This film is one of a series of newsreels that was packaged and sold to the German public in department stores before and during WWII. This particular film focuses on the invasion of Lithuania in the early stage of Operation Barbarossa. At :36, a road sign for Chernyshevskoye is seen, on the eastern part of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, close to the border with Lithuania. At :38, German soldiers open the border gates to allow invading forces entry. At :44, combat scenes with German soldiers advancing under fire. At :48, what appear to be Soviet or Red Army soldiers are seen surrendering to the Germans. At :56, the line of advance towards Kaunas, Lithuania is shown on a map. At 1:01, artillery fires a barrage as panzer tanks rumble forward. Mortars (1:06) and machine guns are shown in action. At 1:18, Germans in a truck move through a cloud of smoke. At 1:24, the Germans are saluted by civilians who apparently view them as liberators. At 1:37 a German soldier is presented with flowers by a pretty nurse. At 1:43, the map indicates an advance towards Daugavpils, second in size only to the capital Riga. German troops advance on bicycles, in tanks, and armored vehicles. A panzer rumbles past at 2:07. At 2:10, a thrust is made towards Minsk, through Grodno in modern Belarus. Cavalry — troops on horseback — are seen threading their way down a street. At 2:31 a German officer commands an artillery strike against a factory smokestack and through the magic of editing, it is destroyed. At 2:49, German troops advance under fire, taking prisoners as they move. A smashed concrete blockhouse, pillbox or strongpoint is shown. At 2:59, a body lies in the street. At 1:03, a smashed Russian tank is shown, its tracks badly damaged. The Germans are on the move again, with infantry riding on tanks towards the center of Grodno. At 3:10 the city is seen aflame. At 3:14, the thrust on Brest, in modern day Belarus, is shown. A ruined factory is seen at 3:29. At 3:34 a shoeless, deceased Soviet soldier lies on the ground as if asleep. Many of his comrades are shown surrendering or taken prisoner. At 3:42, a Heinkel He 111 is shown taking off on a bombing mission. At 4:21 a massive railroad gun fires at the Soviets, at 4:24 a Stuka hits a factory with a bomb, almost flattening it. The film ends with a shot of a panzer on the move, deep into the heart of Russia.

German troops attacked Soviet forces in Operation Barbarossa on June 22, 1941. Many Latvians did not like the Russians, who they saw as occupiers, and they assisted the Germans against the Red Army. By June 29, Riga was in German hands, and the entire nation was under Germany control by July 10. Latvia then became the Province General of Latvia, an occupied state controlled by Germany. As the population began to realize that their German occupiers were even more oppressive than the Soviets, resistance grew, but anyone who openly defied the occupation was killed or (like much of Latvia’s Jewish population) sent to concentration camps. The occupation of Lithuania lasted to January 28, 1945.

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com