World War Two: Behind Closed Doors

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War Documentary hosted by Laurence Rees, published by BBC in 2008 - English narration

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An examination of the USSR's alliances during World War Two.

[edit] Chapter 1:

Laurence Rees hears evidence of Stalin's secret allegiances in the late 1930s, which demonstrate the importance of the Soviet switch to Britain and America's side after its betrayal by the Nazis at the height of war in 1941. He discovers secrets hidden by Russia for more than 50 years and hears from previously silent KGB officers.

[edit] Chapter 2:

Laurence Rees investigates the events of 1941 when, having been betrayed by Hitler, Stalin switched his allegiance to Britain and America. It was an alliance based on military pragmatism which never altered the mutual antipathy between Churchill, who despised only Nazism above Communism, and the Soviet leader who knew the Red Army was ill equipped to cope with the Nazi onslaught alone.

[edit] Chapter 3:

Laurence Rees investigates the personal animosity between Churchill and Stalin, its basis in more than just political differences, and the threat it posed to their first meeting in August 1942. Having already been betrayed by Hitler, the Soviet leader had a deep mistrust of his new allies, but still went to extraordinary lengths to hide war crimes from them - as new evidence and testimony shows.

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Laurence Rees examines the clash of values between Josef Stalin and Winston Churchill and how they were played out over the future of Poland in 1944. Records of secret meetings reveal the British prime minister thought he could persuade the Soviets to allow an independent government in the country the UK had gone into the war to protect, but the efforts to play politics threatened the integrity of the alliance.

[edit] Chapter 5:

Laurence Rees learns how and why the alliance between Britain, America and the USSR began to collapse as the Second World War entered its final stages and the fighting became more political. With preparations for the peacetime redrawing of Europe's borders, new evidence shows Churchill losing patience with the Poles and pushing them into agreeing terms with the Soviets coming from the east.

[edit] Chapter 6:

Laurence Rees analyses how the end of the war saw once-vital ally the USSR become the enemy, as the people of eastern Europe swapped one tyranny for another. Using archive material only available since the fall of communism, he reveals how the Soviet Union began using a notorious Nazi concentration camp for its own prisoners.