Uploaded February 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Just like the Germans and most other war-waging nations of WWII, the Japanese used the concept of a weekly newsreel as an important propaganda tool.
Under the premise of "news", the images and reports shown were carefully select to convince the common people that Japan was winning the war. In 1939, the Motion Picture Law was introduced, requiring the showing of newsreels before and after all cinema movies.
In April 1940, the newsreel production was centralised in Japan, with the forced merger of all big publishing companies newsreel departments into the Japan News Film Corporation, which, from that point on, would produce Japans only newsreel- the "Japan News". These newsreels were produced untill the end of the war.
This is issue No. 230 from late October 1944.
It focuses on a series of American air raids on Taiwan, commonly known as the "Formosa Air Battle" from October 12th to October 16th.
While in reality, the Americans damaged a lot of Japanese military installations on Taiwan and succesfully lured out Japanese planes to their fleet to destroy them, resulting in 312 Japanese planes lost, the Japanese only shot down 89 American air craft and managed to damage a few American ships.
But, the Japanese pilots claimed dozens of American ships destroyed, including several aircraft carriers and battleships, and despite some concerns and questions from Japanese officers over these numbers, they were eventually published and it was publicly announced and celebrated that the Japanese had achieved a great victory, while in reality, they lost hundreds of planes and didnt manage to sink a single American ship.
This newsreel focuses on that event, by showing footage of destroyed American planes, a declaration by the Japanese grand headquarters about the alledged success against American ships, and a rally in Tokyo, including a speech of Japanese Prime Minister Koiso.
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Subtitles made by me.
Just like the Germans and most other war-waging nations of WWII, the Japanese used the concept of a weekly newsreel as an important propaganda tool.
Under the premise of "news", the images and reports shown were carefully select to convince the common people that Japan was winning the war. In 1939, the Motion Picture Law was introduced, requiring the showing of newsreels before and after all cinema movies.
In April 1940, the newsreel production was centralised in Japan, with the forced merger of all big publishing companies newsreel departments into the Japan News Film Corporation, which, from that point on, would produce Japans only newsreel- the "Japan News". These newsreels were produced untill the end of the war.
This is issue No. 230 from late October 1944.
It focuses on a series of American air raids on Taiwan, commonly known as the "Formosa Air Battle" from October 12th to October 16th.
While in reality, the Americans damaged a lot of Japanese military installations on Taiwan and succesfully lured out Japanese planes to their fleet to destroy them, resulting in 312 Japanese planes lost, the Japanese only shot down 89 American air craft and managed to damage a few American ships.
But, the Japanese pilots claimed dozens of American ships destroyed, including several aircraft carriers and battleships, and despite some concerns and questions from Japanese officers over these numbers, they were eventually published and it was publicly announced and celebrated that the Japanese had achieved a great victory, while in reality, they lost hundreds of planes and didnt manage to sink a single American ship.
This newsreel focuses on that event, by showing footage of destroyed American planes, a declaration by the Japanese grand headquarters about the alledged success against American ships, and a rally in Tokyo, including a speech of Japanese Prime Minister Koiso.
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Subtitles made by me.
](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nQ-KpoZNkIM/mqdefault.jpg "Ufa Sound Week No. 499- 28 March 1940 [Full HD](U-Boat Shipyard, Bf-109 Production, Scapa Flow Raid)
The Ufa (Universum Film AG) was a German movie and TV company, founded in December 1917. It was founded by several companies, with the German goverment secretly involved; and its initial goal was to produce pro-German propaganda movies that would be shown outside of Germany.
After the end of WWI, however, the focus shifted on producing movies for Germany for commercial profit.
In 1927, Ufa had financial difficulties and was facing bankruptcy, the company was bough by right-wing media mogul Alfred Hugenberg, who continued production as normal, but also Newsreels of the Ufa to advertise his own party and later the Nazi party.
After the Nazis rose to power, Ufa, like all other movie companies, came under strict goverment control, and in March 1937, Hugenberg had to sell the majority of his stakes in Ufa to a goverment-controlled company; the Ufa thus came under direct goverment control.
The Ufa Week was produced from September 1925 onwards, initially as silent newsreel, from September 1930 onwards with sound, hence the name was changed to Ufa Sound Week.
Like all newsreels in Nazi Germany, it was not a neutral news source, but rather full of Nazi propaganda. After the outbreak of WWII, the content that all newsreels produced was unified, and in mid-1940, all newsreels were unified to The German Newsweek.
This here is Ufa Sound Week No. 499 from late March 1940.
It shows footage from a meeting between Mussolini and Hitler, the construction of the new Nibelungen Bridge in Linz, and footage of building of new U-Boats and Bf-109 fighter planes.
The last section shows lenghty post-mission briefing from an attack of a German bomber squadron on British ships at Scapa Flow.
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Subtitles made by me.")
![German Newsweek No. 677- 25 August 1943 [Full HD] (SA Sport Festival, Eastern Front Combat Footage)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/naBddSFWGm8/mqdefault.jpg "German Newsweek No. 677- 25 August 1943 [Full HD] (SA Sport Festival, Eastern Front Combat Footage)
The German Newsweek (Die Deutsche Wochenschau) was the unified newsreel of Germany from 1940-1945. The concept of a weekly newsreel was much older, dating back to WWI, and in the 1930s, there were several different weekly newsreels in Germany.
With the outbreak of WWII, these were unified and from June 1940 onwards shown under the title of The German Newsweek.
It was one of the most important aspects of German wartime propaganda. These Newsreels were made to show the war in a favorable way for the Germans, even when the tide of the was clearly turned against German after 1943. Even in 1945, they still tried to generate a feeling of resistance and told the people that Germany is able to continue its defense.
They also often contain other elements of Nazi propaganda, such a antisemitic footage, or footage describing the alleged misery or bad conditions among the Allied nations or the Soviet Union, and the superiority of Germany in fields of arts, social programs and living conditions.
Each week, over 2000 copies were sent to theaters and movie houses throughout Germany and shown to the general public, as well as frontline soldiers, RAD-workers etc.
The showing was mandatory before films, and later, a regulation was added that people were not allowed to enter the cinema after the Wochenschau started, forcing people to sit through it if they wanted to watch a film.
285 wartime issues were produced, from September 1939 (No. 470) to March 1945 (No. 755).
This is issue No. 677, released in mid-August 1943.
It shows footage from an SA sport festival in Prague, and a gliding competition of the Hitler Youth. The next scene showcases how packages are prepared for German POWs in enemy countries, followed by a section about the fight against Malaria, among other scenes.
Then, combat footage from the Eastern Front is shown, first from the area around Lake Ladoga, and then from the Battle of Kursk, including bombers attacking enemy positions at Belgorod and tanks and infantry attacking in the area at Orel.
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Subtitles made by me.")
![German Instruction Video about V1 Missile Launch- ca. 1943 [Full HD]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/oFuzCN4XqzU/mqdefault.jpg "German Instruction Video about V1 Missile Launch- ca. 1943 [Full HD]
The Fiesler Fi 103, officially called V1 (Vergeltungswaffe- “Vengeance Weapon”) was the world’s first operational cruise missile.
Development started already in the late 1930s, by engineer Fritz Gosslau from the Argus Engine Company in Berlin. In early 1942, the Fiesler company joined the project and built the actual missile, which was first tested in December 1942. In May 1943, a comparison between the V1 and V2 was conducted, and it was decided to continue development of both weapons.
The first use of the weapon was on June 13th, 1944, against London, and until March 1945, around 12,000 of these rockets were launched, mainly against London and the port of Antwerp, to disrupt Allied supply.
However, the V1 failed to achieve a major effect, and while it caused some panic among British civilians, it did not disrupt British war production. It was also a pretty inaccurate weapon. For example, during an attack on Manchester on December 24th, 1944, 50 rockets were launched, but only 30 reach Britain, and only a single one hit the city area of Manchester. Many rockets missed their targets, hitting fields or small villages in the countryside, causing almost no damage.
The following is a German instruction video about the launch of the V1, explaining the mechanism behind the launch, and showing a test launch of a V1, including a slow-motion scene, footage of the V-1 during flight and it hitting the ground. It also explains technical details about how the missile is launched and the effect it has on a target.
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Subtitles made by me.")
![Footage from German Air Force Bomber Training School- 16 January 1941 [Full HD]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/olss1ZKMSlY/mqdefault.jpg "Footage from German Air Force Bomber Training School- 16 January 1941 [Full HD]
During WWII, Germany, like all war-waging nations, extensively used bombers, both for strategic and tactical bombing.Flying and operating a bomber is a difficult task, so the crews had to be well-trained to be efficient in combat. This video shows footage from a German bomber school, were future pilots and crew members would receive training in navigation, bombing, target detection and defensive firing with MGs. The footage also shows the first training flight of the new crews.
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Subtitles made by me.")
![“Auschwitz”-Soviet Film about the Concentration Camp Auschwitz (German Version)- June 1945 [Full HD]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/pzqO_Up4Qws/mqdefault.jpg "“Auschwitz”-Soviet Film about the Concentration Camp Auschwitz (German Version)- June 1945 [Full HD]
Auschwitz is the title of a Soviet documentary/propaganda film about the infamous German concentration camp Auschwitz in occupied Poland, where around 1,1 Million people, the majority Jews, were killed by the Germans as part of the Holocaust.
The camp in Auschwitz has become a symbol of the Holocaust, and the date of its liberation, January 27th, 1945, is nowadays remembered as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Shortly after the Liberation, in January and February, Soviet cameramen arrived at Auschwitz, taking the earliest photos and footage of the camp. This also included a number of staged and re-enacted scenes, such as of the Liberation itself, which was not filmed originally.
The footage was then edited into a movie simply called Auschwitz which premiered in Moscow in May 1945; a German dub was created in June and mainly shown in the Soviet occupation zones in Germany and Austria.
Many scenes from this film were later used in documentaries about the Holocaust.
The film contains a number of inaccuracies, such as the early claims by the Soviets that around 4 million people were killed in Auschwitz (in reality, this number was at 1,1 million). These inaccuracies are mostly because the full extent of the Holocaust was not well researched so shortly after the end of the war, but also because the Soviets wanted to keep the numbers higher for propaganda reasons.
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Subtitles made by me.")
