The international political situation by April 1945 showed that the war with Germany was nearing its end. The armed forces of the Third Reich, retreating on the Eastern Front under powerful blows and pressed by Allied forces on the Western Front, were on the verge of disaster. Germany lost all its allies. Some of Berlin's former allies declared war on Germany.
The Soviet Union was at the peak of its glory and military-political power. The successes of the Soviet Army in the European Theater of Operations and the skillful actions of the Kremlin in the international arena raised the authority of the USSR in the world even higher. If at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War the USSR had diplomatic ties with 25 states, then by the beginning of the Berlin operation it already had diplomatic ties with 41 states. The Soviet Union created the foundation for the formation of an alternative model of the world order, breaking the monopoly of the Western project. The Crimean Conference was a victory for Stalin and the USSR personally. Soviet civilization had the opportunity to secure the Western strategic direction for decades to come, to form a detachment of allies in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe that created a line of security in Europe. The decisions of the Crimean Conference provided for the complete denazification, demilitarization and democratization of Germany, the center of war in the center of Europe was destroyed.
Although the war brought enormous harm to the Soviet Union, destroying its western, southwestern regions, and part of the center of the country, it proved the advantages of the socialist system and the planned principle. Socialism allowed the USSR-Russia not only to survive, but also to continue to grow, proving the advantage and effectiveness of the Soviet model over the Western, capitalist one. During the war years, the national economy grew at a significant pace for wartime, and the military-industrial complex strengthened. There was an increase in the production of the most important types of products and the extraction of strategic raw materials, which allowed the military-industrial complex to produce weapons, equipment and ammunition for the Armed Forces of the USSR in the quantities that were necessary. The Soviet military-industrial complex won a convincing victory over the German military industry. “Magnitka defeated the Ruhr,” as the famous German general Guderian admitted. The technical equipment of the Soviet Army was constantly improving. Compared to the beginning of 1944, in 1945 it increased for self-propelled guns by 41.1%, for combat aircraft - by 209%, for motor vehicles - by 72%, for anti-aircraft guns - by 54%, for machine guns - by 23 .6%.
Thus, the country's national economy created all the necessary means to deliver the final blow to the Reich.
Agony of the Reich
By April 1945, it was obvious that from the point of view of military-strategic and economic factors, Germany had lost the war. The Third Reich was in its death throes. After losing most of Europe, Germany's economic situation deteriorated sharply. Germany did not have large internal resources and could not wage a war of attrition, losing in all respects to the Soviet Union and the Anglo-American Alliance. In March 1945, steel production was only 15% of the 1944 monthly average. Coal production fell to 16% and coke production to 38%. The general economic decline led to the fact that in March 1945, the output of military products decreased by 65% compared to July 1944.
In the first quarter of 1945, the production of basic types and ammunition fell so much that the German command was no longer able to fully and timely supply the troops with everything they needed. Aircraft production satisfied about 50% of the needs, tank production fell by more than half (in 1944, 705 tanks were produced monthly, in 1945 - 333 vehicles), the production of artillery and small arms was at the level of 50% of the average monthly output in 1944 .
The country's human resources were exhausted. The loss of Hungary, Slovakia and Austria, East Prussia and East Pomerania further weakened the resource base of the Third Reich. The personnel losses that the German army suffered during the winter battles of January-February 1945 were only replaced by 45-50%. This was achieved by conscripting men born in 1928-1929 into the army. that is, they were already conscripting young men of 16-17 years old. The quality of personnel has also decreased significantly.
At the same time, despite the growth of internal contradictions within the German leadership, caused by the desire to save their own skin, the Third Reich retained control over the population. The carpet bombing of the Anglo-American aviation, which wiped out entire cities, massively exterminating the civilian population, and destroyed the historical and cultural centers of Germany, did not lead to the desired effect. Air terror could not break the morale of the Germans. The preservation of the monolithic nature of the German people led by the Fuhrer (German anti-fascists and communists did not have mass influence) was associated with two factors: 1) this is skillful propaganda, which year after year (using certain psychotechnologies) implanted in the masses the ideas of the superiority of the “chosen people”, “the infallibility of the leader”, “the invincibility of the Wehrmacht”, etc.; 2) repression and terror. All the “dissenters” were in concentration camps. There was no “fifth column” in Germany. There were only disagreements within the Reich leadership itself. German soldiers continued their resistance in a disciplined manner until the capitulation. Workers stood at machines in underground factories. The entire Reich fought and worked without thinking about the uprising.
It must be said that this example convincingly shows that all hopes for a “correct Maidan” in Ukraine-Little Russia are in vain. Neither war, nor impoverishment, nor the sale of the remnants of the country's wealth, including land, nor the prospect of famine in the former breadbasket of the USSR, will lead to a revolution that will stabilize relations between Russia and Ukraine at least at the level of the reign of Yanukovych or Yushchenko. The modern level of media, especially television and the Internet, makes it possible to program a large part of the population. Especially after the departure of generations raised and educated in the USSR. Control over the media, the education and upbringing system, and culture allows the formation of entire “ethnic chimeras”, like the “Ukrainian people” (confused Russians). Under such a system, all the blame for problems is placed on the “external enemy”, in this case the “Muscovites”. There is no hope for internal cleansing. A “cancerous tumor” can only be cured by external surgery. Following the example of Germany, it is obvious that Ukraine-Little Russia can only be saved by the military defeat of the oligarchic, pro-Western regime, its physical liquidation (military tribunal in Donetsk or Kyiv), complete de-Ukrainization and Russification of Little Russia. After this, the reunification of the two parts of a single Russian civilization, Rus'.
The Third Reich lost all its allies. The economic and military situation of the country was critical. However, the Reich leadership still hoped for a “miracle.” Hitler and his associates made desperate efforts to delay the end, to prolong the war. At the expense of the Western Front, they continued to strengthen the defenses on the Eastern Front. By April 1945, Germany still had powerful armed forces: the ground forces alone numbered 325 divisions. This allowed Berlin to put up strong resistance at the final stage of the war, hoping to prolong the war and wait for a split in the ranks of the anti-Hitler coalition.
General situation in the European Theater of Operations
As a result of successful offensive actions of the Soviet Army in the east and American-British-French troops (with the participation of other allied contingents) in the west, the armed struggle was transferred to the territory of Germany itself. The Third Reich was caught in the grip of two strategic fronts. In January - early April 1945, the Red Army defeated large Wehrmacht groups in Poland, Silesia, Hungary, Austria, Czechoslovakia, East Prussia and East Pomerania. Soviet troops on a broad front advanced towards the central regions of Germany.
The troops of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts defeated Army Group A and advanced deeply into German territory. The troops of the 1st Belorussian Front reached the Oder River (Odra) in the section from the Baltic to the mouth of the Neisse River (Nisa), capturing a number of bridgeheads on the western bank of the Oder. The Soviet armies in the central direction were 60 kilometers from Berlin. The troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front reached the Neisse River in the sector from Ratzdorf to Penzikh, the left wing of the front fought in Czechoslovakia. On the left wing of the strategic Soviet-German front, troops of the 4th, 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts defeated Army Group South, completely liberated Hungary, Slovakia, part of Austria, took the Austrian capital Vienna and the capital of Slovakia Bratislava, liberated Brno , fought to liberate the Czech Republic. The Yugoslav army, with the support of the USSR, successfully completed the liberation of Yugoslavia.
It is also worth remembering that the Red Army was supported by allied forces. The 1st Army of the Polish Army fought as part of the 1st Belorussian Front, the 2nd Polish Army fought as part of the 1st Ukrainian Front, the 4th and 1st Romanian armies fought in the 2nd Ukrainian Front, the 3rd On the Ukrainian Front - the 1st Bulgarian Army, in the 4th Ukrainian Front - the Czechoslovak Army Corps.
Troops of the Leningrad and 2nd Baltic Fronts continued the blockade in the western part of Latvia of Army Group Kurland. Troops of the 2nd and 3rd Belorussian Fronts encircled and defeated the main forces of Army Group North in East Prussia. In April 1945, the armies of the 3rd Belorussian Front completed the destruction of the East Prussian group in the area of Königsberg and the Zemland Peninsula. The fall of Königsberg was the hardest blow for the Third Reich. The 2nd Belorussian Front, with the support of the 1st Belorussian Front, defeated the enemy's East Pomeranian group. The 2nd Belorussian Front finished off the remnants of Army Group Vistula in the area of Danzig and Gdynia.
On the Western Front the situation was also in favor of the anti-Hitler coalition. On the Italian Front, the French 1st Army occupied the front on the Franco-Italian border in the Nice area, while the American 5th Army and the British 8th Army operated north of Florence. Using the success of the Red Army during the winter offensive and the transfer of the selected 6th SS Panzer Army and a number of other formations from the Western Front to the Eastern Front, the Allies resumed their offensive in the second half of March, crossing the Rhine in the Bonn and Mannheim sector. By April 1, the Allies reached the front of Breda, Bonn, Kassel Mannheim and Mulhus, completing the encirclement of the Ruhr group (Army Group B) of the Wehrmacht. On April 17, the commander of Army Group B, Field Marshal Walter Model, gave the order to stop resistance and soon shot himself. The Allies captured more than 300 thousand people.
Thus, the Third Reich lost its last major grouping on the Western Front. Germany lost the Ruhr, the country's most important military-industrial region. The defeat of the German Army Group B in the Ruhr actually led to the collapse of the entire Western Front. Now the Allies moved east without much resistance from the Wehrmacht. The Germans fought back only in individual strong points. Allied troops attacked in the Hamburg, Leipzig and Prague directions.
The initial slowness of the Western armies gave way to extreme haste. The military-political leadership of England and the United States hurried the military command in order to develop an offensive on Berlin in order to occupy the German capital before the Russians. The headquarters of the High Command in Europe envisaged, after the defeat of the Ruhr group, to concentrate the main efforts on the central sector of the front to develop an offensive in the Dresden direction in order to split the German troops into two parts and unite with the Red Army. If the situation was favorable, they planned to develop an offensive on the southern sector of the front from the area north of Strasbourg to Regensburg and Linz, in order to also connect with the Russians. However, this plan met with objections from Churchill, who believed that the main blow should be delivered on the northern sector of the front. He believed that the Allied forces should advance as far east as possible and, if possible, take Berlin. As a result, the American plan was adopted. At the same time, the American military leadership also believed that, under favorable conditions, Berlin should be taken. Only the exit of Soviet troops directly to Berlin forced the Allies to abandon this plan. In addition, Churchill believed that the entry of American troops into Prague would be of great political importance.
The distance between Soviet and Anglo-American troops was reduced to 150-200 km. The closest to Berlin - less than 100 km - the Allied front line passed near Magdeburg, where the Allied advance detachments reached. However, the Allies no longer had time to prepare a breakthrough to Berlin from this line. The Soviet Army has already completed its preparations and gone on the offensive. The Supreme Commander of the Allied armies, Dwight Eisenhower, considered it impossible to attack Berlin under these conditions. “It is true that we have captured a small bridgehead across the Elbe,” he noted, “but it should be remembered that only our advanced units reached this river; our main forces are far behind."
It is worth remembering that the Eastern Front in 1945, like previous years, was the decisive front of the Second World War. Most of the German troops fought against the Red Army. The total number of German armed forces by April 1, 1945 reached 263 divisions, 14 brigades, 82 combat groups of divisions, remnants of divisions, remnants of brigades, combat groups, which generally corresponded to 325 divisions. On the Soviet-German front, Germany had 167 divisions (including 32 tank and 13 motorized), and more than 60 combat groups, remnants of divisions, remnants of brigades, combat groups, that is, translated into divisions this corresponded to 195 divisions.
57 German divisions (including 4 tank and 3 motorized), 18 battle groups of divisions, remnants of divisions and battle groups fought on the Western Front. Translated into divisions, this amounted to 70 divisions. In terms of combat and quality, these were weaker divisions than on the Eastern Front. Previously, a significant part of the divisions that were defeated on the Soviet-German front were transferred to France for restoration. These formations were only 50-60% staffed due to the latest total mobilizations, when elderly people 50-60 years old and young men 16-17 years old were taken into the troops. These formations were less trained and armed, and their combat strength was less than that of the divisions fighting on the Eastern Front. About 11 divisions remained in the reserve of the Supreme High Command of the German Armed Forces.
Strategic plans of the German leadership
Despite the obvious loss in the war, the German leadership, and above all Hitler, who fanatically believed in a “miracle,” did not want to admit defeat and sought a way out by prolonging the war. The main hopes were placed on the fact that insurmountable contradictions would arise in the enemy camp and the anti-Hitler coalition would fall apart, then it would be possible to reach an agreement with the Western powers. Moreover, these contradictions, according to the German leadership, should have worsened as the end of the war approached. The German leadership hoped that it would be possible to save the Nazi personnel that England and the United States would need for the new stage of the war with Russia-USSR. An updated, more “democratic” Third Reich could become the spearhead of the fight against the Soviet Union.
There were prerequisites for such a vision of the situation, since the German leadership, even before the start of the Great Patriotic War, had unspoken agreements with England that the British would not prevent the Germans from crushing the Soviet Union. Such negotiations between Berlin and London were conducted by Rudolf Hess. It was not for nothing that after the end of the war he was kept in prison until he was very old, and then the 93-year-old man was liquidated so that he would not blurt out too much.
In March 1945, General Wolf arrived in Bern, Switzerland, with a group of officers to establish contacts and conduct separate negotiations with the Anglo-American command with the goal of Germany’s surrender to the Allies. On the part of the allies, negotiations were led by the chief resident of the US Office of Strategic Services (the future CIA) for Europe, Allen Dulles. Negotiations lasted about two weeks. And only thanks to the measures that Moscow took by making the negotiations public, the German leadership’s plan was thwarted. The Soviet government addressed American President Roosevelt with a special message, demanding an end to unilateral negotiations. Roosevelt stopped them.
Another idea of the Nazi leadership was the slogan “it is better to surrender Berlin to the Allies than to let the Russians into it.” However, the rapid advance of the Red Army thwarted these plans. The Anglo-American troops simply did not have time to reach Berlin before the Soviet troops.
In February - March 1945, the German High Command, trying at all costs to prolong the war and stop the advance of the Red Army, organized the last counter-offensives in Hungary and Eastern Pomerania, using the last powerful mobile formations and reserves. However, despite the power of the attacks and the desperate tenacity of the German troops, including selected SS units, the advance of the Soviet troops could not be stopped. The German counteroffensive ended in failure and the complete depletion of the armored fist of the Third Reich, necessary for defense in the Berlin direction.
Anticipating the main attack of the Red Army in the Berlin direction, the German High Command concentrated a large number of forces and resources necessary for the defense of the Berlin metropolitan area. Particular attention was paid to creating a powerful defense along the western bank of the river. Oder. This line was to be defended by the main forces of the 9th Army. The formed reserves were concentrated north of Berlin. The essence of Hitler's strategic plan was simple: to contain the Russian advance in the east at any cost and at that time reach an agreement with England and the United States, avoiding the complete liquidation of the Nazi regime.
To be continued…
8.01.2018 17:48The internationally recognized term “collaborationism” refers to the cooperation of the local population of the occupied territories with the Nazis during the Second World War. In Ukraine, almost a quarter of a century of “independent” existence, attempts are being made to justify the traitors. In this series are decrees on the liquidation of Soviet monuments and their destruction without any decrees, on the honoring of Hauptmann Shukhevych and Bandera, on the recognition of UPA soldiers as veterans, on the removal of “communist-chauvinist literature” from libraries for destruction, etc. All this is accompanied by constant attempts to whitewash “at the scientific level” of Ukrainian nationalists, up to the complete denial of such a phenomenon as Ukrainian collaborationism, in the works of V. Kosik, O. Romaniv, M. Koval, V. Sergiychuk and others.
We have to remind you of well-known facts. All the leaders of the OUN Wire - E. Konovalets, A. Melnyk, S. Bandera, Y. Stetsko - were agents of the German intelligence services since the 1930s. This is confirmed by the same testimony of Abwehr Colonel E. Stolze: “In order to attract the broad masses for subversive activities against the Poles, we recruited the leader of the Ukrainian nationalist movement, Colonel of the Petliura Army, White emigrant KONOVALETS... Soon Konovalets was killed. The OUN was headed by Andrei MELNIK, who, like Konovalets, we attracted to cooperate with German intelligence... at the end of 1938 or at the beginning of 1939, a meeting was organized for Lahousen with Melnik, during which the latter was recruited and received the nickname “Consul”... Germany was intensively preparing for a war against the USSR and therefore measures were taken through the Abwehr to intensify subversive activities, because those activities that were carried out through Melnik and other agents seemed insufficient. For these purposes, the prominent Ukrainian nationalist BANDERA Stepan was recruited, who during the war was released by the Germans from prison, where he was imprisoned by the Polish authorities for participating in a terrorist attack against the leaders of the Polish government.”
Almost all the commanders of the Bandera UPA (not to be confused with the Bulba-Borovets UPA destroyed by Bandera with the help of the Nazis at the end of 1942-1943) are former officers of German units. 1939: “Ukrainian Legion”, also known as the special unit “Bergbauerhalfe” (R. Sushko, I. Korachevsky, E. Lotovich), who fought as part of the Wehrmacht against Poland. 1939 - 1941: Abwehr battalions “Roland” and “Nachtigal” (Hauptmann R. Shukhevych, Sturmbannführer E. Pobigushchiy, Hauptmanns I. Grinoch and V. Sidor, Oberst-lieutenants Yu. Lopatinsky and A. Lutsky, Abwehr lieutenants L. Ortynsky, M. Andrusyak, P. Melnik) - all of them subsequently transferred to the police “Schutzmannschaftbattalion-201”, and from there to the UPA. The commander of the “Bukovinsky Kuren” and military assistant of the OUN (M) P. Voinovsky is a Sturmbannführer and commander of a separate SS punitive battalion in Kyiv. P. Dyachenko, V. Gerasimenko, M. Soltys - commanders of the “Ukrainian Self-Defense Legion” of the OUN (M) in Volyn, also known as “Schutzmanschaftbattalion-31”, which suppressed the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. And also B. Konik (shb–45), I. Kedyumich (shb–303) - executioners of Babyn Yar; K. Smovsky (shb–118) - Khatyn is on his conscience; SB No. 3 - Cortelis. And also the numerous “Ukrainian auxiliary police” (K. Zvarych, G. Zakhvalinsky, D. Kupyak), which in 1943, in full force, joined the SS division “Galicia”. This is not counting the various “Abwehrstelle” teams (M. Kostyuk, I. Onufrik, P. Glyn). One cannot but agree with the thesis of the famous Canadian scientist V.V. Polishchuk that “the OUN lost its allegiance to Great Britain until May 9, 1945. There was only a short period of time in the OUN Bandera - up to 3 months - a break from the conflict with the occupiers - when their “powers of power” were established... (end 1 942 - cob 1943)"
Even before the start of the Great Patriotic War, the leadership of the Third Reich thought about what needed to be done first in the occupied territories. The Germans also had a plan for the development of the Soviet Union...
Disputes on the topic
There is still no (and cannot be) a consensus among historians about what would have happened to the Soviet Union if Germany had won World War II. This topic is by definition speculative. However, documented plans of the Nazis for the development of the conquered territories do exist, and their study continues, revealing more and more new details.
The plans of the Third Reich regarding the development of the conquered territories of the USSR are usually associated with the “General Plan Ost”. You need to understand that this is not one document, but rather a project, because historians do not have the complete text of the document officially approved by Hitler. But there are six documents (see table).
The very concept of Plan Ost was developed on the basis of Nazi racial doctrine under the patronage of the Reichskommissariat for the Strengthening of German Statehood (RKF), headed by Reichsführer SS Himmler. The concept of the General Plan Ost was supposed to serve as a theoretical foundation for the colonization and Germanization of the occupied territories after the victory over the USSR.
Work is in full swing...
The Nazis began thinking about how to “organize life” in the conquered territories back in 1940. In February of this year, Professor Konrad Mayer and the planning department of the RKF, headed by him, presented the first plan concerning the settlement of the western regions of Poland annexed to the Reich.
The Reichskommissariat itself for strengthening German statehood was created less than six months earlier - in October 1939. Mayer led the creation of five of the six documents listed above.
The execution of the "General Plan Ost" was divided into two parts: the near plan - for the already occupied territories, and the distant one - for the eastern territories of the USSR, which had yet to be captured. The Germans began performing the “close shot” already at the beginning of the war, in 1941.
Ostland and Reichskommissariat Ukraine
Already on July 17, 1941, on the basis of Adolf Hitler’s order “On civil administration in the occupied eastern regions”, under the leadership of Alfred Rosenberg, the “Imperial Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories” was created, subordinating two administrative units: the Reichskommissariat Ostland with its center in Riga and the Reichskommissariat Ukraine with its center in Rivne.
The Nazis also planned to create the Reichskommissariat of Muscovy, which would include the entire European part of Russia. It was also planned to create the Don-Volga, Caucasus and Turkestan Regional Commissariat.
"Germanization"
One of the main points of the Ost plan was the so-called Germanization of the population of the occupied territories. The racist concept of the Third Reich considered Russians and Slavs to be untermensch, that is, “subhumans.”
Russians were recognized as the most un-Germanized people, and besides, they were “poisoned by the poison of Judeo-Bolshevism.” Therefore, they either had to be destroyed or deported to western Siberia. According to the Ost plan, the European part of the USSR was to be completely Germanized.
Himmler has repeatedly said that the goal of the Barbarossa plan is to destroy the Slavic population of 30 million; Wetzel wrote in his memoirs about the need to take measures to limit the birth rate (promoting abortion, popularizing contraception, refusing to fight child mortality).
Hitler himself wrote frankly about the program of extermination of the local population of the USSR: " Locals? We'll have to start filtering them. We will remove destructive Jews altogether. My impression of the Belarusian territory is still better than that of the Ukrainian one. We will not go to Russian cities, they must completely die out.<...>There is only one task: to carry out Germanization through the importation of Germans, and the former inhabitants must be considered as Indians.”
Plans
The occupied territories of the USSR were primarily supposed to serve as a raw material and food base for the Third Reich, and their population - as a cheap labor force. Therefore, Hitler, if possible, demanded that agriculture and industry be preserved here, which were of great interest to the German war economy.
Ost Mayer allocated 25 years for the implementation of the plan. During this time, most of the population of the occupied territories had to be "Germanized" in accordance with nationality quotas. The indigenous population was deprived of the right to private property in cities in order to force them “to the land.”
According to the Ost plan, margraviates were introduced to control those territories where the percentage of the German population was initially low. Like, for example, Ingria (Leningrad region), Gotengau (Crimea, Kherson), and Memel-Narev (Lithuania - Bialystok). In Ingria it was planned to reduce the urban population from 3 million to 200 thousand.
Mayer planned the creation of 36 strongholds in Poland, Belarus, the Baltic states and Ukraine, which would ensure effective communication of the margraviates with each other and with the metropolis. After 25-30 years, the margraviates were to be Germanized by 50%, strongholds by 25-30%.
Himmler allocated only 20 years for these tasks and proposed to consider the complete Germanization of Latvia and Estonia, as well as a more active Germanization of Poland
All these plans, on which scientists and managers, economists and business executives worked, on the development of which 510 thousand Reichsmarks were spent - they were all postponed. The Third Reich had no time for fantasies.
History of Germany. Volume 2. From the creation of the German Empire to the beginning of the 21st century Bonwech Bernd
The end of the Third Reich and the results of the war
The military defeat of the Third Reich began in June 1944 and took place in parallel on the western and eastern fronts. On June 23, 1944, the offensive of the Soviet Army began, which resulted in the collapse of the German Army Group Center on the Eastern Front. Despite their resistance, the defeat was even worse than the disaster at Stalingrad. In the battles for Belarus alone, the Wehrmacht lost 400 thousand soldiers killed, wounded and captured. By the end of August 1944, the Soviet Union was completely liberated from the German invaders.
By the end of 1944, the large-scale offensive of the Soviet armed forces allowed them to reach the Baltic Sea near Memel (with the encirclement of the German military group of troops "Courland") and to the border of East Prussia. The front ran from north of the Vistula near Warsaw south through Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary to Budapest. The advance of Soviet troops along the Danube forced the German command to move Army Group E from Greece and Yugoslavia. During the fighting, the German Wehrmacht lost dozens of divisions. Almost 100 divisions required up to 80% replacement of personnel and equipment.
On June 6, 1944, at 6:30 a.m., Allied troops began landing in Northern Normandy (Operation Overlord). Thus, a second front was opened, but in the first weeks of the offensive the German army put up unexpectedly serious resistance. On July 25, the Americans made a decisive breakthrough, and the allied troops began to advance deeper into French territory. The American-French landing between Cannes and Toulon on August 15 accelerated the liberation of France. Paris was liberated on August 25, Brussels on September 3, Antwerp on September 4, and on October 21 the Allies took Aachen, the first major German city.
The German army could not hold the front for long, despite individual manifestations of fanaticism and patriotism of German soldiers. Having collected the last human and material reserves, the Wehrmacht command launched a militarily senseless offensive in the Ardennes (December 16-22, 1944). This offensive faltered and ultimately resulted in even heavier losses at the end of December.
The year 1944 went down in the history of World War II as the year of confident victories of the anti-Hitler coalition. The collapse of the fascist bloc in Europe by the end of 1944 was virtually complete: the governments of Romania, Finland, Bulgaria and Hungary broke off relations with Germany and declared war on it. Now 44 states of the world were at war with the Third Reich, its outcome was predetermined.
In the spring of 1945, fighting in Europe developed rapidly. Anglo-American troops quickly enough, encountering much less resistance from the Nazis than in the East, advanced across West Germany. The hopes of Hitler and his circle for a separate peace with the Anglo-Americans (the corresponding secret negotiations took place in Switzerland), which intensified after the death of US President F. Roosevelt on April 12, did not materialize.
The loss of industrial areas and the lack of raw materials led at the end of 1944 to the beginning of 1945 to a rapid decline in German military production. Due to losses in South-Eastern Europe, there was a severe shortage of fuel. By order of the Minister of Armaments Speer, part of the factories was transferred to underground premises to save them from bombing. But the economic crisis continued to deepen. From May 1944 to January 1945, the production index decreased by 32%. From February to March 1945, the transport crisis paralyzed the entire industry. The current situation forced Speer to move to decentralization of the management of the military industry. Six large industrial districts were created, within which a closed cycle for the production of products for the front was ensured. Speer, like some other leaders of the Third Reich, opposed the implementation of Hitler’s “scorched earth” order, so it was possible to ensure the production of weapons and ammunition until the end of the war.
The Nazi regime intensified its terror in these last months of the war. On February 15, 1945, military courts for deserters began to operate in the front-line zones. Hanging a white flag was punishable by death. Then the action of military courts extended to the civilian population.
In connection with the events in the Ardennes, the Soviet command accelerated the second major offensive of its troops, which began on January 12, 1945 along the entire eastern front. Its result was the liberation of Poland and the encirclement of three German armies in East Prussia. During the 21 days of the offensive, Hitler's Wehrmacht lost about 500 thousand people, 1300 aircraft, 1300 tanks, 14 thousand guns and mortars.
The military disaster of the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front also turned into a tragedy for the residents of East Prussia. The Soviet Army, cutting it off from the rest of the Reich, caused a multimillion-dollar flow of refugees from the war and Soviet occupation. They moved westward, towards Danzig, at the mouth of the Vistula. Many people who did not have time to cross the front line died or were captured if they had not previously frozen from the cold January days or fallen through the ice of the bay. Some of the population managed to evacuate to western Germany in the following weeks, thanks to rescue operations by the German navy. The total number of victims among the German population in the eastern regions of Germany was about 500 thousand people.
In the central sector of the front, the advanced units of the Soviet Army captured Warsaw, reached Küstrin on the Oder, encircled Breslau and captured the little-damaged Upper Silesian industrial region. In the south, on April 13, the Soviet Army captured Vienna. The agony of the Third Reich began.
On April 16, 1945, three Soviet fronts, numbering a total of 2.5 million people, more than 42 thousand guns, 6,200 tanks and self-propelled guns and 8,300 aircraft, began the Berlin operation. In the Berlin area there were three defensive lines, four German armies numbering 83 divisions, a Berlin garrison of 200 thousand people and 200 Volkssturm battalions. By order of the German High Command, the city was to be held “until the last breath.” On April 20, the day of the 56th anniversary of Hitler's birth, the actual assault on Berlin by Soviet troops began with a salvo of thousands of guns.
The Western Allies' crossing of the Rhine on March 7, 1945 opened the way for them deep into Germany. German troops surrendered with virtually no resistance. On April 18, the Allies occupied the territory of the Ruhr region. They then reached the Elbe near Magdeburg. On April 19, the Germans surrendered Leipzig. On April 25, the opening day of the UN founding conference in San Francisco, Soviet and American troops met on the Elbe. The Nazi regime was living out its last days, and divisions appeared within its leadership. The first group, led by Hitler, Goebbels, Bormann and others, until the last moment hoped that when the Western allies met Soviet troops, a military conflict would arise between them, which the German armed forces would take advantage of for a powerful blow from the North and South. This was the result of political blindness and fanaticism. The second group of leaders, led by Goering and Himmler, considered it possible for the German troops in the West to capitulate and continue the joint struggle with the British and Americans against the Soviet troops. They were even able to establish contacts in Switzerland with representatives of England and the United States. But this group underestimated the strength of the negative public reaction of the anti-Hitler coalition to a possible alliance with the Nazis. The third group (Minister of Armaments Speer, representatives of business circles) considered a clash between the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition to be unrealistic. They sought only to avoid general capitulation. But all these behind-the-scenes maneuvers of part of the Nazi leadership were destroyed by events on the Soviet-German front.
On April 25, two Soviet groups of troops under the command of Marshal Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov (1896-1974) and Marshal Ivan Stepanovich Konev (1897-1973) completed the encirclement of Berlin and broke into the city. Fierce street fighting began, and on April 30 the Red Banner was hoisted over the Reichstag.
On the same day, Hitler and Goebbels committed suicide in the bunker of the Imperial Chancellery. In the “will” left behind, Hitler appointed Admiral Karl Dönitz (1891-1980) as his “successor,” who in Flensburg on the Danish border (British zone of occupation) formed a “government” that sought to save the remnants of the Wehrmacht from unconditional surrender. Despite the efforts made, this intention failed.
On May 7, in Reims, before representatives of the Western Allies, Germany was forced to sign the Act of Unconditional Surrender. He joined the force on May 9, 1945 at 0 o'clock. 00 min., after the re-signing of the surrender before representatives of the High Commands of the USSR, USA, England and France in the eastern part of Berlin - Karlshorst.
Dönitz's "government" lasted just over three weeks. All his efforts these days were aimed at transferring as many people as possible from the Soviet occupation zone to the zones of the Western allies out of fear of the Soviet Army. More than half of the German military group in the East (1 million 850 thousand soldiers and officers) crossed the Anglo-American line of occupation, while 1.5 million were captured by Soviet troops. More than 2 million civilians independently reached the western zones of occupation through the Baltic, Schleswig-Holstein and Denmark. At the urgent request of the Soviet side, on May 23, 1945, British troops finally arrested the Dönitz government.
The European war was over. The Pacific War came to an end on September 2, 1945, with the surrender of Japan. In Germany, the allies of the anti-Hitler coalition, according to the Berlin Declaration of June 5, 1945, assumed supreme power. The Third Reich ceased to exist de facto and de jure.
The war, which was planned and unleashed by the Nazi elite as a series of “blitzkriegs,” turned into the Second World War, in the fire of which about 60 million people died. The total theater of operations was more than 5 times larger than the theater of operations of the First World War. To one degree or another, 64 states with a population of 1 billion 700 million people were drawn into the war.
The Second World War had enormous consequences for the fate of mankind. The borders of a number of states were revised, and another “great migration of peoples” of the 20th century took place. The geopolitical situation has changed: instead of 8 “great” powers, as there were in 1939, there were 2 “superpowers” left - the USA and the USSR, and the Cold War began. Gradually, the so-called “Yalta-Potsdam” system of international relations emerged. All this directly influenced the fate of Germany.
The consequences of the war were also severe for her: 7 million 234 thousand dead, or 9.5% of the pre-war population. Civilian losses are close to the number of soldiers and officers killed: 3 million 204 thousand and 4 million 30 thousand, respectively. About 17 million people were left homeless. 41 large and 158 medium-sized cities were severely destroyed, and the economy was paralyzed.
Total defeat and unconditional surrender removed Germany from the category of great powers on the European continent for a long time. After Germany had existed as a single state for three quarters of a century, it again lost its unity for 45 years. The Nazi imperialist policy of creating a “new order” in Europe and the world led the country to this. The collapse of Nazi Germany's foreign policy and diplomacy seems obvious.
The war clearly demonstrated what society can come to if power falls into the hands of terrorist, right-wing extremist forces. Germany's defeat in the war was also a defeat for Nazi ideology. The “National Socialist Revolution”, instead of “reviving” Germany, pushed it into the abyss of world war; the international community condemned National Socialism as a system of power.
The consequences of Nazism were also severe for the morale of the Germans. A deep sense of guilt, which, perhaps, has become one of the features of the nation’s mentality, still, more than half a century after the end of the war, makes all the controversy surrounding Hitler’s “volunteer assistants” very painful.
Hitler and his supporters, with their war, paradoxically accelerated exactly those processes in the world that they wanted to prevent: they wanted to destroy the Soviet Union and bring the United States to its knees, but it was these countries that began to determine world post-war development. The Nazis planned to create a vast colonial empire - and as a result of the war, the collapse of the colonial system accelerated. Hitler's National Socialism proclaimed the destruction of “world Jewry” - and thereby gave a decisive impetus to the formation of the Israeli state. The Nazis' intention was to make a second "push for world domination" - and they lost not only Germany as a world power, but also its political unity.
The National Socialists were fanatical supporters of the dominance of the white, "Aryan-Nordic" race over Europe and the world. The experience of the world war that they unleashed gave impetus to the founding of the United Nations and the projects of the European Community. Thus, a decisive impetus was given to overcome the idea of the nation state and the “racial purity” of nations. All these “paradoxes” were a consequence of the fact that Hitler’s worldview, the ideology of Nazism and fascism in general, were neither “modern” nor “rational.”
The anti-fascist resistance movement failed to overthrow the Hitler regime on its own. Germany was liberated from Nazism by the forces of the anti-Hitler coalition. This shows that fascist ideology, under certain conditions, can carry away a significant part of the population. Timely recognition and fight against it, preventing fascists from coming to power are the tasks of today.
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