Original subtitles

(dramatic music)

Weapons have existed as long as humankind.

For millennia, they have determined

the destiny of generations.

Weapons bring suffering and death.

They show what humans can inflict upon other humans.

But they are also intended to keep the peace

and pave new ways for technology.

For centuries, three weapons have marked

the most immediate form of warfare, hand-to-hand combat.

Astonishing experiments will reveal

how closely physical and psychological factors

can be intertwined.

To this day, the bayonet is still used by many armies

and there's a reason for this.

(soldier yelling)

So, I felt afraid.

The war hammer.

A brute instrument against the knight's armor.

That's just blows to the body.

What would a weapon like this do with a blow to the head?

The Roman gladius, the short sword

that will help conquering an entire empire.

The Romans used a special technique

to draw the sword.

The gladius, for more than half a century,

it was the standard weapon of Roman legionaries.

A weapon that marked a whole era.

(powerful music)

It is the year 200 B.C.E.

After a battle against the Romans, the Macedonian warriors

want to bury their dead comrades.

A chronicler later reports on the terrifying wounds

inflicted by Roman swords.

The Macedonians were absolutely horrified by the damage

the Romans had done to the bodies of their soldiers.

These men weren't complete anymore.

This was very very successful, psychologically

as well as militarily.

The idea for the short sword

was originally developed by the Celtiberians in Spain.

The Romans adopt it and gradually perfect the system.

The Romans conquered Spain from the Carthaginians

and took over these assets.

They also took over the basic sword design,

which was Iberian rather than Roman.

So this is the Roman's being their usual relentless,

remorseless, ruthless selves.

They've found something really good

and they're going to make the very best use of it.

An effective weapon for hand to hand combat,

as an addition to range weapons, like the pilum,

is essential for survival.

(intense music)

Earlier Romans swords are thin and long.

They don't fit to the Roman combat technique.

The dense testudou or tortoise formation.

Swords expert Stephan Rote can show us why.

When you're in a Roman formation

and you carry your sword on the left hip,

you'll struggle a lot to unsheath it.

I'll show you.

This way, I hit the man behind me.

If I try to make a level cut, I hit the man next to me too.

It's life threatening for my fellow combatants

to fight next to me.

The worst case would be

that I would have to open the formation

to draw my sword forwards.

Meaning I would open myself completely.

I would create a gap for the enemies to penetrate

and destroy the formation.

We are simulating an ancient

close combat situation.

Using a long sword first.

(intense music)

That would be the end of me.

A complete catastrophe.

I'd open the shield wall, in fact,

that's not only my end but the end for my comrades as well.

Stephan Roth expose

how historical cut and thrust weapons

were deployed and manufactured.

He will show us how he forges a gladius

with traditional techniques.

(powerful music)

(fire crackling)

He needs a special raw material for this project.

Steel, in this form it doesn't look like

one of the most important materials in the world.

(powerful music)

This is raw steel.

It looks quite unspectacular, like coral.

You can't see yet that it's steel.

But that's the kind of material they used 2,000 years ago.

We want to forge a traditional sword here.

As close to the original as possible.

And of course we can only achieve this with steel.

(lively music)

Stefan Roth and his apprentice

intend to turn this red hot lump

into a sharp and precise sword.

There is a lot of work ahead for them.

They have to heat and hammer the steel over and over again.

This is how it gets into the right form for the sword blank.

(lively music)

The next step, folding the steel.

This process helps remove impurities and micro-fractures

and evens out the carbon content,

making the material extremely stable.

You usually fold eight to 20 times.

Folding eight times is approximately one day's work.

Whether I'm in Africa, Europe or Asia,

the preparation process, or rather the folding

and homogenizing of the steel, is the same everywhere.

For his work, Stephan Roth

refers back to a 3,500 year old tradition.

Archeological finds of iron weapons and tools

dating back to this period.

Back then, they brought about

a veritable revolution in warfare.

From 800 B.C. onwards, the Romans, Celtic

and Germanic peoples used blumeries made of clay

for smelting iron ore.

One of the things, for example, Romans were able to do

as they expand their empire, they get to control

resource ares where they can find new materials.

So they're stripping out timber from their empire

because they've used their own, they're using iron

from Spain, Spanish islands, been a very significant part

of weapons manufacturing since the early iron age.

The Carthaginians use Spanish iron.

The Romans use Spanish iron to make the gladius.

As you extend your resource base

you can pick up other weapons.

You can pick up both local ideas but also local resources.

So one of the things you're conquering is the ability

to manufacture weapons.

At temperatures of more than

1100 degrees celsius,

smelted iron flows out of the bloomery.

It is the basic material for steel.

It all starts with iron ore.

Strictly speaking, that's iron oxide.

The compound of iron and oxygen.

The problem is the oxygen.

It affects the material properties, so you get rid of it

by heating it.

You also add carbon because it uses oxygen and combustion.

But afterwards, you have a high carbon proportion.

Making the steel brittle.

There are a few more elements that you don't want in there

and you get rid of all of these by burning them off

with a very high temperature.

The weapons industry has developed

many significant innovations in steel processing.

The first cast steel cannon was developed in Esson

in 1847 by the German company Kru.

And one of the most important factors

is that the steel can be easy processed

due to its flexibility.

Milling, rolling it is really quite versatile.

And afterwards you can harden it again as you wish,

which it means that it's easy to work with

yet very resistant once processed.

Whether it's for manufacturing weapons

or for civil purposes, steel casting is a challenging

and dangerous process in the 19th century.

The workers are poorly protected.

And cast steel is at a temperature of 1600 degrees celsius.

Today most of the working steps

close to the extremely hot liquid steel

are done by machines.

Germany, once world leader has lost much of its significance

for the steel industry.

About 50% of today's global steel production

is located in China.

(light music)

Forging the gladius is hard, physical work.

But at the same time, Stefan Roth

has to pay close attention to the material

and its properties.

Forging the gladius is particularly difficult

because we have a very wide, flat surface.

You have to be very careful not to hammer any edges

into the material.

This could cause problems later in the process

when the sword will be grinded.

(light music)

Sophisticated forging methods

can further improve steel, depending on the scope

of the application.

Ancient blacksmiths were already aware of this.

Some blades have been analyzed metallurgically

and it was found that the Romans produced top quality steel.

The high quality of the blade

for Roman hand to hand combat is however,

not only due to the Roman's

extraordinary blacksmithing skills,

they also used a special material, Noric steel.

This feramericum was a little miracle

of the classical era.

It had remarkable properties.

It is believed today that this raw material

might have stemmed from a comet.

And that the comet already consisted

of a special combination of metals.

We could produce this metal today in elaborate processes

in high-tech blast furnaces.

But it was readily available to the Romans

as a mineral in Austria.

At the end of the first century B.C.E.

the Romans, under Emperor Augustus, conquered the territory

that is now known as Austria.

They used the local ore to make their glade tougher

and easier to sharpen.

The sword becomes more successful and more prevalent.

The gladius is an extraordinary sword,

revolutionary for its time.

A very wide blade, sometimes up to nine centimeters.

The sword has a very prominent point.

It is, of course, double edged.

You can use it to cut.

But actually the point is mainly designed for stabbing.

It's a very long, mean weapon.

It's pretty nasty if you think what they could do with it.

(light music)

The short sword with its wide, hard steel blade

is only 50 to 60 centimeters long,

and weighs 1.2 to 1.6 kilograms.

It will become the dominant close combat weapon

of the ancient world.

(light music)

But why is the gladius so useful in formation fighting?

How do the legionaries keep their war formation tight?

Swords expert Stefan Roth has studied

the Roman's combat technique.

The Romans found a solution to the problem

by wearing the gladius on their right side,

and using a special technique to draw the sword.

So that they would not put their neighbor in danger

or hinder them in any way.

What they did was grab the sword

with their hand turned inwards,

unsheath it and wait for the attack.

Exactly what they needed in this formation.

(dramatic music)

The enemy is attacking again.

Can our Roman formation,

this time armed with short swords, stop them?

(dramatic music)

The legionaries can thrust their glade

without opening their formation.

The short, hard blade allows the warriors

to wound their opponents in various ways.

But always quickly and effectively.

The Romans created a perfect weapon for killing people

at very close quarters.

It had a sharp point and two very sharp blades.

So which ever way you used it, it was going to do

a lot of damage.

People have compared the Roman army to a mincing machine.

They literally chopped up the opposition

and inflicted terrible injuries on them,

which both disabled them and demoralized them.

The gladius, a short sword

conquers the ancient world.

Copied from the Celtiberians in Spain,

perfected over centuries, hardened through special steel.

The gladius, in their hands, the Roman legions

conquer ever more territories.

In the beginning of the third century C.E.

they rule over the majority of the then-known world.

During its golden age, at it's largest expanse,

the Imperial Romanum stretches from the north of Britannia,

the coast of the Black Sea.

For more than half a millennium, the Romans have the most

powerful army of the ancient world.

Their sophisticated military structure and perfect logistics

paved their way to success.

Everywhere in the huge empire military structures

are the same.

The Romans set up, train and lead each cohort,

each legion, according to strict rules.

(energetic music)

Neither the Celts nor the Tuscons

were particularly good at fighting in a coherent group.

They tended to fight as a mass of individuals.

Whereas the Romans fought as a solid, professional body

of trained men.

And this has been the great advantage of disciplined,

professional armies throughout history.

It's not their numbers, it's not necessarily their skill,

their strengths, it's the cohesion with which they fight.

During month long campaigns Roman legionaries

have to function like clockwork.

They build their camps following the same plans and rules.

(energetic music)

An experienced legionary would always find his way

in any imperial camp.

(energetic music)

Every Roman immediately knows

to whom he has to report,

where to find the commandant's tent,

where to find the Shrine of the Standards

and where to find his tent.

This should not be underestimated.

The efficiency of Roman engineers is reflected

in the infrastructure they built

in newly conquered provinces.

Many of their achievements live on to this very day.

(lively music)

Of course the Roman Empire

has left its marks, some of which can still be seen today.

The Roman's perfected the entire engineering system.

We have streets and bridges built by the Romans

that you can still use in Spain, for example.

You can drive over them with a modern car.

They can withstand this.

(bright music)

In order to move their troops

in ordinance quickly, the Roman's built

an unprecedented road network

throughout their vast empire.

At its largest expansion, the network was about

85,000 kilometers long.

(dynamic music)

Some of the traces of the empire are still visibile today.

And many modern streets run exactly where the Roman roads

used to be.

The way the Romans manufacture and use the gladius

is another instance of their superior technology

and organization.

It remains a pivotal weapon until the fall of the empire.

Many of the Roman's ingenious inventions fade into oblivion

as the ancient world gives way to the middle ages.

(dynamic music)

The era of knights begins entailing the search

for military means to fight armored-clad knights on horses.

The most efficient weapon against them

is widely unknown today.

The war hammer.

San Romano, Northern Italy, it's the first of June, 1432.

The troops of Florence and Sienna

are facing a fierce battle.

Their knights are in full armor.

They will fight for hours.

In the end, it's the Florentines who emerge victorious.

The battle was immortalized thanks to a picture

by Florentine painter, Paolo Uccello.

It shows a knight swinging his war hammer,

a rare artistic depiction of this weapon.

(dark music)

The medieval village, In-e-curbin.

It is here where we want to explore the secrets

of the war hammer.

And find out why it has almost been forgotten.

Modern books and films almost always depict knights

with their typical long sword.

(dark music)

Together with stunt men Yoakim

weapons expert Mike Loweds is preparing an experiment.

They set up a typical breast plate made from steel.

An integral part of late medieval armor.

The main job of this is to deflect.

Yoakim has to become a knight

for the experiment.

He will attack his opponent, sitting on this horse

in full armor.

Just like in the middle ages.

The process takes almost 30 minutes.

He has to put on roughly 15 parts, one by one.

(dramatic music)

Mail, the gambison made of linen

and plate armor on top of it.

The intention of the numerous layers

is to protect the knight from all dangers

that may arise in the thick of a fight.

But how immobile will the heavy armor make him?

(dark music)

Of course you can tell a difference

because you are wearing

approximately between 20 to 25 kilos more.

But of course it's made so that it supports the way

your body is supposed to be moving.

So if I fall to the ground, there's this big misconception

that you can't get up again.

But of course you can because in battle,

you could get torn off your horse and then you would

be lying on the ground.

And of course you need to get up again

so you can protect yourself.

Can Yoakim's long sword

seriously damages the dummy in armor at all?

(tense music)

The armor withstands the attack.

The blade even breaks.

What I could see just by observation

was the shape of the armor, it deflected it.

That sword didn't deliver full force into the man.

The constant arms race fuels the ambitions

to develop a weapon that can knock fighters out,

despite their armor.

Killing without being killed.

The leading motive of warfare is as old as human history.

Since the dawn of time, men going into battle

have thought of ways of protecting themselves

against the enemy's weapons.

It's a natural human response.

And they begin by using readily available materials.

Leather, wood and increasingly

as metal becomes more commonly available,

pieces of metal are studded onto the leather defenses.

And then the defenses themselves become metal.

(light music)

In the early middle ages, the knights

often rely on mail.

Large plate armor can only be manufactured

once metal working has improved.

(light music)

But the armor, which can be as heavy as 25 kilograms,

also has its downsides.

The problem has always been balancing off

the advantage of protection against the disadvantage

of weight and immobility.

You could be perfectly protected but also perfectly immobile

and therefore perfectly useless.

Plate armor has to be tailor made

to the man wearing it in order to fit perfectly.

This takes several months,

and not everyone can afford bespoke armor.

(tense music)

But these are costly pieces.

It's all handmade.

It's made of high grade steel.

It is a costly enterprise and the skills needed

to make a full set of armor are quite rare.

The English, for example, had to import armor

for a very long time because they simply didn't have

the skillsets available to make it.

This is why armor also has high symbolic value.

As a visible sign of the knight's social status.

The full suit of armor is a status symbol.

It says, look at me, I'm very important.

I'm so important I'm protected, whereas you are unimportant

and not protected.

Elitist, self centered, violent.

The idea of noble knights is a myth.

Of course we always have this idea

of the chivalrous knight who's honest,

who helps the poor and always tells the truth.

Unfortunately reality often looked quite different,

if not contrary to that.

Knights also displayed self-serving behavior.

They waged war against and amongst each other.

(tense music)

But is it at least true

that knight are superior on a military level?

Are they really the super warriors in armor

that no one can take down on the battle field?

That no weapon can harm?

(tense music)

By the mid 14th century, they had developed the ability

to make larger plates of steel.

And that enabled them to make large surfaces, plate armor.

You could cover the body.

It was very difficult to defeat.

The war hammer was developed specifically

to defeat plate armor.

A simple hammer as a weapon

against well trained and well protected knights?

(suspenseful music)

The first documented evidence of war hammers

dates back to the 11th century.

The weapon comes in different lengths.

Up to two meters and weighing up to 14 kilograms.

(suspenseful music)

Mike Lowed and stuntman Yoakim, want to test the effect

of a war hammer blow to solid, medieval plate armor.

(intense music)

That was chilly to see that force go through.

And it just goes to show that however ingenious man is,

however much he invents new armor and new protection,

another man can invent what will defeat it

and it was the war hammer that defeated armor.

The handle of the war hammer serves

as an extended arm.

I have to strike out with a weapon head, like this,

in order to gain any momentum at all.

And it is very heavy.

I need a lot of strength to make it move.

But once I've managed to do that, the momentum is enormous,

an immense weight with perhaps even great speed.

Hitting a target can release

a considerable amount of energy.

(lively music)

In our test, the plate armor deflects

part of the impact energy of the war hammer blow.

Not all of it though.

The rest is transferred directly to the body,

with fatal consequences.

Such a blow can break bones.

For example, the rib bones and in some circumstances,

especially of the area over the heart is hit,

Commotio cordis can occur.

That's Latin for agitation of the heart.

It's basically a concussion of the heart.

And can lead to a very sudden cardiac arrest.

What the war hammer does

is it doesn't try to break the armor,

it sends the power through the armor.

And blow after blow after blow would weary a man.

But that's just blows to the body.

What would a weapon like this do with a blow to the head?

If two knights face each other,

they usually sit on their horses.

But if one of them has already lost his horse,

the war hammer offers an additional advantage.

The attacker can use the blunt weapon

to hit his opponent from above.

Brutal violence that we want to simulate in our test.

(intense music)

Stunt man Yoakim hits the dummy with full force.

The experiment gives an idea of how brutal medieval battles

must have been.

That was a colossal, powerful blow.

Really well aimed.

You did a good job there and it's created quite a dimple.

That really has damaged this helmet.

Such blows can break a man's neck.

Or at least knock him out immediately.

A concussion doesn't do long term damage to the brain.

But you can lose consciousness and I imagine,

when you're in a battle, it might not be the best moment

to pass out.

Obviously there will be consequences.

But what can happen even with protection,

even if the knight is wearing a helmet,

is internal bleeding in the head.

Not even a steel helmet can do a lot

against the war hammer.

It is a fatal weapon for knights on the battle field.

The Battle of Towton, England in 1461

is a veritable blood bath.

Archeological excavations have unearthed countless skulls

that have been smashed in by war hammers.

But the weapon is not only perilous

when it's deployed from above,

on the reverse side of the hammer head,

there is an iron spike, that is slightly curved downwards,

called Raven's Beak.

The warrior on foot can use the Raven's Beak

to penetrate the armor plates.

The curved spike serving as a hook.

And can tear down the enemy rider from his horse.

(suspenseful music)

The war hammer has unforeseen social potential.

It becomes the weapon of the ordinary people.

They use it to literally get the noblemen

down from their high horses.

Every blacksmith's shop has a hammer.

A hammer is not a sophisticated weapon.

And the had learned that this was the way

to fight these men in their armor.

(powerful music)

June 1524, the peasant's war is raging

in Southern Germany.

Ten thousand peasants are standing up

against the tyranny of the nobility.

Their symbol is the rainbow flag.

They demand more rights and lower taxes.

At some point the peasantry

of the lowest class, devoid of all rights,

can no longer carry the tax burden.

Can no longer accept the social injustice, the inequality.

Of course this leads to revolt.

But for the nobility and clergy, this represented

a clear infringement of the divine order by the underclass.

The peasants summarize their demands

into 12 articles.

A negotiation attempt that fails miserably.

In the conflicts that follow, the war hammer

becomes one of the most important weapons of the peasants.

Mostly because it is so easy to make.

In the end, however, the war hammer does not lead

the peasants to victory.

The nobility defeats them with knights and cannons.

The era of black powder begins.

(dramatic music)

Firearms and ever growing armies render the knights

and their weapons, like the war hammer, superfluous.

The early modern era sees the rise

of new close combat weapons.

One of them is still used today.

The bayonet.

It has a double effect.

A physical and a psychological one.

(lively music)

Muskets, early firearms, inaccurate, complicated to operate

and often useless after a few shots, due to overheating.

(guns firing)

In the middle of the 17th century resourceful musketeers

are paid to find a way to tackle the problem

in Bayonne, France.

The city also gives the bayonet its name.

Once they can't fire their muskets anymore,

they put knife blades into the muzzles.

Now they are ready for hand to hand combat.

Historian and weapons expert Steven Bowl,

shows us how to combine musket and bayonet.

(dramatic music)

So this is the plug bayonet.

It's an extremely simple weapon.

It's basically a knife blade with a wooden handle.

And a wooden handle just fits into the barrel of the musket.

So let's see that.

Here's the musket, the plug bayonet.

Straight into the barrel.

Then I can confront my enemy like this.

This bayonet is named after a plug

used to close wine barrels.

It was first used in the 17th century.

The wooden handle on the straight, leaf shaped steel blade

is adjusted to the different musket calibers over time.

But can I do this quickly on the field of battle?

This is a question we're gonna ask ourselves.

(dramatic music)

The adversary's preparing for our experiment.

Together with him, Steven Bowl wants to take his shot

at using the plug bayonet in close combat

and see how well it works.

Because quick reactions are essential in this situation.

So now I'm getting slightly nervous.

I'm gonna be charged at 15 meters.

My opponent is going to be Victor.

And Victor will take his musket and in battle,

if he gets to me first, I'm gonna be hit with this thing.

So let's see what happens.

(dramatic music)

We simulate a battle situation

in early modern times.

Putting on the bayonet for close combat

mustn't take too long.

One meter, two meters, three, four, five, six,

more nervous, 14, 15.

The closer the enemy is,

the higher the accuracy of the musket.

Steven Bowl wants to try the musketeer's technique

at a distance of just 15 meters.

After taking his last shot, will he be able to

fit the bayonet into the barrel in time?

Or will his opponent reach him first?

(gun fires) (fast paced music)

(yelling)

His attacker is faster.

Our musketeer Steven would be defenseless

in hand to hand battle now.

And in all the rush he hurts himself with the bayonet.

So we've discovered one of the disadvantages

of trying to use a plug bayonet very quickly

and that is if you grab hold of the blade very fast

it actually cuts your fingers.

So really we need a better technology than the plug bayonet.

To make this system work, bayonet and musket together.

A more sophisticated version

is not long in coming.

At the end of the 17th century,

a new device was introduced.

This is the socket or ring bayonet.

And as you can see, it fits around the muzzle of the weapon

so that you can still continue to fire

even with the bayonet in place.

This is quite the breakthrough.

(light music)

French general and military engineer Vauban,

invents the socket bayonet in 1669.

From that year on, it mounts Europe's wars

for more than two centuries.

And takes the lives of countless soldiers.

(light music)

Leipzig, Germany, in October 1813; Russian, Austrian,

Prussian and Swedish troops face France and its allies.

Sabers and bayonets play a crucial role

in hand to hand combat.

Bayonets also prove efficient

in fending off cavalry attacks.

This is how they replace the long wooden lance

that has been used until then.

The pike.

The pike was essential

to defend the musketeers against cavalry.

Because they couldn't load and fire fast enough

to hold off cavalry.

If you could give them a self defense weapon

essentially their own form of pike,

you could reduce the need for the defensive element

and increase your fire power.

Attacking with one single weapon

and securing the defense.

In the battle of Leipzig, all sides are using the bayonet.

Over 90,000 out of 600,000 men lose their lives.

Many of them in close combat.

In the end, Napoleon is forced to admit defeat.

He's done what the Napoleon Wars does,

he's blown away all the best of his troops

in the search for a perfect victory.

And he's achieved nothing.

And he will have to abdicate all over again.

From the 19th century on,

firearms become more efficient.

Battle distances become greater.

Hand to hand combat becomes rarer.

The bayonet though remains crucial also in the 20th century.

This is mostly due to its psychological effect.

We want to explore the reason for this effect

in an experiment.

Karin Ruttgers is a neurobiologist.

She will confront some volunteers with a bayonet attack.

For security reasons, we resort to virtual reality.

We know today that watching films

with this virtual reality glasses, we experience

similar emotions to those we have in real life.

This is why we even use them to treat anxiety disorders.

Our subconscious simply cannot differentiate

between reality and fantasy.

Our cognitive conscious self can make this differentiation

but our subconscious feels the same fear.

So it's all very realistic.

Two scenes will take place

in the virtual reality setting.

In a World War I trench, participants will face

a solider aiming at them with a rifle.

In the second scenario the soldier approaches them,

a bayonet on his rifle.

Will the participants reaction be different?

The first round starts under the observing eye

of Karin Ruttgers.

We measure the heart rate and skin resistance

of each participant, to be able to analyze

their reactions in detail.

These parameters will undeniably reveal their fear.

Putting on a virtual reality glasses,

the first participant is plunged into World War I.

She was not briefed before hand.

And has difficulties orienting herself

in the unusual setting.

Then the first part begins.

Hey!

Okay we could see how she moved back.

We show the scene

to a total of 10 participants.

They are given no warning before hand.

The subjects all going into the experiment

without being brought up to speed.

Hey!

Their reactions are similar.

They all experience a moment of fear.

Virtual reality works.

In the first round, they all froze and waited

for what was to come next.

They were less relaxed, definitely tense.

But were not terrified yet.

The second round, now the virtual soldier

is attacking with his bayonet.

Will the participants react differently

in the simulated close combat situation.

(soldier yelling)

(soldier yelling)

I felt afraid for a brief moment.

He looked my directly in the eye

and that felt uncomfortable.

(soldier yelling)

Well that was frightening

because he didn't stop, but ran directly towards me.

What you actually want to do is to get out of his way

somehow and run away.

There we could clearly see the move back.

The trench warfare situation is nightmarish.

A screaming soldier with a bayonet on his firearm

clearly increases the tension.

(soldier yelling)

You can see an enormous spike here.

You can see how she oriented herself.

She moved around a lot in the room as well.

Then she calmed down and then all of a sudden

the soldier appeared and she became very nervous.

It was very very frightening and scary.

And I felt kind of defenseless.

Wanting to escape the situation

is the natural response observed in our experiment.

(soldier yelling)

Again, this fear can be clearly seen by way

of the measured curve.

You definitely feel a lot more scared.

And when he started to scream I really just wanted

to get away.

The participants rated their emotional state

on a scale before the experiment.

And after each virtual reality scenario.

Using this subjective data, and the measurements

of heart rate and skin resistance, Karin Ruttgers obtains

an unequivocal analysis result.

The data clearly shows that the tension rose

by 140% in the bayonet situation.

Where as it only increased by 75% in the rifle scenario.

So we could show that the bayonet is twice as frightening

as the firearm alone.

The bayonet is a psychological weapon.

Its main object is to instill fear of edged weapons

onto a battle field where the killing is done

with artillery rounds and rifle bullets.

It brings that visceral ancient fear

that unsettles the nerves of troops.

That persuades people to surrender.

Being confronted with a bayonet will make you surrender

because it's a bayonet not because behind it is a rifle

that will kill you much more easily,

and much more quickly.

It's a weapon of terror.

Once you've struck fear in your enemy,

you have power over them then.

Any weapon that gives a soldier an additional sense

of control and power

is going to have a huge psychological effect on them

and how they go into war.

How they feel about their enemy.

And in this situation of a bayonet,

they're carrying something

that can kill because it also has the bullet

but can also strike fear into the person

that they're fighting.

(light trumpet music)

The idea of weakening

the opponent's psychological mindset

is older than mankind.

Ancient warriors come with the loud cries and roars

of attacking animals with horns, drums

and war cries before the battle.

In World War II fighter aircraft are equipped

with little sirens to spread fear and terror.

(sirens blaring)

Airstream activated sirens are fitted directly onto bombs.

(bomb whistling)

They amplify the natural sound of the falling bombs

and render bombardments even more traumatizing.

(bombs whistling)

In warfare any advantage is positive.

The psychology of war is, if possible,

persuade the enemy to do what you want

without having to fight.

That way you don't get killed at all

and you can do what you like with them

when they've surrendered.

(yelling)

Psychology in a military context

has two objectives, with their traditional war dance,

the Haka, the Mowri Tribe in New Zealand,

wants to demonstrate strength and instill fear

in their opponents.

But the famous dance also has an imminent effect

on the dancers.

The loud screams encourage the warriors themselves,

make them aggressive and lower inhibitions.

Fix bayonets.

Still to this day, war cries

are part of the vein of training.

(yelling)

Military training focuses on overcoming our natural

inhibition to kill.

The war cry speaks to our most ancient instincts.

Often we'll see people chanting things like,

kill, kill, kill.

So it's getting the adrenaline ready

but it's also desensitizing them

to commit acts of violence,

which goes against what they have probably

been brought up to do.

So it's almost like training somebody to be able to kill,

to be able to inflict harm with somebody,

by going through this process of desensitizing them.

En garde! En garde!

En garde!

Hand to hand combat is the most immediate

experience of war.

That was true back in the days of the gladius

and still is true today.

The Iraq War has shown in modern conflicts,

soldiers shoot most of their enemies

from a large distance.

But the worst psychological problems are caused

by hand to hand combat.

During and long after the battle.

In the future, the soldier is intended to become

a perfectly protected and technically enhanced

close quarter combat machine.

With equipment reminiscent of robots.

The exoskeleton.

There are different models.

Some of them can catch bullets.

Others enable soldiers to carry up to 100 kilograms

for several hours.

(soft music)

From a military point of view,

it makes them able to bear heavy loads.

If they aren't moving around with heavy equipment,

it is the exoskeleton that makes transporting

and operating this machinery possible at all.

In the 21st century, we've moved away

from just thinking about protection.

And human mobility.

We're starting now to think about using an exoskeleton

which will both protect the wearer and also enhance

their physical prowess.

So they can move faster, jump higher.

And carry on functioning for longer.

The load of the equipment

is intelligently shifted onto metal grieves

and electronic motors.

The soldier of the future: half man, half machine?

(dramatic music)

What we're doing is we're making

one of the classic trade-offs in the history of war

between numbers and quality.

We're starting to say maybe having a few, highly expensive,

super warrior figures in exoskeletons

might be more effective

that having a very large number of ordinary foot soldiers.

And that this may be the way ahead.

So we have to be very careful that we're not pursuing

a false premise here.

That a small number of mechanically enhanced soldiers

replacing the same value in a more conventional forces.

But despite all technological advancements

and improvements of the weapons industry,

war will remain what it has always been.