From the opening shots of World War II in Poland in September 1939, through the blitzkrieg to the fall of France and the Low Countries, the German Army was at the forefront of battle. It remained in the thick of the action - the Eastern Front, North Africa, the Balkans, Scandinavia, North West Europe - right up until the last desperate shots were fired over the ruins of a crumbling Third Reich in May 1945. As the instrument with which Hitler was to achieve his plan for world domination, the German Army was at the cutting edge of 20th-century military technology. Before the emergence of the US Army as a force to be reckoned with later in World War II, the German Army was the most powerful, efficient and well-equipped fighting force in the world. This text takes a look at das Heer, or the German Army, as it origins of the German Army in the post-Versailles Treaty era and its resurgence under the Nazi regime; training and organization during the war years; equipment, vehicles and weapons; uniforms, rank and insignia. The author also describes the parts played by the Waffen-SS and the airborne arm of the service, the Fallschirmjager. Although neither force was strictly army, both fought as ground troops under Army commanders.