Berlin strategic offensive operation (Battle of Berlin). Battle for Berlin: the end of the Great Patriotic War The story of the army's attack on Berlin

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Everything seems to be clearer with the capture of the den of fascism by Soviet troops, if we do not take into account the discord in assessing the number of opposing enemies and their losses, weapons and military equipment that took part in the battles for Berlin

"The defense of Berlin is very poorly organized, and the operation of our troops to take the city is developing very slowly," Zhukov convinced the army commanders in a telegram dated 04/22/1945 (Note 1 *)
"The number and strength of the formations defending the capital of the German Reich in these April days ... were so insignificant that it is even difficult to imagine" - Theo Findal, Norwegian journalist for the Aftenposten newspaper (Oslo), eyewitness to the siege of Berlin (Note 22 * )
"... it feels like our troops have worked with taste on Berlin. On the way, I saw only a dozen surviving houses" - Stalin 07/16/1945 at the Potsdam Conference of the Heads of the Three Allied Powers (Note 8 *)

BRIEF INFORMATION: the population of Berlin in 1945 was 2-2.5 million people, the area was 88 thousand hectares. This area, the so-called Greater Berlin, was only 15% built up. The rest of the city was occupied by gardens and parks. Greater Berlin was divided into 20 districts, of which 14 were external. The development of the outer regions was sparse, low-rise, most of the houses had a wall thickness of 0.5-0.8 m. The boundary of Greater Berlin was the ring freeway. The inner districts of the city were built up most densely within the boundaries of the district railway. Approximately along the border of the densely built-up area, the perimeter of the city defense system divided into 9 (8 and one internal - Note 28 *) sectors passed. The average width of the streets in these areas is 20–30 m, and in some cases up to 60 m. The buildings are stone and concrete. The average height of houses is 4-5 floors, the thickness of the walls of buildings is up to 1.5 m. By the spring of 1945, most of the houses had been destroyed by Allied bombing. Sewerage, plumbing and electricity were damaged and did not work. The total length of the metro lines was about 80 km. (Note 2* and 13*). There were more than 400 reinforced concrete bunkers for 300-1000 people in the city (Note 6*). 100 km. was the total length of the Berlin front and 325 sq.m - the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe besieged city at the time the assault began
- on 03/06/45, General H. Reiman, commandant of Berlin (until 04/24/45 - Note 28 *), stated that no measures had been taken to protect the city from the assault, there was neither a plan nor a line of defense, and in fact there was no there were troops. Worse, food supplies for the civilian population were not made, and the plan for the evacuation of women, children and the elderly simply did not exist (Note 27*). According to General G. Weidling, the last commandant of Berlin, on April 24, 1945, there were stocks of food and ammunition in Berlin for 30 days, but the warehouses were located on the outskirts, there was almost no ammunition or food in the center, and the more the Red Army ring narrowed around the defenders of the city, the more difficult the situation with ammunition and food became, and in the last couple of days they were left almost without one or the other (Note 28 *)
- communication between individual defensive sectors, as well as communication with the defense headquarters, was useless. There was no radio communication, telephone communication was maintained only through civil telephone wires (Note 28)
- 04/22/45, for unknown reasons, 1400 Berlin fire brigades were ordered to move from the city to the West, subsequently the order was canceled, but only a small number of firefighters could return (Note 27 *)
- on the eve of the assault, 65% of all large factories and factories continued to operate in the city, employing 600 thousand people (Note 27 *)

More than 100 thousand foreign workers, mostly French and Soviet citizens, were on the eve of the storming of Berlin (Note 27 *)
- in accordance with the agreements reached earlier with the USSR, the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition at the beginning of April 1945 finally stopped at the turn of the Elbe River, which corresponds to a distance of 100-120 km. from Berlin. At the same time, Soviet troops were at a distance of 60 km from Berlin (Note 13 *) - fearing that the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition would violate their earlier obligations, Stalin ordered to start the assault on Berlin no later than 04/16/45 and take the city after 12- 15 days (Note 13*)
- initially, on 04/14/45, the Berlin garrison consisted of 200 Volkssturm battalions, the Great Germany security regiment, one anti-aircraft division with reinforcement units, 3 tank destroyer brigades, a special Berlin tank company (24 T-VI and T- V not on the move, as well as separate towers mounted on concrete bunkers), 3 anti-tank divisions, defensive armored train No. 350, which totaled 150 thousand people, 330 guns, 1 armored train, 24 tanks not on the move (Note 12 *) . Until 04/24/45, according to the last commandant of the city, General G. Wedling, there was not a single regular formation in Berlin, with the exception of the guard regiment "Grossdeutschland" and the SS Monke brigade guarding the Imperial Chancellery and up to 90 thousand people from the Volkssturm , police, fire protection, anti-aircraft units, except for the rear units serving them (Note 28 *). According to modern Russian data for 2005, Weidling had 60,000 soldiers at his disposal, who were opposed by 464,000 Soviet troops. On April 26, 1945, the Germans took the last step to stop the enemy (Note 30 *)

According to Soviet data, on April 25, 1945, the encircled garrison of Berlin consisted of 300 thousand people, 3 thousand guns and mortars, 250 tanks and self-propelled guns. According to German data: 41 thousand people (of which 24 thousand were "Volkssturmists", 18 thousand of which belonged to the "Clausewitz call" from the 2nd category and were in a state of 6-hour readiness). The city hosted the Münchenberg Panzer Division, the 118th Panzer Division (sometimes called the 18th Panzergrenadier Division), the 11th SS Volunteer Panzergrenadier Division Nordland, parts of the 15th Latvian Grenadier Division, air defense units (Note 7 * and 5*). According to other sources, in addition to the Hitler Youth and Volkssturm, the city was defended by units of the 11th SS division "Nordland", the 32nd grenadier division of the Waffen-SS "Charlemagne" (a total of about 400 Frenchmen - data from Western historians), a Latvian battalion from the 15th grenadier divisions of the Waffen-SS, two incomplete divisions of the 47th Wehrmacht Corps and 600 SS men of Hitler's personal battalion (Note 14 *). According to the last commandant of Berlin, on April 24, 1945, the city was defended by units of 56tk (13-15 thousand people) consisting of: 18th MD (up to 4000 people), the Müncheberg division (up to 200 people, division artillery and 4 tanks ), MDSS "Nordland" (3500-4000 people); 20th MD (800-1200 people); 9th ADD (up to 4500 people) (Note 28*)
- The 102nd Spanish company as part of the SS Grenadier Division "Nordland" fought in the Moritz Platz area, where the buildings of the Reich Ministries of Aviation and Propaganda were located (Note 24 *)
- 6 Turkestan battalions from the Eastern volunteers took part in the defense of the city (Note 29 *)

- the total number of defenders was approximately 60 thousand and consisted of various units of the Wehrmacht, SS, anti-aircraft units, police, fire brigades, "Volkssturm" and "Hitler Youth" with no more than 50 tanks, but a relatively large number of anti-aircraft guns, including 4 anti-aircraft defense towers (Note 20 *); the number of defenders of Berlin - 60 thousand with 50-60 tanks (Note 19 *), a similar estimate is given by Z. Knappe, head of the operational department of the 26th shopping mall, and not 300 thousand according to official Soviet data. In the book "The fall of Berlin" by the English historians E. Reed and D. Fisher, figures are given, according to which, as of 19.04.45, there were 41,253 people at the disposal of the military commandant of Berlin, General H. Reiman. Of this number, only 15,000 were soldiers and officers of the Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine. Among the rest there were 1713 (12 thousand - Note 27 *) policemen, 1215 "Hitler youth" and representatives of the labor service and 24 thousand Volkssturmists. Theoretically, within 6 hours a call could be put under arms (Volkssturm units of the 2nd category, which were supposed to join the ranks of the defenders already during the battles, and as certain enterprises were closed - Note 28 *), called "Clausewitz Muster", numbering 52,841 people. But the reality of such a call and its combat capabilities were rather arbitrary. In addition, weapons and ammunition were a big problem. In total, Reiman had 42,095 rifles, 773 submachine guns, 1,953 light machine guns, 263 heavy machine guns, and a small number of mortars and field guns. Standing apart among the defenders of Berlin was Hitler's bodyguard, numbering about 1,200 people. The number of Berlin defenders is also evidenced by the number of prisoners taken during the surrender (as of May 2, 1945, 134 thousand military personnel, military officials and military police officers were taken prisoner (surrendered or were arrested? - ed. note) (Note 5 * and 7 *) The number of the Berlin garrison can be estimated at 100-120 thousand people (Note 2*).

Norwegian journalist Theo Findal from the newspaper "Aftenposten" (Oslo), an eyewitness to the siege of Berlin: "... Undoubtedly, the basis of the defense of Berlin was artillery. It consisted of light and heavy batteries, which were combined into weak regiments ... Almost all the guns were foreign production, and consequently, the supply of ammunition was limited. In addition, the artillery was almost immobile, since the regiments did not have a single tractor. The infantry units of the defenders of Berlin were not distinguished by either good weapons or high combat training. The Volkssturm and the Hitler Youth were the main forces of local self-defense. They could not be considered as combat units. Rather, they could be compared with paramilitary detachments of the people's militia. All age groups were represented in the Volkssturm - from 16-year-old youths to 60-year-olds. But most often the bulk of the units Volkssturm were elderly people.As a rule, the party appointed unit commanders from its ranks, etc. Only the brigade of SS troops of SS Brigadeführer Mohnke, which exercised command power in the city center, was well equipped and distinguished by high morale "(Note 22 *)
- at the time of the end of the assault on the city, out of 950 bridges, 84 were destroyed (Note 11 *). According to other sources, the defenders of the city destroyed 120 bridges (Note 20* and 27*) out of the existing 248 city bridges (Note 27*)
- Allied aviation dropped 49,400 tons of explosives on Berlin, destroying and partially destroying 20.9% of urban development (Note 10 *). According to the rear services of the Red Army, the Allies dropped 58,955 tons of bombs on Berlin over the last three years of the war, while Soviet artillery fired 36,280 tons. shells in just 16 days of assault (Note 20 *)
- Allied bombing of Berlin reached its peak in early 1945. 03/28/1945 The 8th US Air Force Army, based in England, struck 383 B-17 aircraft with 1038 tons of bombs on board (Note 23 *)
- only on 02/03/45, 25 thousand inhabitants of Berlin were killed as a result of an American raid (Note 26 *). In total, 52 thousand Berliners died as a result of the bombing (Note 27 *)
- The Berlin operation is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the bloodiest battle of our time: 3.5 million people, 52 thousand guns and mortars, 7750 tanks, and 11 thousand aircraft participated in it on both sides (Note 5 *)
- the storming of Berlin was carried out by units of the 1st, 2nd Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts with the support of warships of the Baltic Fleet and the Dnieper River Flotilla (62 units). From the air, the 1st Ukrainian Front was supported by the 2nd VA (1106 fighters, 529 attack aircraft, 422 bombers and 91 reconnaissance aircraft), the 1st Belorussian Front - by the 16th and 18th VA (1567 fighters, 731 attack aircraft, 762 bomber and 128 reconnaissance), the 2nd Belorussian Front was supported by the 4th VA (602 fighters, 449 attack aircraft, 283 bombers and 26 reconnaissance aircraft)

1st Belorussian Front consisted of 5 combined arms armies, 2 shock and 1 guards armies, 2 guards tank armies, 2 guards cavalry corps, 1 army of the Polish Army: 768 thousand people, 1795 tanks, 1360 self-propelled guns, 2306 anti-tank guns, 7442 field guns (caliber from 76mm and above), 7186 mortars (caliber from 82mm and above), 807 Ruzo "Katyusha"
2nd Belorussian Front consisted of 5 armies (one of them is shock): 314 thousand people, 644 tanks, 307 self-propelled guns, 770 anti-tank guns, 3172 field guns (caliber from 76mm and above), 2770 mortars (caliber from 82mm and above), 1531 ruzo " Katyusha"
1st Ukrainian Front consisted of 2 combined arms, 2 guards tank and 1 guards armies and the army of the Polish Army: 511.1 thousand people, 1388 tanks, 667 self-propelled guns, 1444 anti-tank guns, 5040 field guns (caliber from 76mm and above), 5225 mortars (caliber from 82mm and above), 917 Ruzo "Katyusha" (Note 13 *)
- according to other sources, the storming of Berlin was carried out by units of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, which included 464 thousand soldiers and officers, 14.8 thousand guns and mortars, almost 1500 tanks and self-propelled guns, as well as, (Note 19 *) - at least 2 thousand Katyushas. 12.5 thousand Polish military personnel also took part in the assault (Note 7 *, 5 *, 19 *)
- to conduct Berlin operation, in addition to the armies of the three fronts, units of the 18th VA long-range aviation, air defense forces, the Baltic Fleet and the Dnieper military flotilla were involved, which totaled 2.5 million people, 41.6 thousand guns and mortars, 6250 tanks and self-propelled guns, 7 .5 thousand aircraft. This made it possible to achieve superiority in personnel - 2.5 times, in tanks and artillery - 4 times, aircraft - 2 times (Note 7 * and 25 *)
- for every kilometer of the offensive of the 1st Belorussian Front, which performed the main combat mission, on average there were 19 tanks and self-propelled guns, 61 guns, 44 mortars and 9 Katyushas, ​​not counting the infantry (Note 13 *)
- 04/25/1945 500 thousand German grouping was cut in two - one part remained in Berlin, the other (200 thousand more than 300 tanks and self-propelled guns, over 2 thousand guns and mortars) - south of the city (Note 7 *)

On the eve of the assault, 2000 aircraft of the 16th and 18th VA delivered three massive attacks on the city (Note 5 *). On the night before the storming of Berlin, 743 long-range bombers Il-4 (Db-3f) bombed, and in total more than 1,500 long-range bombers were involved in the Berlin operation (Note 3 *)
- 04/25/45 674 long-range bombers of the 18th VA alone (ex-ADD of the Red Army Air Force) attacked Berlin (Note 31 *)
- on the day of the assault, after artillery preparation, two strikes were made by 1486 aircraft of the 16th VA (Note 22). During the assault on Berlin, ground forces also supported 6 air corps of the 2nd VA (Note 7 *)
- during the battle, almost 2 million gun shots fell on Berlin - 36 thousand tons of metal. From Pomerania to railway fortress guns were delivered, firing at the center of Berlin with shells weighing half a ton. Already after the victory, it was estimated that 20% of the houses in Berlin were completely destroyed, and another 30% - partially (Note 30 *)
- according to the Soviet command, up to 17 thousand people managed to escape from Berlin with 80-90 armored vehicles. However, few people managed to get to the German positions in the north (Note 4 *) According to other sources, a group of 17 thousand people left Berlin for a breakthrough, and 30 thousand from Spandau (Note 5 *)

Losses of the Red Army in the seven days of the storming of Berlin: 361,367 people were killed, wounded or missing, 2108 guns and mortars were lost, 1997 tanks and self-propelled guns (Note 19 * and 22 *), 917 combat aircraft (Note 5 * and 7 * ). According to other sources, the losses amounted to 352 thousand people, of which 78 thousand were killed (9 thousand Poles), 2 thousand tanks and self-propelled guns, 527 aircraft (Note 19*). According to modern estimates, in the battles for Berlin, the total losses of the Red Army amounted to about 500 thousand people
- for 16 days of fighting in Berlin (16.04-02.05.1945), the Red Army approximately lost 100 thousand people only killed (Note 20 *). According to the newspaper "Arguments and Facts" 5 \ 2005, the Red Army lost - 600 thousand, while, according to G. Krivosheev in his work "Russia and the USSR in the wars of the XX century. Statistical study" irretrievable losses in the Berlin strategic offensive operation amounted to 78.3 thousand (Note 21*). According to modern official Russian data for 2015, the irretrievable losses of the Red Army during the storming of Berlin amounted to 78.3 thousand people, and the losses of the Wehrmacht - about 400 thousand killed and about 380 thousand prisoners (Note 25 *)
- losses amounted to more than 800 tanks out of 1200 that took part in the storming of Berlin (Note 17 *). Only the 2nd Guards TA lost 204 tanks in a week of fighting, half of which from the actions of faustpatrons (Note 5 * and 7 *)
- 125 thousand civilians died during the capture of Berlin in 1945 (Note 9 *). According to other sources, about 100 thousand Berliners became victims of the assault, of which about 20 thousand died of heart attacks, 6 thousand became suicides, the rest died directly from shelling, street fighting or died later from wounds (Note 27 *)
- due to the fact that the dividing line between the advancing Soviet units was not established in time, Soviet aviation and artillery repeatedly attacked their own troops on the premises of the deputy head of the secret department of the OGPU Yakov Agranov. (Note 5 *)
- the Reichstag was defended by a garrison of up to 2,000 people (1,500 of whom were killed and 450 were taken prisoner), mostly parachuted cadets of the naval school from Rostock (Note 6 *). According to other sources, about 2.5 thousand defenders of the Reichstag died and about 2.6 thousand surrendered (Note 14 *)

04/30/41, on the eve of suicide, Hitler signed and brought to the Wehrmacht command an order to break through troops from Berlin, but after his death, by the evening of 04/30/41, it was canceled by the "Goebbels government", which demanded to defend the city at the last - from the post-war interrogation of the latter Chief of Defense of Berlin, General Weidling (Note 28*)
- during the capitulation of the Reichstag, the following trophies were taken by Soviet troops: 39 guns, 89 machine guns, 385 rifles, 205 machine guns, 2 self-propelled guns and a large number of faustpatrons (Note 6 *)
- before the storming of Berlin, the Germans had about 3 million Faustpatrons at their disposal (Note 6 *)
- the defeat of the faustpatron caused the death of 25% of all destroyed T-34s (Note 19 *)
- : 800 gr. bread, 800 gr. potatoes, 150 gr. meat and 75 gr. fat (Note 7*)
- the assertion remains unconfirmed so far that Hitler ordered the opening of the locks on the Spree River in order to flood the metro section between Leipzigerstrasse and Unter der Linden, where thousands of Berliners took refuge at the stations (Note 5 *). According to other information, sappers of the SS division "Nordland" on the morning of 05/02/45 blew up a tunnel under the Landwehr Canal in the Trebinner Strasse area, the water from which gradually flooded a 25-kilometer section of the metro and caused the death of about 100 people, and not 15-50 thousand, as it is previously reported according to some data (Note 15*)

The tunnels of the Berlin metro were repeatedly blown up during the storming of the city by Soviet sappers (Note 16 *)
- during the Berlin operation (from 16.04-08.05.45), 11635 wagons of ammunition were used up by Soviet troops, including over 10 million artillery and mortar ammunition, 241.7 thousand rockets, almost 3 million hand grenades and 392 million small arms cartridges (Note 18*)
- released from the Berlin prison Moabit (7 thousand - Note 30 *) Soviet prisoners of war were immediately armed and enrolled in rifle battalions that stormed Berlin (Note 20 *)

NOTES:
(Note 1 *) - B. Belozerov "Front without borders 1941-1945."
(Note 2 *) - I. Isaev "Berlin 45th: Battle in the lair of the beast"
(Note 3 *) - Y. Egorov "Aircraft of the Design Bureau of S.V. Ilyushin"
(Note 4 *) - B. Sokolov "Mythical war. Mirages of the Second World War"
(Note 5 *) - Runes "Assaults of the Great Patriotic War. Urban battle, it is the most difficult"
(Note 6 *) - A. Vasilchenko "Faustniks in battle"
(Note 7 *) - L. Moshchansky "At the walls of Berlin"
(Note 8 *) - B. Sokolov "Unknown Zhukov: a portrait without retouching in the mirror of the era"
(Note 9 *) - L. Semenenko "The Great Patriotic War. How it was"
(Note 10 *) - C. Webster "Strategic bombing of Germany"
(Note 11 *) - A. Speer "The Third Reich from the inside. Memoirs of the Reich Minister of War Industry"
(Note 12 *) - V. But "Battle for Berlin" part 2 magazine "Science and Technology" 5 \ 2010
(Note 13 *) - V. But "Battle for Berlin" part 1 of the journal "Science and Technology" 4 \ 2010
(Note 14 *) - G. Williamson "SS is an instrument of terror"
(Note 15 *) - E. Beaver "The Fall of Berlin. 1945"
(Note 16 *) - N. Fedotov "I remember ..." magazine "Arsenal-Collection" 13\2013
(Note 17 *) - S. Monetchikov "Domestic easel anti-tank grenade launchers" magazine "Brother" 8 \ 2013
(Note 18 *) - I. Vernidub "Ammunition of Victory"
(Note 19 *) - D. Porter "World War II - a steel shaft from the East. Soviet armored forces 1939-45"
(Note 20 *) - "Encyclopedia of WW2. The collapse of the Third Reich (spring-summer 1945)"
(Note 21 *) - Y. Rubtsov "Penal boxes of the Great Patriotic War. In life and on the screen"
(Note 22 *) - P. Gostoni "Battle for Berlin. Memoirs of eyewitnesses"
(Note 23 *) - H. Altner "I am Hitler's suicide bomber"
(Note 24 *) - M.Zefirov "Aces of WW2. Allies of the Luftwaffe: Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria"
(Note 25 *) - Y. Rubtsov "The Great Patriotic War 1941-1945" (Moscow, 2015)
(Note 26 *) - D. Irving "Destruction of Dresden"
(Note 27 *) - R. Cornelius "The Last Battle. Assault on Berlin"
(Note 28 *) - V. Makarov "Generals and officers of the Wehrmacht tell ..."
(Note 29 *) - O. Karo "Soviet Empire"
(Note 30 *) - A. Utkin "Storm of Berlin" magazine "Around the World" 05 \ 2005
(Note 31 *) - collection "Long-range aviation of Russia"

Berlin was taken surprisingly quickly. The assault on Berlin itself lasted from April 25 to May 2. Berlin offensive started April 16th. For comparison: Budapest was on the defensive from December 25, 1944 to February 13, 1945. The besieged city of Breslau (now Wroclaw) capitulated after Berlin without being taken by assault, being under siege since mid-February. The Germans were never able to take the besieged Leningrad. Fierce battles in Stalingrad went down in history. Why did Berlin fall so quickly?

According to German data, the city was defended in the final phase by 44 thousand people, of whom 22,000 died. Military historians involved in the reconstruction of the storming of Berlin agreed on a figure of 60 thousand soldiers and officers and 50-60 tanks. The Soviet army directly involved 464,000 people and 1,500 tanks and self-propelled guns in the assault on Berlin.

It fell to the city firefighters and police to defend Berlin, but the Volkssturmists prevailed - poorly trained and poorly armed old men and underage members of the Hitler Youth (Nazi "Komsomol"). There were about 15,000 regular soldiers in Berlin, including about 4,000 SS men. Even in April 1945, Hitler had a very large army, but hundreds of thousands of soldiers were not found for the capital. How did it happen that 250 thousand professional experienced soldiers waited for the end of the war in Courland (Latvia), and were not transferred across the Baltic Sea to Germany? Why did 350,000 soldiers meet their surrender in Norway, from where it was even easier to get to Germany? A million soldiers surrendered in Italy on 29 April. Army Group Center, located in the Czech Republic, totaled 1 million 200 thousand people. And Berlin, declared a fortress (Festung Berlin) in February 1945, had neither a sufficient garrison nor any serious fortification preparation for defense. And thank God.

Hitler's death led to the swift surrender of the German army. While he was alive, the German troops surrendered whole formations in extreme cases, when all possibilities of resistance were exhausted. Here you can remember Stalingrad or Tunisia. Hitler was going to fight to the last of his soldiers. Strange as it may sound today, but on April 21 he believed that he had every opportunity to push the Red Army back from Berlin. Although at that time the German defense line on the Oder had already been broken through and it became clear from the advance of the Soviet troops that a few more days and Berlin would be in the blockade ring. American troops reached the Elbe (at the summit in Yalta, the Elba was designated as the dividing line between American and Soviet troops) and waited for the Soviet army.

At one time, Hitler demonstrated outstanding abilities in the struggle for power. Having a very low starting position, he managed to outplay, or even just fool, many professional politicians and gain complete control over a large European country. Hitler's power in Germany was much greater than the power of the Kaiser. And if during the First World War the military actually deprived the Kaiser of power, then during the Second World War Hitler increased his power over Germany. How can one not imagine oneself a genius, a favorite of Providence? And Hitler believed in his own genius.

A characteristic episode is cited in his memoirs ("Hitler. The last ten days.") Captain Gerhard Boldt, assistant chief of the General Staff Guderian, and then Krebs: absolutely reliable information, prepared by experts of the highest level, regarding the plans of the Soviet command and the places of concentration of the Russian strike units.Having listened, Hitler, in the strongest irritation and in a tone that did not allow objections, declared: "I categorically reject these unsuitable proposals. Only a true genius is able to predict the intentions of the enemy and draw the necessary conclusions. And no genius will pay attention to various trifles.

Hitler, rejecting all the proposals and requests of the General Staff for the evacuation of two armies from Courland, justified his refusal with a "brilliant" insight that if this supposedly happens, then Sweden, which is just waiting for this, will immediately declare war on Germany. All the arguments of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in favor of Sweden's steadfast observance of neutrality were not taken into account by the "brilliant" strategist.

The Courland Cauldron was formed on the coast of the Baltic Sea.

Hitler did not trust his generals. And this distrust intensified after the assassination attempt on July 20, 1944. A sharp deterioration in health after a shell shock and many minor injuries also affected the quality of decisions made. All this led to such stupid decisions as the appointment on January 24, 1945 of the Reichsführer SS Himmler as the commander of the Vistula Army Group (equivalent to our concept - the front commander), and the Minister of Information and Propaganda Goebbels - the Reich Defense Commissioner and, concurrently, the Berlin Defense Commissioner . Both tried very hard and did everything in their power to safely fill up the assignments.

Our commissars, in truth, were no better. The famous Mekhlis, sent by Stalin in 1942 to the Crimea to look after the "stupid" generals, broke so much firewood. that no Goebbels could compete with him. Thanks to Mekhlis, who constantly interferes in military affairs, the Red Army, having a great advantage in numbers and equipment, suffered a crushing defeat. The Red Army lost 170,000 prisoners alone and tens of thousands killed. The Germans lost 3,400 men, of which about 600 were killed.

But back to the storming of Berlin. The troops of the First Belorussian Front were in front of a decisive offensive at a distance of 60 km from Berlin. The direct route to the capital of the Reich was covered by the 9th German Army. After breaking through the defense line to Berlin, the 56th Panzer Corps under the command of Lieutenant General Helmut Weidling retreated from the Seelow Heights. On April 16, on the eve of the Berlin operation, the corps numbered 50,000 people along with the rear. After bloody battles, the corps retreated to the capital, greatly weakened. By the beginning of the fighting in Berlin itself, the corps had the following forces:

1. 18th Panzer Division - 4000 people.

2. 9th Airborne Division - 4000 people (500 paratroopers entered Berlin and here the division was replenished with Volkssturmists up to 4000).

3. 20th Panzer Division - about 1000 people. Of these, 800 Volkssturmists.

4th SS Panzer Division "Nordland" - 3500 - 4000 people. The national composition of the division: Danes, Norwegians, Swedes and Germans.

In total, the corps that retreated to Berlin totaled 13,000 - 15,000 fighters.

After the surrender of Berlin, General Weidling gave the following testimony during interrogation: “Already on April 24, I was convinced that it was impossible to defend Berlin and from a military point of view it was pointless, since the German command did not have sufficient forces for this, moreover, at the disposal of the German command by April 24 there was not a single regular formation in Berlin, with the exception of the security regiment "Grossdeutschland" and the SS brigade guarding the Imperial Chancellery.All defense was entrusted to units of the Volkssturm, police, fire brigade personnel, personnel of various rear units and services.

The commandant of Berlin, Helmut Weidling, died in the Vladimir prison on November 17, 1955. (aged 64).

Before Weidling, the defense of Berlin was led by Lieutenant General Helmut Reimann, who completed the people's militia (Volkssturm). In total, 92 Volkssturm battalions (about 60,000 people) were formed. For his army, Reiman received 42,095 rifles, 773 machine guns, 1,953 light machine guns, 263 heavy machine guns, and some mortars and field guns.

Volkssturm - a people's militia in which males from 16 to 60 years old were called up.

By the time the militia was formed, the German armed forces were experiencing an acute shortage of weapons, including small arms. Volkssturm battalions were armed mainly with captured weapons, manufactured in France, Holland, Belgium, England, Soviet Union, Italy, Norway. In total, there were 15 types of rifles and 10 types of light machine guns. Each Volkssturmist had an average of 5 rifle cartridges. But there were quite a lot of faust cartridges, although they could not compensate for the lack of other weapons.

The Volkssturm was divided into two categories: those who had any weapons - Volkssturm 1 (there were about 20,000 of them), and Volkssturm 2 - who had no weapons at all (40,000). The battalions of the people's militia were formed not according to the military scheme, but according to party districts. Party chiefs who were not trained in military affairs were usually appointed commanders. These battalions did not have headquarters, moreover, they did not have field kitchens and did not stand on allowances. The Volkssturmists were fed by the local population, usually their families. And when they fought far from their homes, they ate what God would send, or even starved. Volkssturm also did not have its own transport and communications. Among other things, these battalions were subordinate to the party leadership, and not to the military command, and passed to the commandant of the city only after receiving a prearranged signal, which meant that the assault on the city had begun.

This is also a Volkssturm. Dictators need subjects only as cannon fodder.

The fortifications of Berlin erected under the leadership of Goebbels were, according to General M. Pemzel, simply ridiculous. The report of General Serov addressed to Stalin also gives an extremely low assessment of the Berlin fortifications. Soviet experts stated that there were no serious fortifications within a radius of 10-15 km around Berlin.

On April 18, on the orders of Goebbels, Reimann, then commandant of Berlin, was forced to transfer 30 Volkssturm battalions and an air defense unit with their excellent guns from the city to the second line of defense. On April 19, 24,000 militias remained in the city. The departed battalions never returned to Berlin. Also in the city there were units made up of military personnel of the rear services, firefighters, policemen, members of the Hitler Youth. Among the young Volkssturmists was 15-year-old Adolf Martin Bormann, the son of Hitler's deputy in the party. He survived and became a Catholic priest after the war.

The last replenishment arrived in Berlin by land (April 24) were about 300 French from the remnants of the SS Volunteer Division "Charlemagne". The division suffered heavy losses in the fighting in Pomerania. Of the 7,500 people, 1,100 survived. These 300 French SS men provided invaluable assistance to Hitler. They knocked out 92 Soviet tanks out of 108 destroyed in the defense zone of the Nordlung division. On May 2, 30 French survivors were taken prisoner at the Potsdam railway station. Oddly enough, two-thirds of the SS men who fought furiously against the Soviet army in Berlin were foreigners: Norwegians, Danes, Swedes and French.

Armored personnel carrier of the commander of a company of Swedish volunteers. To the right of the car lies the driver: Unterscharführer Ragnar Johansson.

The last meager replenishment of the defenders of Berlin arrived on the night of 26 April. A battalion of cadets of the naval school from Rostock was transported by transport aircraft. Some sources (even Wikipedia) report. that it was a parachute landing. But these comrades probably saw paratroopers jumping only on TV, otherwise they would not have written that young people trained for service on submarines mastered parachuting so skillfully and were able to perform a technically difficult jump at night from a low altitude. Yes, and on the city, which in itself is difficult even during the day and in peacetime.

Not only Hitler and Goebbels helped us to take Berlin, but also German generals. The commander of the Vistula Army Group, which covered Berlin from the east, Colonel General Heinrici, belonged to those German generals who believed that the war was lost and it must be urgently ended, to prevent the complete destruction of the country and the destruction of the people. He was extremely sensitive to Hitler's intentions to fight to the last German. Heinrici, a talented military leader, was considered very suspicious from the point of view of the Nazis: he was married to a half-Jewish woman, was a zealous Christian, went to church and did not want to join the NSDAP, refused to burn Smolensk during his retreat. Heinrici, after breaking through the line of defense on the Oder, withdrew his troops in such a way that they would not fall into Berlin. On April 22, the 56th Panzer Corps received an order from the headquarters of the 9th Army, which is part of the Vistula group, to withdraw south of Berlin to connect with the main parts of the army. The generals, playing giveaway, hoped that the Red Army would reach the Reich Chancellery somewhere by April 22. Weidling received an order from Hitler to lead a corps to defend the city, but he did not obey the order immediately, but only after the Fuhrer duplicated it. Hitler even ordered Weidling to be shot for insubordination on April 23, but he managed to justify himself. True, the general won a little from this. Weidling died in a Vladimir prison after spending 10 years there.

Heinrici continued to withdraw his troops, located north of Berlin, to the west for surrender to the Anglo-American troops. In doing so, he tried to deceive Keitel and Jodl, who remained loyal to Hitler to the very end. Heinrici did everything possible not to comply with the demand of the command and Hitler personally to organize a counterattack by the Steiner group from the north to unblock Berlin. When Keitel was finally convinced of Heinrici's intentions, he removed him from his post and offered to shoot himself as an honest officer. However, Heinrici surrendered command. left for a small town and later surrendered to British troops.

Colonel General Gotthard Heinrici. Died in December 1971 (aged 84).

On April 22, SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner received Hitler's order to strike from the north and unblock Berlin. Steiner attempted to carry out the order, but failed. Realizing that further attempts would doom his hastily formed group to death, Steiner arbitrarily began to withdraw his subordinate units to the West. He also disobeyed the orders of Field Marshal Keitel, the Chief of the General Staff, General Krebs, to send his troops back towards Berlin. On April 27, 1945, Hitler removed him from command of the group for disobedience, but Steiner again did not obey and continued to retreat. According to Heinz Hehne, author of The Black Order of the SS, Himmler was critical of Steiner, calling him "the most disobedient of my generals." Close to Himmler, Obergruppenführer G. Berger stated: “Obergruppenführer Steiner cannot be educated. He does whatever he wants and does not tolerate objections.

SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner. He died in May 1966 (aged 69).

Great help was given to the Soviet Army by the Minister of Armaments Speer, who did so much to ensure that until the beginning of 1945 the production of armaments in Germany steadily increased. Speer, after the winter offensive of the Soviet army, wrote a report for Hitler, which began with the words "the war is lost." Speer was categorically against the "scorched earth" tactics in Germany, believing that the surviving Germans would have to live somehow. Speer prevented most of the bridges in Berlin from being blown up, which could have led to delays in the offensive and heavy losses for the Red Army. Of the 248 bridges in Berlin, only 120 were blown up.

The central defense sector of Berlin, the Citadel, was defended by a group under the command of Brigadeführer W. Monke.

Brigadeführer W. Monke, released from Soviet captivity in October 1955, died in 2001.

On the night of April 21, 1945, Adolf Hitler appointed him commander of the Monke Battle Group, which was entrusted with the defense of the Reich Chancellery and the Fuhrer's bunker. In total, the group included 9 battalions with a total number of about 2100 people. After Hitler's suicide, on May 1, Mohnke led a group that made a breakthrough from the bunker and unsuccessfully tried to break out of Berlin to the north. Was taken prisoner.

The inhabitants of the Nazi bunker tried to escape from Berlin in three groups. In one of the groups were Bormann, Axman, the head of the Hitler Youth and Hitler's personal doctor, Ludwig Stumpfegger. They, along with other inhabitants of the bunker, tried to get through the fighting center of Berlin, but soon Stumpfegger and Bormann separated from the group. In the end, exhausted and demoralized, they committed suicide at Lehrter station. On December 7-8, 1972, two skeletons were found during the laying of an underground mail cable. After their careful examination by forensic doctors, dentists and anthropologists, the skeletons were recognized as belonging to Stumpfegger and Bormann. Fragments of glass ampoules with potassium cyanide were found between the teeth of the skeletons.

Knowing the weakness of the defense of Berlin, the Soviet command planned to capture the German capital on Lenin's birthday, April 21. On this day, the "Victory Banner" was supposed to fly over Berlin. Why, then, did the Red Army, which has a colossal advantage in men and equipment, have to take Berlin with such heavy losses, the highest average daily losses in the entire war? Military historians are still looking for an answer to this day.

I shared with you the information that I "dug up" and systematized. At the same time, he has not become impoverished at all and is ready to share further, at least twice a week. If you find errors or inaccuracies in the article, please let us know. My e-mail address: [email protected] I will be very grateful.

How did this important historical event take place? What preceded it, what were the plans and the alignment of forces of the warring parties. How the operation of the Soviet troops to capture Berlin developed, the chronology of events, the assault on the Reichstag with the hoisting of the Banner of Victory and the significance of the historical battle.

The capture of Berlin and the fall of the Third Reich

By the middle of spring 1945, the main events were unfolding in a significant part of Germany. By this time, Poland, Hungary, almost all of Czechoslovakia, Eastern Pomerania and Silesia had been liberated. The troops of the Red Army liberated the capital of Austria - Vienna. The defeat of large enemy groupings in East Prussia, Courland, and the Zemlandsky Peninsula was completed. Most of the coast of the Baltic Sea remained with our army. Finland, Bulgaria, Romania and Italy were withdrawn from the war.

In the south, the Yugoslav army, together with the Soviet troops, cleared most of Serbia and its capital Belgrade from the Nazis. From the west, the Allies crossed the Rhine and the operation to defeat the Ruhr group was coming to an end.

The German economy was in great difficulty. The raw material areas of the previously occupied countries were lost. The decline in the industry continued. Production of military products for six months has decreased by more than 60 percent. In addition, the Wehrmacht experienced difficulties with mobilization resources. Sixteen-year-old youths were already subject to the call. However, Berlin still remained not only the political capital of fascism, but also a major economic center. In addition, Hitler concentrated the main forces with a huge combat potential in the Berlin direction.

That is why the defeat of the Berlin grouping of German troops and the capture of the capital of the Third Reich was of such importance. The battle for Berlin and its fall was supposed to end the Great Patriotic War and become the natural outcome of the Second World War of 1939-1945.

Berlin offensive operation

All members of the anti-Hitler coalition were interested in the speedy end of hostilities. Fundamental questions, namely: who will take Berlin, the division of spheres of influence in Europe, the post-war structure of Germany and others were resolved in the Crimea at a conference in Yalta.

The enemy understood that strategically the war was lost, but in the current situation he tried to extract tactical benefits. His main task was to drag out the war in order to find ways to enter into separate negotiations with the Western allies of the USSR in order to obtain more favorable conditions surrender.

There is also an opinion that Hitler had hope for the so-called retaliation weapon, which was at the final stage of development and was supposed to turn the balance of power. That is why the Wehrmacht needed time, and losses here did not play any role. Therefore, Hitler concentrated 214 divisions on the Soviet-German front, and only 60 on the American-British one.

Preparation of an offensive operation, the position and tasks of the parties. The balance of forces and means

On the German side, the defense of the Berlin direction was assigned to army groups "Center" and "Vistula". The construction of echeloned defense was carried out from the beginning of 1945. The main part of it was the Oder-Neissen line and the Berlin defensive area.

The first was a deep defense of three lanes up to forty kilometers wide, with powerful strongholds, engineering barriers and areas prepared for flooding.

In the Berlin defensive area, three so-called defensive ring bypasses were equipped. The first, or external, was prepared at a distance of twenty-five to forty kilometers from the center of the capital. It included strongholds and points of resistance in settlements, defense lines along rivers and canals. The second main, or internal, up to eight kilometers deep passed through the outskirts of Berlin. All lines and positions were tied into a single system of fire. The third city bypass coincided with the ring railway. Berlin itself was divided into nine sectors by the command of the Nazi troops. The streets leading to the city center were barricaded, the first floors of buildings were turned into long-term firing points and structures, trenches and caponiers were dug out for guns and tanks. All positions were connected by message moves. For a covert maneuver, it was supposed to actively use the metro as a roadway.

The operation of the Soviet troops to capture Berlin began to be developed during the winter offensive.

Plan for the Battle of Berlin

The idea of ​​​​the command was this - to break through the Oder-Neissen line with coordinated strikes from three fronts, then, developing the offensive, go to Berlin, surround the enemy grouping, cut it into several parts and destroy it. In the future, no later than 15 days from the beginning of the operation, reach the Elbe to join the Allied forces. To do this, the Headquarters decided to involve the 1st and 2nd Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts.

Due to the fact that the Soviet-German front narrowed, the Nazis in the Berlin direction managed to achieve an incredible density of troops. In some areas, it reached 1 division per 3 kilometers of the front line. The army groups "Center", "Vistula" included 48 infantry, 6 tank, 9 motorized divisions, 37 separate infantry regiments, 98 separate infantry battalions. Also, the Nazis had about two thousand aircraft, including 120 jets. In addition, about two hundred battalions, the so-called Volkssturm, were formed in the Berlin garrison, their total number exceeded two hundred thousand people.

Three Soviet fronts outnumbered the enemy and had the 21st combined arms army, 4 tank and 3 air, in addition, 10 separate tank and mechanized and 4 cavalry corps. It was also envisaged to involve the Baltic Fleet, the Dnieper military flotilla, long-range aviation and part of the country's air defense forces. In addition, Polish formations took part in the operation - they included 2 armies, a tank and aviation corps, 2 artillery divisions, a mortar brigade.

By the beginning of the operation, Soviet troops had an advantage over the Germans:

• in personnel by 2.5 times;
• in guns and mortars by 4 times;
• in tanks and self-propelled artillery installations by 4.1 times;
• in airplanes by 2.3 times.

Operation start

The offensive was to begin April 16. In front of him, in the offensive zone of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, one rifle battalion from each tried to open fire weapons on the front line of the enemy’s defense.

AT 5.00 artillery preparation started on the appointed date. After that 1 -th Belorussian Front under the command of Marshal Zhukov went on the offensive, inflicting three blows: one main and two auxiliary. The main one in the direction of Berlin through the Seelow Heights and the city of Seelow, the auxiliary ones are north and south of the German capital. The enemy stubbornly resisted, and it was not possible to take the heights from a swoop. After a series of detour maneuvers, only towards the end of the day did our army finally take the city of Zelov.

On the first and second days of the operation, battles were fought in the first line of defense of the German fascists. It was not until April 17 that a breach was finally made in the second lane. The German command tried to stop the offensive by committing available reserves into battle, but they did not succeed. The battles continued on 18 and 19 April. The pace of progress remained very low. The Nazis were not going to give up, their defense was filled with a large number of anti-tank weapons. Dense artillery fire, stiffness of maneuver due to difficult terrain - all this influenced the actions of our troops. Nevertheless, on April 19, at the end of the day, they broke through the third, last line of defense of this line. As a result, in the first four days, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front advanced 30 kilometers.

The offensive of the 1st Ukrainian Front under the command of Marshal Konev was more successful. During the first day, the troops crossed the Neisse River, broke through the first line of defense and wedged to a depth of 13 kilometers. The next day, throwing the main forces of the front into battle, they broke through the second lane and advanced 20 kilometers. The enemy retreated across the river Spree. The Wehrmacht, preventing a deep bypass of the entire Berlin grouping, transferred the reserves of the Center group to this sector. Despite this, on April 18, our troops crossed the Spree River and broke into the front line of the defense of the third line. At the end of the third day, in the direction of the main attack, the 1st Ukrainian Front advanced to a depth of 30 kilometers. In the process of further movement by the second half of April, our units and formations cut off the Vistula Army Group from the Center. Large enemy forces were in a semi-encirclement.

Troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, commanded by Marshal Rokossovsky, according to the plan, they were supposed to attack on April 20, but in order to facilitate the task of the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, they began to cross the Oder on the 18th. By their actions, they pulled part of the enemy's forces and reserves onto themselves. Preparations for the main phase of the operation were completed.

Storming Berlin

Before April 20, all 3 Soviet fronts basically completed the task of breaking through the Oder-Neissen line and destroying the Nazi troops in the suburbs of Berlin. It was time to move on to the assault on the German capital itself.

The beginning of the battle

On April 20, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front began shelling the outskirts of Berlin with long-range artillery, and on April 21 they broke through the first bypass line. Since April 22, fighting has already been fought directly in the city. The distance between the troops of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts advancing from the northeast from the south was reduced. The prerequisites for the complete encirclement of the German capital were created, it also became possible to cut off from the city and encircle a large grouping of the enemy’s 9th infantry army numbering up to two hundred thousand people, with the task of preventing its breakthrough to Berlin or retreat to the west. This plan was implemented on 23 and 24 April.

To avoid encirclement, the Wehrmacht command decided to remove all troops from the western front and throw them on the deblockade of the capital and the encircled 9th Army. On April 26, part of the forces of the 1st Ukrainian and 1st Belorussian fronts took up defensive positions. It was necessary to prevent a breakthrough both from the inside and from the outside.

Fighting to destroy the encircled group continued until May 1. In some areas, the fascist German troops managed to break through the defense ring and go to the west, but these attempts were thwarted in time. Only small groups were able to break through and surrender to the Americans. In total, in this sector, the troops of the 1st Ukrainian and 1st Belorussian fronts managed to capture about 120 thousand soldiers and officers, a large number of tanks and field guns.

On April 25, Soviet troops met with American troops on the Elbe. Through a well-organized defense and access to the Elbe, units of the 1st Ukrainian Front created a very successful bridgehead. It became important for the subsequent attack on Prague.

Culmination of the Battle of Berlin

Meanwhile, in Berlin, the fighting reached its climax. Assault detachments and groups carried out advancement deep into the city. They consistently moved from building to building, from quarter to quarter, from district to district, destroying pockets of resistance, disrupting the control of the defenders. In the city, the use of tanks was limited.

However, tanks played an important role in the battle for Berlin. Hardened in tank battles on the Kursk Bulge, during the liberation of Belarus and Ukraine, tankers were not to be frightened by Berlin. But they were used only in close cooperation with the infantry. Single attempts, as a rule, led to losses. Artillery units also encountered certain features of the application. Some of them were assigned to assault groups for direct fire and destruction.

Storming of the Reichstag. Banner over the Reichstag

On April 27, the battles for the city center began, which were not interrupted day or night. The Berlin garrison did not stop fighting. On April 28, it flared up again near the Reichstag. It was organized by the troops of the 3rd shock army of the 1st Belorussian Front. But our fighters were able to come close to the building only on April 30th.

Assault groups were given red flags, one of which belonged to the 150th Infantry Division of the 3rd Shock Army of the 1st Belorussian Front, later became the Banner of Victory. It was erected on May 1 on the pediment of the building by soldiers of the infantry regiment of the Idritskaya division M.A. Egorov and M.V. Kantaria. It was a symbol of the capture of the main fascist citadel.

Standard-bearers of Victory

While preparations for the Victory Parade in June 1945 were in full swing, there was not even a question of whom to appoint as the flag bearers of the Victory. It was Yegorov and Kantaria who were instructed to act as assistant denominator and carry the Banner of Victory across the main square of the country.

Unfortunately, the plans did not materialize. The front-line soldiers, who defeated the Nazis, could not cope with combat science. In addition, combat wounds still made themselves felt. Despite everything, they trained very hard, sparing neither effort nor time.

Marshal G.K. Zhukov, who hosted that famous parade, looked at the rehearsal of carrying the banner and came to the conclusion that it would be too difficult for the heroes of the battle for Berlin. Therefore, he ordered the removal of the Banner to be canceled and the parade to be held without this symbolic part.

But after 20 years, two heroes still carried the Banner of Victory across Red Square. It happened at the 1965 Victory Parade.

Capture of Berlin

The capture of Berlin did not end with the storming of the Reichstag. By May 30, the German troops defending the city were divided into four parts. Their management was completely broken. The Germans were on the brink of disaster. On the same day, the Fuhrer took his own life. On May 1, the chief of the Wehrmacht General Staff, General Krebe, entered into negotiations with the Soviet command and offered to temporarily stop hostilities. Zhukov put forward the only demand - unconditional surrender. It was rejected, and the assault resumed.

In the dead of night on May 2, the commander of the defense of the German capital, General Weidling, surrendered, and our radio stations began to receive a message from the Nazis asking for a ceasefire. By 3:00 p.m., the resistance had completely ceased. The historic assault is over.

The battle for Berlin was over, but the offensive continued. The 1st Ukrainian Front began a regrouping, the purpose of which was an attack on Prague and the liberation of Czechoslovakia. At the same time, the 1st Belorussian by May 7 went out on a wide front to the Elbe. The 2nd Belorussian reached the coast of the Baltic Sea, and also entered into interaction with the 2nd British army, positioned on the Elbe. Later, he began the liberation of the Danish islands in the Baltic Sea.

The results of the assault on Berlin and the entire Berlin operation

The active phase of the Berlin operation lasted a little over two weeks. Her results are:

• a large group of Nazis was defeated, the command of the Wehrmacht practically lost control of the remaining troops;
• the main part of the top leadership of Germany was captured, as well as almost 380 thousand soldiers and officers;
• gained experience in the use of different types of troops in urban battles;
• made an invaluable contribution to the Soviet military art;
• according to various estimates, it was the Berlin operation that dissuaded the leadership of the United States and Britain from starting a war against the USSR.

On the night of May 9, Field Marshal Keitel in Potsdam signed an act that meant the complete and unconditional surrender of Germany. So May 9 became the Day of the Great Victory. A conference was soon held there, at which the fate of post-war Germany was decided and the map of Europe was finally redrawn. There were still a few months left before the end of the Second World War of 1939-1945.

All the heroes of the battle were marked by the leadership of the USSR. More than six hundred people were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

In addition, in order to recognize special merits to the Fatherland, a medal was developed "For the capture of Berlin." Interesting fact- the battles in the German capital were still ongoing, and in Moscow they had already presented a sketch of the future medal. The Soviet leadership wanted Russian soldiers to know that wherever they fought for the glory of the Motherland, their awards would find their heroes.

Over a million people have been awarded. In addition to our soldiers, servicemen of the Polish army, who especially distinguished themselves in battles, also received medals. There are a total of seven such awards established for victories in cities outside the USSR.

The plan of the operation of the Soviet Supreme High Command was to inflict several powerful blows on a wide front, dismember the Berlin enemy grouping, surround and destroy it in parts. The operation began on April 16, 1945. After powerful artillery and aviation preparation, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front attacked the enemy on the Oder River. At the same time, the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front began to force the Neisse River. Despite the fierce resistance of the enemy, the Soviet troops broke through his defenses.

On April 20, long-range artillery fire of the 1st Belorussian Front on Berlin laid the foundation for its assault. By the evening of April 21, its strike units reached the northeastern outskirts of the city.

The troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front carried out a swift maneuver to reach Berlin from the south and west. On April 21, having advanced 95 kilometers, the tank units of the front broke into the southern outskirts of the city. Using the success of tank formations, the combined arms armies of the shock group of the 1st Ukrainian Front quickly moved west.

On April 25, the troops of the 1st Ukrainian and 1st Belorussian fronts joined up west of Berlin, completing the encirclement of the entire enemy Berlin grouping (500 thousand people).

The troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front crossed the Oder and, breaking through the enemy defenses, advanced to a depth of 20 kilometers by April 25. They firmly fettered the 3rd German Panzer Army, preventing its use on the outskirts of Berlin.

The German fascist group in Berlin, despite the obvious doom, continued stubborn resistance. In fierce street battles on April 26-28, it was cut by Soviet troops into three isolated parts.

The fighting went on day and night. Breaking through to the center of Berlin, Soviet soldiers stormed every street and every house. On some days they managed to clear up to 300 quarters of the enemy. Hand-to-hand fights took place in the subway tunnels, underground communication facilities and communication passages. During the fighting in the city, assault detachments and groups formed the basis of the combat formations of rifle and tank units. Most of the artillery (up to 152 mm and 203 mm guns) was attached to rifle units for direct fire. Tanks operated as part of both rifle formations and tank corps and armies, operationally subordinate to the command of combined arms armies or operating in their offensive zone. Attempts to use tanks on their own led to their heavy losses from artillery fire and faustpatrons. Due to the fact that Berlin was shrouded in smoke during the assault, the massive use of bomber aircraft was often difficult. The most powerful strikes on military targets in the city were carried out by aviation on April 25 and on the night of April 26, 2049 aircraft participated in these strikes.

By April 28, only the central part remained in the hands of the defenders of Berlin, which was shot through by Soviet artillery from all sides, and by the evening of the same day, units of the 3rd shock army of the 1st Belorussian Front reached the Reichstag area.

The Reichstag garrison numbered up to one thousand soldiers and officers, but it continued to grow steadily. He was armed with a large number of machine guns and faustpatrons. There were also artillery pieces. Deep ditches were dug around the building, various barriers were set up, machine-gun and artillery firing points were equipped.

On April 30, the troops of the 3rd shock army of the 1st Belorussian Front began fighting for the Reichstag, which immediately took on an extremely fierce character. Only in the evening, after repeated attacks, Soviet soldiers broke into the building. The Nazis offered fierce resistance. Hand-to-hand fights broke out on the stairs and in the corridors. The assault units, step by step, room by room, floor by floor, cleared the Reichstag building of the enemy. The entire path of the Soviet soldiers from the main entrance to the Reichstag and up to the roof was marked with red flags and flags. On the night of May 1, the Banner of Victory was hoisted over the building of the defeated Reichstag. The battles for the Reichstag continued until the morning of May 1, and individual groups of the enemy, who had settled in the compartments of the cellars, capitulated only on the night of May 2.

In the battles for the Reichstag, the enemy lost more than 2 thousand soldiers and officers killed and wounded. Soviet troops captured over 2.6 thousand Nazis, as well as 1.8 thousand rifles and machine guns, 59 artillery pieces, 15 tanks and assault guns as trophies.

On May 1, units of the 3rd Shock Army, advancing from the north, met south of the Reichstag with units of the 8th Guards Army, advancing from the south. On the same day, two important Berlin defense centers surrendered: the Spandau citadel and the Flakturm I ("Zoobunker") anti-aircraft concrete air defense tower.

By 3 p.m. on May 2, the enemy’s resistance had completely ceased, the remnants of the Berlin garrison surrendered in total more than 134 thousand people.

During the fighting, out of about 2 million Berliners, about 125 thousand died, a significant part of Berlin was destroyed. Of the 250 thousand buildings in the city, about 30 thousand were completely destroyed, more than 20 thousand buildings were in a dilapidated state, more than 150 thousand buildings had medium damage. More than a third of metro stations were flooded and destroyed, 225 bridges were blown up by Nazi troops.

Fighting with separate groups, breaking through from the outskirts of Berlin to the west, ended on May 5th. On the night of May 9, the Act of Surrender of the Armed Forces of Nazi Germany was signed.

During the Berlin operation, Soviet troops surrounded and eliminated the largest grouping of enemy troops in the history of wars. They defeated 70 infantry, 23 tank and mechanized divisions of the enemy, captured 480 thousand people.

The Berlin operation was costly Soviet troops. Their irretrievable losses amounted to 78,291 people, and sanitary - 274,184 people.

More than 600 participants in the Berlin operation were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. 13 people were awarded the second Gold Star medal of the Hero of the Soviet Union.

(Additional

Never before in world history has such a powerful citadel been taken in such a short time: in just a week. The German command carefully thought out and perfectly prepared the city for defense. Six-story stone bunkers, pillboxes, bunkers, tanks dug into the ground, fortified houses in which “faustniks” settled down, representing a mortal danger to our tanks. The center of Berlin with the Spree River, cut by canals, was especially strongly fortified.

The Nazis sought to prevent the Red Army from seizing the capital, knowing that the Anglo-American troops were preparing an offensive in the direction of Berlin. However, the degree of preference for surrender to the Anglo-Americans, rather than the Soviet troops, was greatly exaggerated in the Soviet era. On April 4, 1945, J. Goebbels wrote in his diary:

The main task of the press and radio is to explain to the German people that the Western enemy is hatching the same vile plans for the destruction of the nation as the Eastern one ... We must again and again point out that Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin will ruthlessly and regardless of anything carry out their deadly plans, as soon as the Germans show weakness and submit to the enemy ...».

Soldiers of the Eastern Front, if in the coming days and hours each of you fulfills his duty to the Fatherland, we will stop and defeat the Asian hordes at the gates of Berlin. We foresaw this blow and countered it with a front of unprecedented power... Berlin will remain German, Vienna will be German...».

Another thing is that the anti-Soviet propaganda among the Nazis was much more sophisticated than against the Anglo-Americans, and the local population of the eastern regions of Germany experienced panic at the approach of the Red Army, and Wehrmacht soldiers and officers were in a hurry to break through to the West to surrender there. Therefore, I.V. Stalin hurried the Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov as soon as possible to begin the assault on Berlin. It began on the night of April 16 with the most powerful artillery preparation and the blinding of the enemy by a multitude of anti-aircraft searchlights. After long and stubborn battles, Zhukov's troops captured the Seelow Heights, the main German defensive point on the way to Berlin. Meanwhile, the tank army of Colonel-General P.S. Rybalko, having crossed the Spree, advanced on Berlin from the south. In the north, on April 21, the tankers of Lieutenant General S.M. Krivoshein were the first to break into the outskirts of the German capital.

The Berlin garrison fought with the desperation of the doomed. It was obvious that he could not resist the deadly fire of Soviet heavy 203 mm howitzers, nicknamed by the Germans "Stalin's sledgehammer", "Katyusha" volleys and constant air bombardment. Soviet troops acted on the streets of the city in the highest degree professionally: assault groups with the help of tanks knocked out the enemy from fortified points. This allowed the Red Army to suffer relatively small losses. Step by step, Soviet troops approached the government center of the Third Reich. Krivoshein's tank corps successfully crossed the Spree and connected with the units of the 1st Ukrainian Front advancing from the south, encircling Berlin.

The captured defenders of Berlin are members of the Volksshurm (militia detachment). Photo: www.globallookpress.com

Who defended Berlin from the Soviet troops in May 1945? The Berlin Defense Headquarters urged the population to prepare for street fighting on the ground and underground, using metro lines, sewers and underground communications. 400 thousand Berliners were mobilized for the construction of fortifications. Goebbels began to form two hundred Volkssturm battalions and women's brigades. 900 square kilometers of city blocks turned into "impregnable fortress Berlin".

The most combat-ready divisions of the Waffen-SS fought in the southern and western directions. The newly formed XI Panzer Army under the command of SS-Oberstgruppenführer F. Steiner operated near Berlin, which included all the surviving SS units of the city garrison, reservists, teachers and cadets of the "SS Junker Schools", personnel of the Berlin headquarters and numerous SS departments.

However, in the course of fierce battles with the Soviet troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, Steiner's division suffered such heavy losses that he, in his own words, "remained a general without an army." Thus, the main part of the Berlin garrison was made up of all kinds of improvised battle groups, and not regular formations of the Wehrmacht. The largest division of the SS troops with which the Soviet troops had to fight was the SS division Nordland, its full name is the XI Volunteer SS Panzergrenadier Division Nordland. It was recruited mainly from volunteers from Denmark, the Netherlands, and Norway. In 1945, the division included the Danmark and Norge grenadier regiments, Dutch volunteers were sent to the emerging SS Nederland division.

Berlin was also defended by the French SS division "Charlemagne" ("Charlemagne"), the Belgian divisions of the SS "Langemark" and "Wallonia". On April 29, 1945, for the destruction of several Soviet tanks, a young native of Paris from the SS Charlemagne division, Unterscharführer Eugene Valo, was awarded the Order of the Knight's Cross, becoming one of his last cavaliers. On May 2, a month before his 22nd birthday, Vajo died on the streets of Berlin. The commander of the LVII battalion from the Charlemagne division, Haupsturmführer Henri Fene, wrote in his memoirs:

Berlin has a French street and a French church. They are named after the Huguenots, who fled from religious oppression and settled in Prussia at the beginningXVIIcentury, helping to build the capital. In the middle of the 20th century, other Frenchmen came to defend the capital that their ancestors had helped build.».

On May 1, the French continued to fight on Leipziger Strasse, around the Air Ministry and at Potsdamer Platz. The French SS "Charlemagne" became the last defenders of the Reichstag and the Reich Chancellery. During the day of fighting on April 28, out of the total number of 108 Soviet tanks knocked out, the French "Charlemagne" destroyed 62. On the morning of May 2, following the announcement of the surrender of the capital of the III Reich, the last 30 Charlemagne fighters out of 300 who arrived in Berlin left the Reich Chancellery bunker, where, besides them, there was no one left alive. Along with the French, the Reichstag was defended by the Estonian SS. In addition, Lithuanians, Latvians, Spaniards and Hungarians took part in the defense of Berlin.

Members of the French SS division "Charlemagne" before being sent to the front. Photo: www.globallookpress.com

Latvians in the 54th fighter squadron defended the Berlin sky from Soviet aviation. The Latvian legionnaires continued to fight for the Third Reich and the already dead Hitler even when the German Nazis stopped fighting. On May 1, a battalion of the XV SS Division under the command of Obersturmführer Neulands continued to defend the Reich Chancellery. The famous Russian historian V.M. Falin noted:

Berlin fell on May 2, and "local battles" ended in it ten days later ... In Berlin, SS units from 15 states resisted the Soviet troops. Along with the Germans, Norwegian, Danish, Belgian, Dutch, Luxembourg Nazis acted there».

According to the French SS man A. Fenier: “ All of Europe gathered here for the last meeting”, and, as always, against Russia.

Ukrainian nationalists also played their part in the defense of Berlin. On September 25, 1944, S. Bandera, Ya. Stetsko, A. Melnyk and 300 other Ukrainian nationalists were liberated by the Nazis from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp near Berlin, where the Nazis had once placed them for too zealous agitation for the creation of an “Independent Ukrainian State”. In 1945, Bandera and Melnyk were instructed by the Nazi leadership to gather all Ukrainian nationalists in the Berlin area and defend the city from the advancing Red Army units. Bandera created Ukrainian units as part of the Volkssturm, and he himself hid in Weimar. In addition, several Ukrainian air defense groups (2.5 thousand people) operated in the Berlin area. Half of the III company of the 87th SS Grenadier Regiment "Kurmark" were Ukrainians, reservists of the XIV Grenadier Division of the SS troops "Galicia".

However, not only Europeans took part in the Berlin battle on the side of Hitler. Researcher M. Demidenkov writes:

When in May 1945 our troops were fighting on the outskirts of the Reich Chancellery, they were surprised that they came across the corpses of Asians - Tibetans. This was written about in the 50s, however, briefly, and was mentioned as a curiosity. The Tibetans fought to the last bullet, shot their wounded, did not surrender. Not a single living Tibetan in the form of the SS left».

In the memoirs of veterans of the Great Patriotic War there is information that after the fall of Berlin, corpses were found in the Reich Chancellery in a rather strange form: the cut was everyday SS troops (not field), but the color was dark brown, and there were no runes in the buttonholes. Those killed were clearly Asians and pronounced Mongoloids with rather dark skin. They apparently died in battle.

It should be noted that the Nazis conducted several expeditions to Tibet along the Ahnenerbe line and established strong, friendly relations and a military alliance with the leadership of one of the largest religious movements in Tibet. Permanent radio communications and an air bridge were established between Tibet and Berlin; a small German mission and a guard company from the SS troops remained in Tibet.

In May 1945, our people crushed not just a military enemy, not just Nazi Germany. Nazi Europe was defeated, another European Union, previously created by Charles of Sweden and Napoleon. How can one not recall here the eternal lines of A.S. Pushkin?

The tribes went

Trouble Russia threatening;

Wasn't all of Europe here?

And whose star led her! ..

But we have become the fifth solid

And breast took the pressure

Tribes obedient to the will of the proud,

And it was an unequal dispute.

But no less relevant today is the following stanza from the same poem:

Your disastrous escape

Boasting, they have forgotten now;

Forgot Russian bayonet and snow

Buried their glory in the wilderness.

A familiar feast beckons them again

- The blood of the Slavs is intoxicating for them;

But it will be hard for them to hangover;

But the guests' sleep will be long

On a cramped, cold housewarming party,

Under the grass of the northern fields!