During the opening of a British army regimental museum , one person present mentally speculates on what might have happened had past events taken a different course . This alternative history follows the life of George Grant ( Michael Caine ) , a young army officer , as Britain capitulates to Germany in 1940 to avoid bombing . There follows a Nazi-directed reorganisation of Britain 's domestic and foreign policy , a brutal reconquest of India , and a gradual complicity in racial atrocities and the building of a Channel tunnel using slave labour . Remaining a professional soldier , Grant gradually but inevitably compromises himself under the new regime , via three tests of his humanity , after accepting a posting connected to building a road from India to the Russian frontier . First he is confronted with an old friend in a Jewish working party ; then he must try and execute a fellow officer for Communist treason ; before finally having to denounce his former superior officer . Grant 's seeking of emotional solace with a prostitute is interrupted by a Cossack attack , during which he tries to get himself killed . He regains consciousness a year later and discovers that his shattered body has been rebuilt using the same advanced transplant surgery that is used to keep alive the leading Nazis - including Adolf Hitler - and " heroes of the Reich " like Grant himself . Rebuilt with a new leg , a new arm , new internal organs , and a new eye , he is told that the parts came from live " donors . " The narrative closes with both the " real " Grant and his Nazi-serving alter ego delivering essentially the same speech about " why we are here today " at the ceremony first seen at the beginning of the play
racial atrocities
The Holocaust
The Other Man (1964 TV programme)