Secret War

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War Documentary hosted by Alisdair Simpson, published by UKTV in 2011 - English narration

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"The secret agents who set Europe ablaze" Just when you thought you knew everything about WWII, Secret War uncovers more incredible stories that exist under the radar. As bombs were dropped from planes, missiles were launched and tanks were deployed all over the world, another kind of war was being waged by the Allies: a secret war -- a war of espionage. This secret war involved countless acts of espionage, courage, ruthlessness, double dealing and betrayal. It featured secret agents risking everything, working undercover on the continent to turn the tide against the Nazis, never knowing who, at any time, they could trust. Some became double agents playing both sides for the thrill of the danger, others did it just to stay alive. Always these extraordinary characters lived their lives on the edge. Secret War tells their amazing stories. Less than a year after World War II began, Hitler’s armies occupied much of mainland Europe—and the island nation of Great Britain stood alone. Rather than wait for the expected German invasion, Prime Minister Winston Churchill decided to hit back at the Nazis any way he could. In the summer of 1940, he set up a secret new organization called the Special Operations Executive, or SOE, and gave it a simple mission: "set Europe ablaze." SECRET WAR goes inside Churchill's secret army, to a dangerous world of agents, double agents, and even triple agents. In 13 episodes, it tells the story of SOE agents and other clandestine warriors who went behind enemy lines to conduct intelligence-gathering, sabotage, and assassination. Sometimes the operations were spectacularly successful, at other times inexplicably inept. But together, the efforts of these intrepid men and women helped save thousands of lives, liberate Europe, and turn the tide of World War II. WMR Productions and IMG Entertainment Co-Production

[edit] The Special Interrogation Group

The S.I.G. were German-speaking Jewish volunteers from Palestine who posed as Germans to gain vital intelligence. In 1942, the British army was locked in a deadly back-and-forth struggle in the North African desert with Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps. A small band of soldiers were selected by the British for a unique mission. These men could speak fluent German because they were the children of German Jews, victims of the holocaust. They were called the Special Interrogation Group, the S.I.G. and their task was to infiltrate the German lines. Few were as motivated as 40 or so men ready to risk immediate execution in order to strike at the Nazis behind the front lines. The last surviving member of the S.I.G., 93 year old Maurice Tiefenbrunner speaks just a few years before his death about the group's astonishing adventures.

[edit] Hardy Amies: Operation "Ratweek"

Lifting the lid on the lesser-known WWII operations. Ratweek was an operation of 'assassinations without trial' in Belgium by the UK's special ops. A celebrated postwar fashion designer and style icon, Hardy Amies was one of the most unlikely spymasters of World War II. In the future dressmaker to the queen, the SOE found a man capable of unleashing a devastating wave of attacks on German-occupied Europe. He sent agents into occupied Belgium, running a legendary campaign of assassinations known as Operation Ratweek, using the top secret "Welrod" silenced pistol. His unit then had a key role during D-Day.

[edit] The Mafia Connection

A rare glimpse into the perilous world of wartime espionage. The Americans struck a deal with the Mafia to glean data from the Germans on the Atlantic coast. As Britain held out against the Nazis in Europe, the United States was desperate to keep supply lines open to its ally across the Atlantic. To do so, it needed help from the man who knew more about the operation of the New York City docks than anyone else: mobster Charles Luciano. Charles "Lucky" Luciano was the father of modern organised crime -- a pimp, racketeer and murderer. In 1936 he was sentenced to serve 50 years in jail. That was where he was meant to die. But instead he spent just 10 years there and died a free man in Italy. Behind this remarkable reversal of fortune is one of the most unlikely collaborations of the Second World War. This film reveals the startling new evidence that proves beyond any doubt that US government and Mafia worked together to help win the war.

[edit] Double Agent Tricycle

Dusko Popov was one Britain's most successful double agents and some say the inspiration for James Bond. Real-life James Bond and ladies' man Dusan Popov worked as a daring double agent, bankrolled by both the Germans and MI6. While pretending to spy for the Germans during the war, a young Yugoslav offered his services to the British, and at a stroke Agent Ivan became Agent Tricycle. A gambler and multilingual, Dusko Popov seemed to be Germany's perfect spy. A debonair playboy, he appeared to have easy access to the top echelons of British society and sent in streams of apparently high-grade intelligence. But in fact he was a double agent, working for the British, and his intelligence was pure disinformation. He also learned about Japanese interest in aircraft carriers and the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor--intelligence the FBI tragically dismissed. With privileged access to Popov's family photograps and records and an exclusive interview with one of his sons Marco, Double Agent Tricycle's incredible adventures can now be told.

[edit] The Banker, the Norwegians and the Bomb

Sir Charles Hambro oversaw two operations that helped stop the Nazis from developing nuclear capability. Despite reverses on the battlefield, Hitler knew that if he could win the race to develop a nuclear bomb, he could still win the war. Churchill's SOE turned to a small group of highly trained Norwegian agents and a successful London financier to make sure that he didn't.
In the chaos of 1940, Churchill created the 'Special Operations Executive'. Its task -- to "set Europe ablaze". Charles Hambro, a powerful City financier was one of the founding fathers of S.O.E., heading up the unit's Scandinavian Section. One day, a dossier arrived on his desk emblazoned with two simple words -- "Heavy Water". It was a key component in a weapon with unheard of power -- the Atom Bomb -- and it was being made in a top secret plant in Norway. The dossier caused panic throughout Whitehall. It was time for Hambro to send in his agents...

[edit] The English Scholar and the Fight for Greece

One SOE agent who would have a decisive impact on the future of Greece was an Oxford academic more interested in the country's classical past. Monty Woodhouse wrote his name in history by helping to destroy the Gorgopotamos Bridge in 1942, and was the man behind one of S.O.E.'s most ambitious operations codenamed Harling. In 1941 he was parachuted into Greece with the task of uniting the local partisans and taking part in the sabotage of the Gorgopotamos Bridge. He achieved both tasks and the operation was a huge success, disrupting German supplies. Money and weapons poured into the partisans, but increasingly Woodhouse became worried. The Communist ELAS group in particular seemed untrustworthy. He discovered that they were planning to take over control of Greece after the war. In the end, his work among local partisans not only helped liberate Greece from Axis occupation--it also sowed the seeds of the Greek civil war.

[edit] The Dutch Disaster

Missions carried out by the SOE in Holland during World War II were among the most disastrous episodes in the history of British intelligence. On the night of the 7th November 1941 the RAF dropped two agents of the Special Operations Executive into the German-occupied Netherlands. Their landing behind enemy lines marked the beginning of the most disastrous episodes of the history of the secret warfare. The Germans called the episode The England Game.
Operation North Pole was a mission mounted by the Germans that delivered false information to British security services. In all, 47 Allied agents were captured. Why did London continue to drop agents into the country only for them to be arrested by the Nazis? Was German counterintelligence really that good--or was something more sinister afoot? This is the story of how dozens of agents were lured to the Netherlands by the Germans, captured and compromised and yet the British sent more and more! The British had many clues that something was wrong, yet failed to act on them.

[edit] The SAS Italian Job

Top SAS man Roy Farran and SOE agent Michael Lees led a bold attack on a German HQ in Italy with a group of misfit partisans. With the Allied advance in northern Italy stalled in late 1944, the SOE prepared an attack on German military headquarters in the region. When London called the plans off at the last minute, the mission leaders had to decide whether to comply with the order or defy it.
S.O.E. agent Michael Lees is parachuted into German-held north Italy. His mission -- to meet up with local partisans and cause mayhem behind German lines. Within weeks, he locates an important German HQ. Take it out and Lees would sew chaos all along the front. But he needs help. Roy Farran, an officer with Britain's elite special forces the SAS decides to disobey orders to stay behind his desk and joins Lees out in the field. And so begins one of the most extraordinary sagas of the war.

[edit] The Spymistress and the French Fiasco

Intelligence officer Vera Atkins, said to be the influence for Miss Moneypenny, traced the fate of 118 missing SOE agents after the end of WWII. For much of WWII, the SOE waged a successful secret war in occupied France. But the woman at the heart of it all also presided over a series of bungled operations that delivered agents straight into the hands of the Gestapo. Was it simple (if uncharacteristic) incompetence on her part? Or did Britain's otherwise meticulous spymistress knowingly send agents to their deaths in order to hide a dark personal secret?
This sensational instalment of the history series throws new light on British bungling during the Second World War. Vera Atkins had helped to run Britain's spy network in France and, afterwards, became a national heroine for relentlessly tracking down the Nazis who'd tortured and killed 118 British agents. But could that have been a search for personal atonement rather than a quest for justice?
This fascinating programme contrasts the meticulous Atkins with her cavalier boss, whose actions helped compromise security. So why didn't Atkins blow the whistle? Perhaps because she was born Maria Rosenberg, in Romania, and may have had secret dealings with the Nazis. It's an extraordinary story, told in essence by Atkins biographer Sarah Helm, with first-class archive and film clips.

[edit] The French Triple Agent

Unshrouding the mystery of WWII espionage. Story of a suspected triple agent who might have worked for the British and Germans in WWII. Henri Dericourt went from quiet beginnings in a small hamlet northeast of Paris, to working his way to the center of one of the most consequential clandestine operations in WW2. Operation Cockade was meant to unsettle the Nazis, but Dericourt threw a spanner in the works.
How did the Nazis manage to penetrate so thoroughly the French Resistance networks working with the Special Operations Executive? Why were so many British agents captured as soon as they landed in France? Part of the answer may lie in the activities of a mysterious agent who was working with the Germans and the British--and may have been reporting to a third party as well.
After the war, Dericourt returned to France and resumed his pre-war job as a pilot. Following victory in Europe, France began investigating the collaborators who had worked with the Germans. Questions were asked about the collapse of the 'Prosper' network and Derincourt role in the affair. He was arrested by the French authorities in November 1946 and charged with supplying intelligence to the enemy.

[edit] Christine Granville: Polish Spy

Beautiful, charismatic, and cunning, Winston Churchill's favorite spy was a young Polish woman, an inveterate gambler who seemed to thrive on adrenaline and beating the odds. Christine Granville was Britain's first and longest-serving female special agent during World War II. Born Krystyna Skarbek in Warsaw in 1908, she joined British Intelligence after Germany invaded her home country in 1939.
For five years in the Second World War, she regularly risked her life to arm the resistance and to bring back information crucial to victory over Germany. Beautiful, charismatic and cunningly intelligent, she is said to be the inspiration for the original Bond girl Vesper Lynd, a spy in Ian Fleming's first James Bond novel, Casino Royale. What made her a great spy was her ability and inclination to take risks. Compared to most other female agents who were often quickly caught, Christine evaded capture and never compromised other agents in the field. "A flaming Polish patriot, an expert skier and great adventuress" was how her recruiting agent described her, and Granville served with distinction in three theatres of war – Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Western Europe. She was Winston Churchill's favourite female spy.

[edit] Agent Garbo

Juan Pujol Garcia lived a lie that helped win World War II. He was a double agent for the British, performing so well that they nicknamed him for the enigmatic actress Greta Garbo. Before he remade himself as the master spy known as Garbo, Juan Pujol was nothing more than a Barcelona poultry farmer. But as Garbo, he turned in a masterpiece of deception that changed the course of World War II. This is the true story of a consummate liar; the ultimate double agent; the spy who saved D-Day.
Early in WWII, the British embassy in Madrid rejected Pujol's offers of help. So, pretending to be an ardent fascist, he went to work for the Germans. When an innocuous-looking Spanish civilian walked into the German embassy in Madrid and asked to spy for the Nazis, he set off a train of events that had huge consequences for WWII. Posing as the Nazis' only reliable spy inside England, he created an imaginary million-man army, invented armadas out of thin air, and brought a vast network of fictional subagents to life. The scheme culminated on June 6, 1944, when Garbo convinced the Germans that the Allied forces approaching Normandy were just a feint—the real invasion would come at Calais. Because of his brilliant trickery, the Allies were able to land with much less opposition and eventually push on to Berlin.
After the war it became known that over sixty of Pujol's messages had been included in important German intelligence summaries during, and shortly after, the critical time of the Allied invasion of France, many reaching the desk of the Fuhrer himself. Amazingly, Garbo's cover was never broken. For his wartime services, Pujol would be awarded the German Iron Cross Second Class, the medal being authorised by Adolf Hitler himself. He was also awarded an MBE by the British, making the Spaniard probably unique in the world of double-agents, being the only one to receive honours from both sides. Hear his story.

[edit] The Aristocrat and the Balkan Communist

Fitzroy MacLean was handpicked by Winston Churchill to parachute into Yugoslavia and unite with Tito's Partisans against the Germans. On Churchill's orders, an SOE agent parachuted into German-occupied Yugoslavia in 1943 to cut a deal with communist partisans who had an agenda far beyond defeating the Nazis. The prime minister realized the dangers of cooperating with the communists even as Britain provided a home for Yugoslavia's royalist government in exile. Only time would tell if it was worth the risk.
This is the story of a wartime gamble that paid off. How a Scottish aristocrat befriended a ruthless communist and formed the unlikeliest of coalitions. When Hitler invaded Yugoslavia in 1941 it was a country ripe for takeover. It contained radically different people, divided by race, religion, culture, heritage and language. Some like the Croats welcomed their German conquerors. Others, like the Serbs, loyal to their king, would have much to fear. Thousands fled, but some men had no intention of running away. One of them was Draza Mihailovic. Another was Josep Broz who preferred to be called Tito. Tito recruited a guerilla force known as the Partisans. Mihailovic also raised an army called the Cetniks to fight the Germans so that the king could one day reclaim his country.

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Video Codec: x264 CABAC Main@L3
Video Bitrate: 2 000 Kbps
Video Resolution: 720x404
Display Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Frames Per Second: 25.000 fps
Audio Codec: AAC (LC)
Audio Bitrate: 125 kb/s VBR 48000 Hz
Audio Streams: 2
Audio Languages: english
RunTime Per Part: 51 min
Number Of Parts: 13
Part Size: 749 MB - 795 MB
Source: WEB DL
Capper: TrollSD@a.b.hdtv

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