Spying on Hitler’s Army: The Secret Recordings

Story

Synopsis

British intelligence undertook an audacious operation to listen in on the private conversations of 10,000 German prisoners of war without their ever knowing they were being overheard. The prisoners' unguarded reminiscences and unintentional confessions have only just come to light, and prove how closely the German army were involved in the atrocities of the Holocaust. British intelligence requisitioned three stately homes for this epic task, and converted each into an elaborate trap. The 100,000 hours of conversation they captured provided crucial intelligence that changed the course of the war, and revealed some of its worst horrors, from rape to mass executions to one of the earliest bulletins from the concentration camps. But when the fighting ended, the recordings were destroyed and the transcripts locked away for half a century. Only now have they been declassified, researched and cross-referenced.

Director

Christopher Spencer

Writers

Christopher Spencer

Language

English

Country

United Kingdom

Release date

2 June 2013

Ensemble

Cast

• 

  Philip Glenister

  Narrator

• 

  David Barrass

  General Kittel

• 

  Nicholas Farrell

  General von Thoma

• 

  Jack Fortune

  General Bruhn

• 

  Rupert Frazer

  General Cruwell

• Richard Freeman

  General Von Choltitz

• Peter Harding

  General Schlieben

• Gareth Keiran Jones

  Fried

• 

  Elliott Jordan

  Hartelt

• 

  Valentine Pelka

  General Von Felbert

• Rafe Pugh

  Minnieur

• 

  Alan Turkington

  Pffanberger