After the First World War the German Army was in crisis. Limited in the size and its equipment by the Versailles Treaty which ended the war, it was a shadow of the mighty force it had been in 1914. Help came from a surprising source. Soviet Russia.Historian Ian Johnson explains to Dan how it was the Soviets who helped rebuild the German military machine before World War Two. In this episode from the archive, explore this relationship in which the Soviets helped turn the Wehrmacht into a military machine that in 1941-2 came very close to toppling the Soviet state.For more Warfare content, subscribe to our Warfare newsletter here.If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today!To download, go to Android or Apple store.Music provided by All3Media. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.