Star Media - Soviet Storm: WWII in the East: Series 1 (2011) 1080p WEB-DL x264 AAC MVGroup

On 22nd June 1941, Adolf Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa--the Nazi invasion of Soviet Russia. Four million troops, backed by 19 panzer divisions, fought their way east, confident of total victory within a just few short months. They were wrong.
Instead of collapsing, the Soviet Union held strong and--under the utterly ruthless leadership of Josef Stalin--fought a savage, four year war of attrition on a scale the world had never before witnessed. Over 30 million people would be slaughtered in the horror, most of them civilians. Four out of every ten German soldiers to be killed in WWII would die fighting the Russians. The Red Army suffered ten times as many dead as the Western Allies combined. Hitler and Stalin were prepared to accept losses on any scale in the pursuit of victory.
Soviet Storm tells the complete story of the War on the Eastern Front, profiling the epic campaigns and battles, revealing the tactics employed by both sides and exposing the true horrors of a conflict almost unimaginable in its sheers cruelty and depravity. Here were the greatest civilian losses the largest battle and the biggest tank battle--Kursk--the world has ever seen. This was war on a scale and ferocity never seen before as Hitler and Stalin battled for the future of the world.

Part 1: Operation Barbarossa
The Battle of Britain is over. The Luftwaffe has been driven to exhaustion, and Germany suffers its first major defeat. Even though Britain remains undefeated, it is so isolated that Hitler has no concerns about turning his attention East. In April 1940 Hitler signed the operation Barbarossa, and heavy war machinery started making its way to the boundaries of the USSR. Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the USSR, takes the Soviets completely by surprise and the Red Army suffers terrible casualties. However, the very first battles in June 1941 at the border at the Brest Fortress, near Kiev and Minsk broke the German design of Blitzkrieg, a 'lightning war'. Massive losses sustained by the retreating Red Army could well be explained but the mistakes had to be paid for by both the soldiers and generals.

Part 2: The Battle of Kiev
After the swift success at Smolensk, Hitler has diverted the bulk of Heinz Guderian's panzers down to the South, so as to capture the Ukrainian capital Kiev, considered more important than Moscow in Hitler's mind. It begins a gigantic clash and turns out to be the biggest military encirclement in history. Despite heroic and long resistance, approximately six hundred and fifty thousand Soviet soldiers face captivity or death.

Part 3: The Defence of Sevastopol
Hitler's 1941 invasion of the USSR ran into some its fiercest resistance at the Black Sea ports of Odessa and Sevastopol, where Soviet elite naval infantry brigades fought doggedly to hold back German and Romanian troops. Erich von Manstein's soldiers have trapped a massive Soviet force in Crimea, but the doomed troops have no intentions of surrendering, strongly motivated by patriotism. Manstein assembles the greatest concentration of artillery in history, which includes the world's biggest railway-gun nicknamed "Dora," and for eight months Soviets troops are savagely bombarded; destroying Sevastopol's only harbor. Realizing the battle is hopelessly lost, the Soviet forces finally surrender.

Part 4: The Battle of Moscow
From the very first days of the war the USSR capitol had been preparing its defense. Institutions and plants, embassies and ministries were evacuated. In order to organize the defense of Moscow and stifle the fascist offensive, Marshal Zhukov was called from Leningrad to Moscow.

Part 5: The Siege of Leningrad
Leningrad, a vital and large Baltic sea port, is facing the entire weight of Army Group North. The Soviets have no reserves to spare as the Battle of Moscow is about to begin. Wilhelm von Leeb's Army Group North fails to take Leningrad, but begins a horrible siege that will last 872 days, in which over a million civilians will die of starvation and disease.
The takeover of Leningrad was of strategic importance for the German Command. On the 8th of September 1941 the Germans reached Lake Ladoga and the city turned out to be cut off from the 'mainland'. Death from starvation began to threaten the population of Leningrad. The ships of the Baltic Fleet, anti-aircraft guns, artillery and troops of the Red Army defended the city and the 'life road' that became operable after the frosts. Multiple attempts of the Soviet Command to break though the encirclement failed one after another.

Part 6: The Rzhev Meat-Grinder
The German conquests of 1941 left Hitler's troops perilously close to the Soviet capital, Moscow. Around Rzhev terrible fighting raged as the Red Army attacked again and again to drive back the invader. The capture of Rzhev, the city that connects all railroads in Western Russia, is imperative. It will cost the lives of some 3 million Soviet soldiers and 500 000 German soldiers. It will take the Soviets a total of 3 years to throw the Germans firmly out of the city. These bloodbaths will become known by the veterans and historians as "The Rzhev Meat-Grinder".

Part 7: The Battle of Stalingrad
After the failure to take both Moscow and Leningrad, Hitler sets his sights on the oil fields in the Caucasus. If captured, the Red Army will lose 70–90 per cent of all its oil resources. Therefore, the famous city on the Volga, Stalingrad, must be "held at all costs." The German General Staff thinks taking the city will be a matter of a few weeks, but events steadily turn against the Germans. It will be one of the most costly, famous, and decisive battles of the Second World War.

Part 8: The Battle of the Caucasus
In 1942 Hitler launched his great summer offensive against the Soviet oil fields in the Caucasus. If he could seize control of this vital resource, the war might be lost. But bitter fighting in the Caucasus Mountains, and in the streets of Stalingrad, would thwart Hitler's dream.

Part 9: The Battle of Kursk
After two years of war, Hitler was no closer to victory in the East, and his forces had suffered a devastating defeat at Stalingrad. Now the Germans gathered their strength for one last massive offensive to decide the outcome of the war.