SBS - Hitlers Henchmen Vol. 2 (1998)

Created, ordered and led by Hitler, the state apparatus of Nazi Germany rigorously controlled all aspects of life in the Third Reich from cradle to grave. To maintain his iron grip on the German people through the ministries of his dictatorial government, Hitler surrounded himself with a small clique of fanatical, devoted acolytes. Men such as Heinrich Himmler, the much-feared chief of the Waffen-SS and organiser of the Holocaust, and Hermann Goering, the bombastic head of the Luftwaffe, wielded enormous power and held the fate of millions in their corrupt hands.
This series tells the inside story of the Third Reich, looking at the personalities, roles and rivalries of Hitler's closest associates; Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Reich's chief diplomat; Baldur von Schirach, the fanatic who moulded the thoughts of the youth of Germany; and Martin Bormann, Hitler's enigmatic advisor. The programs not only examine the actions of these infamous men, but probes their psychological makeup, determining how they earned Hitler's trust, became blindly loyal to the cause, committed deadly atrocities and remained unrepentant to the end.
Made in association with Germany's leading TV producer, HITLER'S HENCHMEN features never-before seen footage from both government and private sources, rare photographs, documents and eyewitness testimony that proves conclusively that these men were not just following orders, but willing accomplices in Hitler's crimes. Among those interviewed are members of Hitler's staff, retired German army officers, and world- renowned historians. It's the definitive dossier of some of the most reviled men in history.
"Hitler's Henchmen Volume 2" is a six-part sequel to "Hitler's Henchmen Volume 1", portraying the men who aided Adolf Hitler in his rise to power and serviced the infernal machinery of the Third Reich. They were the men who consolidated Hitler's reign and turned his plans into action. Hitler's henchmen wove the complicities and plots without which Hitler could have never perpetrated the crime of the century. They helped to sway the judges and the bureaucrats, the armed forces and the police, the scientists and the industrialists, the students and their teachers to the regime's ways of thinking.
What kind of men were they? What inspired them to serve a corrupt administration with such enthusiasm and devotion? How did their careers unfold and their fates end? This fascinating original German ZDF series answers all these and other burning questions by examining six of Hitler's most infamous cohorts. With the use of newly discovered film clips and sound recordings from international archives, the portraits of these aides-de-camp provide viewers with a revealing psychogram of 'Hitler's most willing executors', making it a must-have for anyone interested in military history.

ZDF in association with ARTE, SBS TV, ZDF Enterprises ; English version by SBS-TV, Australia

Part 1: Eichmann: The Exterminator
Eichmann was a pen-pusher who committed mass murder with rubber stamps and signatures. From his desk, he meticulously organised the deportations of Jews to the death camps. As head of the Jewish Affairs Department at the Headquarters of National Security, he organized in detail the deportation of more than three million Jews to death camps throughout the Third Reich. He was hanged in 1962 after a sensational trial in Israel.
The film shows Eichmann's career, describes his role as one of the most important cogs in the death machinery and reveals captivating details about how he was finally captured and abducted by Israel's secret police.

Part 2: Mengele: The Doctor of Death
He greeted the death trains arriving at Auschwitz on the look out for 'good subjects' for his unspeakable 'medical experiments'. Thousands would die truly terrible deaths as human guinea pigs for the doctor Anne Frank called the 'Angel of Extermination'.
Josef Mengele enjoyed inspecting the shattered Holocaust victims in his search for suitable material for the pseudo-scientific experiments he was engaged in. For Mengele, these victims of Nazi racial hatred were nothing more than human guinea pigs. Twins had a particularly bad time. They were evaluated and subjected to experiments, and then they were dissected and recorded. The way they suffered and died is a disgrace to humanity. The only thing the concentration camp doctor was thinking behind the unscrupulous foreground of a perverted ruler race domineering and reproductive policy was his own career. After the war, Mengele managed to hide in South America until his death in 1979. The autopsy of his remains puts an end to a number of strange speculations about where he is and how long he managed to survive.
The film goes through carefully the crimes Mengele committed, and what purpose was behind it. Survivors of his horrific experiments give their eyewitness accounts. In addition, his secret "second life" after the war is revealed.

Part 3: Ribbentrop: The Errand Boy
Von Ribbentrop was the archetype of a careerist, who rose from humble origins to the highest levels of power. He was a versatile adviser and envoy, who quickly won Hitler's favor and was sent to London as Germany's ambassador. After that, he served as Foreign Minister, and was tasked with preparing the way for Hitler's high-flying attack plans.
Largely thanks to Ribbentrop's efforts to bring about the non-aggression pact between Germany and the Soviet Union, Hitler received the support he needed to invade Poland. As war succeeded diplomacy however, he lost prestige and to compensate that he and his entire staff worked to persuade Germany's neighbours to turn over their Jewish citizens for slaughter in "final solution." He would meet his fate at Nuremberg…

Part 4: Schirach: The Corrupter of Youth
Dubbed the 'Poet Laureate of the Nazi Party' for his fawning poems about Hitler, Baldur von Schirach corrupted a generation of German youth with his twisted Aryan ideals and went on to supervise the 'deportation of minors' during the Nazi's reign of terror…
Like no other, Schirach abused the gullible and trusting nature of young people to support Germany's dictatorship. As leader of the Nazi Youth League, Baldur von Schirach recruited Hitlerjugend, young people who were systematically transformed into obedient and easily manipulated child soldiers for the Third Reich. He acted as the High Priest of the National Socialist faith and was worshiped as a national hero.

Part 5: Freisler: The Hanging Judge
There was no justice to be found in Freisler's courtroom. The 'Blood Judge' would rave and scream at the accused, lecturing them and robbing them of all dignity before handing down the inevitable sentence – death.
His name is synonymous with a parody of justice. His victims never received a real trial, but rather were humiliated in public. He handed down judgments that suited him. For the most part, the verdict was one and the same: death. As President of the People's Court, he was the main representative of the legal reign of terror in the Third Reich. Those who stood accused before the furious and roaring Bloody Judge had no hope of being able to maintain their dignity.

Part 6: Bormann: The Shadow Man
Hitler's personal secretary followed him like a shadow. Martin Bormann was the gray eminence of the Third Reich, his master's faithful servant and a tireless plotter who pulled many strings behind the scenes.
This power-hungry man can best be described in his own words: No one meets the Fuhrer without first meeting me. For Bormann, knowledge was a weapon that could be used to neutralize unwanted competitors. As head of the NS at the Nazi party headquarters, he was one of Hitler's closest advisers. Only he had the power to turn one of the Fuhrer's many incomplete instructions into an unshakable command from the F?hrer.
This film paints the portrait with the help of exclusive film clips from private collections of a rather withdrawn man who played a very important role in the inner circle of powerful men. Forever in the background, as the end of the war loomed, he made one last desperate attempt to slip away.