"Blitzkrieg"

A mechanized light armored unit spearheads the advance into Poland during the early morning hours of September 1, 1939

Vicious struggle for villages, towns, farms and cities preceded the German war machine across vast swathes of Russian territory.

German military police sets up a checkpoint inside Polish territory

Not far from the east would rise the vast Klooga concentration camp complex. This is present-day Estonia.

Goosestepping in the beautiful avenues of Paris.

"The people in the houses were rudely awoken by the din of our tanks, the clatter and roar of tracks and engines. Troops lay bivouacked beside the road, military vehicles stood parked in farmyards and in some places on the road itself. Civilians and French troops, their faces distorted with terror, lay huddled in the ditches, alongside hedges and in every hollow beside the road. We passed refugee columns, the carts abandoned by their owners, who had fled in panic into the fields. On we went, at a steady speed, towards our objective. Every so often a quick glance at the map by a shaded light and a short wireless message to Divisional H.Q. to report the position and thus the success of 25th Panzer Regiment. Every so often a look out of the hatch to assure myself that there was still no resistance and that contact was being maintained to the rear. The flat countryside lay spread out around us under the cold light of the moon. We were through the Maginot Line! It was hardly conceivable. Twenty-two years before we had stood for four and a half long years before this self-same enemy and had won victory after victory and yet finally lost the war. And now we had broken through the renowned Maginot Line and were driving deep into enemy territory. It was not just a beautiful dream. It was reality."

                                                                                                    -- Erwin Rommel