WW2 German “Atlantic Wall" - Fortifications & Armaments -1944 HD

New scenes including high quality footage you wont see anywhere else!
After the invasion and occupation of France, Germany built a string of fortifications stretching from the Bay of Biscay to Norway, including the Channel Islands, known as the "The Atlantic Wall" to repel any attempt by Allied Forces to launch offensive operations.
Only the dense fortifications built at Pas de Calais, the shortest and most likely invasion route, could reasonably be called a "Wall,” the rest were a string of strong points, including fortified cities like Cherbourg & Brest, with reinforced beach defenses at likely landing spots in between. More than 600,000 laborers were involved in construction, including many Frenchman unwillingly drafted by the Vichy government, German subcontractors, and workers imported from abroad. "Organisation Todt," who also built "The Siegfried Line," was in charge.
These scenes, from films produced by the German Propaganda Ministry, focus mostly on heavy fortifications near Calais and were intended to reassure the German people that they were protected by a virtually invulnerable "Fortress Europe." Heavy guns were installed to attack shipping and bombard the English Coast near Dover as well as repel amphibious landings. You'll see everything from small pill boxes housing light machine guns to massive reinforced concrete bunkers with repurposed naval guns, artillery seized abroad and that could fire shells up to 406mm - 16" and huge railway guns on tracks so they could move in and out of bunkers . Some of the fortified locations seen here include the massive "Todt Battery" at Cap Gris Nez and “Battery Lindeman.” You'll see several examples of railway guns, including the KRUPP 28 CM K5(E), some mounted on huge turntables to provide a wide arc of fire.
But, like many "walls" built throughout history, including the Great Wall of China and the Maginot Line, the promised security and invulnerability of the Atlantic Wall proved to be to be an illusion on D-Day, June 6th, 1944.
For more World War 2 German and Japanese newsreel footage, see our DVD "World War 2 Through Axis Eyes" bit.ly/11ISB8R
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[@hanskloss1331]

as a career concrete worker these structures are incredible not only in design but understanding the forms that had to be built for them

[@ricardomedina0317]

Appreciated seeing the different weapons and workings on the Atlantic wall from a pre-D Day German perspective.

[@markroberts9577]

Simply incredible the way they set up their defenses and how everybody knew what their job was

[@coralienya]

I found this really interesting and thank you so much for sharing! Greetings from Coralienya

[@danielcruz8347]

Bypass static emplacements!!! Thank you for posting

[@Paughco]

That's what it was before D-day. We visited Normandy Beach in 2012 and mostly all I saw was craters, once you got off the beach.

[@lwilton]

Zeno, suggestion: turn on closed captions and tell it the source is auto-generated German. That would probably provide an approximate translation of what that announcer is shouting in a very martial Germanic way.

[@ZenosWarbirds]

I think I did that, but I read it can take up to 24 hours to be activated. I’ll wait & see. If it doesn’t happen, I’ll mess around with it some more.

[@jakeeves5935]

I'm thinking the railway gun shown at the end was a similar model to the famous Asiatic Annie railway gun it looked like the same type

[@rambow2550]

Spotted a few places that are in the Channel Islands Guernsey, Alderny and Jersey At 5:05 defantly Jersey

[@johndeschamps1797]

Few of the much larger guns were in Normandy. I think the battleship turrets (Gneisenau?) and the like were mostly along the Norwegian coast or the pas de Calais and never saw much , if any action

[@davidlafranchise4782]

Are those 88's they are running to towards the first???

[@davidlafranchise4782]

I wonder what bay. It looks like the same place for most of the clip

[@johnjacobs1625]

Bombs away and jump in Behind !! Great Strategy!! JJ

[@blairrighton6270]

... like the way the 'deutscher soldart' casually throws the lid of the cannister aside @ 6.47 like a frisbee 😄🙃

[@Gool349]

most nations would have dug earth holes or trenches with some wood around em, not ze germans...this has got to be neatest and tidyest concrete defense line in history

[@rambow2550]

Exsept that every country in WWII built conceret bunkers

[@Gool349]

@@rambow2550 yes but surely not in that magnitude!

[@rambow2550]

Hi @@Gool349 you are correct in that;-) I should have said in my comment that they did build lots of holes and trenches in surport of the concret bunkers

[@davidlafranchise4782]

Except the very 1st gun and towards the end

[@Disneymagic24]

couple things, first, i wonder how many of these atlantic wall positions and bunkers in general actually saw any real action? and second, this video makes me think it would take forever to remove all this stuff to get ready for battle haha

[@ryanhudson3807]

And then.. kerr smash.

[@radarplotextractor3168]

Well, for all the good it did them.

[@pm-bg9mu]

Do u think they watered those plants Infront of that gun emplacement 😂😂

[@timburr4453]

They did. During the wait for the invasion they had to occupy their time and there were actually quite a few vegetable gardens planted that many Nazi soldiers doted on relentlessly.

[@rambow2550]

@@timburr4453 What you are calling Nazi soldiers are infact plain German Soldiers very few were nazis in most cases they were just conscrips doing their govermnts fighting

[@johnbuchman4854]

Video should have ended with a flash and then a mushroom cloud...

[@marshallblythe7240]

"Nazis! I hate these guys!"

[@SvenXXX-mg1fn]

Ein Zusammenspiel vom feinsten!!!