Between Hitler and Stalin: Europe’s Darkest Years

From 1930 to 1945, Eastern Europe became the stage of mass violence on an unprecedented scale.

In the vast territory comprising Poland, the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine, and parts of Russia, the crimes of Nazi Germany and those in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin overlap. While the Wehrmacht and the Red Army clashed in brutal battles, the SS and the Soviet secret police spread fear and terror among civilians. Here, two dictatorships unleashed a reign of violence unlike anything seen before. Historians estimate that around 14 million civilians were murdered in this region alone – mainly Jews, Poles, Balts, Belarusians, and Ukrainians. What made Eastern Europe the epicenter of such devastation? To what extent did Stalin’s policies of repression pave the way for the German occupiers long before the war began? Based on interviews with contemporary witnesses and extensively researched archive material, the documentary explores the mechanisms of terror, mass murder, and famine.