- 7/10/2025
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00:00Hidden deep in the forests of Germany.
00:05This is a very impressive example of Nazi engineering.
00:09Concealed inside vast mountains.
00:12It's almost exactly like a Bond villain's lair.
00:15Lie the remains of one of the most intriguing engineering projects of World War II.
00:20This is a do-or-die operation.
00:24Vast underground factories built for the world's first operational jet fighter.
00:30What they wanted to do was to build the entire aircraft here.
00:35This is the incredible story of the Me 262.
00:42The Me 262 was the most advanced fighter aircraft of its time.
00:47And to build it, the Nazis will create a revolutionary subterranean lair.
00:56The biggest construction projects of World War II.
00:59Ordered by Hitler to secure world domination.
01:03Now they survive as dark reminders of the Fuhrer's fanatical military ambition.
01:09These are the secrets of the Nazi megastructures.
01:19Germany, 1945.
01:21A force of Allied bombers head for home after unleashing their deadly payload.
01:26When a mysterious shape suddenly appears in the skies.
01:30Fighters, ten o'clock.
01:33They're coming in.
01:39He's coming in on a half roll.
01:41Four up, please. Four up, hurry.
01:43It's Adolf Hitler's new wonder weapon.
01:46The Messerschmitt Me 262.
01:50A revolutionary plane without propellers.
01:53Capable of flying up to 190 km per hour faster than anything the Allies have.
02:00At the controls is Adolf Galland.
02:04Bombus, directly ahead.
02:06Galland has piloted over 700 combat missions.
02:09And this is the fastest aircraft he's ever flown.
02:15He knows the jet's incredible speeds give German pilots the edge in air-to-air combat.
02:20Call!
02:28Galland rips the bombers apart.
02:37But it's not just the jet that's an awesome piece of Nazi engineering.
02:41Just as extraordinary is the top secret factory where the Me 262 will be built and made ready for war.
02:53An underground lair known as the Rimag.
02:58Rimag was an incredibly ambitious project.
03:01It was an enormous undertaking and a very good example of Nazi engineering.
03:04Jet historian Dr. Mike Pavolek is one of the few people to have been allowed inside.
03:13It's a colossal complex that wouldn't look out of place in a modern-day spy film.
03:19It's almost exactly like a Bond villain's lair.
03:23The combination of underground tunnels, concrete bunkers, and a mountaintop airstrip would have been ideal.
03:30The story of the Rimag factory and the high-tech fighter it built begins in the 1930s.
03:44When the race is on to produce the world's first jet aircraft.
03:49World War II historian and writer James Holland has studied the early years of jet development.
03:57In 1939 you've got at least seven or eight different jet engines being developed by various German aircraft manufacturers.
04:07Pioneering work to a greater degree than any other country in the world.
04:12On the 27th of August 1939 the Germans launched the world's first jet aircraft.
04:19The breakthrough means their air force could soon have a massive advantage over their enemies.
04:24But right now the plane is only a prototype, unproven in battle.
04:31Just five days later Hitler invades Poland.
04:38World War II has begun.
04:42And Luftwaffe chief Hermann Göring relies on his propeller planes to win the air war.
04:55The leadership thought that the prop driven aircrafts would be enough to run the victory.
05:01And that there's no need for something spectacular, unusual and new like the Messerschmitt May 262.
05:10Within months, Göring's Luftwaffe crushes the Allies in the sky and on the ground.
05:17By summer 1941 the Nazis occupy most of Western Europe.
05:21Confidence among the Luftwaffe is enormous. It's sky high. The world has never seen the degree of conquest that the Germans manage.
05:32It seems they're completely unstoppable.
05:34The Luftwaffe's success does have one unintended casualty.
05:37Their conventional propeller planes perform so well that the Nazis scale back their jet program.
05:49Development continues slowly.
05:52But by 1943 the tide turns.
06:07The German offensive in Russia fails.
06:11The Nazis are now on the defensive.
06:16American and British bombers wreak havoc on their industrial heartland.
06:19The Germans need a new weapon to seize back the initiative.
06:26Hitler is obsessed with wonder weapons and there are huge hopes for anything that involves dynamic and exciting new technology.
06:38Hopes turn to Germany's revolutionary jets.
06:41By 1943, one aircraft emerges as a front-runner in the Nazis' jet program.
06:48The Messerschmitt Me 262.
06:52The Me 262 is like nothing ever seen before.
06:58The Nazis believed that this aircraft was potentially a war winner or at least, but this might be an answer to keeping American bombers out of the skies.
07:07Determined to win Hitler's favor, Luftwaffe chief Hermann Goering champions the new Me 262 prototype.
07:17But it's still a test flight stage.
07:21Adolf Galland, commander of the Luftwaffe's fighter squadrons, is one of the first pilots to be given the chance to fly it.
07:31An ace with over 90 kills to his name.
07:34Galland's approval could help get the new jet into full production.
07:37He is one of the most respected combat pilots in the Luftwaffe, if not the most respected.
07:48He's a pin-up. He's got bucket loads of charisma.
07:52Goering loves him. The Nazis love him.
07:54On the 22nd of May, 1943, Galland arrives at the test center.
08:03He knows taking to the skies in this experimental plane is a risk.
08:08A test pilot has recently been killed, and there have been problems with the new engines.
08:13This crate will probably shake me to death, or break down at 3000 meters, huh?
08:21Galland is stepping into the unknown.
08:24He'll be flying 175 kilometers per hour faster than he's ever flown before.
08:43As Galland later recounts, the jet quickly blows away all his doubts.
08:50I could see that this aircraft was not just our last hope in the air war.
08:56I could see the future of aviation for the next century right in front of me.
09:02Galland thinks the Me 262's speed could allow him to stop the Allied onslaught of Germany.
09:13Now, if you're still a young guy like Galland is in 1943-44,
09:20and there's some super new technology which enables you to fly aircraft even faster than anyone ever before,
09:27you're going to grab that with two hands and say, yes, give me a bit of that.
09:31With Galland backing the program, the German Air Ministry put in an order for 100 production Me 262's just a few days later.
09:39High-tech aircraft factories are prime targets, and the new Me 262 production lines are destroyed.
09:50German air chiefs need a solution if they're to build Hitler's new jet and regain control of their skies.
09:59The problem is for Germany is that they're now a nation in a hurry.
10:05They've got to develop places where the Allied bombers cannot reach.
10:12The Nazis decide to hide Me 262 production all over Germany.
10:17Wings, engines and fuselages are built in forests, caves and tents.
10:22But scattering production means different parts of the plane have to travel hundreds of kilometers before assembly can take place.
10:31They need a single centralized location where a fast assembly line can be recreated in complete safety.
10:38In Kala, 230 kilometers from Berlin, an old porcelain mine that's already been earmarked for aircraft production could become the perfect hideaway.
11:00But transforming the inside of a mountain into a high-tech jet factory is something that's never been attempted before.
11:10Heading up the project is one of the most ruthless men in the Third Reich.
11:14Obergruppenführer Fritz Saukel.
11:21Saukel was put in charge to get it running and get the airplanes in the air.
11:27Fritz Saukel is an early Nazi Party member and fanatically loyal to Adolf Hitler.
11:33He is now head of forced labor for the Reich.
11:37Saukel will do whatever it takes to transform the old mine complex into a fighter-making facility.
11:44He was very driven personally. He was also pushed very, very hard from above.
11:51Hermann Göring, head of the German Air Force, is anxious for the RIMAG factory to be built quickly.
11:58It is still incredible to think of the enormous hold that Hermann Göring has over the Nazi war machine.
12:08And the RIMAG is just another example of this.
12:11Saukel promises a bomb-proof factory that can produce 1,000 aircraft a month.
12:17We can start production of the site immediately and with the highest intensity.
12:23I am confident the project will be a success.
12:27But Saukel faces a massive challenge, building a high-tech production line under a mountain.
12:39And they have to do all this in the last year of the war, where everything is in short supply and in which the whole Third Reich's war effort is unbelievably stretched.
12:55Saukel has to deliver before Hitler's Germany is bombed into oblivion.
13:02This is a do-or-die, boom-or-bust operation.
13:06In 1944, construction begins on the Nazi's underground fighter lair.
13:19From the outset, Fritz Saukel has a problem.
13:23A massive army of workers is needed to build this subterranean factory.
13:27But for the head of First Labour in Hitler's Reich, the solution is obvious.
13:36Out! Quickly!
13:39Marcel van den Steen is a 23-year-old living in Belgium, when the Gestapo abduct him from his parents.
13:46Okay, okay, I'm coming!
13:50Marcel keeps a secret diary during the war years.
13:53It provides a rare insight into the brutal conditions faced at Saukel's Rymag facility.
13:59Out! Quickly!
14:02We were forced into a truck and then a train, and we were taken to Karlach.
14:08Where are we?
14:10No talking! Bob!
14:11Marcel is one of 12,000 forced laborers transported across Europe and forced to work at Rymag.
14:22It's the beginning of a living nightmare.
14:25It quickly became obvious that Fritz Saukel had utter contempt for human life as he used a number of slave laborers brought in from camps specifically for this program.
14:37The workers must fight to survive.
14:41They have to complete the tunnels before Saukel can begin building planes.
14:46A staggering amount of energy, logistical effort, resources, human and financial, and materials are being put into creating this.
14:58Incredibly, the ruins of Fritz Saukel's massive project still remain. Hidden in a clearing in a remote part of Germany, the broken rubble, silent witness to the Nazis' obsession with the Me 262.
15:19Mike Pavolek wants to explore underground at the Rymag facility, but access is limited and extremely dangerous.
15:33You can use another, another way.
15:39Local historian Marcus Gleischmann is on hand to lead the way.
15:46Oh, you've got to be kidding me.
15:48You've got to be kidding me.
15:55To travel back to Saukel's secret wartime tunnels, they have to head deep under the Vulpesburg mountain.
16:02It's not too easy to find the right path.
16:07I would imagine. It's a good thing we've got you here.
16:10Mike and Marcus access the tunnel system through the one remaining entrance.
16:16All other ways in and out had been sealed off.
16:23Trekking 700 meters underground, they arrive at production tunnels that were being dug in 1944.
16:33Saukel's plans for this place was to build the entire aircraft here.
16:37Jets, the engines, the components, the fuselage, everything.
16:43The Nazis have to build an underground factory where they can assemble a 13 meter wide plane.
16:52Planners envision 75 separate tunnels, measuring 15 kilometers.
16:58Thousands will be employed on this immense task of enlarging the existing porcelain mine
17:04and building the new facility.
17:08Including Belgian forced laborer Marcel van den Steen.
17:14Workers are selected for heavy or light duties depending on their strength.
17:18This is not good.
17:20You worthless piece of dirt are a light worker.
17:25Sixteen hour shifts with no breaks are commonplace.
17:31This place would have been enormously difficult to build.
17:33Imagine having to remove all of the material from inside these tunnels, putting it outside, but just digging through this sandstone and then reinforcing it and building a production center under a mountain.
17:47Conditions in the tunnels are terrible.
17:52Workers are forced to dig with little expertise and basic tools.
17:56Unstable bands of slate in the ceiling above mean that tunneling is a life or death gamble.
18:14Especially in areas where Saucol plans to build even wider tunnels and bigger halls.
18:30The aircraft assembly halls are planned to be at the center of the mountain.
18:35Components built in smaller tunnels will be fed into this working area where the ME 262 can be put together.
18:40The plan was to build it 450 meters in length and a height of 5.5 to 6 meters and a height of 15 meters so that the whole airplane will fit in here.
18:53But a cave this big might completely collapse during construction.
19:16So the Nazi engineers come up with a low-tech fix.
19:19Rather than excavating one big tunnel, workers dig four smaller tunnels so the weight of the rock above remains supported.
19:31Within these four tunnels they gradually secure the ceiling overhead and build up the foundations with concrete.
19:38Then they hollow out the cave until just two columns of rock remain.
19:44Once these are removed, a space big enough for a fighter jet is created.
19:49And it was big enough in here for a full-size Messerschmitt 262.
19:56Yeah.
19:58Very impressive technology.
20:00All this was done by hand.
20:01Yes.
20:02All this is done by forced laborers from all over Europe.
20:05The Nazis have long-term plans to produce 750 jets a month at the Rimac facility.
20:14But building the fully functional factory is taking much longer than they hoped.
20:18And this isn't the only challenge the ME 262 project faces.
20:29Willy Messerschmitt has built the world's fastest jet fighter.
20:33But it's so revolutionary the Nazis argue over how best to use it.
20:37Ever since its conception, Adolf Hitler has had strong opinions on how to exploit the jets deadly capabilities.
20:46Professor Messerschmitt, is this aircraft able to carry bombs?
20:51Yes, my Führer. It can carry for sure a 250 kilo per bomb, perhaps.
20:56This is the blitz bomber I have been requesting for years.
21:01What Hitler wants to do is have an aircraft that can knock an invasion force back into the sea.
21:09And so he thinks a fighter bomber, which could combine the role of being a fighter and drop bombs, is the answer to that.
21:16But Adolf Galland thinks that weighing down the aerodynamic ME 262 with a bomb will slow it down.
21:23Hitler is destroying the jets main asset as a fighter, its speed.
21:29Galland thought that Hitler's request to make the aircraft a bomber was absurd.
21:34Galland knew that the ME 262 was the point interceptor fighter that he was looking for to clear the allied bombers from the skies.
21:43By an invasion of the Atlantic.
21:45If the Atlantic invasion comes, it can easily fly through enemy defenses, attack ground targets and escape at speed.
21:53You, Messerschmitt, have to make all the necessary preparations to make this feasible.
22:02This was really the beginning of the misuse of the Messerschmitt 262. I felt my heart sink at that moment.
22:11Hitler is more concerned about attacking the enemy than providing his fighter pilots with the jet they need to defend Germany from allied bombers.
22:23If Galland is going to change how the ME 262 will be used, he has to take on the toughest opponent in the Third Reich, the Fuhrer himself.
22:34Galland knows how to play the game. He knows how to manipulate and talk to the right people and get what he wants.
22:43Galland enlists the help of Armaments Minister Albert Speer, one of the Fuhrer's closest confidants.
22:49Given the tactical situation, we believe the best we can do is use these aircrafts as a protective fighter force at our critical industries.
22:59No, never. I will order the Hortes to all fighter aircraft production. If you persist in this, I will have the fighter arm disbanded.
23:10But... I've heard quite enough.
23:13This is how Hitler paints the war. It's how he's always seen the war. He's a man of extremes. There's no middle ground. It's always one or the other in his mind.
23:24Before long, how the Germans use the ME 262 is going to be less critical than how quickly they can get them into the air.
23:34The Allies are planning to launch the largest invasion armada ever seen against Hitler's fortress Europe.
23:43At the RIMAC facility, Fritz Saukel's underground plane factory is a long way from completion. The die-hard Nazi pushes his workers to the limit.
23:59All the men must be fed, sheltered and treated in such a way as to exploit them to the highest possible extent, at the lowest conceivable degree of expenditure.
24:07Hermann Göring promises Hitler that when the Allied invasion comes, the German Air Force will smash them on the beaches.
24:18Göring needs as many planes as he can get and puts the pressure on Saukel to get things moving.
24:24But he might be too late.
24:32The 6th of June, 1944. D-Day. The Allied invasion of France.
24:39Thousands of troops and tanks pour ashore, taking on Hitler's Atlantic Wall.
24:44None of the new Nazi wonder jets are available to throw the Allies back into the sea.
25:05Worse, the Luftwaffe fails to provide the air support the German troops need.
25:12Göring's promise is false.
25:18The Allies secure their foothold and advance into mainland Europe.
25:23It signals the beginning of the end for the Third Reich.
25:26In desperation, work on the Reimag Me 262 factory steps up a gear.
25:42Belgian laborer Marcel van den Steen is one of 12,000 laborers forced to work 16-hour shifts, overseen by brutal SS guards.
25:50It's gone up. One slice of bread is now four cigarettes.
25:55You swine! Back to work!
25:59Saukel pushes Marcel and his fellow workers even harder.
26:04Starved of food and with the onset of winter, Marcel sees the death toll rise, along with the levels of brutality.
26:12Workers get thrashed here like dogs and so many have died in the last six months.
26:21I saw someone dying on the floor.
26:24I wasn't even allowed to help him.
26:27A German guard kept shouting,
26:29Leave him! Keep walking, pigs!
26:32Fifteen hundred prisoners will die at the Reimag facility.
26:35By winter 1944, the factory under the mountain is still not ready.
26:42The Nazis are forced to construct buildings outside of the tunnels, where the production of plane parts can go ahead.
26:50Including massive bomb-proof bunkers.
26:53There's simply no end in sight for Reimag's forced laborers.
27:08My future here is looking bleak.
27:10I'm suffering here like it's hell.
27:13But I don't want to die here for Hitler.
27:23But Fritz Saukel's cruel regime begins to pay off for the Nazis.
27:31His workers are finally ready to assemble complete ME 262s for the first time.
27:38The resources and effort that are required to do that are just absolutely enormous.
27:43And yet they do it.
27:45It never ceases to amaze me the lengths to which the Nazis go to continue their war effort.
27:54Saukel's attention turns to the next challenge.
27:57How to get his new planes into the skies above Nazi Germany.
28:05Germany's railways have been bombed into oblivion.
28:09And Reimag is in the middle of nowhere.
28:14The problem that Fritz Saukel runs into is,
28:16how do you get the aircraft to where they're needed to be,
28:19their combat operational squadrons.
28:22There isn't a clear place anywhere in this valley to put an airfield.
28:28So he comes up with either the craziest idea in the world,
28:31or the most ingenious idea in the world,
28:33and that's put an airstrip on the top of this mountain
28:38to move the aircraft out of this valley.
28:41Reimag's very own takeoff site will have to be at least 1,000 meters long to launch the new jet.
28:49Marcel van den Steen is one of over 1,000 workers forced to work under strict guard.
28:55Building the runway was an impressive undertaking.
28:59All of these trees had to be cleared, the topsoil had to be cleared,
29:04in addition to the concrete that had to be brought to the top of the mountain to build this runway.
29:08The laborers eventually level off the top of the mountain and form a concrete runway.
29:15Saukel is in a rush to launch the wonder jet.
29:19But the planes are still at the facility 85 meters below.
29:23Mike is on the hunt in the forest alongside Reimag's ruins to find out exactly how Saukel hauls a fighter plane to the top of a mountain.
29:42Well, these are the concrete pilings that the wooden trestles would have laid across.
29:59One and a half meter wooden trestles are kept in place by concrete foundations that still remain today.
30:05What this is, is an image taken at the end of the war, 1945.
30:11The picture is of the elevator that took the Messerschmitt 262 from this level up to the top of the mountain.
30:23The assembled ME 262 is hauled on a wheeled platform up a rail on the southern slope of the mountain, to the runway above.
30:31Over 1,000 workers are employed in building Saukel's ambitious vision.
30:38The human and engineering effort to get an aircraft up 660 feet at a 25 degree incline is enormous.
30:50What this tells us is the Nazis were incredibly desperate trying to get aircraft from bomb-proof production facilities up this mountain to an airfield at the top.
31:01In order to get them into the war as fast as possible.
31:05By January 1945, workers from factories all across Germany have given Hitler just 500 operational ME 262s.
31:15It's not enough.
31:17But the Fuhrer has given up on his fixation with using the jet as an attacking blitz bomber.
31:22Hitler finally relents, allows the ME 262 to be developed specifically as a fighter, and after that the argument is over.
31:32The Fuhrer gives orders allowing Adolf Galland to form his own jet fighter unit.
31:37He assembles Germany's top guns into an elite squadron.
31:45His aim?
31:46To finally prove the ME 262 is the perfect defensive fighter.
31:51We are to form the ultimate fighter squadron.
31:56We will be flying 262s as fully operational fighters.
31:59We have full reign to deploy them as a sea fit.
32:03Gentlemen, welcome to the future of air war.
32:05Let's clear this.
32:13ME 262s are rushed into battle across Germany, and the drive to get more of these jets into the air is immense.
32:21Nowhere is this pressure more obvious than at the RIMAG facility.
32:24Mike Pavolek treks further up the Walpersburg mountain to find out more about just how the aircraft was hauled up the steep incline.
32:39What we have here is the top of the aircraft elevator system.
32:46This was probably the wheelhouse for the entire elevator.
32:49And what that means is there were machinery components in here that ran the cables to bring the aircraft platform to this level.
32:59The runway is no longer visible.
33:02Lost to the forest.
33:04In 1945, it would be from this level that Saucol's new jets would have to take off.
33:12But the 1,000-meter runway will be dangerously short for a new jet fighter.
33:16They could have never landed if they had a problem.
33:21Because it was too short of a runway to land.
33:24They had to go where they were going.
33:26There was no coming back.
33:29The 21st of February, 1945.
33:32The big launch.
33:34Lift off from the short runway will be touch and go.
33:40Marcel and some of his fellow workers are allowed to witness the risky first flight.
33:43I hope he crashes.
33:46Marcel may get his wish.
33:48Marcel may get his wish.
34:09But against all the odds,
34:10Rimag's first Me 262 soars into the skies.
34:15Saucol has delivered his first jet to his Führer.
34:20From an engineering point of view, you've got to take your hat off to it.
34:23I mean, it's astonishing what they managed to achieve.
34:28March 1945.
34:30The Nazi drive to get the new jets into the sky shows no signs of diminishing.
34:35The Allies are on the borders of Germany.
34:39Soviets set their sights on Hitler and Berlin.
34:43The German capital already lies in ruins.
34:46There are not enough jet fighters to defend the city from bombers.
34:50But Hitler will never allow surrender.
34:51In one final act of defiance, his engineers fast track an Me 262 factory
35:01that takes the insanity of the Third Reich to a whole new level.
35:05In Muldorf, 70 kilometers from Munich in southern Germany,
35:12lie the remains of one of the most remarkable Nazi structures ever built.
35:20A desperate last-ditch idea to bolster the Me 262 production line
35:25and give the Nazis more of the new jets they need.
35:28This is the last remaining arch of a huge bunker structure
35:33that was planned and partly built by the Nazis during the last months of World War II.
35:38These remains of Nazi architecture were once a vast barrel-shaped bunker,
35:45built using arches made of poured concrete.
35:48The purpose of this bunker was to build parts for the Messerschmitt 262 fighter airplane.
35:59It is planned to be 400 meters long,
36:05with nine stories below producing 900 jets a month.
36:09This is a very impressive example of Nazi engineering.
36:21Incredibly, this structure can withstand a direct hit from a six-ton bomb.
36:30This is fantastic. How would you have built this?
36:34They had a mountain of gravel for the forum.
36:37Under here.
36:38Under here, where we're standing now.
36:41And on top of this gravel mountain, they would build the concrete.
36:50Each separate arch section is built on top of a huge mound of gravel,
36:56which is removed once the reinforced concrete is set.
36:59But how did the workers move this gravel once the arch had been constructed?
37:02A dark secret lies beneath the earth in this secluded forest.
37:05In Muldorf, local historian Michael Geertner searches for clues from Germany's Nazi past.
37:23You can see the dimensions of the gravel removal tunnel, which was big enough to host a railway.
37:37An underground railway runs beneath the entire length of Muldorf's vast fighter jet bunker.
37:47Carriages are moved into position below, allowing the fast removal of the gravel above.
37:52A good part of the gravel came down itself by gravity, but there were prisoners working by hand, removing the gravel from the carriages.
38:0410,000 workers are employed on the project.
38:118,500 of them forced laborers and inmates of a nearby concentration camp network.
38:17Of these, more than 3,000 will die.
38:22During the construction, the prisoners had to run with cement bags of 50 kilograms on their backs.
38:32And it would happen that they would slip out and just fall down into the liquid concrete and drown there.
38:39Despite the horrific loss of life, only 7 of the 12 intended arches are built.
38:45The Germans are months off completing the factory, and no fighters will ever be made here.
38:55Just one of the massive arches now remains.
38:58A moving monument to the human cost of the Me 262.
39:05The whole thing is insanity.
39:06I mean, it's just, it's another sign of the way in which the final year of the Third Reich is just going more and more into the realms of fantasy world.
39:21It is a fantasy that will soon be brought to an abrupt end.
39:25But first, Nazi fighter ace Adolf Galland still has a point to prove.
39:29His elite unit of fighter aces takes to the skies to attack Allied bombers.
39:38This is very much the last hussar, the last cavalry charge, so to speak, of the Luftwaffe.
39:45Galland's new jet fighters are 190 kilometers per hour quicker than the fastest Allied planes.
39:51Galland can use them as he wants, gunning down slow-moving bombers at high speed.
40:02One of the major tactics was, don't touch the throttles.
40:08Climbing to high altitudes, holding there, waiting for your targets, and then dashing through the targets.
40:15With the speed that guns can't follow, and especially also the prop fighters can't follow.
40:22The 18th of March, 1945, 37 Me 262s take on over 1,300 Allied aircraft.
40:34The heavily outnumbered Germans shoot down 13 enemy bombers for the loss of three jets.
40:40A ratio of over four to one.
40:42The Me 262 proves how deadly it can be.
40:47But it's too little, too late.
40:51The Luftwaffe, by the end of the war, didn't have enough pilots to fly the descent.
40:56They didn't have enough fuel to fly them.
40:59They didn't have enough maintenance units to maintain them.
41:02The Germans had a wonderful weapon.
41:06It was simply outnumbered by American and British material superiority.
41:10The 12th of April, 1945, the Americans advance towards the RIMAG facility.
41:19The troops are stunned by what they discover.
41:25A hidden subterranean factory, built to create an aircraft that looks like something out of science fiction.
41:35And the camps of the laborers that were forced to construct it.
41:38After eight months' imprisonment, Marcel van den Steen is a free man.
41:46I don't believe this. My heart is beating.
41:49I just want to kill those men that made us suffer.
41:52But Fritz Saukel is nowhere to be seen.
41:56He's now a Nazi on the run.
41:58His plan to build hundreds of jets at the RIMAG facility has failed.
42:02By the end of the war, when this installation was taken over by the Americans, only 24 or 26 Me 262s had left this installation, gone up the elevator and taken off from this very short runway.
42:17Obviously not enough aircraft to change the course of the war.
42:26Adolf Galland would ride his luck to the bitter end.
42:30And pay the price.
42:31My canopy was shattered and my right knee was struck by a bullet.
42:38I was losing power and in great pain, I flew for the deck.
42:52Galland somehow manages to survive the crash.
42:55He's later captured and taken to England where he would be interrogated about the Me 262.
43:02On the 9th of May, 1945, Fritz Saukel, the man responsible for RIMAG, was eventually captured at Hitler's mountain retreat.
43:11He's later tried at Nuremberg for his crimes and executed.
43:15Alongside him in the dock is Hermann Göring, who continued to believe the Me 262 could have won the air war if more of them had been built earlier.
43:28This was an aircraft that would never be forgotten.
43:32Anyone who has even just the remotest love of aviation cannot help but be seduced by the Me 262.
43:39But you can't escape its origins and how it was built in horrific conditions in underground factories by a monstrous regime that was just responsible for some incredible level of misery and death and mayhem.
44:00of mayhem.
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