Plot summary

German ski instructor Christian Diestl (Marlon Brando) is hopeful that Adolf Hitler will bring new prosperity and social mobility to Germany. He detests living on tips from foreigners in his own country. So, when war breaks out, he joins the army, becoming a lieutenant. Christian is dissatisfied with police duty in Paris under Captain Hardenberg (Maximilian Schell). Sergeant Brandt (Parley Baer) introduces Christian to Simone (Dora Doll) & Françoise (Liliane Montevecchi). Francoise is a pretty woman and doesn't shy away from confronting Christian on the Nazi plan to murder all liberals in the name of a Unified Europe. Francoise realizes that Christian is an idealist, but polite. He is willing to sacrifice himself for peace. She apologizes to him but won't fraternize with the enemy.Christian has the duty of arresting rebels and resistance members. He tells their families that they will not be hurt. But they are all brutally tortured and killed. Christian asks for a transfer, but Hardenberg refuses it. Captain Hardenberg asks Christian to take a gift of lace that he procured in Paris, to his wife Gretchen Hardenberg (May Britt) in Berlin, while Christian is on leave. Gretchen seduces Christian and he goes along, as she promises the transfer that he wants.Christian is assigned to the North African campaign front. Captain Hardenberg is also transferred. Christian is sharp and intelligent, and Hardenberg is threatened by him usurping his position as commander of the unit. Christian plans and leads raids against allied forces, but Hardenberg then shoots unarmed wounded soldiers instead of taking them prisoner.Michael Whiteacre (Dean Martin) and Noah Ackerman (Montgomery Clift) befriend each other during their U.S. Army draft physical examination. Michael is in show business & finds it unfair that he is being drafted against his will into the army. Both Michael and Noah have the same joining date. Michael appeals against the decision. Michael is romantically involved with American socialite Margaret Freemantle (Barbara Rush), who dated ski instructor Christian in 1938 while both were in the Bavarian Alps, where she spent her skiing vacation. Upset by his convictions as Christian was a big supporter of Hitler and his promise of a better Germany, she left him on New Year's Eve and returned to Michael. Michael tells Margaret that he is against war.Noah works as a junior department store clerk and attends a party that Michael throws prior to the drafting date, where he meets Hope Plowman (Hope Lange). Noah walks Hope home all the way to Brooklyn. They kiss before parting. Noah falls in love with Hope, declaring that he wants to marry her. Hope invites Noah to her provincial hometown in Vermont, where she intends introduces him to her father. After speaking with Noah (who is honest, and sincere), Hope's father approves of him.Noah and Michael enter the Army on the same day and attend basic training together. Their commanding officer and some of the men in their boot camp platoon bully Noah and demonstrate antagonism towards him due to his religion. They steal money from Noah's locker as well. Noah gains their respect by standing up to them, even though he's much smaller and is badly hurt in fistfights with some of them. Noah deserts his outfit after the last fight & is jailed. Hope visits Noah in jail and reveals that she is pregnant. Noah is so happy that he wants to get out of jail and agrees to rejoin his company to escape jail-time and finish his tour of duty to go back home.Michael is posted overseas to London due to his connects in Washington that gets him a safe role to ride out the war. Military authorities, however, discover that Noah was unfairly treated by his own Company officers, and this is why he deserted the unit. The company commander is made to undergo a Court Martial.Christian is conflicted, hating what the war has done to his fellow Germans, but unable to escape from his role in the conflict. He despises what his fellow soldiers have done in the name of the Fatherland but is determined to fulfill his duty to the end. As Germans come under attack from allied forces in Africa, Christian and Hardenberg escape on a bike from the onslaught. Both are wounded when they drive over a land mine. While visiting his seriously wounded captain, his entire face is bandaged and, in cast, in a hospital, he is duped into bringing him a bayonet. Handerberg says it's for a fellow patient who has lost all his limbs. He later learns from Gretchen (who is in Germany) that he committed suicide with it. Christian finds Brandt and travels with him to Paris and finds Francoise, who is living with Simone. Christian is a broken man and admits that war cannot bring peace.Thanks to his fame, Michael spends most of the war in a safe job in London, nowhere near the fighting. He finally decides to volunteer for combat after Margaret shames him into action. By pulling strings, he rejoins his old outfit at the front, in Germany, in the final days of the war. He reunites with Noah there.Noah risks his own life during combat by swimming across a canal to save a fellow soldier. The soldier is one of the men who abused him in boot camp. Christian discovers the reality of the Third Reich when he stumbles upon a concentration camp and hears the commander talk about the mass exterminations and about meeting targets. The commander talks about systematic extermination of millions of people in the camps.Shortly afterwards, the camp is liberated by American forces, which include Michael and Noah. The mayor of a nearby town offers working parties of his constituents to "clean up" the camp before American reporters and photographers arrive. He is roughly rebuffed by Captain Green (Arthur Franz) after an imprisoned rabbi asks Green for permission to hold a religious service and the mayor protests.Seeing how Noah is affected by the camp, Green instructs him to take a walk and sends Michael with him. Nearby, dazed and tired, Christian screams in rage, breaking apart his machine-pistol on a tree-stump. The noise draws the attention of Michael and Noah, and seeing the German, Michael shoots Christian. They silently watch him die, then quietly walk back to the camp.After the war, a discharged Noah emerges from a subway station. Hope is at a window in their apartment and notices him coming and lifts up their baby daughter for him to finally see, and he ascends the stairs quickly to embrace his family.