History of the Second World War

In early 1941, the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau set out on Operation Berlin, an attempt to break into the Atlantic and strike at Britain's convoy lifeline. This episode follows Admiral Günther Lütjens as he weighs weather, fuel, British patrols, and strict orders against the promise of a major commerce-raiding success, while also examining how the absence of German carrier aviation limited what the surface fleet could accomplish. When the two battleships finally found convoy HX-106, the presence of the aging battleship Ramillies revealed the central tension of the operation: Germany's most powerful raiders could threaten the Atlantic, but they could not afford the damage that might come from forcing the issue.

Credit Episode Image: ⁠https://www.flickr.com/photos/state_library_south_australia/3331881750/in/album-72157623232407924
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Start off this one with a few quick hitters, then a question that takes 15 minutes to answer. Allied invasion of France in 1942? That Churchill guy you may have heard of? How did occupied economies work?
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode examines Germany's auxiliary cruisers and the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper as they carried the commerce war into distant shipping lanes during 1940 and early 1941. It follows the disguised merchant raiders that forced the Royal Navy to disperse its strength around the globe, then traces the Hipper's design limitations, encounters with convoys WS-5A and SLS-64, and repeated mechanical setbacks. Together, their operations reveal both the reach and the limitations of Germany's surface-raiding strategy before the battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau entered the Atlantic.

Credit Episode Image: https://www.flickr.com/photos/state_library_south_australia/3331881750/in/album-72157623232407924
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode begins a new look at the German surface raiding campaign of late 1940 and early 1941, when the Kriegsmarine tried to use cruisers and battleships to threaten Britain's Atlantic lifelines. We trace how the fall of France transformed Germany's naval options, why ports like Brest and St. Nazaire mattered, how intelligence shaped the hunt on both sides, and how the Admiral Scheer's attack on Convoy HX-84 forced the Royal Navy to rethink convoy protection just before the campaign reached its most dramatic phase.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The evacuation from Crete reaches its final stage as British, Commonwealth, and Greek forces try to escape through Sphakia while others are left behind at Rethymno and across the island. This episode follows the difficult choices made by commanders and naval crews, the losses suffered by the Royal Navy, the surrender and occupation that followed, and the way the defeat shaped later judgments of Freyberg, Churchill, and the battle itself.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices