed on Nazi propaganda claiming the Allies would kill or castrate them if they surrendered, the 12th SS Division turns into a killing machine. This orgy of violence alarms Allied command. Montgomery is wrong-footed by this unit of fanatical kids, which his troops have nicknamed the Baby Division. The worst were Hitler Youth. Yeah, they were good and they were fanatic. So, every day was a potential disaster day. A Canadian unit had taken over an orchard and as you know, in all the farmhouses outside, there was always a big vat of cider. Well, the Canadians, they got well-wined, not allowing for the fact that there were counter-attacks. And they found them in their things, incapable of fighting. And there they were shot or bayoneted, and so many of them. And that's how they dealt with the Canadians. Very frightening. Two days after D-Day. While they wait for the next battle, the 12th Division camouflages its tanks. Kurt Meyer has come up with a new plan. He sends 250 soldiers to the village of Breteville. Convinced his young wolves can easily take the village, the SS commander even imagines they can drive the Allies back into the sea, arrogantly treating them as small fry. Fired up by their first victory, the teenagers head into battle in high spirits. But this time, the tables are turned. In Breteville, it is the Canadians who are lying in wait. The teenagers will suffer their first defeat, and the toll will be high. Two days after the D-Day landings, the Canadians have set an ambush. They have four times as many troops as the teenagers of the 12th SS. Eberhard Wenzel was inside one of the panzers, advancing on Breteville. The first tank reached the village road. It was hit immediately. The tank turret exploded, and the tank caught fire. Everyone died. The commander says, Butterfly 2, destroy the cannon to the right of the church, now! The panzer starts moving. Then the commander sticks his head out of the tank to look through binoculars at the enemy. A grenade tears his head off. All gone. The body falls back into the tank, onto my friend Hans Rohrbach. All the gushing blood from the arteries splattered on him, on his head, his body, his uniform. Everything was splattered with blood. He was so devastated that all he could do was tremble. The day ends in carnage. Of the 250 Germans who went into battle, 150 are dead. The panzers where these teenagers play things, now they become their coffins. On that day in Breteville, Hitler's teen soldiers realized they are mere mortals. I cannot tell you how badly my stomach hurt. This is a key moment in the history of the baby division. The teenagers believed in a lightning victory, but they now know this was an illusion fueled by their elders. Now that the Allies have got the measure of this young army, they call in the resources to defeat it. Aerial strikes rain down on these young soldiers. When we were returning to the unit, I was driving. Our commander said, you look out on the left, I'll look out on the right. Everything was fine for the first few kilometers, and then we started getting shot at. I opened the door and I threw myself out. The young SS troops have been left to fend for themselves. The Luftwaffe pilots, few in number and poorly trained, were overwhelmed by Allied aviation. In Normandy, the 12th division gets no equipment supplies, no reinforcements. The imbalance of power is growing every day. And the Allies, they would leave their broken-down tanks behind, and the next day they had 20 new ones. And we never received any backup or equipment. When a tank was destroyed, we had to go back to get it at night and repair it at the camp. That was the difference. This is when we first started to think, we aren't going to make it. We told ourselves, we cannot win this war. But there is no room for doubt. They believe the survival of the Reich depends on them. The SS command decides to counter any dip in morale by handing out medals for heroism. This flatters the teenagers, shoring up the image they have of themselves. Such values are exalted by Kurt Mayer in a speech. The call for sacrifice finds a deep resonance in these teenagers. Nazism has groomed them for this from a young age. The cult of personality combined with childhood dreams has created an explosive totalitarian cocktail. They each nurture a powerful image of the idealized father. An idealized father who can ask anything of them. Of course it was upsetting when you came back at the end of the day and asked where's Heiner or where's Karl? And we were told he fell in combat or we don't know where he is or he was wounded. Until the same thing happened to you. We had sworn to Adolf Hitler that we'd die for our homeland if need be. And that is what we did. I had promised I wouldn't run away. I had to continue fighting in this war. I had to go on. The words of their oath take on their full meaning. The teenagers must fight to the death. They have one single obsession. To eliminate the enemy. We had a lot of trouble with snipers. They were youngsters. Lashed to branches of trees. And they would wait for the opportunity to shoot someone in the back more than anything rather than the front. General Montgomery is about to take a decision which will have grave consequences. He wanted to take Caen within 24 hours. But one month later, the city has still not fallen, due to the relentless resistance of the Germans, including a band of 17-year-old kids. On July 7th 1944, he launches a vast aerial operation. The mission is to pound the German positions ahead of a decisive land offensive. Several units of the 12th SS Division are hiding in Caen, hoping they will be safe among the civilian population. The Royal Air Force drops more than 2,500 tons of bombs. Montgomery has reached his objectives. He has taken Carpiquet Airfield, and now he enters the city. Despite being outnumbered, the teenagers put up a dogged resistance. After two days of fierce fighting, they receive orders to withdraw from Caen. I was wounded when I was out riding a motorcycle. I got shot by a Canadian reconnaissance group. I was hit with shrapnel in the chest and arm. For me, the Battle of Normandy was over. For many young Waffen-SS troops, the journey finally ends here in the Normandy countryside, which has turned into the antechamber of hell. The German defeat in Normandy is a decisive moment in the Second World War. It opens the way for the Allies, who can now move on and liberate the rest of Western Europe. But the survivors of the 12th SS Division do not give up. During their withdrawal, they will take revenge on the civilian population. Of the 20,000 young Germans recruited by the Baby Division, only 14,000 remain. They have tasted defeat, and their vengeance will be terrible. As the young men retreat, they leave a trail of civilian victims in their wake. They kill some, as an example, in reprisal for attacks by the French resistance on their convoys, and they act with even greater savagery than in the village of Asque at the start of their campaign. On August 30th in Tavaux, they torch houses and murder 20 civilians, this time including women and children. Two days later in Brouillon, they kill 14 inhabitants. And on the 4th of September, they kill 23 people, rape two women, and burn down houses in Belgian villages in the valley of the Meuse. The killing machine is on the rampage. These teenagers are prepared to do anything and have nothing left to lose. Exactly what Hitler needs as Nazi Germany teeters on the brink of collapse. Autumn 1944. His generals no longer believe that the war can be won, but he still does. He tries one final roll of the dice, and he draws on the irrational faith in victory that was inculcated into the Hitler youth. Hans Baumann, the boy who just wanted to be a policeman, now finds himself clinging to his belief to the bitter end. I must admit that I was among those who believed that a miracle would happen. On December 16th, 1944, Hitler launches the counter-offensive in the Ardennes. The teen soldiers are still dazzled by his aura and head back into combat. In icy conditions and poorly equipped, they advance headlong into the abyss. When I think of the conditions under which we left for the Ardennes, it was criminal. Ultimately, we had to stop because we ran out of gas. Weakened by their latest failure, the teenagers of the 12th Division now find themselves transferred to the 6th Panzer Army, trying to shore up breaches in Hungary and Austria. Laying down their weapons is never an option for them. That is, until their symbolic father, Adolf Hitler, takes his own life on April 30th, 1945. The parallel universe in which they have lived since childhood suddenly evaporates. It wasn't so easy to accept. It was as though something had been taken from us. Some of us cried. I can definitely say that all of us were bereft. What would happen now? On May 8th, 1945, the capitulation of Nazi Germany comes down like a hammer. The world of the 12th Division's teen soldiers collapses, but their story is not yet over. Now comes the time of reckoning. The Americans were screaming, U-S-S, hands up! We had to raise our hands. They looked up our blood type. Naturally, they sorted us out. U-S-S, over there! Identified by their tattoos, the SS were separated from other prisoners of war. The leaders who incited them to commit war crimes will stand trial. In December 1945, Kurt Mayer, the idol of the youngsters in the 12th Division, is tried before a Canadian court. He is sentenced to death for executing prisoners of war in Normandy. In France, the trial of those accused of the Aske massacre takes place in August 1949. The members of the reconnaissance unit responsible for killing 86 villagers are also sentenced to capital punishment. But all the death sentences will be commuted to prison terms. This is the price for reconciliation with Germany and therefore peace. Kurt Mayer would be released after 10 years. Despite being sentenced to death in France for his part in the massacre at Aske, Karl Munter lived free until his death in 2019. And yet, behind this apparent immunity lies another truth. That of the teenagers who have had to bear the burden of their enlistment for the rest of their lives. By the time the war was over, we were a few years older and we had thought things through a bit. As teenagers we considered certain things good when in fact they were not. At the time I believed in it and I took part enthusiastically. But now I can see it was a mistake. We no longer knew right from wrong. I think it was a tragedy and one which should never be repeated. By forming a teenage armored division, Hitler and his right-hand man, Himmler, had created a monster. And yet, Nazi barbarity did not immunize humanity against the folly of totalitarianism. This story of indoctrination of young, impressionable minds, far from being consigned to the past, is repeating itself.