April 27 1945

As Russian troops fought their way closer to Berlin, Adolf Hitler lived out the final days of the Third Reich within the Führerbunker. This massive two-level bunker complex was constructed some 22 feet below the Reich Chancellery. Some of the most senior Nazi political and military staff, with their SS guards and other administrative personnel, shared this space with their doomed leader.

April 1945 by Hermann Göring's bid to usurp him, and by Himmler's attempt to negotiate with the Allies. Already Adolf Hitler had declared that Nazi Germany had proved itself unworthy of his genius, and therefore deserved defeat in its historic struggle.

In the twilight world of the bunker, gloomy fatalism prevailed. Its occupants indulged in alcohol and casual sex, knowing that each day might be their last. Above ground in Berlin, the madness persisted, as the SS continued executing deserters and any who counseled surrender.



A few days before, on 27 April 1945, shortly after the Soviet occupation of the Berlin Tempelhof Airport, General Vasily Chuikov had moved his field headquarters from Johannisthal Airfield in south-eastern Berlin to Schulenburgring 2 in Tempelhof. Instead of the airport building he chose a traditional Berlin apartment building which he used until 4 May 1945.  In the ground floor apartment of a certain Mrs. Anni Goebels, Weidling signed the order of surrender to all soldiers of the Berlin garrison. This signature meant the end of the Second World War for Berlin. Six days later, the unconditional surrender of the entire German forces was signed in nearby Berlin’s Karlshorst district.

26 April 1945 Germany
Accompanied by Hanna Reitsch, Field Marshal Greim, new Luftwaffe CinC, flies a Fieseler Storch into Berlin to confer with Hitler. With the Storch hit by AA fire over Berlin and Greim wounded, Hanna Reitsch safely crash-lands the aircraft on a street near the Brandenburg Gate

Hitler's private train is demolished to keep it out of Allied hands

According to a statement issued by Downing Street, the commanders of a United States division and of a Russian Guards division met at Torgau, south of Berlin on 26 April at 1600 hours local time.

Here we met the Russians who had advanced from the East. This was the first meeting of the Allied Forces. In fact the first contact was made between patrols on 25 April when a first lieutenant and three men of an intelligence and reconnaissance platoon of the US division met forward elements of the Russian Guards division. First Lieutenant Albert Kotzebue of the 3rd Battalion, 273rd Infantry, 69th Infantry Division took his men in a boat across the Elbe to be greeted by Lt Col Alexander Gardiev, Commander of the 175th Rifle Regiment of the 58th Guards Division, 34th Corps.

By 27 April, Berlin was cut off from the rest of Germany. Secure radio communications with defending units had been lost; the command staff in the bunker had to depend on telephone lines for passing instructions and orders and on public radio for news and information.

27 Apr 1945 The western Allies refused to consider Himmler's attempts at negotiation for peace.

27 April 1945 Hitler learns of Himmler's betrayal. Orders arrest of Himmler and Kammler.

27 April 1945 Austria
In Vienna, provisional government of Austria headed by Karl Renner asserts its independence from Germany

27 April 1945 Switzerland
Dulles ordered to immediately resume surrender negotiations with SS General Wolff

28 April 1945 Germany
Eva Braun's brother-in-law, SS Gruppenfuehrer Hermann Fegelein, executed outside Hitler's bunker for cowardice and treachery

United Kingdom
BBC announces that Himmler has offered to surrender Germany to the western Allies, but the offer has been refused

Italy
Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, attempt to flee to Switzerland

Mussolini, Clara Petacci, and twelve Fascist leaders captured and executed by partisans at Giulino di Mezzenegra near Lake Dongo

Bodies of Mussolini and Clara Petacci hung upside down on display in Milan

29 April 1945 Germany
Hitler marries Eva Braun in his bunker in Berlin with Goebbels and Bormann as witnesses. Hitler dictates his final testament to his secretary, Traudl Junge

Hitler orders German forces to continue fighting in the so-called Alpine Fortress

Hitler expels Goering and Himmler from the Nazi party

Hitler names Doenitz his successor as leader of Germany

Hitler names Hanke leader of the SS, Goebbels Reich Chancellor, Bormann party minister, Seyss-Inquart Foreign Minister, and Field Marshal Schorner Army CinC

Hitler learns of the death of Mussolini and display of bodies in Milan

Hitler orders Blondi, his Alsatian dog, killed in order to test effectiveness of poison capsules

In an Arado 96 aircraft which takes off from a street, Hanna Reitsch and Luftwaffe CinC Field Marshal Greim, each carrying a cyanide capsule presented by Hitler, flown out of Berlin with orders from the Fuehrer to arrest Himmler

Italy
In Caserta, German representatives sign surrender of German forces in Italy, to become effective 2 May

30 April 1945 Germany

Eva Braun and Adolf Hitler commits suicide in the bunker in Berlin.

Bodies of Hitler and Eva Braun soaked in gasoline and burned outside the bunker

Bormann notifies Doenitz of his appointment as Hitler's successor, but neglects to tell him the Fuehrer is dead

Overnight, in agreement with Goebbels and Bormann, General Krebs makes his way to Zhukov's HQ with a letter for Stalin offering a German-Soviet armistice

Netherlands
Reichskommissar Seyss-Inquart confers with General Walter Bedell Smith and other Allied officers near Apeldoorn about food supplies and possible surrender of German forces in western Netherlands

4 May 1945 German forces in Denmark, the Netherlands, and northwestern Germany surrendered to British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, to be in effect at 0800 hours on the next day. Meanwhile, in Germany, US Ninth Army accepted surrender of German Ninth and Twelfth Armies and US Third Army accepted the surrender by Feldmarschall Paul von Kleist.

5 May 1945 German General Blaskowitz surrendered all German forces in the Netherlands at the Hotel de Wereld in Wageningen to Canadian General Charles Foulkes. In Denmark, the German occupation forces surrendered. In Italy, German Armeegruppe C surrendered.

         

Germany's Surrender 7 May 1945

7 May 1945 General Jodl signed the unconditional surrender of all German forces to the Allies, to take effect on the following day, at Eisenhower's headquarters near Rheims, France; the Soviets witnessed the surrender at Rheims, but did not recognise the surrender until another document was signed in the Soviet-conquered territory. On the same day, German occupation forces in Norway surrendered.

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Eisenhower sent the following message to his troops upon the German surrender:

The route you have traveled through hundreds of miles is marked by the graves of former comrades. Each of the fallen died as a member of the team to which you belong, bound together by a common love of liberty and a refusal to submit to enslavement. Our common problems of the immediate and distant future can be best solved in the same conceptions of co-operation and devotion to the cause of human freedom as have made this Expeditionary Force such a mighty engine of righteous destruction.

Let us have no part in the profitless quarrels in which other men will inevitably engage as to what country, what service, won the European war. Every man, every woman, of every nation here represented has served to the outcome. This we shall remember-and in doing so we shall be revering each honored grave, and be sending comfort to the loved ones of comrades who could not live to see this day.

The British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, said:

"We meet in true and victorious comradeship and with inflexible resolve to fulfil our purpose and our duty. Let all march forward upon the foe."

Marshal Joseph Stalin spoke of the war still ahead:

"Our task and our duty are to complete the destruction of the enemy to force him to lay down his arms and surrender unconditionally.The Red Army will fulfil to the end this task and this duty to our people and to all freedom-loving peoples."

President Harry S Truman welcomed the news:

"This is not the hour of final victory in Europe, but the hour draws near, the hour for which all the American people, all the British people and all the Soviet people have toiled and prayed so long."

Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, was unhappy to see the surrender ceremony taken place outside of the area conquered by Soviet forces, thus demanded, and got, a separate surrender ceremony in Berlin.
This took place on the following day, 9 May, with British Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder representing the western Allies. Zhukov was very much the star of this separate ceremony, and made every effort to behave as a proud conqueror.

When Keitel signed the document, removed his monocle, and began to make a formal speech marking the occasion, Zhukov interrupted Keitel, announcing that all Soviet representatives at the ceremony were free to go as the document had already been made official.

Berlin was already encircled by Soviet and Allies troops. There was no need to attack Berlin, because of the enormous casualties. There were a rumors that Stalin was scared abt. allies troops who will capture Berlin. In fact, Nazi would surrender to the allies to avoid communist capturing and thus Berlin would not be separated by the wall in the future.

Despite the pressure from Churchill, Eisenhower preferred to let the Russians incur tens of thousands of casualties rather than his own troops. Militarily he was correct. Militarily, Berlin meant nothing.

Why did the Battle of Berlin happen?

One could say that on the German side, even though there was a German resolve to fight was largely due to fear of Soviet retributions, Hitler was totally paranoid and off-balance and was having grand illusions by this time period of the war and from the very beginning of Hitler taking over power in Germany did he have any thought of the German peoples or their plight especially at the end of the war. And the German high command was still having flashbacks of the trials that were carried out after failed bomb plot of July, 1944 and also there was the blind support of the German people for the Nazi regime and the peoples willing collaboration with it almost to the end.

For the Soviet troops, Stalin was just as power hungry and paranoid as Hitler and time after time showed his careless thought of the Soviet people. And prime examples of this are the prewar death totals from a man made famine in the Ukraine, imprisonment and arbitrary executions of the purges and the deportation of the Crimean Tatars after the war.

With no thought at all of the Soviet soldiers that had already fought their way to the doors of Berlin, Stalin's thoughts were thinking more of Soviet prestige and with his paranoid mistrust of the western Allies and Stalin's own race to take over the empty shell of the German capital for his own.  Again Stalin had no thoughts what so ever that this could be one the bloodiest battles for the Soviet soldiers who would be needlessly slaughtered in the fields and towns around Berlin.

I disagree with the militarily Berlin meant nothing. A Capital city of any country is the seat of government. If you don't take it you are allowing the government to remain functioning and direct resistance to your army. Militarily and psychologically it make sense to occupy the enemy's capital city.
A country is more likely to capitulate once it's capital is occupied than not.

Stalin and Hitler were the opposite sides of the same coin. Ruthless, ambitious, cold, power-hungry, paranoid and totally devoid of scruples. Europe 's great misfortune was that they both took power in 2 powerful countries and thus caused tens of millions of death.

I disagree with the militarily Berlin meant nothing.

Militarily... Berlin/ Germany was already fully defeated. The only justification for expending more deaths with Soviet forces or German lives for the Holy Grail Berlin was because of self justification by a sociopath that Stalin was.

So if not, then tell me, what was to be gained militarily or economically from what was left of Berlin, except for a pile of ruins and what was left of the civilians of the city?

I am not sure what you mean???

frinik wrote:I disagree with the militarily Berlin meant nothing. A Capital city of any country is the seat of government. If you don't take it you are allowing the government to remain functioning and direct resistance to your army. Militarily and psychologically it make sense to occupy the enemy's capital city.
A country is more likely to capitulate once it's capital is occupied than not.

Stalin and Hitler were the opposite sides of the same coin. Ruthless, ambitious, cold, power-hungry, paranoid and totally devoid of scruples. Europe 's great misfortune was that they both took power in 2 powerful countries and thus caused tens of millions of death.

I stand by my statement. The German government was not functioning in April and May 1945 and Hitler was directing nothing beyond his bunker. The capture of Berlin was a political consideration, not a military one. If FDR had not been so sick and had been a little more prescient and had not viewed Stalin and the Soviets with rose colored glasses, he may have agreed with Churchill that it was important to grab all the territory possible before the war ended. As it was, Eisenhower based his decision on military considerations, not geopolitical ones. There was no military threat from Berlin. Why waste tens of thousands of casualties to take it? Eisenhower was more concerned with the possible threat of German "werewolf" resistance being formed in the Austrian mountains.

Russia captured the Crimea in 2014. That was in the spring 2014.


After that russians asked for the water, stays on the knees:


Of course, Ukraine will help them.
And Jesus said, let them have forgiveness, for they have no knowledge of what they are doing.

the Holy Grail Berlin was because of self justification by a sociopath that Stalin was.

Woofie I agree with what you said about Berlin being a Holy Grail for Stalin and especially the lair of his arch enemy Hitler. However politically and militarily it mattered to Stalin that the Soviet Union would capture the city rather than the Allies. Letting the Allie stake the city would have been a loss of face for Stalin