In April 1945, the Soviet army conducted an offensive, approaching close to the capital of the Third Reich - Berlin. Superiority was felt in everything. Red star aviation dominated the sky, the Luftwaffe had almost nothing to refuel aircraft, tank columns filled German roads, the density of gunfire did not know historical precedents, to which it still has no equal. The flywheel of the defense industry reached titanic revolutions; there was no shortage of military technical support. The capture of Berlin by Soviet troops was a settled matter, the question was only in the price of victory, expressed in human lives.
Enemy
Almost everything that was left of the Wehrmacht and the SS troops (as of the beginning of April, about half a million military personnel, of which about 200 thousand were in the city itself), was concentrated in the capital of the Reich and its suburbs. The inability to keep the boundaries and the lack of hope for success did not prevent Adolf Hitler from stubbornly issuing frightening orders providing for the death penalty for all who did not wish to continue the fight to the last bullet. The operational environment, meanwhile, was becoming increasingly catastrophic. The 3rd Panzer Army, which the German command was counting on, was firmly blocked by the forces of the 2nd Belorussian Front, which crossed the Oder River with battles.
There were three circular lines of defense, the farthest of which was in a strip 30-40 kilometers from the city center. During its organization, the nature of natural water barriers and the terrain were taken into account. The middle line repeated the outlines of railway tracks, playing the role of a sort of rockade, along which it was possible to supply theoretically, which in practice was problematic due to the lack of defense resources. The inner line passed already along the outskirts and was considered the main one. Inside, the city was divided into nine defense areas. In general, the command of the Wehrmacht did everything to make the capture of Berlin by Soviet troops as difficult as possible. Briefly, these measures can be described as useless. There were no hopes of repelling the attacks and going over to the counteroffensive.
General strategic plan and environment
On April 2, the Headquarters decided on the question of who would directly supervise the operation. Stalin decided that the capture of Berlin by the Soviet troops would be coordinated by the general headquarters, and Marshal Zhukov, who urgently flew by plane to the operational area from Moscow, was appointed to lead it. Of the two possible options for capturing the German capital (siege and assault), the one that accelerated its decline as much as possible was chosen. On April 16, a general offensive began. The city, the outskirts and lines of defense were subjected to artillery shelling and powerful bombardments by aircraft. The assault began on April 20, and on the 21st, a tank attack captured the southern suburbs. The most stubborn resistance awaited in the area of Zeelovsky heights, where the Soviet troops used sound sirens and searchlights (more than 140 pieces) in conjunction with two tank armies to intimidate the enemy. April 25, the general environment of the city became a fact, the Germans had nowhere else to retreat.
Fights in the city
The mobilization of all possible resources only increased the number of victims of both sides. Untrained Volkssturm and Hitler Youth militias died in the very first battles with experienced Soviet soldiers; the houses turned into reference firing points were demolished under the foundation by artillery fire and attack aircraft. Converging wedges approached the city of the 2nd Belorussian, first and second Ukrainian fronts. Resistance, however, remained stubborn. Between April 26 and 28, another catastrophe occurred that practically disorganized the forces of the garrison: the city was cut into three separate parts that fell into isolation. The communication between them, previously carried out via telephone lines laid in tunnels, was disrupted. Coordination was possible until the Red Army began to throw bundles of grenades into the hatches of the communication wells.
The capture of Berlin by the Soviet troops took place in stages, they advanced towards the center, suffering huge losses, but it was already impossible to stop them. The practice of assault groups that cleared quarter after quarter was widely used. On April 28, the 3rd shock army of the 1st Belorussian Front reached the Reichstag.
Reichstag
The building of the German parliament was defended by a total of five thousand people, of whom a thousand were an impromptu garrison sent there in April, and the rest were there as a result of constant replenishment and reinforcement. By the evening of April 30, Soviet soldiers managed to break inside, and the most dramatic battle of the entire war began, resembling the agony of a mortally wounded, but still resisting monster. This continued until the morning of May 1, until a red flag began to fly over the dome, meaning that the capture of Berlin by Soviet troops was actually completed. Separate centers of resistance were suppressed for about another day. After the fall of the Reichstag, the garrisons of two other powerfully fortified areas - Spandau and Zoobunker immediately capitulated. Thus, the date of the capture of Berlin by Soviet troops is May 2, 1945.
Results and sacrifices
Only during an attempt to defend the Reichstag, more than two thousand of his defenders folded their heads senselessly. 125 thousand civilians in Berlin were victims of street fighting. During the operation, seventy infantry and another 23 mechanized divisions were completely defeated. Of the entire half-million number of troops involved in the defense of the city, a little more than 134 thousand were captured alive.
Berlin was almost completely destroyed. In particular:
- completely demolished - 30 thousand buildings;
- dilapidated - 150 thousand houses;
- received average damage - 150 thousand buildings;
- the defenders blew up 225 bridges in an attempt to deter the Soviet offensive;
- a third of the metro stations by order of Hitler were flooded with people hiding there from shelling.
In the battles for Berlin, more than 78 thousand Soviet soldiers died.
Over six hundred soldiers of the Red Army accomplished feats worthy of the title of Hero, of which 13 were repeated.
The war after Berlin
After the capture of Berlin, Soviet troops liberated Prague, in which the remaining SS units tried to finally arrange a "blood bath" for the rebellious townspeople. A lightning tank throw stopped the last European hotbed of the fire of war. It was a shame, probably, to die and get injured in her last days and hours, but such is the fate of a soldier.
Czechoslovakia is the last country liberated by Soviet troops after the capture of Berlin, but the war was still ongoing, and soldiers, sometimes passing by their homes, went to the Far East. There they were waiting for battles with the Japanese. But that's another story…