The Abyss - Rise and Fall of the Nazis
Explores the Third Reich from a contemporary perspective to investigate how the Nazis managed to conquer Germany and then half of Europe in the wake of World War I.
In the wake of the First World War, Adolf Hitler identifies Benito Mussolini as his model and has one ultimate goal: to gain power in Germany. (S1, ep 1)
Hitler appears to be eliminated after his failed putsch in 1923. Discover how the Nazi movement used democracy's tolerance in Germany to come back. (S1, ep 2)
A protest turns into a racist and anti-Jewish movement during the 1920s and the NSDAP use emotions to gain the loyalty of the people. (S1, ep 3)
President Hindenburg suspends freedom of speech and Hitler comes to power in 1933. The first concentration camps for political opponents are set up. (S1, ep 4)
In 1934, Hitler's government is firmly in the saddle. Most Germans support Hitler's anti-Jewish policy and the regime's terror soon escalates. (S1, ep 5)
At the end of 1939, the German Army invades Poland. Examine how Hitler succeeded in pushing through his rearmament and war plans relatively unhindered. (S1, ep 6)
In the shadow of the war, the Nazi regime gradually advances its "final solution to the Jewish problem", culminating in the Holocaust. (S1, ep 7)
Along with Treblinka and Majdanek, Sobibor was one of the camps used in Operation Reinhard, in which the Nazis murdered almost two million people. (S1, ep 8)
The defeat at Stalingrad in 1943 was the turning point of the war and convinced the Nazi leadership to intensify their terror and propaganda campaigns. (S1, ep 9)
In 1945, WWII was over but the violence had not ended. The survivors want to blame the Germans. The reckoning with National Socialism is ambivalent. (S1, ep 10)