This is without doubt the best documentary about German armoured cars and half-tracks ever produced.

@HistoryChannel..... Plz take note ..... This is what an actual ww2 documentary looks like .....

The "German War File" series are really good and well researched without forcing a moral opinion on the viewer.

At last a TV doc that actually refers to the footage on screen rather than just using it for eye candy.

Excellent footage of the 88mm being brought into action, 44:50 onwards. You can get a great look at most of the support equipment - for all you modelers looking for references!

AWESOME documentary! Usually people tend to "concentrate" on tanks or tank-destroyers, but forget that without proper fast "scout" vehicles, a "Panzerdivision" was virtually blind... Some of those vehicles became legendary, no matter they were suposed to "engage only forces of similar strenght", as they say at the 7th minute, like that "PUMA", that was very probably the BEST vehicle of its type of the whole war, and was used even after the war by many countries of the "Ally"-coalition (...France in first place, if I'm not much mistaken...). Some of the best German tankers and top "Panzer-aces" were sort of ..."brought up" and trained in scout units afterall (like - if I remember well - Wittman). BIG THANKS FOR UPLOADING! Have a nice day everybody.

Dear Military Channel- THIS is a documentary.

This is probably the best Documentary series of WWII.

As a kid when I saw pictures of the puma I thought it couldn't be a WW2 vehicle, it looked to futuristic. Still one of my favorite WW2 designs.

My favorite scene (29.50) is the German Shepard riding shotgun in the halftrack.

Damn the Germans had some sexy war machines!

Love the Schachtellaufwerk (overlapped interleaved) track design.

I think so too. This video is just about engineering, so you shouldn't distract from this to policy and the ethical side.

Thank you for uploading these. Excellent documentaries with amazing footage.

Very interesting review of important vehicles that are mostly overshadowed by Tanks.

Great footage, we'll never see the likes of these vehicles again.

These war file docs are very good i must say. Most informative and so much unseen footage, nice.

I've seen all sorts of war documentaries, but never saw any of the footage utilized in this video. Very informative!

I have watched a lot of WW2 documentaries and have never seen a series that goes as in depth and the video actually matches the veh/weapon they are discussing.

great docu, only problem is when the music starts. its difficult to here the speaker. thanks.

Germany made some bad ass vehicles...

Absolutely love these German war files docs Do wish the music wasn’t louder then the speaker

They describe vehicles being produced in the hundreds while allies were turning out vehicles by the thousands or tens of thousands

My point is Germany could not produce enough good heavy semi heavy trucks with a 2 front war.The Red Army,with their logistical support was provided by hundreds of thousands of U.S.-made trucks. Indeed by 1945 nearly two-thirds of the truck strength of the Red Army was U.S.-built. Trucks such as the Dodge 3/4 ton and Studebaker 2½ ton, were easily the best trucks available in their class on either side on the Eastern Front. The USA simply put was able to supply all its allies with trucks.

I couldn't agree more. I have the whole series, and have only picked up one error in the whole thing. This series and the "Battlefield" series are among the best available.

Indeed. Objective documentaries are a rarity these days.

Great document, the Wermacht had so many variations it´s a vast inventory some really great, like the Blitz or the puma

This doc is very good , maybe one of the best on this specific topic .

NICE PICTURES NOY OFTEN SEEN 👌 GOOD FULL DOCUMENTARY ON WHAT WAS PRODUCED .

I arrived at this video due to my fascination with the Kettenkrad. I was so glad to see the coverage and amazing video provided in this documentary. Thanks for this film.

y The so-called "Blitzkrieg" of the German Wehrmacht was carried out mainly by the Pz.I and Pz. II combat vehicles in Poland and France . During the restructuring in 1940/41, the vehicle was no longer used as a battle tank, but as a reconnaissance tank. Due to the simultaneous reduction, there were 65 Type II tanks with a target stock of 200 tanks per division. In 1942, with a target stock of 164 tanks in total, only 28 Panzer II were planned. The following year the type was finally retired. Since the German armaments industry did not succeed in providing the Wehrmacht with the intended standard tanks of the types Panzer III and Panzer IV in significant numbers until the outbreak of the Second World War, the Panzer II with almost 1,100 were operational in the first two years of the war Vehicles the backbone of the German tank weapon. At the beginning of the western campaign, the divisions deployed there had 955 Panzer II at their disposal. At the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union in June 1941 there were just under 1200 vehicles; in May of the following year this number fell to 860 vehicles. [1] The Panzer II bore the brunt of the fighting in Poland and France and it became apparent relatively quickly that, like its predecessor, it was too weakly armed and armored and could only be viewed as a makeshift tank. It only offered advantages in street fighting because of its small size. Panzer II were also used to fight partisans. The total losses can be quantified as follows: 1939: 83 pieces 1940: 240 pieces 1941: 460 pieces By April 1942 a total of 921 Panzer IIs had been recorded as total losses.

I know that there are many out there that love the half-track. But they never had to drive one. Realize that they are powered by a track that has no ability to steer the machine. Both tracks are either in "forward" or "reverse', all steering is done by the 2 front wheels. Now plop that machine into mud, ice or deep snow. You might be able to go forward or back OK, but turning? Not so much.

I like this series because they are not repeating for the thousandth time same and same clips.

An EXCELLENT video. WEll researched and a comprehensive coverage of the German vehicles. Don't worry about the negative comments:as some viewers aren't very bright.

Thanks for uploading, but I wish the people who made the video had listened to it so they would know that the music is louder than the narrator. There are some people in the house that don't want to listen to the music while I'm trying to make out what the guy is mumbling about.

I've built a few models of German halftracks because they are ridiculous. Great documentary. These are often overlooked in favor of the wunderwaffels.

Its nothing to do with the loss of scientists. They had plenty of the greatest thinkers in Germany during the war.Heisenberg was one of the greatest. German scientists Hahn and Strassman discovered nuclear fission in 1939 but it wasnt seen as a war winning priority. The fact that over a 100,000 people were needed to make the American bombs at a cost of over 30 Billion dollars it was never going to happen.Germany didn't have the manpower or the uranium.

Both are equally formidable, and are not to be underestimated. Those who do are left in complete defeat.

Just a bit of editing to reduce the level of the background music would improve this. Otherwise, extremely interesting. I love seeing little bits of esoterica that you're not normally aware of; the air dropped fuel canisters to resupply the forward recon units was fantastic. I've never seen that before.

No, he was saying how Ford and other American manufacturers built mules similar in design to the German half track trucks.

Thank you for posting these different WW 2 Videos. WW2 KZfaq buff here!

Great documentary thanks for posting

I think the narrator's script may lead to confusion with the weight designations of the half-tracks, which are really 3/4 track anyway, the various ton designations do not refer to the vehicle weight at all but the weight of the intended maximum towed load. There seemed to be no mention either that all the half-tracks also had a simple peg and slot arrangement from the steering box that progressively applied track brakes after a relatively small angle of the steering wheel.

even Odder, Maxim's Machine Gun was used by Every side in WW1, he made a fortune

It's amazing how futuristic some of these vehicles look , The sloped armor is a blueprint for pretty much all subsequent armoured vehicles

In my last Panzer General II campaign, two Sd.Kfz. 234 platoon's survived years of combat and were easily worth their weight in gold.

Great video, thanks for posting it! I wish they had done one on Allied arms too.

This great series will be even greater, when it is colourised!!

the tonnage given for the unarmored halftracks is NOT their weight. This vehicles were classified by the Tonnage they could pull. Hence the 18ton ZKW(Zugkraftwagen/motorized Vehicle for pulling) is to pull a weight of 18 tons.

Extremely interesting. Thanks very much for posting this.

I thought the German army is criticized for still being 3/4 horse-drawn by the end of the war, let alone at the beginning. Germany made good use of the mechanized units that it did have, but it wasn't like they had more tanks and trucks than the Allies...they just use the ones they did have to better effect in the beginning. Notice how German artillery, with a few exceptions (such as 88mm Flak guns) were always mounted on steel wheels with solid rubber tires? These are called "low-speed" carriages, and are meant for speeds you'd expect being drawn behind a team of horses. Russian, British and US artillery was mostly mounted on rubber tires and equipped with shock absorbers. This is because their entire artillery arms (for starters) were designed and equipped for motor transport before the war even began. Trying to tow a low-speed German gun behind a truck would have shaken the mounting to pieces within 20 miles, and/or screwed the accuracy all up, even if the gun didn't go out of control or flip over the first time you hit a rough stretch of road. The Germans put their high-speed units to good use,, but mostly it was good armor tactics and coordination that won the day for Blitzkrieg, but most of the infantry and artillery still moved up in the same fashion as a forced march done during the Franco-Prussian war. The mechanized units just broke the enemy in areas and drove spearhead behind their lines, allowing the slower units to come in an mop up. Yet popular "knowledge" since WWII has been that Hitler built this highly modern, completely mechanized army, and this was how he beat the Allies, who had neglected to do this. That was not at all how it happened. Not only that, by the end of the war, the Allies armies were almost 100% mechanized, while most of Hitlers troops still marched on foot, most guns were still drawn by horses, and supply trains were still mostly horse-drawn wagons. Only the relatively few mechanized "spearhead" units (also often used as fire brigades after Russia started beating them in 1942) were given motorized logistic trains, because horse-drawn wagons couldn't keep up with mechanized units. Germany went through like tens of millions of horses lost in combat during WWII. How many horses did the US army loose during fighting, just out of curiosity?

Very nice documentary. Needless to say some of those same designs have been mimic by the Allies after the WWII.

Germany was far ahead of all of the Allies as far as technology at the beginning of WW2. Their Achilles heel was the lack of uniformity and ease of field repair. Simplicity is the greatest attribute of military equipment in actual war. This is why the Russian T34 proved to be the best tank design of WW2. I hate Communists but there’s no denying that the T34 was the best tank of WW2. Simple to build, simple to repair and simple to operate. Not to mention that it had great frontal armor. Hitler was constantly awarding military contracts to various companies that kissed his ass and as a result there was little uniformity of parts. Once his armor broke down on the battle field it was extremely difficult to quickly get the parts and get it back into the fight. Not so for the T34 and to a lesser extent the Sherman.

The primary reason that the Germans did so well was NOT that their equipment was far superior to that of their opponents. Some of it was, but much of it was not. German discipline, training, armored doctrine, and tactics were the reasons. In other words, human factors.

Fun fact: the Sdkfz. 251 was one source of inspiration for the Star Wars Walker.

This was interesting and I appreciate the upload. The background 'music' was very piercing; too bad it couldn't have been eliminated. It would also have been good if the images could have been frozen, even for a few seconds, when a new model is mentioned and a decent shot is available. i realize it's too much to ask for a caption of the model to be included. But this is niggling - Thanks again for uploading.

The Puma is rarely acknowledge for it's invaluable service for the Werhmacht.

I can hardly imagine keeping a useful inventory of spare parts for all these machines.

I use to have a bunch of these videos on VHS. They're just not making good documentaries anymore.

I never really ponder the half track, but this is very good.

Interesting and informative. Excellent photography job. Good investigative research. Good reviews of the different armored vehicles. 1st class documentary.

The Germans had the best military technology. Way ahead of its time.

Apologies for the long string of replies but I neglected to mention the array of Soviet heavy tanks, most importantly the IS-2 in my previous post. In addition the Soviet Union also fielded several self propelled guns such as the SU-155 which was designated a "Big game hunter" designed to knock out the German "Animal" heavy tanks such as the Tiger, Panther, Royal Tiger and Ferdinand (formerly Elefant). Finally ignorance of the Gloster Meteor does not diminish its importance.

I was also perplexed by all the downvotes. Maybe not enough CG? This is an absolute gem, along with the one about the STUG and Hummel. This is well researched, and certainly more academic than the vast majority of the documentaries one finds on German fighting vehicles, and very niche, only something a person who knows his stuff would appreciate. The music was a bit much though.

That blockade had ended by 1919 (and in place by all btw with food shipments being allowed but delayed, heavily condemned in the UK by the opposition might i add so not "the general view" at all and was supported by all the allies and even demanded by some such as France), What i am on about was the major post war damages, such as the taking of German lands by France etc etc.

I couldn't agree more, looking at battlefield, what a great series. Although the fact they used the same slow music in every single episode wasn't something i was particularly thrilled about ;)

Taking a shot at America, that's not tough to do. Europe wanted US troops during the cold war in case of a Soviet invasion. Japan had attacked the United States at pearl harbor and the US occupied and allied the country very appropriately. It's not just America "destroying" the world but you can thank every other human on earth for that too.

Yeah they had some sexy war machine but their field transport during the entire war was heavily dependant on horses. During the Battle of the Bulge the US were able to move men and supplies quicker. The troops were not exhausted when the reached the front lines from marching - cold yes and initially low on supplies but this was soon retified because of their STANDARDISED mechanised transports.

Thank you 🙏, I’m a history nut, love ❤️ this video. I build models and now I’m going to have to expand my diorama of North Africa Corp, I new there were variants, didn’t realize how many, very informative, my hobby store is in for some work

I love this type of uploads, thank you you tube and geesusdb :)

Super great show. I like the fact that it is strictly informative without all the politics and B.S. Thanks for posting!!!

Surprised to see the motorcycle outfit at 9.16 has the chair mounted on the left.

Thanks for sharing just picked up a couple of these in 1/35 by Tamiya and AFV

Without Lend/Lease the USSR would have caved.

I had no idea Ford was still building vehicles for Germany in 1944 or did I hear that wrong?

FFW to 3:45 if you want to see the proper beginning of this vid. Far too much waffle in the narration, but some great footage together with descriptions of the vehicles being shown.

*lol* That German Shepherd commanded that SdKfz very good. XD

So the Germans used sloped armor for increased protection on their armored cars and halftracks, but were surprised when they came across the T-34?

The eighth Air force was the sacrificial lamb of the western allies. As huge Soviet casualties racked up, the eighth Air force cause they Germans to retain 80% of 88s to be as AA units. The huge number of allied airman sacrificed served a very real, very important diversionary purpose as the western allies contribution to total war. It would have been a slaughter to allow 5x times the number of 88s to proceed to the eastern front of Germany!

Good video. It is amazing how many vehicles (different types) were used by the Germans. 14,000 Ford trucks, haha. Me thinks old Henry made out pretty good on the war. Playing both sides against the middle. The other video about the mobile artillery is very good too. Ford didn't get to make any artillery. lol

Guys, I am not here to ignite racism, I am here to watch a documentary

The word 'Greif' on the side of Rommel's Sdkfz 250 meant 'take' or 'seize' - not 'Griffin' as stated.

Would there be a market for a limited production run of the Sd.Kfz. 222 to the original drawings?Just wondering (Obviously engine,transmission and final drives would be sourced from a current production vehicle so as to comply with modern emissions and "Construction and use" regulations).Ideas anyone?

Didn't Rommel like US halftracks? I remember seeing a video where he was quite taken with one.

wow, only 800 of the 8 wheeled reconaissance/armoured cars were made? seems like a pretty low number, i thought they were more common than that...is that correct, can anyone else verify that?

no it wouldn't have been, considering the united states held Germany to a pretty high regard before the propaganda hit the fan.

And the KwK 30, et al, are NOT "derived from the weapons carried on the Messerschmitt 109". The Bf 109E used two MG FF cannon, derived from the Oerlikon 20mm cannon, itself derived from the Becker cannon. The KwK 30 is derived from the Solothurn ST-5, and is unrelated although sharing certain similarities (besides both being 20mm autocannon). The later MG 151/20 is a totally different weapon altogether.

The germans did so well because they were the only ones to have a good overall tactic that actually worked, whereas other countries had outdated tactics. Secondly the germans had the equipment(and built it in good numbers, because their economy was designed solely for that purpose) to be able to implement said strategy. So they mainly did so well because the rest was incapable or unwilling to react effectively.

Splendid presentation!

In early 1944 when US General Doolittle told P-51 fighter pilots to stop flying in formation when escorting bombers and go directly after German fighters, the Luftwaffe lost over 17% of their remaining fighter force in just over 1 week. Goring was stunned & he speaks of this development as the beginning of the end because that signalled Allied air superiority over Germany. I don't dismiss the fact that the FW190s & ME109s were innovative fighters, BUT they were TOTALLY outclassed by the P51.

The German “ArmouredCar” designers were way way way ahead of the times. Just think what those engineers could do with the technology of today.

Did he say Ford built 14,000 halftracks for Germany?

Take out the overwhelming load music.. Gud Lawd! Fantastic film footage.

great video. Never imagined how many armored vehicle where involved how the heck did they lose??

I enjoy background music in documentaries. So if one *can get through the first **15:30** or so one can actually HEAR the narrator.*

Flak Panzer has great looks and the best name.

Yes and there is a massive amount of forbidden history.

the music is WAY too loud

Old docos are the best. no political bullshit just information

Excellent documentary just wish the music was a lower volume as it drowns the narrator out