Chris Madel

Yeah, he has.

And what he's done is he's gone into all the German archives and he's looked at all the original sources.

So he's looked at what they're all saying at the time.

He's looked at all the minutes of all the various conferences, the planning notes, the operational notes.

He's looked at statistics.

And the Germans are very good at keeping all that stuff.

And I know this from personal experience, having been to those same archives.

You know, it's all there.

And we left, didn't we, with the last episode, Stalin's response to the plan, a proposal of a four-power pact between Japan, Italy, Germany, and the Soviet Union.

And he gave five conditions, all of which were impossible for the others to accept, and least of all, Germany.

I think it's fair to say that plans for the invasion of the Soviet Union, from a German point of view, accelerate after Stalin's response.

I mean...

Hitler is not just vexed.

He's incensed.

He's furious.

They're just going into a self-delusion mode.

They know it in their heart of hearts, but they're convincing themselves that it's all going to be fine.

What a situation to have got yourself in.

And to make matters worse, Italy has then invaded Greece at the very end of October and is making a complete hash of it.

And because of all this, Hitler can't just sit back and ignore what is going on on his southern front.