0:00:02 > 0:00:03BOMBER DRONES
0:00:11 > 0:00:13May the 28th, 1940.
0:00:13 > 0:00:15After only 18 days of fighting,
0:00:15 > 0:00:19the Allied armies in Europe have been smashed by the Nazis.
0:00:22 > 0:00:25A German invasion of Britain now looks inevitable.
0:00:29 > 0:00:32The five men of the British War Cabinet consider their options.
0:00:32 > 0:00:35The former Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain,
0:00:35 > 0:00:37and the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax,
0:00:37 > 0:00:40are arguing for peace talks with the Nazis.
0:00:42 > 0:00:44This seems entirely sensible.
0:00:44 > 0:00:50Britain might hang on to her independence and most of the Empire.
0:00:50 > 0:00:55Winston Churchill has been Prime Minister just two and a half weeks.
0:00:55 > 0:00:57He is contemptuous.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00Hitler would reduce Britain to a slave state
0:01:00 > 0:01:02with a puppet government.
0:01:03 > 0:01:06Labour's Clement Attlee backs Churchill.
0:01:06 > 0:01:10His deputy, Arthur Greenwood, a figure forgotten in history,
0:01:10 > 0:01:12is with them too.
0:01:12 > 0:01:16And so the decision is made, Britain will fight on.
0:01:19 > 0:01:23Churchill then calls together the full Cabinet.
0:01:23 > 0:01:29"If this long island story of ours is to end at last,"
0:01:29 > 0:01:32he says, "let it end only
0:01:32 > 0:01:38"when each one of us lies choking in his own blood on the ground."
0:01:38 > 0:01:42There's a pause... A great roar, people are in tears.
0:01:42 > 0:01:45This is a blood pact
0:01:45 > 0:01:50drawing in not only the men in the room, but everybody.
0:01:50 > 0:01:56Britannia, the old conqueror island isn't going to go down easily.
0:01:56 > 0:01:59Stand together.
0:01:59 > 0:02:01Fight to the end.
0:02:32 > 0:02:35PHONE RINGING
0:02:40 > 0:02:46It's ten past midnight on Monday the 27th of May 1940,
0:02:46 > 0:02:49and the telephone is ringing at the home of a chartered accountant
0:02:49 > 0:02:51called Basil Smith.
0:02:51 > 0:02:54It's the Admiralty calling.
0:02:54 > 0:02:57Operation Dynamo is under way.
0:02:59 > 0:03:01Basil Smith set off
0:03:01 > 0:03:06for the boathouse where his 24-foot motor launch, Constant Nymph, was moored.
0:03:06 > 0:03:11Everything unnecessary - china, cutlery, pots and pans -
0:03:11 > 0:03:13had already been stripped out and stored.
0:03:13 > 0:03:15He was just waiting for his naval permit.
0:03:15 > 0:03:17He said, "The officer in charge
0:03:17 > 0:03:20"didn't seem to think there was any tremendous hurry."
0:03:22 > 0:03:24GUNFIRE
0:03:28 > 0:03:32Across the Channel, the British and French armies,
0:03:32 > 0:03:36hundreds of thousands of men, were in full retreat.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39Their only chance of escape was by sea.
0:03:45 > 0:03:49German bombers were trying to close down the nearest port
0:03:49 > 0:03:51still held by the allies...
0:03:51 > 0:03:53Dunkirk.
0:03:56 > 0:04:00After a 20-mile march, Private Fred Barker and his platoon
0:04:00 > 0:04:03clambered to the top of the sand dunes.
0:04:03 > 0:04:07"We stood stock still in astonishment," he said.
0:04:10 > 0:04:14There were lines and lines of thousands of men,
0:04:14 > 0:04:16all waiting to be evacuated.
0:04:18 > 0:04:20Suddenly some of the men around him were seized by panic
0:04:20 > 0:04:24and began to run down the beach towards any boat they could see.
0:04:24 > 0:04:26Their officer roared at them to stop.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29"Stand fast! Stand fast!
0:04:29 > 0:04:31"Form ranks," he shouted.
0:04:31 > 0:04:35But more men began desperately to run down the beach.
0:04:35 > 0:04:37The officer then pulled his revolver
0:04:37 > 0:04:41and threatened to shoot the next man who broke the line.
0:04:49 > 0:04:54Basil Smith was now heading out to sea with a full tank of fuel
0:04:54 > 0:04:57and a crew of two naval ratings.
0:04:57 > 0:05:01Four months in the Navy and had never been to sea.
0:05:01 > 0:05:03Took to it like ducks to water.
0:05:03 > 0:05:08But was it was they were actually going to be doing, he had no idea.
0:05:08 > 0:05:11Whatever it was, he'd been assured
0:05:11 > 0:05:17by the pleasant-voiced man from the Admiralty, "It would be dangerous."
0:05:22 > 0:05:25The men on the Dunkirk beaches could only be reached
0:05:25 > 0:05:27by the shallowest craft.
0:05:29 > 0:05:32Thousands were standing here in rows four-deep,
0:05:32 > 0:05:34waiting day and night to be rescued,
0:05:34 > 0:05:38and when the tides came in, they were up to their necks in water.
0:05:38 > 0:05:42One young private said he counted three tides.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45"We had to keep our cigarettes and matches in our helmets
0:05:45 > 0:05:47"to keep them dry," said another.
0:05:47 > 0:05:51"It was blazing hot and we had nothing to drink."
0:05:55 > 0:05:59The little ships were coming to the rescue.
0:05:59 > 0:06:05A motley flotilla of hundreds of yachts, cockle boats, fishing smacks
0:06:05 > 0:06:10and pleasure cruisers with names like The Richmond, The Resolute
0:06:10 > 0:06:17and Queen Boadicea, and no fewer than 11 boats called The Skylark.
0:06:22 > 0:06:25Basil Smith reached Dunkirk at dusk.
0:06:27 > 0:06:31Strafed by fighter planes, the little ships and hundreds of rowing boats
0:06:31 > 0:06:34tirelessly ferried exhausted men from the beaches
0:06:34 > 0:06:37to the larger ships waiting to take them home.
0:06:40 > 0:06:42Under heavy shelling,
0:06:42 > 0:06:48men fell overboard, some were crushed to death, many drowned.
0:06:53 > 0:06:57Constant Nymph helped to get around 900 soldiers off the beach
0:06:57 > 0:06:59before she had to be abandoned.
0:07:01 > 0:07:03Basil Smith sailed home,
0:07:03 > 0:07:05on a merchant ship, still under heavy fire.
0:07:08 > 0:07:12"Plenty of hot tea and bread and butter and jam and a chance
0:07:12 > 0:07:18"to light a pipe made me perfectly indifferent to anything Jerry did."
0:07:18 > 0:07:22Basil Smith had just defined the spirit of Dunkirk.
0:07:30 > 0:07:36Over nine days, the flotilla of 900 naval and civilian craft
0:07:36 > 0:07:41rescued over a third of a million men from the beaches of northern France.
0:07:41 > 0:07:43It was a resounding military defeat,
0:07:43 > 0:07:47but it was also a kind of miraculous deliverance.
0:07:57 > 0:08:01On Tuesday the 4th of June, Winston Churchill
0:08:01 > 0:08:05turned the Dunkirk spirit into a founding legend of modern Britain.
0:08:07 > 0:08:09CHURCHILL: We shall fight on the beaches,
0:08:09 > 0:08:10we shall fight on the landing grounds,
0:08:10 > 0:08:14we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
0:08:14 > 0:08:18we shall fight in the hills,
0:08:18 > 0:08:20we shall never surrender!
0:08:21 > 0:08:24The British Empire now stood alone
0:08:24 > 0:08:28against the might of the German military machine.
0:08:36 > 0:08:40But who was the "we" Churchill spoke of?
0:08:40 > 0:08:43Who was British and who wasn't?
0:08:46 > 0:08:49SMASHING
0:08:54 > 0:09:00As darkness fell on the 10th of June 1940, Italian ice cream shops
0:09:00 > 0:09:05and cafes were attacked during riots in Edinburgh, Manchester and London.
0:09:10 > 0:09:13Mussolini had just joined forces with Hitler.
0:09:13 > 0:09:17Britain was now at war with Germany and Italy.
0:09:19 > 0:09:23There were 18,000 Italians registered as living in Britain
0:09:23 > 0:09:26and when he was asked what should be done about them,
0:09:26 > 0:09:30Churchill replied, "Collar the lot!"
0:09:34 > 0:09:38Within two weeks, 4,000 Italians were rounded up.
0:09:38 > 0:09:43Most of them ended up in hastily organised internment camps.
0:09:43 > 0:09:46NEWSREEL: To be interned in Britain is like paradise
0:09:46 > 0:09:48when compared with a Nazi concentration camp.
0:09:48 > 0:09:50So there shouldn't be any complaints here.
0:09:50 > 0:09:52Even if the internees have literally to make their own beds
0:09:52 > 0:09:54and take in each other's washing.
0:09:57 > 0:10:02The final destination for many Italians was the Isle of Man.
0:10:02 > 0:10:04DRILLING
0:10:05 > 0:10:10They were fenced in with barbed wire and patrolled by armed guards,
0:10:10 > 0:10:15interned in parades of Victorian guesthouses.
0:10:17 > 0:10:20Almost all of the Italians who were interned
0:10:20 > 0:10:23had done nothing more threatening to national security
0:10:23 > 0:10:27than introduce the British to ice-cream, olive oil
0:10:27 > 0:10:29and coffee you could actually drink.
0:10:29 > 0:10:33George Orwell complained that you couldn't get a decent meal in London
0:10:33 > 0:10:36because the head chefs of the Savoy, the Cafe Royal
0:10:36 > 0:10:39and the Piccadilly had all been locked up.
0:10:46 > 0:10:49But it wasn't just Italians.
0:10:49 > 0:10:54Over 10,000 men and women of Italian, German and Austrian origin
0:10:54 > 0:10:56were interned here.
0:10:57 > 0:11:02One refugee said, "Put Viennese people together for long enough
0:11:02 > 0:11:08"and they will do two things, found a university and open a patisserie."
0:11:08 > 0:11:10And that's just what they did here.
0:11:10 > 0:11:14There were cake shops, there were language lessons in French,
0:11:14 > 0:11:20Portuguese, Hebrew and Italian, lectures in history and literature,
0:11:20 > 0:11:23workshops from great Berlin theatre directors.
0:11:28 > 0:11:31For a short period of time, one of the great centres
0:11:31 > 0:11:36of European intellectual life was the Isle of Man.
0:11:46 > 0:11:48By now, the Luftwaffe was preparing
0:11:48 > 0:11:51for Operation Sea Lion, the invasion of Britain.
0:11:51 > 0:11:55Stage one, destroy the RAF.
0:12:05 > 0:12:11On the 16th of August 1940, Winston Churchill and his Chief of Staff,
0:12:11 > 0:12:15General Hastings Ismay, stopped off here at RAF Uxbridge
0:12:15 > 0:12:17on their way to Chequers.
0:12:17 > 0:12:23This was 11 Group HQ, Fighter Command, responsible for air defence
0:12:23 > 0:12:25in the southeast of England.
0:12:27 > 0:12:31Churchill took every chance he could get to stomp down here
0:12:31 > 0:12:33and watch Fighter Command in action.
0:12:35 > 0:12:37ISSUING CO-ORDINATES
0:12:42 > 0:12:47Each day as the battle in the sky developed, the German attacks
0:12:47 > 0:12:51were plotted almost minute by minute on this giant map board.
0:12:53 > 0:12:57The formations of attacking aircraft were shown by wooden blocks
0:12:57 > 0:12:59marked with the approximate number of planes.
0:12:59 > 0:13:03Their course was tracked by colour-coded arrows,
0:13:03 > 0:13:05corresponding to the room's master clock.
0:13:13 > 0:13:15Now it looks very complicated,
0:13:15 > 0:13:18but in fact this was a masterpiece of clarity.
0:13:18 > 0:13:24It's a dusty old room now, but this is really about information processing
0:13:24 > 0:13:27and, the truth is, we were better at it than they were.
0:13:31 > 0:13:34Plotting the enemy attacks day and night were members of
0:13:34 > 0:13:40the Women's Auxiliary Air Force or WAAFs. They were known as "the beauty chorus."
0:13:40 > 0:13:44Above them was what Churchill called the Dress Circle.
0:13:49 > 0:13:51And up here, the senior commanders were playing a deadly game
0:13:51 > 0:13:53of chess with the Germans,
0:13:53 > 0:13:57taking split-second decisions about when to send squadrons up to fight.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00RINGING
0:14:04 > 0:14:05Timing was critical.
0:14:05 > 0:14:09Fights in the air were won by a narrow margin of advantage.
0:14:09 > 0:14:13So getting clear of the ground and up to the correct height for battle
0:14:13 > 0:14:16could mean the difference between life and death.
0:14:21 > 0:14:23By August 1940,
0:14:23 > 0:14:29squadrons could be scrambled and in the air within 90 seconds.
0:14:30 > 0:14:34This beautifully efficient system was masterminded by the head
0:14:34 > 0:14:40of Fighter Command, Sir Hugh Dowding, also known as Stuffy.
0:14:41 > 0:14:45If a democracy has any advantage in fighting a war,
0:14:45 > 0:14:47it's that some people are prepared to take on
0:14:47 > 0:14:50and challenge the supreme leaders.
0:14:50 > 0:14:55Stuffy Dowding was exactly the kind of stubborn, flinty old so and so
0:14:55 > 0:14:59quite prepared to challenge Churchill at key moments.
0:14:59 > 0:15:03He'd built up Fighter Command almost from nothing in the 1930s
0:15:03 > 0:15:06and was fiercely protective of his men and machines.
0:15:06 > 0:15:09This entirely novel command
0:15:09 > 0:15:14and control system was his idea, they called it Dowding's System.
0:15:14 > 0:15:18Now there was only one question, would it work?
0:15:25 > 0:15:30At 1700 hours on the day of Churchill and Ismay's visit,
0:15:30 > 0:15:34radar detected 100 enemy aircraft crossing the south coast.
0:15:34 > 0:15:39Their target, the airfields of Fighter Command.
0:15:42 > 0:15:45RAF squadrons were scrambled immediately.
0:15:45 > 0:15:49As he watched the attacks building up on the plotting table,
0:15:49 > 0:15:55General Ismay, a grizzled old army hand, said he felt, "sick with fear".
0:16:03 > 0:16:07But the attacks intensified. It seemed as if the RAF
0:16:07 > 0:16:14had nothing left in reserve and Churchill became absorbed by the drama.
0:16:20 > 0:16:2422 British aircraft were shot down, that day,
0:16:24 > 0:16:29eight pilots lost, but 72 enemy aircraft were destroyed.
0:16:31 > 0:16:35Dowding's system was keeping the Luftwaffe at bay
0:16:35 > 0:16:39and the legend of the Battle of Britain was born.
0:16:50 > 0:16:55As Churchill continued his journey to Chequers with General Ismay
0:16:55 > 0:16:58he said, "Don't talk to me.
0:16:58 > 0:17:02"I have never been so moved."
0:17:02 > 0:17:07But a few moments later, Churchill himself broke the silence,
0:17:07 > 0:17:11"Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed
0:17:11 > 0:17:14"by so many to so few."
0:17:14 > 0:17:18Later that evening when he got home, the General quoted those words
0:17:18 > 0:17:21to his wife and four days later, in a morale-boosting speech
0:17:21 > 0:17:26to the House of Commons, Churchill himself used them again.
0:17:27 > 0:17:30CHURCHILL: Never in the field of human conflict
0:17:30 > 0:17:34was so much owed by so many to so few.
0:17:34 > 0:17:39All our hearts go out to the fighter pilots...
0:17:39 > 0:17:44Churchill needed good words, his own position was hardly secure.
0:17:44 > 0:17:48One British reaction to defeat in Europe was a shift to the left,
0:17:48 > 0:17:50even in the strangest places.
0:17:52 > 0:17:56This is Osterley Park, West London,
0:17:56 > 0:17:58left-wing guerrillas are in action.
0:18:01 > 0:18:05They're led by a revolutionary called Tom Wintringham,
0:18:05 > 0:18:09a veteran of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil war.
0:18:12 > 0:18:13Here at Osterley Park,
0:18:13 > 0:18:17Wintringham used his Spanish experience to build a volunteer fighting force
0:18:17 > 0:18:20to confront the Nazis when they arrived in England.
0:18:26 > 0:18:30Britain was hopelessly unprepared.
0:18:30 > 0:18:33Most of the Army's equipment had been left behind at Dunkirk.
0:18:33 > 0:18:37There were just 463 tanks in the whole country.
0:18:40 > 0:18:43Hitler had thousands at his disposal.
0:18:43 > 0:18:44How would we fight back?
0:18:47 > 0:18:51ANTHONY EDEN: We want large numbers of men in Great Britain...
0:18:51 > 0:18:53On the 14th of May 1940, the Secretary of State for War,
0:18:53 > 0:18:58Anthony Eden, broadcast an appeal for volunteers.
0:19:05 > 0:19:10In the next 24 hours, a quarter of a million men came forward.
0:19:10 > 0:19:14NOEL COWARD: # Colonel Montmorency who was in Calcutta in '92
0:19:14 > 0:19:17# Emerged from his retirement for the war
0:19:17 > 0:19:21# He wasn't very pleased with all he heard and all he saw
0:19:21 > 0:19:26# But whatever he felt he tightened his belt and organised a corps
0:19:26 > 0:19:28# Poor...Colonel Montmorency... #
0:19:28 > 0:19:30To begin with they didn't have weapons
0:19:30 > 0:19:32and they didn't have uniforms,
0:19:32 > 0:19:37most marched with golf clubs, pickaxe handles,
0:19:37 > 0:19:41"guns" they carved out of wood, even pikes.
0:19:42 > 0:19:48The Local Defence Volunteers, or LDV, were soon known
0:19:48 > 0:19:54as the Look, Duck and Vanish brigade, or the Long Dentured Veterans.
0:19:54 > 0:19:58They were soon renamed the Home Guard.
0:19:58 > 0:20:01We know them better as Dad's Army.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04And they were mocked from the start.
0:20:06 > 0:20:10COWARD: # Could you please oblige us with a Bren gun?
0:20:10 > 0:20:14# Or failing that, a hand grenade will do
0:20:14 > 0:20:18# We've got some ammunition in a rather damp condition
0:20:18 > 0:20:22# And Major Huss has an arquebus which was used at Waterloo... #
0:20:22 > 0:20:25Frustrated by the old boys in charge,
0:20:25 > 0:20:29Wintringham decided to show his men what he'd learned in Spain.
0:20:29 > 0:20:34MAN: Tactics of guerrilla warfare, this one's known as the monkey crawl.
0:20:34 > 0:20:39Here is Ricky the Spaniard showing them how it's done.
0:20:39 > 0:20:40Here they were taught, amongst other things,
0:20:40 > 0:20:43methods of dealing with a dive bomber.
0:20:45 > 0:20:47Wintringham also wrote a best-selling book,
0:20:47 > 0:20:49which mixed his left-wing principles
0:20:49 > 0:20:54with recipes for home-made grenades and Molotov cocktails.
0:20:54 > 0:20:59- # In some secluded rendezvous... - Whoopee!
0:20:59 > 0:21:02# ..That overlooks the avenue
0:21:02 > 0:21:04# With someone sharing a delight
0:21:04 > 0:21:08# A chat of this and that And cocktails for two... #
0:21:08 > 0:21:11NEWSREEL: Surely more schools of this kind are needed.
0:21:11 > 0:21:15We all want to know the best way of handing out cocktails to unwelcome guests.
0:21:17 > 0:21:20Another member of the team was the surrealist artist
0:21:20 > 0:21:25and camouflage expert, Roland Penrose, who had his own special mixture.
0:21:28 > 0:21:34Soot and flour, which makes a good paste that sticks to the face,
0:21:34 > 0:21:40and he enlivened his lectures with a slide show
0:21:40 > 0:21:43featuring pictures of his girlfriend, the photographer and model,
0:21:43 > 0:21:49Lee Miller, cunningly camouflaged in a variety of nude poses.
0:21:59 > 0:22:03Tom Wintringham's belief that the war would bring socialism
0:22:03 > 0:22:07wasn't far off the mark,
0:22:07 > 0:22:09but his revolutionary zeal was too much for the old guard.
0:22:11 > 0:22:14And just three months after it opened,
0:22:14 > 0:22:19Osterley Park was taken over by the Regular Army.
0:22:19 > 0:22:23It was a compliment of sorts, but it wasn't the same.
0:22:23 > 0:22:30Wintringham's dream of a people's army primed for total war was over.
0:22:43 > 0:22:48The 7th of September 1940, a beautiful afternoon.
0:22:54 > 0:22:57At 4:15, Londoners look up
0:22:57 > 0:23:00and see what they've been dreading for months.
0:23:03 > 0:23:08Almost 1,000 German aircraft were advancing up the Thames.
0:23:08 > 0:23:13This flying terror stretched 20 miles wide across the sky.
0:23:14 > 0:23:20600 fighter planes escorting 350 bombers.
0:23:24 > 0:23:28An American journalist had heard them 20 minutes earlier over Kent.
0:23:28 > 0:23:30"At first we couldn't see anything,"
0:23:30 > 0:23:35he said, "but soon the noise had grown into a deep full roar,
0:23:35 > 0:23:39"like the far away thunder of a giant waterfall."
0:23:39 > 0:23:42"And then they came into view
0:23:42 > 0:23:46"like clouds of insects moving northwest
0:23:46 > 0:23:47"towards the capital."
0:23:52 > 0:23:54WHISTLES
0:24:00 > 0:24:02London's Docks were their main target.
0:24:10 > 0:24:14Warehouses and wharves were soon ablaze.
0:24:16 > 0:24:21The burnt toffee smell from the Tate and Lyle sugar barges
0:24:21 > 0:24:24blazing on the Thames spread through the air.
0:24:24 > 0:24:27The firefighters called for help from all round the country,
0:24:27 > 0:24:30"Send all the bloody pumps you've got," said one.
0:24:30 > 0:24:33"The whole bloody world's on fire."
0:24:38 > 0:24:44They came back the next night and the next and the one after that.
0:24:44 > 0:24:47The first offensive of the London Blitz
0:24:47 > 0:24:51went on for 76 days and nights,
0:24:51 > 0:24:54broken only by one quiet night.
0:24:58 > 0:25:02Up to a point, Britain was ready for this.
0:25:02 > 0:25:07Some public shelters had been prepared, but they proved grossly inadequate.
0:25:16 > 0:25:19In Spitalfields, the locals took over the vaults
0:25:19 > 0:25:21of the strongest building they could find.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26This basement was supposed to have space
0:25:26 > 0:25:28for up to 5,000 people sheltering,
0:25:28 > 0:25:30but on the first night it opened,
0:25:30 > 0:25:34twice that number crammed themselves in down here.
0:25:37 > 0:25:41No water, no proper lighting, no ventilation, no sanitation,
0:25:41 > 0:25:47no privacy, it quickly became a lice-ridden, stinking underworld.
0:25:49 > 0:25:53And yet, in this dark and dirty chaos,
0:25:53 > 0:25:56something rather wonderful happened.
0:25:56 > 0:25:58# Streetlamps aglow
0:25:58 > 0:26:01# And news boys calling... #
0:26:01 > 0:26:05Someone decided to try and make the shelter work.
0:26:05 > 0:26:08His name was Mickey Davis, but he was better known
0:26:08 > 0:26:10as Mickey The Midget.
0:26:10 > 0:26:14He was hunchbacked and only 3' 3" tall
0:26:14 > 0:26:16and he was in the shelter from the first night.
0:26:16 > 0:26:18# Bright coloured lights Palladium nights
0:26:18 > 0:26:21# And a world that was always gay... #
0:26:21 > 0:26:26Mickey established a democratically elected Shelter Committee,
0:26:26 > 0:26:29a penny a week levy to pay for cleaning
0:26:29 > 0:26:32and a scheme to pay for free milk for the children.
0:26:32 > 0:26:37# Laughter and song and swing doors turning... #
0:26:37 > 0:26:40Soon this budding underground welfare state
0:26:40 > 0:26:43was being known as Mickey's Shelter,
0:26:43 > 0:26:46and British government officials were introducing
0:26:46 > 0:26:48visiting American politicians to it
0:26:48 > 0:26:53as a practical example of democracy, Blitz-style.
0:27:02 > 0:27:04In the first month of the Blitz, a quarter of a million Londoners
0:27:04 > 0:27:06lost their homes,
0:27:06 > 0:27:1012,000 were badly injured,
0:27:10 > 0:27:126,000 killed.
0:27:28 > 0:27:32The Blitz was the first sustained attempt to break a country's morale
0:27:32 > 0:27:36and make it surrender, by bombing its civilians.
0:27:40 > 0:27:42This was now a People's War
0:27:42 > 0:27:46and civilians became the heroes.
0:27:46 > 0:27:48We've been bombed,
0:27:48 > 0:27:52dive-bombed, high-level bombed, machine-gunned,
0:27:52 > 0:27:55been through two invasion scares
0:27:55 > 0:27:59and the last lot we had, we had the house down about our ears,
0:27:59 > 0:28:02but we're still sticking it and we're going to stick it.
0:28:04 > 0:28:08But for how long? Britain badly needed help.
0:28:12 > 0:28:17On the morning of 29th August 1940, a young man hailed a cab
0:28:17 > 0:28:20to Euston Station to catch the boat train to Liverpool.
0:28:21 > 0:28:24With his luggage was a large black metal box.
0:28:33 > 0:28:37His name was Edward "Taffy" Bowen, son of a Swansea steel worker,
0:28:37 > 0:28:41and a research scientist in the top secret field of radar.
0:28:48 > 0:28:50Taffy Bowen was off
0:28:50 > 0:28:53on one of the most important secret missions of the war.
0:28:53 > 0:28:58His metal case contained virtually every military breakthrough made
0:28:58 > 0:29:04by British science. It really was, in 1940, the ultimate box of tricks.
0:29:06 > 0:29:11And now the taxi driver insisted on tying it to the roof of the cab.
0:29:11 > 0:29:15No time to argue, so off they went.
0:29:17 > 0:29:19Bowen was part of the Tizard Mission,
0:29:19 > 0:29:23named after its brilliant leader, the scientist Henry Tizard.
0:29:23 > 0:29:27He was proposing an historic exchange of military
0:29:27 > 0:29:31and scientific secrets between Britain and the United States.
0:29:31 > 0:29:34The Americans were still officially neutral,
0:29:34 > 0:29:36but only they had the manufacturing power
0:29:36 > 0:29:40to make the weapons we needed to win the war.
0:29:46 > 0:29:49Henry Tizard persuaded Churchill to let him offer up
0:29:49 > 0:29:52the deepest secrets of British science.
0:29:52 > 0:29:55In his words, "Everything the Americans wanted to know"
0:29:55 > 0:29:59and this was material the Americans
0:29:59 > 0:30:02didn't understand and desperately wanted.
0:30:02 > 0:30:06In the words of the US Army's Chief of Staff, "a goldmine."
0:30:06 > 0:30:08But if it was a gift,
0:30:08 > 0:30:13it was a gift with a hook in it, because Churchill desperately hoped
0:30:13 > 0:30:18that it would help lure the Americans themselves into the war.
0:30:22 > 0:30:26The most highly classified item in Taffy Bowen's box
0:30:26 > 0:30:31was the intriguingly named "cavity magnetron".
0:30:31 > 0:30:36This device would revolutionise radar technology,
0:30:36 > 0:30:40it had the potential to help decide the outcome of the war.
0:30:40 > 0:30:43At Euston Station a porter grabbed the metal box,
0:30:43 > 0:30:48stuck it on to his shoulder and vanished into the rush hour crowds.
0:30:53 > 0:30:55Taffy Bowen was a long-distance runner,
0:30:55 > 0:31:00but he struggled desperately to keep an eye on this priceless cargo.
0:31:00 > 0:31:03At last, to his intense relief, it was safely delivered
0:31:03 > 0:31:07to a first-class compartment on the Liverpool train.
0:31:14 > 0:31:19But they weren't safe yet. As the boat sailed for North America,
0:31:19 > 0:31:22Liverpool suffered one of the first night-time bomb attacks of the war.
0:31:23 > 0:31:26The Captain had instructions to throw the box overboard
0:31:26 > 0:31:28if the ship came under attack.
0:31:32 > 0:31:34One American historian later called it,
0:31:34 > 0:31:38"The most valuable cargo ever brought to our shores."
0:31:41 > 0:31:45Over the next three months, there was a wary exchange of information
0:31:45 > 0:31:49as the British opened their box of magic and waited to see
0:31:49 > 0:31:51what the Americans would offer in return.
0:31:51 > 0:31:55It was a kind of intellectual striptease.
0:31:55 > 0:31:59In the end, the British didn't see anything very interesting,
0:31:59 > 0:32:03but by then it didn't really matter, Britain had virtually run out of options
0:32:03 > 0:32:06and, so far as most American scientists were concerned,
0:32:06 > 0:32:12the Tizard mission had effectively ended US neutrality.
0:32:12 > 0:32:16From now on, it could only be a matter of time before America
0:32:16 > 0:32:19came to the rescue of the Old World.
0:32:19 > 0:32:20Couldn't it?
0:32:30 > 0:32:34Meanwhile, the Blitz went on, not only in London.
0:32:36 > 0:32:42On the night of November 14th 1940, in an operation called Moonlight Sonata,
0:32:42 > 0:32:44Coventry became a target too.
0:32:46 > 0:32:50It was the most intensive bombing raid the world had ever seen.
0:32:53 > 0:32:58There was panic, hysteria, chaos.
0:32:58 > 0:33:03One woman wrote to her daughter, "Coventry is a city of the dead,
0:33:03 > 0:33:05"utterly devastated."
0:33:08 > 0:33:10NEWSREEL: They called it a reprisal.
0:33:10 > 0:33:14In return for the bombing of military objectives by the Royal Air Force,
0:33:14 > 0:33:16German planes flew above the city of Coventry
0:33:16 > 0:33:19to broadcast death and destruction over the whole city.
0:33:21 > 0:33:26Coventry lost a third of its houses, most of its ancient centre
0:33:26 > 0:33:28and its cathedral.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39Other cities suffered terribly too.
0:33:39 > 0:33:41Merseyside...
0:33:41 > 0:33:43Tyneside... Birmingham...
0:33:43 > 0:33:45Bristol... Hull.
0:33:50 > 0:33:56In Clydebank, just seven out of 8,000 houses were left untouched.
0:33:59 > 0:34:03In March, 1941, Plymouth was gutted by 300 bombers
0:34:03 > 0:34:06in a two-night assault.
0:34:11 > 0:34:15Doreen Jessop was a 17-year-old ambulance driver
0:34:15 > 0:34:20who went into a Plymouth shelter just after a hit.
0:34:20 > 0:34:24"There were all these people just sitting," she said.
0:34:24 > 0:34:28"Some with children still on their laps, people with glasses
0:34:28 > 0:34:31"and the glass still intact,
0:34:31 > 0:34:35"their hair, lifeless and dusty.
0:34:35 > 0:34:37"They were all dead.
0:34:38 > 0:34:40"Killed by the blast."
0:34:44 > 0:34:47The taste of defeat
0:34:47 > 0:34:50was sapping confidence in Churchill's leadership.
0:34:50 > 0:34:54Some were pointing to Stalin's Russia, engaged in a bloody struggle
0:34:54 > 0:34:59against the Nazis since 1941, as an example of real fighting spirit.
0:35:06 > 0:35:09On the 23rd of October 1942,
0:35:09 > 0:35:13British Commonwealth forces were about to face their greatest test,
0:35:13 > 0:35:18against the advancing German and Italian armies in North Africa.
0:35:25 > 0:35:28Between the two forces was a five-mile wide lethal strip,
0:35:28 > 0:35:32planted with half a million mines.
0:35:32 > 0:35:35It was known as The Devil's Gardens.
0:35:38 > 0:35:42Erwin Rommel, the German military commander in North Africa,
0:35:42 > 0:35:46was a dazzling strategist, famous across the world as the Desert Fox.
0:35:50 > 0:35:55Even in Britain, Rommel became a kind of popular hero.
0:35:55 > 0:35:59Churchill said in the House Of Commons he was a great general,
0:35:59 > 0:36:03but Churchill badly needed a victory.
0:36:06 > 0:36:10The man entrusted to deliver it was a rather spiky
0:36:10 > 0:36:12but occasionally brilliant general
0:36:12 > 0:36:16called Bernard Montgomery, better known as Monty.
0:36:18 > 0:36:23Monty was an absolutely infuriating self-publicist.
0:36:23 > 0:36:27Just the kind of man for the new age of the celebrity general.
0:36:27 > 0:36:32He was said to be as quick as a ferret and about as likeable,
0:36:32 > 0:36:36but he was a plain-speaking and charismatic leader
0:36:36 > 0:36:39who cajoled and hectored,
0:36:39 > 0:36:44and inspired his men in a way no British general had ever done before.
0:36:44 > 0:36:48When he took over command of the 8th Army, or the Desert Rats,
0:36:48 > 0:36:53he told them, "There will be no more belly-aching, and no more retreats."
0:37:00 > 0:37:05At 21:40, the battle of El-Alamein began...
0:37:05 > 0:37:08SOLDIER: Fire! Fire! Fire!
0:37:09 > 0:37:14..with over 800 Allied artillery guns assaulting the German and Italian lines.
0:37:18 > 0:37:22The first round of shelling lasted for five and a half hours.
0:37:22 > 0:37:27It was the most intense artillery attack since the First World War
0:37:27 > 0:37:33and the noise was so extreme that the gunners' ears poured with blood.
0:37:33 > 0:37:37Under cover of the bombardment, British troops
0:37:37 > 0:37:42began to pick their way forward on foot through the heavily-mined desert
0:37:42 > 0:37:45to create an eight-yard wide track,
0:37:45 > 0:37:48along which the tank attack could begin.
0:37:56 > 0:37:59Heavy German fire meant that
0:37:59 > 0:38:05that job of trying to clear a safe path was incredibly difficult and slow.
0:38:05 > 0:38:09The British tanks were becoming entangled
0:38:09 > 0:38:14in a sand-blown bloody version of a London traffic jam.
0:38:19 > 0:38:26Back in London, Churchill was becoming angry and worried,
0:38:26 > 0:38:32"Is it really impossible to find a general who can win a battle?"
0:38:46 > 0:38:50Montgomery knew he could afford to lose two or three tanks
0:38:50 > 0:38:55for every German tank destroyed, and that's exactly what he did.
0:39:01 > 0:39:0625,000 Germans and Italians were killed, wounded, or captured.
0:39:09 > 0:39:14On the 4th of November, Rommel began his retreat into Libya.
0:39:16 > 0:39:19BIG BEN CHIMING
0:39:20 > 0:39:23NEWSREEL: This the BBC Home and Forces programme....
0:39:23 > 0:39:27Back in Britain, the BBC news announcer was so excited
0:39:27 > 0:39:30he forgot the corporation's traditional neutrality.
0:39:30 > 0:39:35NEWSREEL: Here's some excellent news which has come during the past hour.
0:39:35 > 0:39:40The Axis forces in the Western desert are now in full retreat.
0:39:40 > 0:39:44- That'll show 'em. - Plenty more where that came from.
0:39:45 > 0:39:51# Shine on victory moon
0:39:52 > 0:39:59# And guide our loved ones home... #
0:39:59 > 0:40:06El-Alamein was a great British victory and it was a turning point.
0:40:06 > 0:40:08Churchill summed it up,
0:40:08 > 0:40:11"This is not the end,
0:40:11 > 0:40:14"it is not even the beginning of the end.
0:40:14 > 0:40:18"But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
0:40:18 > 0:40:21And he ordered the church bells to be rung across Britain.
0:40:21 > 0:40:24In many cases, the first time these bells
0:40:24 > 0:40:27had been rung since the war started.
0:40:27 > 0:40:30Later on, Churchill said,
0:40:30 > 0:40:34"Before Alamein, we never had a victory.
0:40:34 > 0:40:38"After Alamein, we never had a defeat."
0:40:40 > 0:40:46# Shine on, victory moon... #
0:40:47 > 0:40:50"He must have been most tiresome to play tennis against,"
0:40:50 > 0:40:54said Lady Moseley, "but it amused me to watch."
0:40:56 > 0:40:59The "he" was a former Wimbledon player
0:40:59 > 0:41:03who would help Britain take the fight to the people of Germany.
0:41:06 > 0:41:12He was an abrasive Oxford physicist and Churchill's favourite scientist.
0:41:14 > 0:41:19Frederick Lindemann, known to friends as Prof.
0:41:20 > 0:41:23Churchill loved having a boffin on hand.
0:41:23 > 0:41:27One of his favourite party tricks was to ask Lindemann to calculate
0:41:27 > 0:41:30the volume of champagne that Churchill had drunk
0:41:30 > 0:41:34in the course of his lifetime, and then to work out the effect
0:41:34 > 0:41:36of decanting all of that champagne
0:41:36 > 0:41:39into whatever room they happened to be sitting in at the time.
0:41:39 > 0:41:42"Would it lap at their ankles?
0:41:42 > 0:41:44"Would they be wading in it?
0:41:44 > 0:41:47"Would they be entirely submerged?"
0:41:51 > 0:41:54Churchill made an occasional splash in Prof's home movies.
0:41:54 > 0:41:59Lindemann played doubles with Mrs Churchill
0:41:59 > 0:42:01and he always played to win.
0:42:03 > 0:42:06Churchill used to say that Lindemann's brain was,
0:42:06 > 0:42:09"a wonderful piece of mechanism."
0:42:09 > 0:42:16And now that mechanism was tuned to destruction.
0:42:21 > 0:42:27In March 1942, Lindemann sent a memo to Churchill based on his analysis
0:42:27 > 0:42:32of the effects of the Nazi raids on Hull and Birmingham in 1940.
0:42:32 > 0:42:37He calculated that every 40 tons of bombs dropped by British bombers
0:42:37 > 0:42:41on German cities would make 4,000, to 8,000 Germans homeless.
0:42:41 > 0:42:43He concluded that,
0:42:43 > 0:42:46"There was little doubt that this would break the spirit of the people."
0:42:51 > 0:42:56At the start of the war, the RAF had tried to avoid civilian casualties.
0:42:56 > 0:43:00Lindemann was justifying a U-turn in bombing policy.
0:43:01 > 0:43:06His memo became known as the "de-housing paper."
0:43:06 > 0:43:08Fellow scientist Henry Tizard
0:43:08 > 0:43:11had once been a great friend of Lindemann's.
0:43:12 > 0:43:16The de-housing paper provoked a fierce battle between them.
0:43:18 > 0:43:20Tizard's opening salvo was a direct hit.
0:43:20 > 0:43:24"I am afraid that I think the way you present the facts
0:43:24 > 0:43:25"is extremely misleading."
0:43:28 > 0:43:34Lindemann hit back, "Mass bombing was the only way to hit the enemy hard
0:43:34 > 0:43:38"and to open a second front to take pressure off the Russians."
0:43:38 > 0:43:43Tizard countered, "I think too that you have got your facts wrong."
0:43:46 > 0:43:50But Lindemann had Churchill's ear and Britain now began diverting
0:43:50 > 0:43:54a huge proportion of her industrial resources
0:43:54 > 0:43:58into the bombing of German cities.
0:44:02 > 0:44:04In fact, Lindemann seems to have deliberately
0:44:04 > 0:44:09distorted the statistics about the effects of German bombing
0:44:09 > 0:44:10on Hull and Birmingham.
0:44:10 > 0:44:15His de-housing memo fudged the numbers and overestimated
0:44:15 > 0:44:19what the bombers could achieve by around 600%.
0:44:19 > 0:44:24It was a piece of shabby evidence-tweaking to lend authority
0:44:24 > 0:44:26to his dodgy dossier.
0:44:26 > 0:44:29And it would have horrendous consequences.
0:44:40 > 0:44:44In February that year, Arthur "Bomber" Harris
0:44:44 > 0:44:46became head of Bomber Command.
0:44:46 > 0:44:51Like Lindemann, Harris believed fervently in "terror" bombing,
0:44:51 > 0:44:52but it came at a price.
0:44:52 > 0:44:56His crews would suffer worse losses than almost any other fighting force,
0:44:56 > 0:45:00and some of them called Harris, simply "Butcher".
0:45:08 > 0:45:11Arthur Harris was once stopped by a police constable
0:45:11 > 0:45:14for racing his Bentley at breakneck speed
0:45:14 > 0:45:17between his headquarters at High Wycombe and London.
0:45:17 > 0:45:21"You might have killed somebody, sir," said the constable.
0:45:21 > 0:45:28"Young man," replied Harris, "I kill thousands of people every night."
0:45:32 > 0:45:37On the nights of February 13th and 14th 1945,
0:45:37 > 0:45:42one of the most beautiful cities in Europe was the target...
0:45:42 > 0:45:45Dresden.
0:45:45 > 0:45:48The intensive bombing unleashed a firestorm.
0:45:48 > 0:45:5325,000 people are believed to have suffocated or burned to death.
0:45:55 > 0:45:59It's estimated that half a million men, women and children
0:45:59 > 0:46:02were killed by British and American bombing in the course of the war.
0:46:05 > 0:46:10In his memoirs, Arthur Harris described the carpet bombing of Germany as
0:46:10 > 0:46:12"a relatively humane method
0:46:12 > 0:46:18"that saved the youth of this country from being mown down by the military,
0:46:18 > 0:46:21"as it was in the war of 1914-18."
0:46:23 > 0:46:27Now, there's no way of knowing those battles
0:46:27 > 0:46:33that the terror bombing avoided, nor whether it shortened the war at all,
0:46:33 > 0:46:37but what is certain is it didn't break the spirit of the Germans
0:46:37 > 0:46:41any more than the Blitz broke the spirit of Britain.
0:46:46 > 0:46:50WOMAN: Here is Learie Constantine, the world famous cricketer.
0:46:50 > 0:46:54Learie used to be just a summer visitor, but when the war began
0:46:54 > 0:46:57he became a welfare officer to the Ministry Of Labour.
0:46:57 > 0:46:58Hello, everybody.
0:46:58 > 0:47:00This is Learie Constantine.
0:47:06 > 0:47:09In July 1943, the man who helped the West Indies
0:47:09 > 0:47:11win their first test matches against England,
0:47:11 > 0:47:14came down to London from his home in Lancashire.
0:47:20 > 0:47:25He had booked a room at the Imperial Hotel in Russell Square,
0:47:25 > 0:47:29but when he and his family arrived the manager told them
0:47:29 > 0:47:31they could stay one night but no longer.
0:47:35 > 0:47:37Learie Constantine refused to budge.
0:47:37 > 0:47:40His boss at the Ministry Of Labour,
0:47:40 > 0:47:43Arnold Watson, arrived and asked what was going on.
0:47:43 > 0:47:47"We can't have these niggers in our hotel," said the manager.
0:47:47 > 0:47:51"He can stay tonight, but he has to go tomorrow morning."
0:47:51 > 0:47:53When Watson demanded to know her reasons,
0:47:53 > 0:47:57she replied, "Because of the Americans."
0:48:01 > 0:48:06By the spring of 1944, 1.5 million Americans were in Britain,
0:48:06 > 0:48:08preparing to liberate Europe.
0:48:13 > 0:48:16About 130,000 of them were black.
0:48:16 > 0:48:20America, in the 1940s, still had racial segregation.
0:48:20 > 0:48:24US military police were supposed to enforce laws keeping blacks
0:48:24 > 0:48:27and whites from socialising together, but it wasn't easy.
0:48:29 > 0:48:32There were flashpoints, pub brawls,
0:48:32 > 0:48:34even shootings.
0:48:39 > 0:48:41Despite their attachment to segregation,
0:48:41 > 0:48:44the Yanks were convinced they were bringing democracy
0:48:44 > 0:48:49as well as military aid to a quaintly class-bound Britain.
0:48:51 > 0:48:55The GIs certainly looked like the future.
0:48:55 > 0:48:58They were taller, louder, better dressed and richer.
0:48:58 > 0:49:00They had chocolate and cigarettes
0:49:00 > 0:49:04in their pocket and plenty of money for the pubs and clubs,
0:49:04 > 0:49:09but they brought with them from America things that were worth more than money -
0:49:09 > 0:49:13millions of condoms and razor blades and stockings.
0:49:15 > 0:49:21Their comics were passed from hand to hand until they became ragged
0:49:21 > 0:49:24and their slang spread like a fever.
0:49:28 > 0:49:31This looks like an interesting corner.
0:49:31 > 0:49:34Hiya, babe, watcha doin' tonight?
0:49:34 > 0:49:37Firewatching. What are you having?
0:49:37 > 0:49:39You're really a hep tomata,
0:49:39 > 0:49:41I'll have a slug of Bourbon.
0:49:41 > 0:49:45Not surprisingly, all this went down badly with British soldiers,
0:49:45 > 0:49:50with their sparse pay packets and their baggier, browner, dowdier uniforms,
0:49:50 > 0:49:54as wives and girlfriends ogled something better.
0:49:54 > 0:49:57I guess I'd better blow.
0:49:59 > 0:50:03And there was a lot of ogling going on.
0:50:06 > 0:50:11A young Canadian soldier wrote in his diary,
0:50:11 > 0:50:13"A lot of men were going to die.
0:50:13 > 0:50:17"Everyone knew that Hyde Park and Green Park at dusk and after dark
0:50:17 > 0:50:20"were a vast battlefield of sex."
0:50:25 > 0:50:27If sex was the battlefield,
0:50:27 > 0:50:30Piccadilly Circus was the front line.
0:50:30 > 0:50:34In the near absolute darkness of the blackout, the prostitutes of London
0:50:34 > 0:50:38would light matches or shine torches on their faces,
0:50:38 > 0:50:42and then down towards their stockings and high heels.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45They were known as the Piccadilly Commandos.
0:50:45 > 0:50:49The Sunday Pictorial newspaper described the mile around Piccadilly Circus
0:50:49 > 0:50:53as "a Spiders web of vice".
0:50:53 > 0:50:57Hello, Darling, you like my little dog? Yes?
0:50:57 > 0:50:59No.
0:51:03 > 0:51:07And at the heart of it all was Rainbow Corner,
0:51:07 > 0:51:10headquarters of the American Red Cross in the West End.
0:51:12 > 0:51:17Here at Rainbow Corner there was a barber shop,
0:51:17 > 0:51:23hot showers, ice cream sodas, a shoe shine parlour and a juke box.
0:51:23 > 0:51:27There was a basement called Dunker's Den where you could devour
0:51:27 > 0:51:31doughnuts and coffee and much else.
0:51:31 > 0:51:33NEWSREEL: Fraternisation on the dance floor and off it.
0:51:33 > 0:51:36See what I mean?
0:51:38 > 0:51:42It was a hive of 24-hour a day all-American action.
0:51:45 > 0:51:49This was where the goods and attitudes from the United States,
0:51:49 > 0:51:54that would later colonise the world, first arrived in Britain.
0:51:54 > 0:51:58The Americans invaded us, right there.
0:52:16 > 0:52:2117th of November, 1943, a village postman in Dorset
0:52:21 > 0:52:22is doing his rounds.
0:52:22 > 0:52:26Today, he's taking the same letter to every house.
0:52:27 > 0:52:33The letter, from Major General CH Miller, was an eviction notice.
0:52:33 > 0:52:37"In order to give our troops the fullest opportunity to perfect
0:52:37 > 0:52:40"their training in the use of modern warfare,
0:52:40 > 0:52:43"the Army must have an area of ground
0:52:43 > 0:52:47"particularly suited to their special needs."
0:52:47 > 0:52:52That area of ground included the little parish of Tyneham,
0:52:52 > 0:52:58whose villagers were given 28 days to pack up and go.
0:53:05 > 0:53:07NEWSREEL: Evacuation in the path of war has come
0:53:07 > 0:53:09to the peaceful south west of England.
0:53:09 > 0:53:11Not the feverish exit from an enemy invader,
0:53:11 > 0:53:16but an orderly removal out of cottages, farms and village stores.
0:53:22 > 0:53:25Tyneham really was Olde England.
0:53:25 > 0:53:29Some of the villagers had never even left for a day-trip
0:53:29 > 0:53:34to the nearest town, never mind going to live somewhere else.
0:53:34 > 0:53:37But Olde England was also intensely patriotic.
0:53:39 > 0:53:43Bessie and Helen Taylor were hanging out the washing
0:53:43 > 0:53:47when the postman came with the eviction letter.
0:53:47 > 0:53:49Helen Taylor said later, "We loved Tyneham
0:53:49 > 0:53:52"but we also loved our country,
0:53:52 > 0:53:57"and if it was our duty to leave for the war effort, so be it."
0:53:59 > 0:54:03Some villagers were hoping to be back for the harvest in May.
0:54:05 > 0:54:07They would never return.
0:54:07 > 0:54:11Tyneham remains a military training area to this day.
0:54:11 > 0:54:15NEWSREEL: Invasion stretched its long lines of tanks and guns and vehicles
0:54:15 > 0:54:17down the rolling English roads.
0:54:17 > 0:54:20Times have certainly changed since those days when invasion
0:54:20 > 0:54:22implied invasion of Britain.
0:54:22 > 0:54:29By April 1944, southern England had become one vast military camp.
0:54:29 > 0:54:34The greatest invasion force in history was preparing for battle.
0:54:41 > 0:54:44The location and timing of the attack
0:54:44 > 0:54:46had become the most crucial secret of the war.
0:54:52 > 0:54:58On June 6th 1944, German troops finally faced the surprise assault
0:54:58 > 0:55:05on five Normandy beaches by American, British and Canadian forces. D-Day.
0:55:09 > 0:55:14And so the secret, the most important secret held.
0:55:14 > 0:55:18The Germans were caught off-guard,
0:55:18 > 0:55:22but this was still a horrendously dangerous operation.
0:55:22 > 0:55:25The huge Allied armada
0:55:25 > 0:55:29was limited by the size of the landing craft and the size of the beaches.
0:55:29 > 0:55:34In the first wave of the attack, only nine Allied divisions
0:55:34 > 0:55:40could reach France, where they would be confronted by 58 German divisions.
0:55:45 > 0:55:49After news of the heroic landings, the liberating Army's advances
0:55:49 > 0:55:54were frustratingly slow.
0:56:11 > 0:56:17The Germans fought cleverly and bravely and hard.
0:56:17 > 0:56:21From the hedgerows of Normandy to the banks of the Rhine,
0:56:21 > 0:56:24the Allied armies never had it easy.
0:56:24 > 0:56:27NEWSREEL: May 4th 1945...
0:56:27 > 0:56:30On Luneburg Heath, five German officers surrender
0:56:30 > 0:56:33the German Armies of the North. The war is over.
0:56:39 > 0:56:44When Victory In Europe finally came, the people's joy knew no bounds.
0:56:47 > 0:56:51But afterwards, the full horror of the war dawned.
0:57:16 > 0:57:20The British people were waking up to a new world order.
0:57:22 > 0:57:24And there'd be little room for a British Empire,
0:57:24 > 0:57:26or even an independent British voice,
0:57:26 > 0:57:28in the post-war world.
0:57:32 > 0:57:38Britannia's Imperial red-jacketed adventurers had become the crumpled,
0:57:38 > 0:57:43relieved bolshie democracy of the VE Day celebrations
0:57:43 > 0:57:45and even as the people cheered,
0:57:45 > 0:57:49and an excited young Princess Elizabeth, the future Queen,
0:57:49 > 0:57:51mingled anonymously with the crowd,
0:57:51 > 0:57:58one of the least likely empires in the history of the world was dying.
0:58:03 > 0:58:07Just 44 years after the death of Queen Victoria,
0:58:07 > 0:58:12Imperial Britannia's final flare was her finest hour.
0:58:14 > 0:58:17She'd faced down defeat, destruction and death
0:58:17 > 0:58:22and the British people had refused to fall apart.
0:58:22 > 0:58:25Instead, they came together in a way
0:58:25 > 0:58:31they'd never really done before and sacrificed dreams and homes
0:58:31 > 0:58:38and lives to keep hope alive around the world until the final victory came,
0:58:38 > 0:58:43and by doing all of that they made Modern Britain,
0:58:43 > 0:58:47and then they gave it to us.
0:58:52 > 0:58:57DAME VERA LYNN: # There's a land of begin again
0:58:57 > 0:59:03# And there's not a cloud in the sky
0:59:03 > 0:59:08# Where we'll never have to grieve again
0:59:08 > 0:59:14# And we'll never say goodbye. #