Did Adolf Hitler really commit suicide in a Berlin bunker in 1945? Or did he instead fake his death and flee Germany to hide in another country?

Did Adolf Hitler really commit suicide in a Berlin bunker in 1945? Or did he instead fake his death and flee Germany to hide in another country?

That second option is one of the questions a recent television series is tracking.

The eight-part series “Hunting Hitler” premiered Nov. 10 and airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. CST on the History Channel. Six episodes have aired so far, with the seventh slated to air Tuesday.

The series is based on FBI files declassified in 2014 that suggest Adolf Hitler may have survived an escape from Berlin, fleeing first to Spain and then to South America after the fall of Nazi Germany. The files include eyewitness accounts of purported Hitler sightings following his supposed death in April 1945.

“Is it conceivable that the world’s most wanted man pulled off history’s greatest disappearing act in hopes of possibly one day reclaiming the Nazi dream?” the History Channel said in a news release. “Bob Baer, a 21-year CIA veteran and one of the most respected military intelligence minds in the world and premier war crimes investigator Dr. John Cencich lead a team of international military experts on the ultimate manhunt.”

The show is a mix of reality television, documentary and political thriller. Baer and an assembled team that includes a member of the Army Special Forces, an investigative journalist with BBC and a “Nazi hunter” travel to Spain and South America to investigate sites where Hitler could have possibly stayed, the show utilizing slick jump cuts and tense soundtrack music to build excitement.

“The narrative the government gives us is a lie,” Baer said in the first episode of the show. “You can’t give people the truth because it scares them.”

Cast members on the show claim there was nothing to back up the stories of Hitler’s suicide in his bunker, that the investigation into his death was botched and there was no primary evidence of Hitler’s suicide.

In the first episode, cast member Tim Kennedy, a sergeant 1st Class with the 7th Special Forces Group of the Army, and others traveled to the city of Charata, Argentina. Farmland and wide grass fields dominated the shots of the city, which the team members described as being in the middle on nowhere.

Following a few leads, they talked to the oldest German resident who they thought may have personally witnessed German activity, but when they met up with him, they didn’t get much information.

The second episode also sees the cast chasing similar leads, coming upon two buildings deep in the jungle of Argentina. Archaeologists, Kennedy and others explored the buildings, conducted a search using ground-penetrating radar and attempted to reach out to the last living relative of Eva Braun (who declined to provide information).

“You don’t collect forensics in the middle of a war,” Baer said in the second episode. “I want to see forensic evidence.”