In what year was the capture of Berlin. The course of the Berlin operation. The course of hostilities

Commanders G. K. Zhukov
I. S. Konev G. Weidling

Storming Berlin- the final part of the Berlin offensive operation of 1945, during which the Red Army captured the capital of Nazi Germany and victoriously ended the Great Patriotic War and World War II in Europe. The operation lasted from April 25 to May 2.

Storming Berlin

"Zoobunker" - a huge reinforced concrete fortress with anti-aircraft batteries on the towers and an extensive underground shelter - served at the same time as the largest bomb shelter in the city.

Early in the morning of May 2, the Berlin metro was flooded - a group of sappers from the SS division "Nordland" blew up a tunnel passing under the Landwehr Canal in the Trebbiner Strasse area. The explosion led to the destruction of the tunnel and filling it with water at a 25-km section. Water rushed into the tunnels, where a large number of civilians and the wounded were hiding. The number of victims is still unknown.

Information about the number of victims ... is different - from fifty to fifteen thousand people ... The data that about a hundred people died under water look more reliable. Of course, there were many thousands of people in the tunnels, among whom were the wounded, children, women and the elderly, but the water did not spread through the underground communications too quickly. Moreover, it spread underground in various directions. Of course, the picture of the advancing water caused genuine horror in people. And some of the wounded, as well as drunken soldiers, as well as civilians, became its inevitable victims. But talking about thousands of dead would be a strong exaggeration. In most places, the water barely reached a depth of one and a half meters, and the inhabitants of the tunnels had enough time to evacuate themselves and save the many wounded who were in the "hospital cars" near the Stadtmitte station. It is likely that many of the dead, whose bodies were subsequently brought to the surface, actually died not from water, but from wounds and diseases even before the destruction of the tunnel.

In the first hour of the night on May 2, the radio stations of the 1st Belorussian Front received a message in Russian: “Please cease fire. We are sending parliamentarians to the Potsdam Bridge.” A German officer who arrived at the appointed place on behalf of the commander of the defense of Berlin, General Weidling, announced the readiness of the Berlin garrison to stop resistance. At 6 am on May 2, Artillery General Weidling, accompanied by three German generals, crossed the front line and surrendered. An hour later, while at the headquarters of the 8th Guards Army, he wrote a surrender order, which was reproduced and, using loud-speaking installations and radio, brought to the enemy units defending in the center of Berlin. As this order was brought to the attention of the defenders, resistance in the city ceased. By the end of the day, the troops of the 8th Guards Army cleared the central part of the city from the enemy. Separate units that did not want to surrender tried to break through to the west, but were destroyed or scattered.

On May 2, at 10 o'clock in the morning, everything suddenly calmed down, the fire ceased. And everyone understood that something had happened. We saw white sheets that were "thrown away" in the Reichstag, the Chancellery building and the Royal Opera and cellars that had not yet been taken. Entire columns were toppled from there. Ahead of us was a column, where there were generals, colonels, then soldiers behind them. It must have been three hours.

Alexander Bessarab, participant in the Battle of Berlin and the capture of the Reichstag

Operation results

Soviet troops defeated the Berlin grouping of enemy troops and stormed the capital of Germany - Berlin. Developing a further offensive, they reached the Elbe River, where they joined up with American and British troops. With the fall of Berlin and the loss of vital areas, Germany lost the opportunity for organized resistance and soon capitulated. With the completion of the Berlin operation, favorable conditions were created for the encirclement and destruction of the last large enemy groupings on the territory of Austria and Czechoslovakia.

The losses of the German armed forces in killed and wounded are unknown. Of the approximately 2 million Berliners, about 125,000 perished. The city was badly damaged as a result of the bombing even before the arrival of Soviet troops. The bombing continued during the battles near Berlin - the last bombing of the Americans on April 20 (Adolf Hitler's birthday) led to food problems. The destruction intensified as a result of the actions of Soviet artillery.

Indeed, it is unthinkable that such a huge fortified city should be taken so quickly. We do not know of other such examples in the history of the Second World War.

Alexander Orlov, Doctor of Historical Sciences.

Two guards heavy tank brigades IS-2 and at least nine guards heavy self-propelled artillery regiments of self-propelled guns took part in the battles in Berlin, including:

• 1st Belorussian Front
  • 7th Guards ttbr - 69th army
  • 11th Guards ttbr - frontline submission
  • 334 Guards. tsap - 47th army
  • 351 Guards. tsap - 3rd shock army, frontline subordination
  • 396 guards tsap - 5th shock army
  • 394 guards tsap - 8th Guards Army
  • 362, 399 guards. tsap - 1st Guards Tank Army
  • 347 Guards. tsap - 2nd Guards Tank Army
• 1st Ukrainian Front
  • 383, 384 guards. tsap - 3rd Guards Tank Army

The situation of the civilian population

Fear and despair

A significant part of Berlin, even before the assault, was destroyed as a result of Anglo-American air raids, from which the population hid in basements and bomb shelters. There were not enough bomb shelters and therefore they were constantly overcrowded. By that time, in Berlin, in addition to the three million local population (which consisted mainly of women, the elderly and children), there were up to three hundred thousand foreign workers, including Ostarbeiters, most of whom were forcibly deported to Germany. They were forbidden from entering bomb shelters and cellars.

Although the war for Germany had long been lost, Hitler ordered to resist to the last. Thousands of teenagers and old people were drafted into the Volkssturm. From the beginning of March, on the orders of Reichskommissar Goebbels, responsible for the defense of Berlin, tens of thousands of civilians, mostly women, were sent to dig anti-tank ditches around the German capital.

Civilians who violated the orders of the authorities, even in the last days of the war, were threatened with execution.

There is no exact information on the number of civilian casualties. Different sources indicate a different number of people who died directly during the Battle of Berlin. Even decades after the war construction work find previously unknown mass graves.

Violence against civilians

In Western sources, especially in recent times, a significant number of materials have appeared concerning mass violence by Soviet troops against the civilian population of Berlin and Germany in general - a topic that practically did not come up for many decades after the end of the war.

There are two opposite approaches to this extremely painful problem. On the one hand - artistic and documentary works of two English-speaking researchers - " last fight by Cornelius Ryan and The Fall of Berlin. 1945 "Anthony Beevor, in more or lesser degree which are a reconstruction of events half a century ago based on the testimonies of the participants in the events (in the overwhelming majority - representatives of the German side) and the memoirs of Soviet commanders. The claims Ryan and Beevor make are regularly reproduced by the Western press, which presents them as scientifically proven truth.

On the other hand, the opinions of Russian representatives (officials and historians), who acknowledge the numerous facts of violence, but question the validity of the allegations of its extreme mass character, as well as the possibility, after so many years, of verifying the shocking digital data that are given in the West . Russian authors also draw attention to the fact that such publications, which focus on the over-emotional description of scenes of violence allegedly perpetrated by Soviet troops in Germany, follow the standards of Goebbels' propaganda of early 1945 and are aimed at belittling the role of the Red Army as the liberator of Eastern and Central Europe from fascism and denigrate the image of the Soviet soldier. In addition, the materials distributed in the West practically do not provide information about the measures taken by the Soviet command to combat violence and looting - crimes against the civilian population, which, as has been repeatedly pointed out, not only lead to tougher resistance of the defending enemy, but also undermine the combat effectiveness and discipline of the advancing army.

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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 organized very poorly, 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, there were no food supplies for the civilian population, 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 not significant amount firemen (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 five*). According to other sources, in addition to the Hitler Youth and the 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 French - 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 parts 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 *)
- in the 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 each kilometer of the offensive of the 1st Belorussian Front, which carried out 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. Fortress guns were delivered from Pomerania by rail, 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"

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 with south direction. 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", volleys of "Katyusha" and constant bombardment of aviation. 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. Known Russian historian V.M. Falin noted:

Berlin fell on May 2, and "local battles" ended in it ten days later ... In Berlin, Soviet troops were resisted by SS units from 15 states. 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!

The war was ending. Everyone understood this - both the generals of the Wehrmacht and their opponents. Only one person - Adolf Hitler - in spite of everything, continued to hope for the strength of the German spirit, for a "miracle", and most importantly - for a split between his enemies. There were reasons for this - despite the agreements reached at Yalta, England and the United States did not particularly want to cede Berlin to the Soviet troops. Their armies advanced almost unhindered. In April 1945, they broke through into the center of Germany, depriving the Wehrmacht of its "forge" - the Ruhr Basin - and gaining the opportunity to attack Berlin. At the same time, the 1st Belorussian Front of Marshal Zhukov and the 1st Ukrainian Front of Konev froze in front of the powerful German defense line on the Oder. The 2nd Belorussian Front of Rokossovsky finished off the remnants of enemy troops in Pomerania, and the 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian Fronts advanced towards Vienna.

On April 1, Stalin convened a meeting of the State Defense Committee in the Kremlin. The audience was asked one question: "Who will take Berlin - we or the Anglo-Americans?" “Berlin will be taken by the Soviet Army,” Konev was the first to respond. He, Zhukov's constant rival, was also not taken by surprise by the question of the Supreme Commander - he showed the members of the GKO a huge model of Berlin, where the targets of future strikes were precisely indicated. The Reichstag, the Imperial Chancellery, the building of the Ministry of Internal Affairs - all these were powerful centers of defense with a network of bomb shelters and secret passages. The capital of the Third Reich was surrounded by three lines of fortifications. The first passed 10 km from the city, the second - on its outskirts, the third - in the center. Berlin was defended by selected units of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS, to whose aid the last reserves were urgently mobilized - 15-year-old members of the Hitler Youth, women and old men from the Volkssturm (people's militia). Around Berlin in the army groups "Vistula" and "Center" there were up to 1 million people, 10.4 thousand guns and mortars, 1.5 thousand tanks.

For the first time since the beginning of the war, the superiority of the Soviet troops in manpower and equipment was not only significant, but overwhelming. Berlin was to be attacked by 2.5 million soldiers and officers, 41.6 thousand guns, more than 6.3 thousand tanks, 7.5 thousand aircraft. The main role in the offensive plan approved by Stalin was assigned to the 1st Belorussian Front. Zhukov was supposed to storm the line of defense on the Zelov heights from the Kustrinsky bridgehead, which towered over the Oder, blocking the road to Berlin. The Konev front was to cross the Neisse and hit the Reich capital with the forces of the tank armies of Rybalko and Lelyushenko. It was planned that in the west it would reach the Elbe and, together with the Rokossovsky front, would join the Anglo-American troops. The Allies were informed of the Soviet plans and agreed to stop their armies on the Elbe. The Yalta agreements had to be fulfilled, besides, this made it possible to avoid unnecessary losses.

The offensive was scheduled for 16 April. To make it unexpected for the enemy, Zhukov ordered to advance early in the morning, in the dark, blinding the Germans with the light of powerful searchlights. At five in the morning, three red rockets gave the signal to attack, and a second later thousands of guns and Katyushas opened up a hurricane of fire of such force that the eight-kilometer space turned out to be plowed overnight. "Hitler's troops were literally sunk in a continuous sea of ​​fire and metal," Zhukov wrote in his memoirs. Alas, on the eve of the captured Soviet soldier, he revealed to the Germans the date of the future offensive, and they managed to withdraw the troops to the Zelov Heights. From there, aimed shooting began at Soviet tanks, which, wave after wave, went to break through and died in a field that was being shot through. While the enemy's attention was riveted on them, the soldiers of Chuikov's 8th Guards Army managed to move forward and take up lines near the outskirts of the village of Zelov. By evening, it became clear that the planned pace of the offensive was frustrated.

At the same time, Hitler turned to the Germans with an appeal, promising them: "Berlin will remain in German hands", and the Russian offensive "will choke in blood." But few believed in it. People listened with fear to the sounds of cannon fire, which were added to the already familiar bomb explosions. The remaining residents - there were at least 2.5 million - were forbidden to leave the city. The Fuhrer, losing his sense of reality, decided: if the Third Reich dies, all Germans should share his fate. Goebbels' propaganda intimidated the inhabitants of Berlin with the atrocities of the "Bolshevik hordes", urging them to fight to the end. The headquarters of the defense of Berlin was created, which ordered the population to prepare for fierce battles in the streets, in houses and underground communications. Each house was planned to be turned into a fortress, for which all the remaining residents were forced to dig trenches and equip firing positions.

At the end of the day on April 16, the Supreme Commander called Zhukov. He dryly reported that Konev overcame Neisse "happened without difficulty." Two tank armies broke through the front at Cottbus and rushed forward, not stopping the offensive even at night. Zhukov had to promise that during April 17 he would take the ill-fated heights. In the morning, General Katukov's 1st Tank Army moved forward again. And again, the “thirty-fours”, which passed from Kursk to Berlin, burned out like candles from the fire of the “faustpatrons”. By evening, Zhukov's units advanced only a couple of kilometers. Meanwhile, Konev reported to Stalin on new successes, announcing his readiness to take part in the storming of Berlin. Silence on the phone - and the deaf voice of the Supreme: “I agree. Turn the tank armies to Berlin." On the morning of April 18, the armies of Rybalko and Lelyushenko rushed north to Teltow and Potsdam. Zhukov, whose pride suffered severely, threw his units into a last desperate attack. In the morning, the 9th German Army, which received the main blow, could not stand it and began to roll back to the west. The Germans still tried to go on the counterattack, but the next day they retreated along the entire front. From that moment on, nothing could delay the denouement.

Friedrich Hitzer, German writer, translator:

My answer regarding the storming of Berlin is purely personal, not of a military strategist. In 1945 I was 10 years old, and as a child of the war, I remember how it ended, what the defeated people felt. Both my father and the closest relative participated in this war. The latter was a German officer. Returning from captivity in 1948, he resolutely told me that if this happened again, he would go to war again. And on January 9, 1945, on my birthday, I received a letter from the front from my father, who also wrote with determination that we must “fight, fight and fight the terrible enemy in the east, otherwise we will be taken to Siberia.” Having read these lines as a child, I was proud of the courage of my father - "liberator from the Bolshevik yoke." But very little time passed, and my uncle, that same German officer, told me many times: “We were deceived. Make sure this doesn't happen to you." The soldiers realized that this was the wrong war. Of course, not all of us were "deceived". One of his father's best friends warned him back in the 1930s: Hitler is terrible. You know, any political ideology of the superiority of some over others, absorbed by society, is akin to drugs ...

The meaning of the assault, and the finale of the war in general, became clear to me later. The storming of Berlin was necessary - it saved me from the fate of being a German conqueror. If Hitler had won, I would probably have become a very unhappy person. His goal of world domination is alien and incomprehensible to me. As an action, the capture of Berlin was terrible for the Germans. But really, it was a blessing. After the war, I worked in a military commission dealing with the issues of German prisoners of war, and once again I was convinced of this.

I recently met with Daniil Granin, and we talked for a long time about what kind of people they were who surrounded Leningrad ...

And then, during the war, I was afraid, yes, I hated the Americans and the British, who almost completely bombed my hometown of Ulm. This feeling of hatred and fear lived in me until I visited America.

I remember well how, evacuated from the city, we lived in a small German village on the banks of the Danube, which was the "American zone". Our girls and women then inked themselves with pencils so as not to be raped ... Every war is a terrible tragedy, and this war was especially terrible: today they talk about 30 million Soviet and 6 million German victims, as well as millions of dead people of other nations.

last birthday

On April 19, another participant appeared in the race for Berlin. Rokossovsky reported to Stalin that the 2nd Belorussian Front was ready to storm the city from the north. On the morning of that day, the 65th Army of General Batov crossed the wide channel of the Western Oder and moved to Prenzlau, cutting into parts the German Army Group Vistula. At this time, Konev's tanks moved north easily, as if in a parade, meeting almost no resistance and leaving the main forces far behind. Marshal deliberately took risks, hurrying to approach Berlin before Zhukov. But the troops of the 1st Belorussian were already approaching the city. His formidable commander issued an order: "No later than 4 o'clock in the morning on April 21, at any cost, break into the suburbs of Berlin and immediately convey a message to Stalin and the press about this."

On April 20, Hitler celebrated his last birthday. Selected guests gathered in a bunker submerged 15 meters into the ground under the imperial office: Goering, Goebbels, Himmler, Bormann, the top of the army and, of course, Eva Braun, who was listed as the Fuhrer's "secretary". The comrades-in-arms offered their leader to leave the doomed Berlin and move to the Alps, where a secret shelter had already been prepared. Hitler refused: "I am destined to win or die with the Reich." However, he agreed to withdraw the command of the troops from the capital, dividing it into two parts. The north was under the control of Grand Admiral Dönitz, to whom Himmler went to help with his headquarters. The south of Germany was to be defended by Goering. At the same time, a plan arose to defeat the Soviet offensive by the forces of the armies of Steiner from the north and Wenck from the west. However, this plan was doomed from the start. Both the 12th Army of Wenck and the remnants of the units of SS General Steiner were exhausted in battles and incapable of action. Army Group Center, on which hopes were also pinned, fought hard battles in the Czech Republic. Zhukov prepared a "gift" for the German leader - in the evening his armies approached the city border of Berlin. The first shells of long-range guns hit the city center. On the morning of the next day, General Kuznetsov's 3rd Army entered Berlin from the northeast, and Berzarin's 5th Army from the north. Katukov and Chuikov advanced from the east. The streets of the dull Berlin suburbs were blocked by barricades, "faustniks" fired at the attackers from the gates and windows of the houses.

Zhukov ordered not to waste time suppressing individual firing points and to rush forward. Meanwhile, Rybalko's tanks approached the headquarters of the German command in Zossen. Most of the officers fled to Potsdam, and the chief of staff, General Krebs, went to Berlin, where on April 22 at 15.00 Hitler's last military conference took place. Only then did they dare to tell the Fuhrer that no one was able to save the besieged capital. The reaction was violent: the leader burst into threats against the "traitors", then collapsed into a chair and moaned: "It's all over ... the war is lost ..."

And yet the Nazi elite was not going to give up. It was decided to completely stop the resistance to the Anglo-American troops and throw all their forces against the Russians. All military capable of holding weapons were to be sent to Berlin. The Führer still pinned his hopes on Wenck's 12th Army, which was to link up with Busse's 9th Army. To coordinate their actions, the command led by Keitel and Jodl was withdrawn from Berlin to the town of Kramnitz. In the capital, besides Hitler himself, only General Krebs, Bormann and Goebbels, who was appointed head of defense, remained among the leaders of the Reich.

Nikolai Sergeevich Leonov, Lieutenant General of the Foreign Intelligence Service:

The Berlin operation is the penultimate operation of the Second World War. It was carried out by the forces of three fronts from April 16 to April 30, 1945 - from the raising of the flag over the Reichstag and the end of resistance - on the evening of May 2. Pros and cons of this operation. Plus - the operation was completed quickly enough. After all, the attempt to take Berlin was actively promoted by the leaders of the allied armies. This is reliably known from Churchill's letters.

Cons - almost everyone who participated recalls that there were too many victims and, perhaps, without an objective need. The first reproaches to Zhukov - he was at the shortest distance from Berlin. His attempt to enter frontally from the east is regarded by many participants in the war as a mistaken decision. It was necessary to cover Berlin from the north and from the south with a ring and force the enemy to capitulate. But the marshal went straight ahead. Regarding the artillery operation on April 16, we can say the following: Zhukov brought the idea of ​​​​using searchlights from Khalkhin Gol. It was there that the Japanese launched a similar attack. Zhukov repeated the same technique: but many military strategists argue that the searchlights had no effect. As a result of their application, a mess of fire and dust was obtained. This frontal attack was unsuccessful and poorly thought out: when our soldiers passed through the trenches, there were few German corpses in them. So the advancing units shot more than 1,000 wagons of ammunition in vain. Stalin specifically arranged competition between the marshals. After all, Berlin was finally surrounded on April 25. It would be possible not to resort to such sacrifices.

City on fire

On April 22, 1945, Zhukov appeared in Berlin. His armies - five infantry and four armored - destroyed the capital of Germany from all types of weapons. Meanwhile, Rybalko's tanks approached the city limits, occupying a bridgehead in the Teltow area. Zhukov gave his vanguard - the armies of Chuikov and Katukov - the order to cross the Spree, no later than the 24th to be in Tempelhof and Marienfeld - the central regions of the city. For street fighting, assault detachments were hastily formed from fighters from different units. In the north, the 47th Army of General Perkhorovich crossed the Havel River along an accidentally surviving bridge and headed west, preparing to join Konev’s units there and close the encirclement. Having occupied the northern districts of the city, Zhukov finally excluded Rokossovsky from the number of participants in the operation. From that moment until the end of the war, the 2nd Belorussian Front was engaged in the defeat of the Germans in the north, pulling over a significant part of the Berlin group.

The glory of the winner of Berlin passed Rokossovsky, she also passed Konev. Stalin's directive, received on the morning of April 23, ordered the troops of the 1st Ukrainian to stop at the Anhalter station - literally a hundred meters from the Reichstag. The Supreme Commander entrusted Zhukov with occupying the center of the enemy capital, thus noting his invaluable contribution to the victory. But Anhalter still had to be reached. Rybalko with his tanks froze on the banks of the deep Teltow Canal. Only with the approach of artillery, which suppressed German firing points, were the vehicles able to cross the water barrier. On April 24, Chuikov's scouts made their way to the west through the Schönefeld airfield and met Rybalko's tankers there. This meeting divided the German forces in half - about 200 thousand soldiers were surrounded in a wooded area southeast of Berlin. Until May 1, this grouping tried to break through to the west, but was cut into pieces and almost completely destroyed.

And Zhukov's shock forces continued to rush towards the city center. Many fighters and commanders had no experience of fighting in big city leading to huge losses. The tanks moved in columns, and as soon as the front one was knocked out, the entire column became easy prey for the German "faustniks". I had to resort to merciless, but effective tactics of military operations: at first, artillery fired at the target of the future offensive, then volleys of Katyushas drove everyone alive into shelters. After that, the tanks went forward, destroying the barricades and smashing the houses, from where the shots were heard. Only then did the infantry come into play. During the battle, almost two million gun shots fell on the city - 36 thousand tons of deadly metal. Fortress guns were delivered from Pomerania by rail, firing at the center of Berlin with shells weighing half a ton.

But even this firepower did not always cope with the thick walls of buildings built in the 18th century. Chuikov recalled: "Our guns sometimes fired up to a thousand shots at one square, at a group of houses, even at a small garden." It is clear that at the same time, no one thought about the civilian population, trembling with fear in bomb shelters and flimsy basements. However, the main blame for his suffering lay not with the Soviet troops, but with Hitler and his entourage, who, with the help of propaganda and violence, did not allow residents to leave the city, which had turned into a sea of ​​fire. Already after the victory, it was estimated that 20% of the houses in Berlin were completely destroyed, and another 30% - partially. On April 22, the city telegraph office closed for the first time, having received the last message from the Japanese allies - "we wish you good luck." Water and gas were turned off, transport stopped running, food distribution stopped. Starving Berliners, ignoring the continuous shelling, robbed freight trains and shops. They were more afraid not of Russian shells, but of SS patrols, who grabbed men and hung them on trees as deserters.

The police and Nazi officials began to flee. Many tried to make their way to the west to surrender to the Anglo-Americans. But the Soviet units were already there. April 25 at 13.30 they went to the Elbe and met near the town of Torgau with tankers of the 1st american army.

On this day, Hitler entrusted the defense of Berlin to Panzer General Weidling. Under his command were 60 thousand soldiers, who were opposed by 464 thousand Soviet troops. The armies of Zhukov and Konev met not only in the east, but also in the west of Berlin, in the Ketzin area, and now they were only 7-8 kilometers from the city center. On April 26, the Germans made a last desperate attempt to stop the attackers. Fulfilling the order of the Fuhrer, the 12th Army of Wenck, which included up to 200 thousand people, attacked the 3rd and 28th armies of Konev from the west. Unprecedentedly fierce even for this fierce battle, the fighting continued for two days, and by the evening of the 27th, Venck had to retreat to his previous positions.

The day before, Chuikov's soldiers occupied the Gatov and Tempelhof airfields, fulfilling Stalin's order to prevent Hitler from leaving Berlin at any cost. The Supreme Commander was not going to let the one who treacherously deceived him in 1941 slip away or surrender to the allies. Corresponding orders were also given to other Nazi leaders. There was another category of Germans who were intensively searched for - specialists in nuclear research. Stalin knew about the work of the Americans on the atomic bomb and was going to create "his own" as soon as possible. It was already necessary to think about the world after the war, where the Soviet Union was to take a worthy, blood-paid place.

Meanwhile, Berlin continued to suffocate in the smoke of fires. Volkssturmovets Edmund Heckscher recalled: “There were so many fires that the night turned into day. You could read the newspaper, but there were no more newspapers in Berlin.” The roar of guns, shooting, explosions of bombs and shells did not stop for a minute. Clouds of smoke and brick dust filled the center of the city, where, deep under the ruins of the Imperial Chancellery, Hitler again and again tormented his subordinates with the question: “Where is Wenck?”

On April 27, three-quarters of Berlin was in Soviet hands. In the evening, Chuikov's strike forces reached the Landwehr Canal, one and a half kilometers from the Reichstag. However, their path was blocked by elite units of the SS, who fought with special fanaticism. Bogdanov's 2nd Panzer Army was stuck in the Tiergarten area, whose parks were dotted with German trenches. Each step here was given with difficulty and considerable bloodshed. Rybalko's tankers had chances again, who on that day made an unprecedented rush from the west to the center of Berlin through Wilmersdorf.

By nightfall, a strip 2–3 kilometers wide and up to 16 kilometers long remained in the hands of the Germans. The first batches of prisoners stretched to the rear - still small ones, leaving with raised hands from the basements and entrances of houses. Many were deafened by the incessant roar, others, who had gone mad, laughed wildly. The civilian population continued to hide, fearing the revenge of the victors. The Avengers, of course, were - they could not help but be after what the Nazis did on Soviet soil. But there were also those who, risking their lives, pulled German old people and children out of the fire, who shared their soldier's rations with them. The feat of Sergeant Nikolai Masalov, who saved a three-year-old German girl from a destroyed house on the Landwehr Canal, went down in history. It is he who is depicted by the famous statue in Treptow Park - the memory of Soviet soldiers who kept their humanity in the fire of the most terrible of wars.

Even before the end of the fighting, the Soviet command took measures to restore normal life in the city. On April 28, General Berzarin, appointed commandant of Berlin, issued an order to dissolve the National Socialist Party and all its organizations and transfer all power to the military commandant's office. In areas cleared of the enemy, soldiers were already beginning to put out fires, clear buildings, and bury numerous corpses. However, it was possible to establish a normal life only with the assistance of the local population. Therefore, on April 20, the Headquarters demanded that the commanders of the troops change their attitude towards German prisoners of war and the civilian population. The directive put forward a simple justification for such a step: "A more humane attitude towards the Germans will reduce their stubbornness in defense."

Former foreman of the 2nd article, member of the international PEN club (International Organization of Writers), Germanist writer, translator Evgeny Katseva:

The greatest of our holidays is approaching, and my soul is scratched by cats. Recently (in February) of this year, I was at a conference in Berlin, supposedly dedicated to this great date, I think, not only for our people, and I became convinced that many have forgotten who started the war and who won it. No, this stable phrase "win the war" is completely inappropriate: you can win and lose in the game - in the same war, you either win or lose. For many Germans, the war is only the horrors of those few weeks when it went on their territory, as if our soldiers came there of their own free will, and did not fight their way to the west for 4 long years on their native scorched and trampled land. So, Konstantin Simonov was not so right, he believed that there was no such thing as someone else's grief. It happens, how it happens. And if you forgot who put an end to one of the most terrible wars, defeated German fascism, where can you remember who took the capital of the German Reich - Berlin. Our Soviet Army took it, our soviet soldiers and officers. Entirely, fighting for every district, quarter, house, from the windows and doors of which shots rang out until the last moment.

It was only later, after a whole bloody week after the capture of Berlin, on May 2, our allies appeared, and the main trophy, as a symbol of the joint Victory, was divided into four parts. Into four sectors: Soviet, American, English, French. With four military commandant's offices. Four or four, even more or less equal, but in general, Berlin was divided into two completely different parts. For the three sectors soon connected, and the fourth - the eastern - and, as usual, the poorest - turned out to be isolated. It remained so, although it later acquired the status of the capital of the GDR. To us, the Americans, in return, “generously” rolled off the Thuringia they occupied. The land is good, but for a long time the disappointed residents harbored resentment for some reason not against the apostate Americans, but against us, the new occupiers. Here's an aberration...

As for looting, our soldiers did not come there on their own. And now, 60 years later, all sorts of myths are spreading, growing into ancient dimensions ...

Reich Convulsions

The fascist empire was disintegrating before our eyes. On April 28, Italian partisans caught dictator Mussolini trying to escape and shot him. The next day, General von Wietinghoff signed the act of surrender of the Germans in Italy. Hitler learned about the execution of the Duce at the same time as another bad one: his closest associates Himmler and Goering started separate negotiations with the Western allies, bargaining for their lives. The Fuhrer was beside himself with rage: he demanded the immediate arrest and execution of traitors, but this was no longer in his power. It was possible to recoup on Himmler's deputy, General Fegelein, who fled from the bunker - a detachment of SS men grabbed him and shot him. The general was not saved even by the fact that he was the husband of Eva Braun's sister. In the evening of the same day, Commandant Weidling reported that there was only two days of ammunition left in the city, and there was no fuel at all.

General Chuikov received the task from Zhukov - to connect from the east with the forces advancing from the west through the Tiergarten. The Potsdamer Bridge, leading to the Anhalter station and Wilhelmstrasse, became an obstacle to the soldiers. The sappers managed to save him from the explosion, but the tanks that entered the bridge were hit by well-aimed shots of faustpatrons. Then the tankers tied sandbags around one of the tanks, doused it with diesel fuel and let it go forward. From the first shots, the fuel flared up, but the tank continued to move forward. A few minutes of enemy confusion was enough for the rest to follow the first tank. By the evening of the 28th, Chuikov approached the Tiergarten from the southeast, while Rybalko's tanks entered the area from the south. In the north of the Tiergarten, Perepelkin's 3rd Army liberated the Moabit prison, from where 7,000 prisoners were released.

The city center has turned into a real hell. There was nothing to breathe from the heat, the stones of buildings cracked, water boiled in ponds and canals. There was no front line - a desperate battle went on for every street, every house. Hand-to-hand fights broke out in the dark rooms and on the stairs - the electricity in Berlin had long gone out. Early in the morning of April 29, soldiers of the 79th rifle corps of General Perevertkin approached the huge building of the Ministry of Internal Affairs - "Himmler's house". Having shot the barricades at the entrance with cannons, they managed to break into the building and capture it, which made it possible to come close to the Reichstag.

Meanwhile, nearby, in his bunker, Hitler was dictating a political testament. He expelled the "traitors" Göring and Himmler from the Nazi party and accused the entire German army of failing to maintain "commitment to duty to the death." Power over Germany was transferred to "President" Dönitz and "Chancellor" Goebbels, and command of the army to Field Marshal Scherner. Toward evening, the official Wagner, brought by the SS from the city, performed the ceremony of the civil marriage of the Fuhrer and Eva Braun. The witnesses were Goebbels and Bormann, who stayed for breakfast. During the meal, Hitler was depressed, muttering something about the death of Germany and the triumph of the "Jewish Bolsheviks." During breakfast, he presented two secretaries with ampoules of poison and ordered them to poison his beloved shepherd Blondie. Outside the walls of his office, the wedding quickly turned into a drinking bout. One of the few sober employees was Hitler's personal pilot Hans Bauer, who offered to take his boss to any part of the world. Fuhrer in again refused.

On the evening of April 29, General Weidling reported the situation to Hitler for the last time. The old warrior was frank - tomorrow the Russians will be at the entrance to the office. Ammunition is running out, there is nowhere to wait for reinforcements. Wenck's army was thrown back to the Elbe, nothing is known about most of the other units. We need to capitulate. This opinion was also confirmed by SS Colonel Monke, who had previously fanatically carried out all the orders of the Fuhrer. Hitler forbade surrender, but allowed the soldiers to “small groups” leave the encirclement and make their way to the west.

Meanwhile, Soviet troops occupied one building after another in the center of the city. The commanders had difficulty orienting themselves on the maps - that heap of stones and twisted metal, which was previously called Berlin, was not indicated there. After taking the “Himmler’s house” and the town hall, the attackers had two main goals left - the imperial chancellery and the Reichstag. If the first was the real center of power, then the second was its symbol, the tallest building in the German capital, where the banner of Victory was to be hoisted. The banner was already ready - it was handed over to one of the best units of the 3rd Army, the battalion of Captain Neustroev. On the morning of April 30, units approached the Reichstag. As for the office, they decided to break through the zoo in the Tiergarten to it. In the devastated park, the soldiers rescued several animals, including a mountain goat, which was hung around the neck of the German "Iron Cross" for bravery. Only in the evening the center of defense was taken - a seven-story reinforced concrete bunker.

Near the zoo, Soviet assault troops were attacked by SS men from the wrecked subway tunnels. Pursuing them, the fighters penetrated underground and found passages leading towards the office. On the move, a plan arose to "finish off the fascist beast in its lair." The scouts went deep into the tunnels, but after a couple of hours water rushed towards them. According to one version, having learned about the approach of the Russians to the office, Hitler ordered to open the floodgates and let the Spree water into the metro, where, in addition to Soviet soldiers, there were tens of thousands of wounded, women and children. Berliners who survived the war recalled that they heard an order to urgently leave the subway, but due to the ensuing crush, few were able to get out. Another version refutes the existence of the order: water could break into the subway due to continuous bombing that destroyed the walls of the tunnels.

If the Führer ordered the flooding of his fellow citizens, this was the last of his criminal orders. On the afternoon of April 30, he was informed that the Russians were at Potsdamerplatz, a block from the bunker. Shortly thereafter, Hitler and Eva Braun said goodbye to their comrades-in-arms and retired to their room. At 15.30 a shot rang out from there, after which Goebbels, Bormann and several other people entered the room. The Fuhrer, with a pistol in his hand, was lying on the couch with his face covered in blood. Eva Braun did not mutilate herself - she took poison. Their corpses were carried out into the garden, where they were placed in a shell crater, doused with gasoline and set on fire. The funeral ceremony did not last long - the Soviet artillery opened fire, and the Nazis hid in the bunker. Later, the charred bodies of Hitler and his girlfriend were discovered and transported to Moscow. For some reason, Stalin did not show the world evidence of the death of his worst enemy, which gave rise to many versions of his salvation. Only in 1991, Hitler's skull and his dress uniform were discovered in the archive and shown to everyone who wanted to see these gloomy evidence of the past.

Zhukov Yuri Nikolaevich, historian, writer:

Winners are not judged. And that's it. In 1944, it turned out to be quite possible to withdraw Finland, Romania, and Bulgaria from the war without serious battles, primarily through the efforts of diplomacy. An even more favorable situation for us developed on April 25, 1945. On that day, on the Elbe, near the city of Torgau, the troops of the USSR and the USA met, and the complete encirclement of Berlin was completed. From that moment on, the fate of Nazi Germany was sealed. Victory became inevitable. Only one thing remained unclear: exactly when the complete and unconditional surrender of the agonizing Wehrmacht would follow. Zhukov, having removed Rokossovsky, took over the leadership of the storming of Berlin. Could just squeeze the blockade ring hourly.

Force Hitler and his henchmen to commit suicide not on April 30, but a few days later. But Zhukov acted differently. For a week, he ruthlessly sacrificed thousands of soldiers' lives. He forced units of the 1st Belorussian Front to conduct bloody battles for every quarter of the German capital. For every street, every house. Achieved the surrender of the Berlin garrison on May 2. But if this capitulation had followed not on May 2, but, say, on the 6th or 7th, tens of thousands of our soldiers could have been saved. Well, Zhukov would have gained the glory of the winner anyway.

Molchanov Ivan Gavrilovich, participant in the storming of Berlin, veteran of the 8th Guards Army of the 1st Belorussian Front:

After the battles at Stalingrad, our army under the command of General Chuikov passed through the whole of Ukraine, the south of Belarus, and then through Poland went to Berlin, on the outskirts of which, as you know, the very difficult Kyustrinsky operation took place. I, a scout of an artillery unit, was then 18 years old. I still remember how the earth trembled and a flurry of shells plowed it up and down ... How, after powerful artillery preparation on the Zelov Heights, the infantry went into battle. The soldiers who drove the Germans from the first line of defense later said that after being blinded by the searchlights that were used in this operation, the Germans fled clutching their heads. Many years later, during a meeting in Berlin, German veterans who participated in this operation told me that they then thought that the Russians had used a new secret weapon.

After the Zelov Heights, we moved directly to the German capital. Due to the high water, the roads were so muddy that both equipment and people could hardly move. It was impossible to dig trenches: at a depth, water came out from the bayonet of a shovel. On the ring road we left by the twentieth of April and soon found ourselves on the outskirts of Berlin, where incessant battles began for the city. The SS men had nothing to lose: they strengthened residential buildings, metro stations, and various institutions thoroughly and in advance. When we entered the city, we were horrified: its center turned out to be completely bombed by Anglo-American aircraft, and the streets were littered so that vehicles could hardly move along them. We moved with a map of the city - the streets and quarters marked on it were difficult to find. On the same map, in addition to objects - fire targets, museums, book depositories, medical institutions were indicated, at which it was forbidden to shoot.

In the battles for the center, our tank units also suffered losses: they became easy prey for the German faustpatrons. And then the command applied a new tactic: first, artillery and flamethrowers destroyed enemy firing points, and after that the tanks cleared the way for the infantry. By this time, only one gun remained in our unit. But we kept going. When approaching the Brandenburg Gate and the Anhalt railway station, they received an order “not to shoot” - the accuracy of the battle here turned out to be such that our shells could hit their own. By the end of the operation, the remnants of the German army were cut into four parts, which began to be squeezed by rings.

Shooting ended on May 2nd. And suddenly there was such a silence that it was impossible to believe. Residents of the city began to leave the shelters, they looked at us frowningly. And here, in establishing contacts with them, their own children helped. The ubiquitous guys, 10-12 years old, came up to us, we treated them to cookies, bread, sugar, and when we opened the kitchen, we began to feed them cabbage soup, porridge. It was a strange sight: shootings resumed somewhere, volleys of guns were heard, and there was a queue for porridge near our kitchen ...

And soon a squadron of our horsemen appeared on the streets of the city. They were so clean and festive that we decided: “Probably somewhere near Berlin they were specially dressed, prepared ...” This is an impression, as well as a visit to the destroyed Reichstag G.K. Zhukov - he drove up in an unbuttoned overcoat, smiling - crashed into my memory forever. There were, of course, other memorable moments. In the battles for the city, our battery had to be redeployed to another firing point. And then we came under German artillery attack. Two of my comrades jumped into the hole that had been torn apart by the shell. And I, not knowing why, lay down under the truck, where after a few seconds I realized that the car above me was full of shells. When the shelling ended, I got out from under the truck and saw that my comrades were killed ... Well, it turns out that I was born that day for the second time ...

last fight

The assault on the Reichstag was led by the 79th Rifle Corps of General Perevertkin, reinforced by strike groups of other units. The first onslaught on the morning of the 30th was repulsed - up to one and a half thousand SS men dug in in a huge building. At 18.00 a new assault followed. For five hours, the fighters moved forward and up, meter by meter, to the roof, decorated with giant bronze horses. Sergeants Yegorov and Kantaria were instructed to hoist the flag - they decided that Stalin would be pleased to participate in this symbolic act of his fellow countryman. Only at 22.50 two sergeants reached the roof and, risking their lives, inserted the flagpole into the hole from the projectile at the very horse's hooves. This was immediately reported to the headquarters of the front, and Zhukov called the Supreme Commander in Moscow.

A little later, other news came - Hitler's heirs decided to negotiate. This was announced by General Krebs, who appeared at Chuikov's headquarters at 3.50 am on May 1. He began by saying, "Today is the first of May, a great holiday for both our nations." To which Chuikov, without too much diplomacy, replied: “Today is our holiday. It's hard to say how things are going for you." Krebs spoke about Hitler's suicide and the desire of his successor Goebbels to conclude a truce. A number of historians believe that these negotiations should have stretched out while waiting for a separate agreement between the "government" of Dönitz and the Western powers. But they did not achieve their goal - Chuikov immediately reported to Zhukov, who called Moscow, waking Stalin up on the eve of the May Day parade. The reaction to Hitler's death was predictable: “Finished, scoundrel! Too bad we didn't take him alive." The answer to the proposal for a truce came: only complete surrender. This was passed on to Krebs, who objected: "Then you will have to destroy all the Germans." The response silence was more eloquent than words.

At 10.30 Krebs left the headquarters, having managed to drink cognac with Chuikov and exchange memories - both commanded units near Stalingrad. Having received the final "no" of the Soviet side, the German general returned to his troops. In pursuit of him, Zhukov sent an ultimatum: if Goebbels and Bormann's consent to unconditional surrender is not given before 10 o'clock, the Soviet troops will strike such a blow, from which "nothing will remain in Berlin but ruins." The leadership of the Reich did not give an answer, and at 10.40 Soviet artillery opened heavy fire on the center of the capital.

The shooting did not stop all day - the Soviet units suppressed pockets of German resistance, which weakened a little, but was still fierce. In different parts of the vast city, tens of thousands of soldiers and Volkssturm men were still fighting. Others, throwing down their weapons and tearing off their insignia, tried to escape to the west. Among the latter was Martin Bormann. Upon learning of Chuikov's refusal to negotiate, he, along with a group of SS men, fled from the office through an underground tunnel leading to the Friedrichstrasse metro station. There he got out into the street and tried to hide from the fire behind a German tank, but he was hit. Axman, the leader of the Hitler Youth, who turned out to be there, who shamefully abandoned his young pupils, later stated that he had seen dead body"Nazi No. 2" under railway bridge.

At 18.30, the soldiers of the 5th army of General Berzarin went to storm the last stronghold of Nazism - the imperial office. Prior to this, they managed to storm the post office, several ministries and the heavily fortified building of the Gestapo. Two hours later, when the first groups of attackers had already approached the building, Goebbels and his wife Magda followed their idol, taking poison. Before that, they asked a doctor to administer a lethal injection to their six children - they were told that they would give an injection from which they would never get sick. The children were left in the room, and the corpses of Goebbels and his wife were taken out into the garden and burned. Soon everyone who remained below - about 600 adjutants and SS men - rushed out: the bunker began to burn. Somewhere in its bowels, only General Krebs, who fired a bullet in the forehead, remained. Another Nazi commander, General Weidling, took charge and radioed Chuikov to agree to an unconditional surrender. At one in the morning on May 2, German officers with white flags appeared on the Potsdam Bridge. Their request was reported to Zhukov, who gave his consent. At 0600, Weidling signed an order to surrender to all German troops, and he himself set an example for his subordinates. After that, the shooting in the city began to subside. From the cellars of the Reichstag, from under the ruins of houses and shelters, the Germans came out, who silently laid down their weapons on the ground and lined up in columns. They were observed by the writer Vasily Grossman, who accompanied the Soviet commandant Berzarin. Among the prisoners, he saw old men, boys and women who did not want to part with their husbands. The day was cold, light rain pouring down on the smoldering ruins. Hundreds of corpses lay on the streets, crushed by tanks. Flags with a swastika and party cards were also lying there - Hitler's adherents were in a hurry to get rid of the evidence. In the Tiergarten, Grossman saw a German soldier with a nurse on a bench - they were sitting embracing and not paying any attention to what was going on around.

In the afternoon, Soviet tanks began to roll through the streets, transmitting an order to surrender through loudspeakers. Around 15.00, the fighting finally stopped, and only in the western regions did explosions rumble - there they pursued the SS men who tried to escape. An unusual, tense silence hung over Berlin. And then she was torn apart by a new flurry of shots. Soviet soldiers crowded on the steps of the Reichstag, on the ruins of the imperial office and fired again and again - this time in the air. Strangers threw themselves into each other's arms, danced right on the pavement. They couldn't believe the war was over. Ahead, many of them had new wars, hard work, difficult problems, but they had already done the main thing in their lives.

In the last battle of the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army crushed 95 enemy divisions. Up to 150 thousand German soldiers and officers were killed, 300 thousand were captured. The victory came at a heavy price - in two weeks of the offensive, three Soviet fronts lost from 100 thousand to 200 thousand people killed. Senseless resistance claimed the lives of approximately 150 thousand civilians in Berlin, a significant part of the city was destroyed.

Chronicle of the operation
April 16, 5.00.
The troops of the 1st Belorussian Front (Zhukov), after a powerful artillery preparation, begin an offensive on the Zelov Heights near the Oder.
April 16, 8.00.
Parts of the 1st Ukrainian Front (Konev) force the Neisse River and move west.
April 18, morning.
The tank armies of Rybalko and Lelyushenko are turning north towards Berlin.
April 18, evening.
The German defenses on the Zelov Heights have been broken through. Parts of Zhukov begin to advance towards Berlin.
April 19, morning.
Troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front (Rokossovsky) cross the Oder, slicing apart the German defenses north of Berlin.
April 20, evening.
Zhukov's armies approach Berlin from the west and northwest.
April 21, day.
Rybalko's tanks occupy the headquarters of the German troops in Zossen, south of Berlin.
April 22, morning.
Rybalko's army occupies the southern outskirts of Berlin, and Perkhorovich's army occupies the northern districts of the city.
April 24, day.
Meeting of the advancing troops of Zhukov and Konev in the south of Berlin. The Frankfurt-Gubenskaya group of Germans is surrounded by Soviet units, its destruction has begun.
April 25, 13.30.
Parts of Konev went to the Elbe near the city of Torgau and met there with the 1st American Army.
April 26, morning.
The German army of Wenck launches a counterattack on the advancing Soviet units.
April 27, evening.
After stubborn fighting, Wenck's army was driven back.
April 28th.
Soviet units surround the city center.
April 29, day.
The building of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the town hall were taken by storm.
April 30, day.
Busy Tiergarten area with a zoo.
April 30, 15.30.
Hitler committed suicide in a bunker under the Imperial Chancellery.
April 30, 22.50.
The assault on the Reichstag, which had lasted since morning, was completed.
May 1, 3.50.
The beginning of unsuccessful negotiations between the German General Krebs and the Soviet command.
May 1, 10.40.
After the failure of the negotiations, the Soviet troops begin to storm the buildings of the ministries and the imperial chancellery.
May 1, 22.00.
The Imperial Chancellery is taken by storm.
May 2, 6.00.
General Weidling gives the order to surrender.
May 2, 15.00.
The fighting in the city finally stopped.

Capture of Berlin

The military-political situation in Europe by mid-April 1945

April was the last year of the World War. Military operations covered a significant part of the territory of Germany: Soviet troops advanced from the east, and allied troops from the west. Real conditions were created for the complete and final defeat of the Wehrmacht.

The strategic position of the Soviet Armed Forces by this time had improved even more. Fulfilling a great international mission, they completed the liberation of Poland, Hungary, a significant part of Czechoslovakia during the winter-spring offensive, completed the liquidation of the enemy in East Prussia, captured Eastern Pomerania and Silesia, occupied the capital of Austria, Vienna and went to the southern regions of Germany.

The troops of the Leningrad Front, in cooperation with the Red Banner Baltic Fleet, continued to block the enemy's Courland grouping. The armies of the 3rd and part of the forces of the 2nd Belorussian Fronts destroyed the remnants of the Nazi troops on the Zemland Peninsula, in the area southeast of Danzig and north of Gdynia. The main forces of the 2nd Belorussian Front, after regrouping to a new direction, reached the coast of the Baltic Sea west of Gdynia and the Oder - from its mouth to the city of Schwedt, replacing the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front here.

On the central sector of the Soviet-German front, the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front fought on the left bank of the Oder River to expand the previously occupied bridgeheads, especially the Kyustra one - the largest of them. The main grouping of the forces of the front was located 60-70 km from the capital of Nazi Germany. The armies of the right wing of the 1st Ukrainian Front reached the Neisse River. Their distance from Berlin was 140-150 km. The formations of the left wing of the front reached the Czechoslovak border. Thus, the Soviet troops reached the approaches to the capital of Germany and were ready to deliver the final blow to the enemy.

Berlin was not only the political stronghold of fascism, but also one of the largest centers of the country's military industry. The main forces of the Wehrmacht were concentrated in the Berlin direction. That is why their defeat and the capture of the capital of Germany should have led to a victorious conclusion to the war in Europe.

By mid-April, the troops of the Western Allies crossed the Rhine and completed the elimination of the enemy's Ruhr grouping. Dealing the main blow to Dresden, they sought to dismember the opposing enemy troops and meet the Soviet army at the turn of the Elbe River.

By this time, fascist Germany was in complete political isolation, because its only ally, militaristic Japan, was unable to exert any influence on the course of events in Europe. The internal situation of the Reich also testified to the approaching inevitable collapse. The loss of raw materials from the previously occupied countries (with the exception of some areas of Czechoslovakia) led to a further decline in German industrial production. Disorganization in the entire German economy led to a sharp drop in military production: the output of military products in March 1945 compared with July 1944 decreased by 65 percent. Difficulties in replenishing the Wehrmacht with personnel increased. Even having called into the army another contingent born in 1929, that is, 16-17-year-old boys, the Nazis could not make up for the losses suffered in the winter of 1944-1945. However, due to the fact that the length of the Soviet-German front was significantly reduced, the fascist German command was able to concentrate large forces in the threatened directions. In addition, in the first half of April, part of the forces and equipment from the western front and the reserve was transferred to the east, and by the beginning of the Berlin operation, 214 divisions were operating on the Soviet-German front, including 34 tank and 15 motorized, and 14 brigades. Only 60 divisions remained against the American-British troops, including 5 tank divisions. At that time, the Nazis still had certain stocks of weapons and ammunition, which made it possible for the fascist command to put up stubborn resistance on the Soviet-German front in the last month of the war.

The essence of the strategic plan of the Wehrmacht's supreme command was to keep the defense in the east at any cost, to hold back the advance of the Soviet Army, and in the meantime try to conclude a separate peace with the United States and England. The Nazi leadership put forward the slogan: "It is better to surrender Berlin to the Anglo-Saxons than to let the Russians into it." The special instructions of the National Socialist Party of April 3 stated: “The war is decided not in the West, but in the East ... Our eyes must be turned only to the East, regardless of what happens in the West. Holding the Eastern Front is a prerequisite for a turning point in the course of the war.

In the Berlin direction, the troops of the Vistula and Center Army Groups as part of the 3rd Panzer, 9th Field, 4th Panzer and 17th Armies under the command of Generals X. Manteuffel, T. Busse, F. Grezer took up the defense and W. Hasse. They had 48 infantry, 6 tank and 9 motorized divisions, 37 separate infantry regiments, 98 separate infantry battalions, as well as a large number of separate artillery and special units and formations. The distribution of these forces along the front was uneven. So, in front of the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, 7 infantry divisions, 13 separate regiments, several separate battalions and the personnel of two officer schools defended themselves on a 120-kilometer stretch. Most of these forces and means were located in the Stettin direction. In front of the 1st Belorussian Front, in a strip up to 175 km wide, 23 divisions, as well as a significant number of separate brigades, regiments and battalions, occupied the defense. The densest grouping was created by the enemy against the Kustrinsky bridgehead, where 14 divisions were concentrated on a 44 km wide section, including 5 motorized and tank divisions.

The operational density of his forces in this sector was one division per 3 km of the front. Here, 60 guns and mortars, as well as 17 tanks and assault guns, accounted for 1 km of the front. In Berlin itself, more than 200 Volkssturm battalions were formed, and the total number of the garrison exceeded 200 thousand people.

In the strip of the 1st Ukrainian Front, 390 km wide, there were 25 enemy divisions, of which 7 constituted the operational reserve. The main forces of the defending troops were concentrated on the Forst-Penzig sector, where the operational density was one division per 10 km, more than 10 guns and mortars, as well as up to 3 tanks and assault guns per 1 km of the front.

In the Berlin area German command had up to 2 thousand combat aircraft, including 70 percent of fighters (of which 120 were Me-262 jets). In addition to fighter aircraft, about 600 anti-aircraft guns were involved to cover the city. In total, in the offensive zone of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, there were 200 anti-aircraft batteries.

The main operational reserves of the enemy were located northeast of Berlin and in the area of ​​Cottbus. Their distance from the front line did not exceed 30 km. In the rear of Army Groups "Vistula" and "Center", strategic reserves consisting of eight divisions were hastily formed. The proximity of not only operational, but also strategic reserves testified to the enemy's intention to use them to fight for the tactical defense zone.

A defense in depth was prepared in the Berlin direction, the construction of which began as early as January 1945. The pace of work was accelerated due to the withdrawal of Soviet troops to the Oder and Neisse, as well as the creation of a direct threat to the central regions of Germany and its capital. Prisoners of war and foreign workers were driven to the construction of defensive structures, and the local population was involved.

The basis of the defense of the fascist German troops was the Oder-Neissen defensive line and the Berlin defensive area. The Oder-Neisen line consisted of three lanes, between which there were intermediate and cut-off positions in the most important directions. The total depth of this boundary reached 20-40 km. The forward edge of the main line of defense ran along the left bank of the Oder and Neisse rivers, with the exception of the areas of Frankfurt, Guben, Forst and Muskau, where the enemy continued to hold small bridgeheads on the right bank. Settlements were turned into strong strongholds. Using locks on the Oder River and numerous canals, the Nazis prepared a number of areas for flooding. A second line of defense was created 10-20 km from the front line. The most equipped in engineering terms, it was on the Zelov (Zeelovsky) heights - in front of the Kyustrinsky bridgehead. The third lane was located at a distance of 20-40 km from the leading edge of the main lane. Like the second, it consisted of powerful nodes of resistance, interconnected by one or two trenches and communication passages.

During the construction of the Oder-Neissen defensive line, the fascist German command paid special attention to the organization of anti-tank defense, which was based on a combination of artillery fire, assault guns and tanks with engineering barriers, dense mining of tank-accessible directions and the mandatory use of such natural obstacles as rivers, canals and lakes. To combat tanks, it was planned to use the anti-aircraft artillery of the Berlin defensive area on a large scale. Numerous minefields were created not only in front of the front edge of the defensive zones, but also in the depths. The average density of mining in the most important directions reached 2 thousand mines per 1 km. In front of the first trench, and in the depths of the defense at the intersection of roads and along their sides, there were tank destroyers armed with faustpatrons.

By the beginning of the offensive of the Soviet troops, the enemy comprehensively prepared the Berlin defensive area, which included three ring bypasses prepared for a stubborn defense. The outer defensive bypass passed along rivers, canals and lakes 25-40 km from the center of the capital. It was based on large settlements turned into nodes of resistance. The inner defensive contour, which was considered the main line of defense of the fortified area, ran along the outskirts of the suburbs. All strongholds and positions were interconnected in terms of fire. Numerous anti-tank obstacles and barbed wire were erected on the streets. The total depth of defense on this bypass was 6 km. The third - the city bypass passed along the district railway. All streets leading to the center of Berlin were blocked by barricades, bridges were prepared to be blown up.

For the convenience of defense management, the city was divided into nine sectors. The most carefully prepared central sector, which covered the main state and administrative institutions, including the Reichstag and the Imperial Chancellery. Trenches for artillery, tanks and assault guns were dug in the streets and squares, and numerous reinforced concrete firing structures were prepared. All defensive positions were interconnected by communications. The subway was widely used for covert maneuvers by forces and means, the total length of lines of which reached 80 km. Considering that the defensive structures were occupied in advance by the troops of the Berlin garrison, the number of which was constantly increasing due to the incoming replenishment, it was clear that a stubborn and intense struggle was ahead for Berlin.

The order issued on March 9 to prepare the defense of Berlin said: “Defend the capital to the last man and to the last cartridge ... The enemy must not be given a single minute of rest, he must be weakened and bled white in a dense network of strongholds, defensive nodes and nests of resistance. Every lost house or every lost stronghold must be immediately returned by counterattack ... Berlin can decide the outcome of the war.

Preparing to repel the offensive of the Soviet army, the Nazi command carried out a number of measures to strengthen its troops organizationally. At the expense of strategic reserves, spare parts and military educational institutions, it restored the strength and technical equipment of almost all divisions. The number of infantry companies by mid-April was increased to 100 people. Instead of Himmler, General G. Heinrici, who was considered a major defense specialist in the Wehrmacht, was appointed commander of the Vistula Army Group instead of Himmler. On April 8, the commander of Army Group Center, F. Scherner, was awarded the rank of field marshal. The new chief of the general staff of the ground forces, General G. Krebs, in the opinion of Hitler's military experts, was the best connoisseur of the Soviet army, since before the war he was an assistant to the military attaché in Moscow.

On April 15, Hitler issued a special appeal to the soldiers of the Eastern Front. He urged at all costs to repel the offensive of the Soviet army. Hitler demanded that anyone who dared to retreat or give the order to withdraw be shot on the spot. The calls were accompanied by threats against the families of those soldiers and officers who would surrender to the Soviet troops.

Instead of stopping the senseless bloodshed and accepting unconditional surrender, which would be in the interests of the German nation, the Nazi leadership tried to postpone its inevitable end with cruel repressions. V. Keitel and M. Bormann issued an order to protect every settlement to the last person, and to punish the slightest instability with the death penalty.

The Soviet Armed Forces were faced with the task of inflicting a final blow on fascist Germany in order to force it to capitulate unconditionally.

Preparations for the Berlin operation

The military-political situation that had developed by April required the Soviet command to prepare and carry out an operation to decisively defeat the Berlin group and capture the German capital in the shortest possible time. Only a successful solution to this problem could thwart the plans of the fascist leadership to prolong the war. It was necessary to take into account the fact that every extra day gave the enemy the opportunity to improve the defense in engineering terms and strengthen the Berlin grouping of troops at the expense of other fronts and sectors, as well as new formations. And this would significantly complicate the overcoming of enemy defenses and would lead to an increase in losses from the advancing fronts. Breaking through the enemy's powerful defenses, crushing his large forces, and quickly capturing Berlin necessitated the creation of strong strike groupings and the use of the most expedient and resolute methods of conducting combat operations.

Given these factors, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command attracted troops from three fronts for the Berlin operation - the 2nd and 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian, in total 21 combined arms, 4 tank, 3 air armies, 10 separate tank and mechanized, as well as 4 cavalry corps. In addition, it was supposed to use part of the forces of the Baltic Fleet, the 18th Air Army of long-range aviation, the Air Defense Forces of the country and the Dnieper military flotilla, operationally subordinate to the 1st Belorussian Front. Polish troops were also preparing for the final operation to defeat Nazi Germany, consisting of two armies, tank and aviation corps, two breakthrough artillery divisions and a separate mortar brigade with a total number of 185 thousand soldiers and officers. They were armed with 3 thousand guns and mortars, 508 tanks and self-propelled artillery mounts, 320 aircraft.

As a result of all the measures, a strong grouping of troops was concentrated in the Berlin direction, which outnumbered the enemy. The creation of such a group testified to the enormous potentialities of the Soviet socialist state, which had powerful Armed Forces by the end of the war, its military and economic advantages, and the art of strategic leadership.

The concept of the Berlin operation was developed during the winter offensive of the Soviet troops. Having comprehensively analyzed the military-political situation prevailing in Europe, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command determined the purpose of the operation and considered the plans prepared by the headquarters of the fronts. The final plan of the operation was approved in early April at an expanded meeting of the Headquarters with the participation of members of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, members of the State Defense Committee and commanders of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts. The plan for the Berlin operation was the result of the collective creativity of the Headquarters, the General Staff, commanders, headquarters and military councils of the fronts.

The purpose of the operation was to quickly defeat the main forces of the Vistula and Center Army Groups, capture Berlin and, having reached the Elbe River, link up with the troops of the Western Allies. This was to deprive Nazi Germany of the possibility of further organized resistance and force her to unconditional surrender.

The completion of the defeat of the Nazi troops was supposed to be carried out jointly with the Western allies, an agreement in principle with which to coordinate actions was reached at the Crimean Conference. Plan of attack on western front was set out in Eisenhower's message to the Supreme Commander of the Soviet Armed Forces dated March 28. In a reply message dated April 1, JV Stalin wrote: "Your plan for cutting the German forces by joining the Soviet troops with your troops completely coincides with the plan of the Soviet high command." Further, he informed the allied command that the Soviet troops would take Berlin, having allocated part of their forces for this purpose, and reported the approximate date for the start of the offensive.

The idea of ​​the Soviet command was to break through the enemy defenses along the Oder and the Neisse with powerful blows from the troops of three fronts and, developing the offensive in depth, encircle the main grouping of Nazi troops in the Berlin direction with its simultaneous dismemberment into several parts and the subsequent destruction of each of them. . In the future, Soviet troops were to reach the Elbe.

In accordance with the plan of the operation, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command set specific tasks for the fronts.

The commander of the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front was ordered to prepare and conduct an operation with the aim of capturing the German capital and reaching the Elbe River no later than the 12-15th day of the operation. The front was supposed to inflict three blows: the main one - directly on Berlin from the Kustrinsky bridgehead and two auxiliary ones - north and south of Berlin. Tank armies were required to enter after the breakthrough of the defense in order to develop success bypassing Berlin from the north and northeast. Given the important role of the front in the upcoming operation, the Stavka reinforced it with eight breakthrough artillery divisions and a combined arms army.

The 1st Ukrainian Front was supposed to defeat the enemy grouping in the area of ​​Cottbus and south of Berlin, not later than the 10-12th day of the operation, to capture the lines of Belitz, Wittenberg and further along the Elbe River to Dresden. The front was ordered to deliver two blows: the main one - in the general direction of Spremberg and the auxiliary one - on Dresden. On the left wing, the troops of the front were to go over to a tough defense. To reinforce the strike force, two combined-arms armies from the 3rd Belorussian Front (28th and 31st), as well as seven breakthrough artillery divisions, were transferred to the front. Both tank armies were to be brought in in the direction of the main attack after the defense had been breached. In addition, at a meeting at Headquarters, the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front received a verbal order from the Supreme Commander-in-Chief to provide in the front-line operation plan for the possibility of turning tank armies to the north after breaking through the Neissen defensive line to strike at Berlin from the south.

The troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front were tasked with crossing the Oder, defeating the enemy's Stettin grouping, and capturing the Anklam, Waren, and Wittenberg line no later than the 12-15th day of the operation. Under favorable conditions, they were supposed to, acting part of the forces from behind the right wing of the 1st Belorussian Front, roll up the enemy defenses along the left bank of the Oder. The coast of the Baltic Sea, from the mouth of the Vistula to Altdamm, was ordered to be firmly covered by part of the forces of the front.

The beginning of the offensive of the troops of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts was scheduled for April 16. Four days later, the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front were to go on the offensive.

Thus, the main efforts of the three fronts were directed primarily to crushing the enemy defenses, and then to encircling and dismembering the main forces of the Nazis defending in the Berlin direction. The encirclement of the enemy grouping was supposed to be carried out by bypassing Berlin from the north and northwest by the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, and from the south and southwest by the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front. Its dissection was ensured by the strike of two combined-arms armies of the 1st Belorussian Front in the general direction of Brandenburg. The direct capture of the capital of Germany was entrusted to the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front. 1st Ukrainian Front, advancing in the north westbound, and part of the forces on Dresden, was supposed to defeat the Nazi troops south of Berlin, isolate the main forces of Army Group Center and thereby ensure the offensive of the 1st Belorussian Front from the south; in addition, he had to be ready to directly assist the 1st Belorussian Front in capturing the capital of Nazi Germany.

The troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front were to cut off the 3rd German Panzer Army from Army Group Center and destroy it, thereby ensuring the advance of the 1st Belorussian Front from the north. The task of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet was to cover the coastal flank of the 2nd Belorussian Front, ensuring the blockade of the enemy's Courland grouping, and disrupt his sea communications. In accordance with the tasks received, the Soviet troops in early April began direct preparations for the operation.

The commander of the 1st Belorussian Front, Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Army) and two tank armies (1st and 2nd Guards) from the bridgehead west of Kustrin. The combined-arms armies of the first echelon of the main strike force were supposed to break through two strips of the Oder defensive line in three sectors with a total length of over 24 km on the very first day of the operation. It was especially important to seize the enemy's second line of defense, the front line of which ran along the Zelov Heights. In the future, it was planned to develop a swift offensive against Berlin from the east, and bypass it with tank armies from the northwest and south. On the sixth day of the operation, it was planned to completely capture the capital of Nazi Germany and reach the eastern shore of Lake Havel. The 47th Army, advancing on the right flank of the shock group, was supposed to bypass Berlin from the north and reach the Elbe on the 11th day of the operation. To build up the efforts of the strike force, it was planned to use the second echelon of the front - the 3rd Army; The 7th Guards Cavalry Corps was in reserve.

The auxiliary strikes prescribed by the Headquarters to ensure the offensive of the main strike force were planned to be delivered: on the right - by the forces of the 61st Army and the 1st Army of the Polish Army in the general direction of Eberswalde, Zandau; on the left - the troops of the 69th and 33rd armies together with the 2nd guards cavalry corps on Fürstenwalde, Brandenburg. The latter were first of all to cut off the main forces of the enemy's 9th Army from Berlin.

It was planned to bring tank armies into battle at a depth of 6-9 km after the combined arms armies took possession of the strongholds on the Zelov heights. The main task of the 2nd Guards Tank Army was to bypass Berlin from the north and northeast and capture its northwestern part. The 1st Guards Tank Army, reinforced by the 11th Tank Corps, was given the task of attacking Berlin from the east and capturing its eastern and then southern suburbs. In making this decision, the front commander sought to increase the power of the strike in the main direction, speed up the breakthrough of the enemy defenses, and prevent the withdrawal of the main forces of the 9th Army to Berlin.

Setting the tank armies of the task of capturing Berlin inevitably led to a limitation of their maneuverability and striking force. So, when bypassing the city from the south, the 1st Guards Tank Army had to maneuver in the immediate vicinity of the inner contour of the Berlin defensive area, where the possibilities for this were very limited, and sometimes completely excluded.

The Dnieper military flotilla, operating in the zone of the 1st Belorussian Front, under the command of Rear Admiral V.V. bridgehead. The third brigade was supposed to assist the troops of the 33rd Army in the Furstenberg area and provide mine defense of the waterways.

The commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front, Marshal of the Soviet Union I.S. Konev, decided to strike the main blow with the forces of the 3rd Guards (with the 25th Tank Corps), 13th and 5th Guards (with the 4th Guards Tank Corps) combined arms , 3rd and 4th Guards Tank Armies from the Tribel region in the general direction of Spremberg. They were supposed to break through the enemy defenses in the Forst, Muskau sector 27 km long, defeat his troops in the Cottbus area and south of Berlin. Part of the forces of the main group planned to strike at Berlin from the south. In the direction of the main attack, it was also planned to use the second echelon of the front - the 28th and 31st armies, which were supposed to arrive by April 20-22.

An auxiliary strike was planned to be delivered by the forces of the 2nd Army of the Polish Army together with the 1st Polish Tank Corps and the right flank of the 52nd Army in cooperation with the 7th Guards Mechanized Corps in the general direction of Dresden with the task of ensuring the operations of the strike force from the south. The reserve of the front was the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps, which was intended for use in the band of the 52nd Army.

The general situation in the front line was more favorable for the actions of tank armies, since the enemy’s defense in this direction was less deep than in the zone of the 1st Belorussian Front, and between the Spree River and the outer contour of the Berlin defensive area, he essentially did not there were prepared lines. In this regard, the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front decided to bring both tank armies into battle on the second day of the operation, after the combined arms formations had reached the left bank of the Spree. They were to develop a swift offensive in a northwestern direction, on the sixth day of the operation, advance detachments would capture the areas of Rathenow, Brandenburg, Dessau and create conditions for encircling the Berlin grouping of Nazi troops. In addition, it was planned to attack Berlin directly from the south with one corps of the 3rd Guards Tank Army.

During the preparation of the operation, the front commander clarified his decision on the use of tank armies. Keeping the main idea of ​​the decision - to bring them into battle on the second day of the operation, he ordered the army commanders to be ready to bring forward detachments of the first echelon corps on the first day, together with the infantry, to complete the breakthrough of the enemy's main line of defense and seize a bridgehead on the Spree River. One of the most important tasks of the advanced detachments was to disrupt the planned withdrawal of enemy troops from the line of the Neisse River to the Spree River. The tank and mechanized corps attached to the combined arms armies were to be used as their mobile groups.

The commander of the 2nd Belorussian Front, Marshal of the Soviet Union K.K. Rokossovsky, decided to deliver the main blow on the Altdamm, Nipperwiese sector with the forces of the 65th, 70th and 49th armies, 1st, 8th and 3rd guards tank, 8th mechanized and 3rd th Guards Cavalry Corps in the general direction of Neustrelitz. During the first five days, the formations of the shock group were supposed to force both channels of the Oder and completely break through the Oder defensive line. With the introduction of mobile formations into battle, the troops of the front had to develop an offensive in the northwestern and western directions in order to cut off the main forces of the 3rd German tank army from Berlin. The troops of the 19th and the main forces of the 2nd shock armies received the task of firmly holding the occupied lines. Part of the forces of the 2nd shock army was planned to assist the 65th army in capturing the city of Stettin, and subsequently to develop an offensive on Forbein.

The separate tank, mechanized and cavalry corps that were part of the front during the period of forcing the Oder and capturing bridgeheads on its left bank by combined arms formations were to remain directly subordinate to the front commander, who retained the right to determine the moment they were brought into battle. Then they were reassigned to the commanders of the combined arms armies and had to develop an offensive in the directions of the main attacks of these armies.

In preparing the offensive, the front commanders sought to create powerful strike groups. In the 1st Belorussian Front, 55 percent of rifle divisions, 61 percent of guns and mortars, 79 percent of tanks and self-propelled artillery installations were concentrated in the direction of the main attack in a section of 44 km (25 percent of the total length of the front line). In the 1st Ukrainian Front, on a section of 51 km (a total of 13 percent of the front line), 48 percent of rifle divisions, 75 percent of guns and mortars, 73 percent of tanks and self-propelled artillery installations were concentrated. This massing of forces and assets made it possible to create high operational densities and achieve decisive superiority over the enemy.

The concentration of significant forces and resources on the main attack axes made it possible to create a deep formation of troops. The fronts had powerful success development echelons, strong second echelons and reserves, which ensured the build-up of forces during the operation and its development at a high pace. In order to create powerful strike groupings, combined arms armies received strips from 8 to 17 km wide. Only the 3rd Guards Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front advanced in a strip 28 km wide. The combined-arms armies of the strike groups of the 2nd and 1st Belorussian Fronts broke through the enemy defenses in sectors of 4-7 km, and in the 1st Ukrainian Front - 8-10 km. To provide maximum strength During the initial strike, the operational formations of most combined-arms armies were one-echelon, while the battle formations of corps and divisions were, as a rule, built in two, and sometimes even three echelons. Rifle divisions operating in the directions of the main attacks usually received offensive zones up to 2 km wide in the 1st Belorussian and up to 3 km in the 1st Ukrainian fronts.

The operational formation of tank armies for entry into battle, except for the 1st Guards, was in two echelons. The mechanized corps stood out as part of the second echelon. The 1st Guards Tank Army had all three corps in one echelon, and a separate Guards Tank Brigade and a separate tank regiment were allocated to the reserve. The combat formations of tank and mechanized corps were also built in two echelons. The densities of tanks for direct support of infantry in the armies of strike groups were different and reached: in the 1st Belorussian - 20 - 44, in the 1st Ukrainian - 10 - 14 and in the 2nd Belorussian - 7 - 35 tanks and self-propelled artillery installations on 1 km front.

When planning the artillery offensive in the Berlin operation, it was characteristic even more than before to mass the artillery in the directions of the main attacks, create high densities for the period of artillery preparation and ensure continuous fire support of the troops throughout the offensive.

The largest grouping of artillery was created in the 1st Belorussian Front, which made it possible to concentrate about 300 guns and mortars per 1 km of the breakthrough area. The front command believed that with the existing density of artillery, the enemy's defenses would be reliably suppressed in the course of a 30-minute artillery preparation. Support for an attack by infantry and tanks to a depth of up to 2 km was to be carried out by a double, and to a depth of up to 4 km by a single fire shaft. Accompanying the battle of rifle and tank units and formations in depth was planned to be ensured by the consistent concentration of fire in the most important directions.

In order to achieve the surprise of the attack of the main strike force, it was decided to launch an attack of infantry and close support tanks 1.5-2 hours before dawn. To illuminate the terrain ahead and blind the enemy in the offensive zones of the 3rd and 5th shock, 8th Guards and 69th armies, it was planned to use 143 searchlight installations, which, with the start of the infantry attack, were to simultaneously turn on the light.

A strong artillery group was also created in the 1st Ukrainian Front. In accordance with the tasks ahead, the front command regrouped artillery and concentrated about 270 guns and mortars per 1 km of the breakthrough area. Due to the fact that the offensive of the front troops began with the crossing of a water barrier, the total duration of the artillery preparation was planned to be 145 minutes: 40 minutes - artillery preparation before forcing the river, 60 minutes - ensuring the crossing and 45 minutes of artillery preparation for the attack of infantry and tanks across the river. Taking into account the closed nature of the area, it was planned to support the attack of infantry and tanks, as a rule, by the method of successive concentration of fire.

In the 2nd Belorussian Front, the main forces of artillery were also concentrated in the breakthrough areas, where the density reached over 230 guns and mortars per 1 km. The artillery offensive was planned in the armies, which was explained by the various conditions for forcing the Oder. The duration of artillery preparation was set at 45-60 minutes.

Strong regimental, divisional, corps and army artillery groups were created in the armies of the strike groups of the 2nd and 1st Belorussian Fronts. In the 1st Ukrainian Front, instead of corps groups, each army group singled out corps subgroups from its composition. According to his command, this allowed the commanders of the armies to have at their disposal large artillery weapons for maneuver during the operation.

In the fronts, a significant amount of artillery was allocated for direct fire and to ensure the introduction of mobile formations into battle. So, only in the 13th Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front, advancing in a 10-kilometer zone, 457 guns were allocated for direct fire. To ensure the entry into battle of the tank armies of the 1st Belorussian Front, it was planned to bring in a total of 2250 guns and mortars.

The enemy's large aviation grouping and the proximity of its airfields to the front line made high demands on the reliable provision of ground troops from air strikes. By the beginning of the operation, the three fronts and corps of the country's Air Defense Forces, which were supposed to cover front-line facilities, had 3275 fighters, 5151 anti-aircraft guns and 2976 anti-aircraft machine guns. The organization of air defense was based on the principle of massive use of forces and means for reliable support of the combat formations of ground forces in the main attack axes. Covering the most important rear facilities, especially crossings over the Oder, was entrusted to the Air Defense Forces of the country.

The main forces of the aviation of the fronts were planned to be used massively to support the offensive of the strike groups. Its tasks included conducting aerial reconnaissance, covering ground troops from enemy air strikes, ensuring a breakthrough in defense and bringing mobile troops into battle, and fighting enemy reserves.

The most important task of the 4th Air Army of the 2nd Belorussian Front was to ensure the crossing of the Oder River. In addition, it was assigned to accompany the infantry offensive during the fighting in the depths of enemy defenses, since the crossing of artillery, which usually performed this task, could take considerable time. A feature of the preliminary aviation training planned in the 2nd Belorussian Front was that it was supposed to be carried out for three nights before the start of the operation. Direct aviation training was planned to be carried out two hours before the troops went on the offensive.

While maintaining air supremacy, the 16th Air Army of the 1st Belorussian Front was to reliably cover the troops of the front and the crossings, at night, during the period of artillery preparation, with Po-2 aircraft, strike at enemy headquarters, communication centers and artillery positions. Assistance to the troops of the front in breaking through the defense at night was entrusted to the 18th Air Army (Il-4 aircraft). With the start of the offensive, attack aircraft and bombers were to concentrate their main efforts on the strongholds and centers of resistance of the Nazis, conduct reconnaissance to the Elbe River and on the flanks of the strike groups. As part of the 1st Belorussian Front, Polish aviation was actively operating, which supported the 1st Army of the Polish Army.

Before forcing the Neisse River, the 2nd Air Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front was to establish a smoke screen in the offensive zone of the strike force and on its flanks, and during the period of overcoming the river and the offensive on its left bank, to inflict massive strikes on enemy battle formations located directly at the front line, as well as at its command posts and centers of resistance in the depths of the defense.

Thus, the combat use of aviation in the fronts was planned taking into account the specific situation in the zone of each front and the nature of the tasks that the ground forces had to solve.

An important place was given to engineering support. The main tasks of the engineering troops were to establish crossings and prepare bridgeheads for the offensive, as well as to assist the troops during the operation. So, in the zone of the 1st Belorussian Front, 25 bridges were built across the Oder and 40 ferry crossings were prepared. In the 1st Ukrainian Front, for the successful crossing of the Neisse, 2440 sapper wooden boats, 750 linear meters of assault bridges and more than 1000 meters of wooden bridge elements for loads from 16 to 60 tons were prepared.

One of the features of the Berlin operation was the short duration of the period of its direct preparation - only 13-15 days. In such a short period of time, it was necessary to carry out a large number of the most diverse and very complex measures to prepare troops and staffs for an offensive. It was especially difficult to carry out numerous regroupings of troops that took part in the East Pomeranian and Upper Silesian operations. After their completion, it became possible to concentrate the main forces in the Berlin direction.

The largest was the regrouping of troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, the main forces of which deployed 180 degrees and were transferred 250-300 km within 6-9 days. “It was a complex maneuver of the troops of the whole front,” recalled Marshal K.K. Rokossovsky, “the like of which was not seen throughout the Great Patriotic War.” The transfer of troops and military equipment was carried out by rail, by road, and some rifle formations - by a combined method, sometimes even on foot. In order to ensure secrecy, movement was most often carried out at night.

In the combat training of the troops, the main attention was paid to putting together units, working out the interaction between the branches of the military, training them in overcoming water barriers and actions in settlements. All combat training was carried out in an environment as close as possible to the upcoming events, and taking into account the accumulated experience. The headquarters of the fronts developed and sent instructions to the troops on the organization and conduct of offensive combat in large German cities. Special memos were also sent out, which summarized the experience of fighting for settlements.

Command-staff exercises were held at the fronts with the headquarters of rifle corps and divisions, as well as artillery, tank and aviation units and formations. Joint reconnaissance was carried out with representatives of all branches of the armed forces, mutual familiarization with the tasks, signals were determined and communication was organized for the interaction of supporting means with combined arms armies, a procedure was established for clearing routes when moving groups were introduced into the breakthrough and securing their flanks.

An important measure was the solution of the tasks of operational camouflage, which pursued the goal of ensuring the operational-tactical surprise of the offensive. For example, by simulating the concentration of three tank corps and two combined arms armies with a large number of crossing facilities in the zone of the 2nd shock army, the command of the 2nd Belorussian Front misled the enemy about the direction of the main attack. In the 1st Belorussian Front, a plan of measures was developed and successfully implemented to create the impression that the troops in the central sector were going over to a long defense, while preparations for the offensive were being carried out on the flanks. As a result, the German command did not dare to sharply strengthen the central sector of the front by weakening the flanks. Measures for operational camouflage were also carried out in the 1st Ukrainian Front. When the regrouping of his troops to the right wing began, in the areas of the former concentration of tank armies, numerous mock-ups of various types of military equipment and radio stations were installed, which continued their work according to the previously determined regime until the start of the offensive.

Along with measures to disinform the enemy, much attention was paid to the fight against fascist intelligence. The state security organs protected the Soviet troops from the penetration of enemy agents, supplied the command of the fronts with intelligence information about the enemy.

The tight deadlines for the preparation of the operation led to a particularly intense nature of the work of the rear, since it was necessary to create the necessary stocks of various materials. Only in the 2nd Belorussian Front during the period of preparation of the operation, 127.3 thousand tons of cargo were to be transported, and the rear parts of the front at the same time had to allocate more than a thousand trucks to ensure the regrouping of troops.

Great difficulties in the work of the rear were also observed on other fronts. To facilitate the work of motor transport, supply stations were as close as possible and transshipment bases were organized at the points of transshipment of wagons to the Western European gauge.

The careful organization of the supply of supplies and the strict control of the military councils over the work of the rear services made it possible to provide the troops with everything they needed. By the beginning of the operation, the fronts had on average: basic types of ammunition - 2.2-4.5 ammunition, high-octane gasoline - 9.5 refills, motor gasoline - 4.1, diesel fuel - 5 refills. Equipment and weapons were well prepared, combat and transport vehicles were transferred to the spring-summer operation mode.

The main task of party political work was to ensure high morale and an offensive impulse among the personnel. At the same time, the need to prepare soldiers for overcoming great difficulties was taken into account, to warn them both against underestimating and overestimating the strength of the enemy. The consciousness of the soldiers was to be firmly grasped by the idea that the defeat of the enemy's Berlin grouping, the capture of its capital, is the decisive and final act that ensures complete victory over German fascism. On the eve of the Berlin operation, the cultivation of a feeling of hatred for the enemy took on a particularly clear direction. An article published in Pravda on April 14 once again set out the Communist Party's point of view on this complex issue. It said: "The Red Army, in carrying out its great liberation mission, is fighting for the liquidation of the Hitlerite army, the Hitlerite state, the Hitlerite government, but has never set and does not set as its goal to exterminate the German people."

In connection with the 75th anniversary of the birth of V. I. Lenin, propaganda of Lenin's ideas about the defense of the socialist Fatherland, about the international mission of the Soviet soldier, was launched in the troops. The Main Political Directorate in a special directive to the military councils and political agencies gave specific instructions on preparations for this significant date. In all units and formations of the fronts, a series of lectures were read for the personnel on the topics: “Under the banner of Lenin”, “Lenin is the great organizer of the Soviet state”, “Lenin is the inspirer of the defense of the socialist Fatherland”. At the same time, propagandists and agitators emphasized Lenin's precept about the danger of underestimating the strength of the enemy, about the importance of iron military discipline.

In the course of previous operations, the fronts received significant reinforcements, mainly from recently liberated regions of the USSR. Being cut off from the life of their country for a long time, they were exposed to fascist propaganda, which in every possible way fanned the myth that Germany had special secret weapons that would be put into use at the right time. Such propaganda continued during the preparations for the Berlin operation. Enemy aircraft continuously dropped leaflets into the location of the Soviet troops, the content of which was aimed at instilling in the souls of insufficiently ideologically tempered soldiers uncertainty about the success of the upcoming offensive operations. One of these leaflets said: “You are not far from Berlin, but you will not be in Berlin. In Berlin, every house will be an impregnable fortress. Every German will fight against you." And here is what was written in another leaflet: “We also visited Moscow and Stalingrad, but they were not taken. You won’t take Berlin either, but you’ll get such a blow here that you won’t even pick up the bones. Our Fuhrer has huge manpower reserves and secret weapons, which he saved in order to completely destroy the Red Army on German soil.

Before the start of offensive operations, it was necessary, using various forms educational work among the personnel, instill in the minds of soldiers, sergeants and officers firm confidence in the complete success of the planned operation. Commanders, political workers, party and Komsomol activists, being among the soldiers, persistently explained to them that a situation had developed on the Soviet-German front when the balance of forces had changed radically in favor of the Soviet Union. Army propagandists and agitators showed by numerous examples how much the power of the Soviet rear had increased, which, on an ever-growing scale, supplied the fronts with manpower reserves, weapons, military equipment, equipment and food.

All this was brought to the consciousness of the soldiers with the help of various forms of party political work. The most common in those days was the organization of short rallies. Such forms of work as group and individual conversations with soldiers and sergeants, reports and lectures for officers, short meetings on organizational and methodological issues of educational work.

For agitators of the units, the political administration of the 1st Belorussian Front within a few days issued a number of thematic developments: “The victory of the Red Army is the victory of the Soviet socialist system”, “The closer our victory is, the higher our vigilance should be, the stronger should be our strikes on enemy." A member of the Military Council of the 1st Ukrainian Front, General K. V. Krainyukov, recalled: “We urged the soldiers to prepare as best as possible for the final battles, to attack decisively and swiftly, to save our native Soviet people driven to fascist hard labor and death camps, to save humanity from brown plague.

The political departments of the fronts, the political departments of the armies published a large number of leaflets, the content of which was very diverse: patriotic appeals to soldiers, appeals, advice on the use of military equipment. A significant part of these materials was published not only in Russian, but also in other languages ​​of the peoples of the USSR.

The success of the operation had to be determined by the high morale and combat qualities of soldiers, sergeants and officers, military skills, the ability to apply in battle and use the entrusted military equipment and weapons to the end. That is why serious attention was paid to the combat training of the troops, the cohesion of subunits and units. The officers of the political departments, together with the commanders, carefully selected people for assault battalions and took part in their preparation for offensive battles. Assault battalions were reinforced by communists and Komsomol members.

Given the experience of previous hostilities, for personnel in large quantities pamphlets were issued summary what every soldier who takes part in breaking through a heavily fortified, deeply echeloned enemy defense needs to know, and they summarized the positive and negative points from the experience of the combat operations of the front troops in capturing Poznan, Schneidemühl and other large cities. Among the leaflets published in the 1st Belorussian Front were: “Memo to an infantryman for fighting in a large city”, “Memo to the crew of an easel machine gun operating as part of an assault group in street battles in a large city”, “Memo to the crew of a tank fighting in in a large city as part of an assault group”, “Memo to a sapper on storming enemy cities”, etc. The political department of the 1st Ukrainian Front published 350 thousand leaflets, which said how to force large rivers, fight in the forest, in a large city.

The Soviet command knew that the Nazis intended to widely use faustpatrons to fight tanks. Therefore, during the period of preparation for the operation, the task was set and then solved - not only to acquaint the soldiers with the tactical and technical data of faustpatrons, but also to train them in the use of these weapons against the Nazi troops, using captured stocks. Komsomol members became skirmishers in mastering the faustpatrons. Groups of volunteers were created in the units to study this type of weapon. And this was very important for ensuring the advancement of the tanks, since on their own they could not successfully fight the Faustniks hiding in the basements, around the corners of buildings, etc. The infantrymen, sitting on the armor of the tanks, had to detect and destroy them in a timely manner.

In the last days before the operation, the influx of applications from soldiers with a request to accept them into the party sharply increased. In the 1st Belorussian Front alone, on the night of April 16 alone, more than 2,000 applications were submitted to party organizations. From March 15 to April 15, over 17 thousand soldiers were accepted into the ranks of the CPSU on three fronts. In total, by the beginning of the operation, they included 723 thousand members and candidate members of the party and 433 thousand Komsomol members.

Party political work was characterized by high efficiency: the soldiers were informed about the situation on all sectors of the Soviet-German front, about the successes of the Soviet troops, about the importance of the upcoming operation. At seminars and meetings, at meetings of party and Komsomol activists, commanders of units and formations spoke. At the meetings held in all parts of the Party and Komsomol, the Communists and Komsomol members undertook the obligation to be the first to go on the attack. Red flags were prepared in advance in the troops for hoisting them on the main administrative buildings of Berlin. On the eve of the offensive, special appeals were published by the military councils of the fronts, which called on the soldiers to honorably fulfill the task set by the party, the Supreme High Command and Soviet people. One of the leaflets published on the eve of the offensive contained a map of Germany and the following text: “Look, comrade! 70 kilometers separates you from Berlin. This is 8 times less than from the Vistula to the Oder. Today, the Motherland is waiting for new exploits from you. Another mighty blow - and the capital will fall Nazi Germany. Glory to whoever breaks into Berlin first! Glory to the one who will hoist our Banner of Victory over the enemy capital!”

As a result of the enormous political work carried out in preparation for the operation, the order of the Supreme High Command to "hoist the Banner of Victory over Berlin" was brought to the consciousness of every soldier and officer. This idea took possession of all the soldiers, caused an unprecedented upsurge in the troops.

The defeat of the Berlin group of Nazi troops. Capture of Berlin

Before the start of the operation, reconnaissance in force was carried out in the bands of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts. To this end, on April 14, after a 15-20-minute fire raid on the direction of the main attack of the 1st Belorussian Front, reinforced rifle battalions from divisions of the first echelon of combined arms armies began to operate. Then, in a number of sectors, regiments of the first echelons were also brought into battle. During the two-day battles, they managed to penetrate the enemy defenses and capture certain sections of the first and second trenches, and advance up to 5 km in some directions. The integrity of the enemy defense was broken. In addition, in a number of places, the troops of the front overcame the zone of the most dense minefields, which should have facilitated the subsequent offensive of the main forces. Based on an assessment of the results of the battle, the front command decided to reduce the duration of the artillery preparation for the attack of the main forces from 30 to 20-25 minutes.

In the zone of the 1st Ukrainian Front, reconnaissance in force was carried out on the night of April 16 by reinforced rifle companies. It was established that the enemy firmly occupied defensive positions directly on the left bank of the Neisse. The front commander decided not to make changes to the developed plan.

On the morning of April 16, the main forces of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts went on the offensive. At 5 o'clock Moscow time, two hours before dawn, artillery preparation began in the 1st Belorussian Front. In the zone of the 5th shock army, ships and floating batteries of the Dnieper flotilla participated in it. The force of the artillery fire was enormous. If for the entire first day of the operation the artillery of the 1st Belorussian Front used up 1,236 thousand shells, which amounted to almost 2.5 thousand railway cars, then during the artillery preparation - 500 thousand shells and mines, or 1 thousand cars. Night bombers of the 16th and 4th air armies attacked enemy headquarters, artillery firing positions, as well as the third and fourth trenches of the main line of defense.

After the final volley of rocket artillery, the troops of the 3rd and 5th shock, 8th guards, and also the 69th armies, commanded by generals V. I. Kuznetsov, N. E. Berzarin, V. I. Chuikov, moved forward, V. Ya. Kolpakchi. With the beginning of the attack, powerful searchlights located in the zone of these armies directed their beams towards the enemy. The 1st Army of the Polish Army, the 47th and 33rd armies of Generals S. G. Poplavsky, F. I. Perkhorovich, V. D. Tsvetaev went on the offensive at 6 hours and 15 minutes. Bombers of the 18th Air Army under the command of Air Chief Marshal A.E. Golovanov attacked the second line of defense. With dawn, the aviation of the 16th Air Army of General S. I. Rudenko intensified the fighting, which on the first day of the operation made 5342 combat sorties and shot down 165 German aircraft. In total, during the first day, the pilots of the 16th, 4th and 18th air armies made over 6550 sorties, dropped over 1500 tons of bombs on command posts, resistance centers and enemy reserves.

As a result of powerful artillery preparation and air strikes, heavy damage was inflicted on the enemy. Therefore, for the first one and a half to two hours, the offensive of the Soviet troops developed successfully. However, soon the Nazis, relying on a strong, engineered second line of defense, put up fierce resistance. Intense battles unfolded along the entire front. Soviet troops strove to overcome the stubbornness of the enemy at all costs, acting assertively and energetically. In the center of the 3rd Shock Army, the 32nd Rifle Corps under the command of General D.S. Zherebin achieved the greatest success. He advanced 8 km and went to the second line of defense. On the left flank of the army, the 301st Rifle Division, commanded by Colonel V.S. Antonov, took an important enemy stronghold and the Verbig railway station. In the battles for her, the soldiers of the 1054th Infantry Regiment, commanded by Colonel H. H. Radaev, distinguished themselves. The Komsomol organizer of the 1st battalion, Lieutenant G. A. Avakyan, with one submachine gunner, made his way to the building where the Nazis sat down. Throwing them with grenades, the brave soldiers destroyed 56 Nazis and captured 14. Lieutenant Avakyan was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

To increase the pace of the offensive in the zone of the 3rd shock army, the 9th tank corps of General I.F. Kirichenko was brought into battle at 10 o'clock. Although this increased the force of the blow, the advance of the troops was still slow. It became clear to the front command that the combined-arms armies were not able to quickly break through the enemy defenses to the depth planned for bringing tank armies into battle. Especially dangerous was the fact that the infantry could not capture the tactically very important Zelov heights, along which the front edge of the second defensive line passed. This natural boundary dominated the whole area, had steep slopes and in every respect was a serious obstacle on the way to the capital of Germany. The Zelov heights were considered by the Wehrmacht command as the key to the entire defense in the Berlin direction. “By 13 o’clock,” Marshal G.K. Zhukov recalled, “I clearly understood that the enemy’s fire defense system had basically survived here, and in the battle formation in which we launched the attack and were advancing, we couldn’t take the Zelov Heights” . Therefore, Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov decided to bring tank armies into battle and, by joint efforts, complete the breakthrough of the tactical defense zone.

In the afternoon, the 1st Guards Tank Army of General M. E. Katukov was the first to enter the battle. By the end of the day, all three of its corps were fighting in the zone of the 8th Guards Army. However, on this day, it was not possible to break through the defenses at the Zelov Heights. The first day of the operation was also difficult for General S.I. Bogdanov's 2nd Guards Tank Army. In the afternoon, the army received an order from the commander to overtake the infantry battle formations and strike at Bernau. By 19 o'clock, its formations reached the line of the advanced units of the 3rd and 5th shock armies, but, having met fierce resistance from the enemy, they could not advance further.

The course of the struggle on the first day of the operation showed that the Nazis were striving to keep the Zelov Heights at any cost: by the end of the day, the fascist command advanced the reserves of the Vistula Army Group to strengthen the troops defending the second line of defense. The fighting was exceptionally stubborn. During the second day of the battle, the Nazis repeatedly launched violent counterattacks. However, the 8th Guards Army of General V.I. Chuikov, who fought here, persistently moved forward. Warriors of all branches of the military showed mass heroism. The 172nd Guards Rifle Regiment of the 57th Guards Rifle Division fought courageously. During the assault on the heights covering Zelov, the 3rd battalion under the command of Captain N. N. Chusovsky especially distinguished himself. Having repulsed the enemy counterattack, the battalion broke into the Zelov heights, and then, after a heavy street battle, cleared the southeastern outskirts of the city of Zelov. The battalion commander in these battles not only led the units, but also, dragging the fighters with him, personally destroyed four Nazis in hand-to-hand combat. Many soldiers and officers of the battalion were awarded orders and medals, and Captain Chusovskoy was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Zelov was taken by the troops of the 4th Guards Rifle Corps of General V.A. Glazunov in cooperation with part of the forces of the 11th Guards Tank Corps of Colonel A.Kh. Babadzhanyan.

As a result of fierce and stubborn fighting, the troops of the shock group of the front by the end of April 17 broke through the second defensive zone and two intermediate positions. The attempts of the fascist German command to stop the advance of the Soviet troops by bringing four divisions from the reserve into battle were not successful. Bombers of the 16th and 18th air armies attacked enemy reserves day and night, delaying their advance to the line of combat operations. On April 16 and 17, the offensive was supported by the ships of the Dnieper military flotilla. They fired until the ground forces went beyond the firing range of naval artillery. Soviet troops persistently rushed to Berlin.

Stubborn resistance also had to be overcome by the troops of the front, who attacked on the flanks. The troops of the 61st Army of General P. A. Belov, who launched an offensive on April 17, crossed the Oder by the end of the day and captured a bridgehead on its left bank. By this time, formations of the 1st Army of the Polish Army crossed the Oder and broke through the first position of the main line of defense. In the Frankfurt area, the troops of the 69th and 33rd armies advanced from 2 to 6 km.

On the third day, heavy fighting continued in the depths of the enemy defenses. The Nazis committed almost all of their operational reserves to the battle. The exceptionally fierce nature of the struggle affected the pace of advance of the Soviet troops. By the end of the day, they covered another 3-6 km with their main forces and reached the approaches to the third defensive line. Formations of both tank armies, together with infantrymen, artillerymen and sappers, continuously stormed enemy positions for three days. The difficult terrain and the strong anti-tank defense of the enemy did not allow the tankers to break away from the infantry. The mobile troops of the front have not yet received operational scope for conducting swift maneuvering operations in the Berlin direction.

In the zone of the 8th Guards Army, the Nazis put up the most stubborn resistance along the highway running west from Zelov, on both sides of which they installed about 200 anti-aircraft guns.

The slow advance of the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front, in the opinion of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, jeopardized the implementation of the plan to encircle the enemy's Berlin grouping. As early as April 17, the Headquarters demanded that the front commander ensure a more energetic offensive by his subordinate troops. At the same time, she instructed the commanders of the 1st Ukrainian and 2nd Belorussian fronts to facilitate the advance of the 1st Belorussian Front. The 2nd Belorussian Front (after forcing the Oder) received, in addition, the task of developing the offensive to the southwest with the main forces no later than April 22, delivering a blow around Berlin from the north, in order to complete encirclement of the Berlin group.

In pursuance of the instructions of the Headquarters, the commander of the 1st Belorussian Front demanded that the troops increase the pace of the offensive, artillery, including high power, be pulled up to the first echelon of troops at a distance of 2-3 km, which should have contributed to closer interaction with infantry and tanks. Particular attention was paid to the massing of artillery in decisive directions. To support the advancing armies, the front commander ordered more resolute use of aviation.

As a result of the measures taken, the troops of the shock group broke through the third defensive zone by the end of April 19 and advanced to a depth of 30 km in four days, having the opportunity to develop an offensive against Berlin and bypassing it from the north. The aviation of the 16th Air Army provided great assistance to the ground troops in breaking through the enemy's defenses. Despite unfavorable meteorological conditions, during this time she made about 14.7 thousand sorties and shot down 474 enemy aircraft. In the battles near Berlin, Major I.N. Kozhedub increased the number of enemy aircraft shot down to 62. The famous pilot was awarded a high award - the third Golden Star. In just four days, Soviet aviation made up to 17,000 sorties in the zone of the 1st Belorussian Front.

The troops of the 1st Belorussian Front spent four days to break through the Oder defensive line. During this time, the enemy suffered great damage: 9 divisions from the first operational echelon and a division: the second echelon lost up to 80 percent of the personnel and almost all military equipment, and 6 divisions advanced from the reserve, and up to 80 different battalions sent from the depths, - more than 50 percent. However, the troops of the front also suffered significant losses and advanced more slowly than planned. This was primarily due to the difficult conditions of the situation. The deep formation of the enemy's defense, occupied in advance by the troops, its large saturation with anti-tank weapons, the high density of artillery fire, especially anti-tank and anti-aircraft artillery, continuous counterattacks and reinforcement of troops with reserves - all this required the maximum effort from the Soviet troops.

Due to the fact that the strike force of the front launched an offensive from a small bridgehead and in a relatively narrow zone limited by water barriers and wooded and swampy areas, the Soviet troops were constrained in maneuver and could not quickly expand the breakthrough zone. In addition, the crossings and rear roads were extremely overloaded, which made it extremely difficult to bring new forces into battle from the depths. The fact that the enemy defense was not reliably suppressed during artillery preparation had a significant effect on the pace of the offensive of the combined arms armies. This was especially true of the second defensive line, which ran along the Zelovsky Heights, where the enemy withdrew part of his forces from the first line and advanced reserves from the depths. It did not have a special effect on the pace of the offensive and the introduction of tank armies into battle to complete the breakthrough of the defense. Such use of tank armies was not envisaged by the operation plan, so their interaction with combined arms formations, aviation and artillery had to be organized already in the course of hostilities.

The offensive of the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front was successfully developing. On April 16, at 0615, artillery preparation began, during which the reinforced battalions of the divisions of the first echelon advanced directly to the Neisse River and, after shifting artillery fire under the cover of a smoke screen placed on a 390-kilometer front, began crossing the river. The personnel of the advanced units were transported along the assault bridges, induced during the period of artillery preparation, and on improvised means. A small number of escort guns and mortars were transported along with the infantry. Since the bridges were not yet ready, part of the field artillery had to be dragged through the ford with the help of ropes. At 7:50 am, the first echelons of bombers of the 2nd Air Army attacked enemy resistance centers and command posts.

The battalions of the first echelon, quickly seizing bridgeheads on the left bank of the river, provided conditions for building bridges and crossing the main forces. The sappers of one of the units of the 15th Guards Separate Motor Assault Engineer Battalion showed exceptional dedication. Overcoming barriers on the left bank of the Neisse River, they discovered property for an assault bridge, guarded by enemy soldiers. Having killed the guards, the sappers quickly built an assault bridge, along which the infantry of the 15th Guards Rifle Division began to cross. For the bravery and courage shown, the commander of the 34th Guards Rifle Corps, General G.V. Baklanov, awarded the entire personnel of the unit (22 people) with the Order of Glory. Pontoon bridges on light inflatable boats were built after 50 minutes, bridges for loads up to 30 tons - after 2 hours, and bridges on rigid supports for loads up to 60 tons - within 4 - 5 hours. In addition to them, ferries were used to transport tanks of direct infantry support. In total, 133 crossings were equipped in the direction of the main attack. The first echelon of the main strike force finished crossing the Neisse in an hour, during which the artillery fired continuously at the enemy's defenses. Then she concentrated blows on the strongholds of the enemy, preparing an attack on the opposite bank.

At 0840 hours, the troops of the 13th Army, as well as the 3rd and 5th Guards Armies, began to break through the main defensive line. The fighting on the left bank of the Neisse took on a fierce character. The Nazis launched furious counterattacks, trying to eliminate the bridgeheads captured by the Soviet troops. Already on the first day of the operation, the fascist command threw into battle from its reserve up to three tank divisions and a tank destroyer brigade.

In order to quickly complete the breakthrough of the enemy’s defense, the front commander used the 25th and 4th Guards Tank Corps of Generals E.I. Fominykh and P.P. armies. Working closely together, by the end of the day, combined arms and tank formations broke through the main line of defense on the front of 26 km and advanced to a depth of 13 km.

The next day, the main forces of both tank armies were introduced into the battle. Soviet troops repulsed all enemy counterattacks and completed the breakthrough of the second line of his defense. In two days, the troops of the shock group of the front advanced 15-20 km. Part of the enemy forces began to retreat across the Spree River. To ensure the combat operations of the tank armies, most of the forces of the 2nd Air Army were involved. Stormtroopers destroyed fire weapons and manpower of the enemy, and bomber aircraft attacked his reserves.

On the Dresden direction, the troops of the 2nd Army of the Polish Army under the command of General K.K. Sverchevsky and the 52nd Army of General K.A. K. Kimbara and I.P. Korchagina also completed the breakthrough of the tactical defense zone and in two days of hostilities advanced in some areas up to 20 km.

The successful offensive of the 1st Ukrainian Front created for the enemy the threat of a deep bypass of his Berlin grouping from the south. The Nazis concentrated their efforts in order to delay the advance of the Soviet troops at the turn of the Spree River. They also sent the reserves of Army Group Center and the retreating troops of the 4th Panzer Army here. However, the enemy's attempts to change the course of the battle were not successful.

In pursuance of the instructions of the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command, on the night of April 18, the front commander assigned the 3rd and 4th Guards Tank Armies under the command of Generals P. S. Rybalko and D. D. Lelyushenko the task of reaching the Spree, forcing it on the move and developing the offensive directly to Berlin from the south. The combined arms armies were ordered to carry out the tasks assigned earlier. The military council of the front drew special attention of the commanders of tank armies to the need for swift and maneuverable actions. In the directive, the front commander emphasized: “In the main direction with a tank fist, it is bolder and more resolute to break forward. Bypass cities and large settlements and not get involved in protracted frontal battles. I demand a firm understanding that the success of tank armies depends on bold maneuver and swiftness in action. On the morning of April 18, the 3rd and 4th Guards Tank Armies reached the Spree. They, together with the 13th Army, crossed it on the move, broke through the third defensive line in a 10-kilometer section and captured a bridgehead north and south of Spremberg, where their main forces were concentrated. On April 18, the troops of the 5th Guards Army with the 4th Guards Tank Corps and in cooperation with the 6th Guards Mechanized Corps crossed the Spree south of the city. On this day, the planes of the 9th Guards Fighter Aviation Division three times Hero of the Soviet Union Colonel A. I. Pokryshkin covered the troops of the 3rd and 4th Guards Tank, 13th and 5th Guards Armies, crossing the Spree. During the day, in 13 air battles, the pilots of the division shot down 18 enemy aircraft. Thus, favorable conditions for a successful offensive were created in the zone of operations of the front's shock grouping.

The troops of the front, operating in the Dresden direction, repulsed strong enemy counterattacks. On this day, the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps under the command of General V.K. Baranov was brought into battle here.

In three days, the armies of the 1st Ukrainian Front advanced up to 30 km in the direction of the main attack. Significant assistance to the ground troops was provided by the 2nd Air Army of General S. A. Krasovsky, who during these days made 7517 sorties and shot down 155 enemy aircraft in 138 air battles.

While the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts were conducting intense combat operations to break through the Oder-Neissen defensive line, the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front were completing preparations for forcing the Oder. In the lower reaches, the channel of this river is divided into two branches (Ost- and West-Oder), therefore, the troops of the front had to overcome two water barriers in succession. In order to create the best conditions for the main forces for the offensive, which was planned for April 20, the front commander decided on April 18 and 19 to cross the Ost-Oder River with advanced units, destroy the enemy’s outposts in the interfluve area and ensure that the formations of the front’s shock group occupy an advantageous starting position.

On April 18, simultaneously in the bands of the 65th, 70th and 49th armies under the command of generals P.I. Batov, V.S. Popov and I.T. smoke screens crossed the Ost-Oder, in a number of areas they overcame the enemy defenses in the interfluve and reached the banks of the West-Oder River. On April 19, the units that crossed over continued to destroy enemy units in the interfluve, concentrating on dams on the right bank of this river. The aircraft of the 4th Air Army of General K. A. Vershinin provided significant assistance to the ground forces. It suppressed and destroyed strongholds and firing points of the enemy.

By active operations in the interfluve of the Oder, the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front had a significant impact on the course of the Berlin operation. Having overcome the swampy floodplain of the Oder, they took an advantageous starting position for forcing the West Oder, as well as breaking through the enemy defenses along its left bank, in the sector from Stettin to Schwedt, which did not allow the fascist command to transfer formations of the 3rd Panzer Army to the zone of the 1st Belorussian front.

Thus, by April 20, generally favorable conditions had developed in the zones of all three fronts for the continuation of the operation. The troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front developed the offensive most successfully. In the course of breaking through the defenses along the Neisse and Spree, they defeated the enemy’s reserves, entered the operational space and rushed to Berlin, covering the right wing of the Frankfurt-Guben group of Nazi troops, which included part of the 4th tank and the main forces of the 9th field armies. In solving this problem, the main role was assigned to tank armies. On April 19, they advanced 30-50 km in a northwestern direction, reached the Lübbenau, Luckau area and cut the communications of the 9th Army. All enemy attempts to break through from the areas of Cottbus and Spremberg to the crossings over the Spree and reach the rear of the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front were unsuccessful. Troops of the 3rd and 5th Guards Armies under the command of Generals V.N. 45-60 km and reach the approaches to Berlin; The 13th Army of General N.P. Pukhov advanced 30 km.

The rapid offensive of the 3rd and 4th Guards Tank, as well as the 13th Armies, by the end of April 20, led to the cutting off of the Vistula Army Group from the Center Army Group, the enemy troops in the areas of Cottbus and Spremberg were in a semi-encirclement. In the highest circles of the Wehrmacht, a commotion began when they learned that Soviet tanks had entered the Wünsdorf area (10 km south of Zossen). The headquarters of the operational leadership of the armed forces and the general staff of the ground forces hastily left Zossen and moved to Wanse (Potsdam region), and part of the departments and services on airplanes was transferred to South Germany. The following entry was made in the diary of the Wehrmacht Supreme High Command for April 20: “For the highest command authorities, the last act of the dramatic death of the German armed forces begins ... Everything is done in a hurry, because you can already hear Russian tanks firing from cannons in the distance ... Depressed mood."

The rapid development of the operation made a quick meeting of Soviet and American-British troops real. At the end of April 20, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command sent a directive to the commanders of the 1st and 2nd Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, as well as the commander of the Air Force, armored and mechanized troops of the Soviet army. It indicated that it was necessary to install signs and signals for mutual identification. By agreement with the allied command, the commanders of the tank and combined arms armies were ordered to determine a temporary tactical dividing line between the Soviet and American-British units in order to avoid mixing troops.

Continuing the offensive in a northwestern direction, by the end of April 21, the tank armies of the 1st Ukrainian Front overcame enemy resistance in separate strongholds and came close to the outer contour of the Berlin defensive area. Given the upcoming nature of hostilities in such a large city as Berlin, the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front decided to reinforce the 3rd Guards Tank Army of General P.S. artillery division and the 2nd Fighter Aviation Corps. In addition, two rifle divisions of the 28th army of General A. A. Luchinsky, brought into battle from the second echelon of the front, were transferred by motor transport.

On the morning of April 22, the 3rd Guards Tank Army, having deployed all three corps in the first echelon, began an attack on enemy fortifications. Army troops broke through the outer defensive perimeter of the Berlin region and by the end of the day started fighting on the southern outskirts of the German capital. Troops of the 1st Belorussian Front broke into its northeastern outskirts the day before.

The action is more to the left of the 4th Guards Tank Army of the General AېRD. By the end of April 22, D. Lelyushenko also broke through the outer defensive contour and, having reached the line of Zarmund, Belits, took an advantageous position for connecting with the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front and completing, together with them, the encirclement of the entire Berlin enemy grouping. Its 5th Guards Mechanized Corps, together with the troops of the 13th and 5th Guards Armies, by this time had reached the Belitz, Treyenbritzen, Tsana line. As a result, the path to Berlin was closed to enemy reserves from the west and southwest. In Treuenbritzen, the tankers of the 4th Guards Tank Army rescued from fascist captivity about 1600 prisoners of war of various nationalities: British, Americans and Norwegians, including the former commander of the Norwegian army, General O. Ryge. A few days later, the soldiers of the same army released from a concentration camp (in the suburbs of Berlin) the former French Prime Minister E. Herriot, a well-known statesman who back in the 20s advocated Franco-Soviet rapprochement.

Using the success of the tankers, the troops of the 13th and 5th Guards armies quickly advanced westward. In an effort to slow down the advance of the shock group of the 1st Ukrainian Front on Berlin, the fascist command on April 18 launched a counterattack from the Gorlitsa area against the troops of the 52nd Army. Having created a significant superiority in forces in this direction, the enemy tried to reach the rear of the front's shock grouping. On April 19-23, fierce battles unfolded here. The enemy managed to wedge into the location of the Soviet, and then the Polish troops to a depth of 20 km. To help the troops of the 2nd Army of the Polish Army and the 52nd Army, part of the forces of the 5th Guards Army, the 4th Guards Tank Corps were transferred and up to four aviation corps were redirected. As a result, heavy damage was inflicted on the enemy, and by the end of April 24, his advance was suspended.

While the formations of the 1st Ukrainian Front were carrying out a swift maneuver to bypass the German capital from the south, the shock group of the 1st Belorussian Front was advancing directly on Berlin from the east. After breaking through the Oder line, the troops of the front, overcoming the stubborn resistance of the enemy, moved forward. On April 20, at 13:50, long-range artillery of the 79th Rifle Corps of the 3rd Shock Army fired the first two volleys at the fascist capital, and then systematic shelling began. By the end of April 21, the 3rd and 5th shock, as well as the 2nd Guards Tank Armies, had already overcome resistance on the outer contour of the Berlin defensive area and reached the northeastern outskirts of the city. By the morning of April 22, the 9th Guards Tank Corps of the 2nd Guards Tank Army reached the Havel River, which is on the northwestern outskirts of the capital, and, in cooperation with units of the 47th Army, began to cross it. The 1st Guards Tank and 8th Guards Armies also successfully advanced, which by April 21 reached the outer defensive contour. On the morning of the next day, the main forces of the strike force of the front were already fighting the enemy directly in Berlin.

By the end of April 22, Soviet troops created the conditions for completing the encirclement and dissection of the entire enemy Berlin grouping. The distance between the advanced units of the 47th, 2nd Guards Tank Armies, advancing from the northeast, and the 4th Guards Tank Army was 40 km, and between the left flank of the 8th Guards and the right flank of the 3rd Guards Tank Army - no more than 12 km. The Headquarters of the Supreme High Command, assessing the current situation, demanded that the front commanders complete the encirclement of the main forces of the 9th Field Army by the end of April 24 and prevent its retreat to Berlin or to the west. In order to ensure the timely and accurate implementation of the instructions of the Headquarters, the commander of the 1st Belorussian Front brought his second echelon into battle - the 3rd Army under the command of General A.V. Gorbatov and the 2nd Guards Cavalry Corps of General V.V. Kryukov. In cooperation with the troops of the right wing of the 1st Ukrainian Front, they were supposed to cut off the main forces of the enemy's 9th Army from the capital and surround them southeast of the city. The troops of the 47th Army and the 9th Guards Tank Corps were ordered to accelerate the offensive and complete the encirclement of the entire enemy grouping in the Berlin direction no later than April 24-25. In connection with the withdrawal of the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front to the southern outskirts of Berlin, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command on the night of April 23 established a new demarcation line with the 1st Belorussian Front: from Lübben to the northwest to the Anhalt station in Berlin.

The Nazis made desperate efforts to prevent the encirclement of their capital. On April 22, in the afternoon, the last operational meeting was held in the Imperial Chancellery, which was attended by V. Keitel, A. Jodl, M. Bormann, G. Krebs and others. Hitler agreed to Jodl's proposal to withdraw all troops from the western front and throw them into the battle for Berlin. In this regard, the 12th Army of General W. Wenck, which occupied defensive positions on the Elbe, was ordered to turn around to the east and advance to Potsdam, Berlin to join the 9th Army. At the same time, an army group under the command of SS General F. Steiner, which operated north of the capital, was supposed to strike at the flank of the grouping of Soviet troops, bypassing it from the north and northwest.

To organize the offensive of the 12th Army, Field Marshal Keitel was sent to its headquarters. Completely ignoring the actual state of affairs, the German command counted on the offensive of this army from the west, and the Steiner army group from the north, to prevent the complete encirclement of the city. The 12th Army, having turned its front to the east, began operations on April 24 against the troops of the 4th Guards Tank and 13th Armies, which occupied the defenses at the Belitz-Treuenbritzen line. The German 9th Army was ordered to withdraw to the west to join the 12th Army south of Berlin.

On April 23 and 24, hostilities in all directions took on a particularly fierce character. Although the pace of advance of the Soviet troops slowed down somewhat, the Nazis failed to stop them. The intention of the fascist command to prevent the encirclement and dismemberment of their group was thwarted. Already on April 24, the troops of the 8th Guards and 1st Guards Tank Armies of the 1st Belorussian Front joined with the 3rd Guards Tank and 28th Armies of the 1st Ukrainian Front southeast of Berlin. As a result, the main forces of the 9th and part of the forces of the 4th tank armies of the enemy were cut off from the city and surrounded. The next day, after joining west of Berlin, in the Ketzin area, the 4th Guards Tank Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front with the troops of the 2nd Guards Tank and 47th Armies of the 1st Belorussian Front was surrounded by the Berlin enemy group itself.

On April 25, a meeting of Soviet and American troops took place. On this day, in the Torgau area, units of the 58th Guards Rifle Division of the 5th Guards Army crossed the Elbe and established contact with the 69th Infantry Division of the 1st American Army that had approached here. Germany was divided into two parts.

The situation in the Dresden direction has also changed significantly. By April 25, the counterattack of the Görlitz grouping of the enemy was finally thwarted by the stubborn and active defense of the 2nd Army of the Polish Army and the 52nd Army. To reinforce them, the defense zone of the 52nd Army was narrowed, and to the left of it, units of the 31st Army, which arrived at the front, under the command of General P. G. Shafranov, deployed. The released rifle corps of the 52nd Army was used in the sector of its active operations.

Thus, in just ten days, Soviet troops overcame the powerful enemy defenses along the Oder and Neisse, surrounded and dismembered his grouping in the Berlin direction and created conditions for its complete liquidation.

In connection with the successful maneuver to encircle the Berlin grouping by the troops of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, there was no need to bypass Berlin from the north by the forces of the 2nd Belorussian Front. As a result, already on April 23, the Headquarters ordered him to develop the offensive in accordance with the original plan of the operation, that is, in the western and northwestern directions, and with part of the forces to strike around Stettin from the west.

The offensive of the main forces of the 2nd Belorussian Front began on April 20 with the crossing of the West Oder River. Thick morning fog and smoke sharply limited the actions of Soviet aviation. However, after 09:00, visibility improved somewhat, and aviation increased support for ground troops. The greatest success during the first day of the operation was achieved in the zone of the 65th Army under the command of General P.I. Batov. By evening, she captured several small bridgeheads on the left bank of the river, transporting 31 rifle battalions, part of the artillery and 15 self-propelled artillery installations there. The troops of the 70th Army under the command of General V. S. Popov also operated successfully. 12 rifle battalions were transferred to the bridgehead they captured. The forcing of the West-Oder by the troops of the 49th army of General I. T. Grishin was less successful: only on the second day did they manage to capture a small bridgehead.

In the following days, the troops of the front fought intense battles to expand their bridgeheads, repulsed enemy counterattacks, and also continued to cross their troops to the left bank of the Oder. By the end of April 25, formations of the 65th and 70th armies had completed the breakthrough of the main line of defense. In six days of hostilities, they advanced 20-22 km. The 49th Army, using the success of its neighbors, on the morning of April 26, crossed the main forces across the West-Oder along the crossings of the 70th Army and advanced 10-12 km by the end of the day. On the same day, in the zone of the 65th Army on the left bank of the West Oder, the troops of the 2nd shock army of General I.I. Fedyuninsky began to cross. As a result of the actions of the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front, the 3rd German Panzer Army was pinned down, which deprived the Nazi command of the opportunity to use its forces for operations directly in the Berlin direction.

At the end of April, the Soviet command focused all its attention on Berlin. Before its assault, party-political work unfolded with renewed vigor in the troops. As early as April 23, the Military Council of the 1st Belorussian Front addressed an appeal to the soldiers, which said: “Before you, Soviet heroes, is Berlin. You must take Berlin, and take it as quickly as possible so as not to let the enemy come to their senses. For the honor of our Motherland forward! To Berlin!" In conclusion, the Military Council expressed full confidence that the glorious warriors would fulfill the task entrusted to them with honor. Political workers, party and Komsomol organizations used any respite in the fighting to familiarize everyone with this document. Army newspapers called on the soldiers: “Forward, for a complete victory over the enemy!”, “Let's hoist the banner of our victory over Berlin!”.

During the operation, employees of the Main Political Directorate negotiated almost daily with members of the military councils and heads of political directorates of the fronts, heard their reports, and gave specific instructions and advice. The Main Political Directorate demanded that the soldiers be made aware that in Berlin they were fighting for the future of their homeland, of all peace-loving mankind.

In the newspapers, on the billboards installed along the path of the movement of Soviet troops, on guns, vehicles were inscriptions: “Comrades! The defenses of Berlin have been breached! The longed-for hour of victory is near. Forward, comrades, forward!”, “One more effort, and victory has been won!”, “The long-awaited hour has come! We are at the walls of Berlin!

And the Soviet soldiers stepped up their blows. Even the wounded soldiers did not leave the battlefield. So, in the 65th Army, more than two thousand soldiers refused to be evacuated to the rear. Soldiers and commanders daily applied for admission to the party. For example, in the troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front, 11,776 soldiers were accepted into the party in April alone.

In this situation, special concern was shown for a further increase in commanders a sense of responsibility for the performance of combat missions, that officers should not lose control of the battle for a minute. All available forms, methods and means of party political work supported the initiative of the soldiers, their resourcefulness and audacity in battle. Party and Komsomol organizations helped the commanders to concentrate their efforts in a timely manner where success was expected, and the Communists were the first to launch attacks and drag along non-Party comrades. “What strength of mind and desire to win had to be in order to reach the goal through a smashing barrage of fire, stone and reinforced concrete barriers, overcoming numerous “surprises”, fire bags and traps, engaging in hand-to-hand combat, - recalls a member of the Military Council 1- th Belorussian Front, General K. F. Telegin. - But everyone wanted to live. But I've been brought up that way. soviet man- the common good, the happiness of his people, the glory of the Motherland is dearer to him than everything personal, dearer than life itself.

The Headquarters of the Supreme High Command issued a directive that demanded a humane attitude towards those rank and file members of the National Socialist Party who are loyal to the Soviet army, to create local administration everywhere, and to appoint burgomasters in cities.

Solving the problem of capturing Berlin, the Soviet command understood that the Frankfurt-Guben grouping, which Hitler intended to use to deblockade his capital, should not be underestimated. As a result, along with building up efforts to defeat the Berlin garrison, the Stavka considered it necessary to immediately begin the liquidation of the troops surrounded southeast of Berlin.

The Frankfurt-Guben group consisted of up to 200 thousand people. It was armed with over 2 thousand guns, more than 300 tanks and assault guns. It occupies a wooded and swampy area of ​​​​about 1500 square meters. km was very convenient for defense. Given the composition of the enemy grouping, the Soviet command involved in its liquidation the 3rd, 69th and 33rd armies and the 2nd guards cavalry corps of the 1st Belorussian Front, the 3rd guards and 28th armies, as well as the rifle corps of the 13th army 1st Ukrainian Front. The actions of the ground troops were supported by seven aviation corps. Soviet troops outnumbered the enemy in men by 1.4 times, artillery - by 3.7 times. Since the bulk of Soviet tanks at that time fought directly in Berlin, the forces of the parties were equal in their number.

In order to prevent a breakthrough of the blockaded enemy grouping in the western direction, the troops of the 28th and part of the forces of the 3rd Guards Armies of the 1st Ukrainian Front went on the defensive. On the paths of a probable enemy offensive, they prepared three defensive lines, laid mines and made blockages.

On the morning of April 26, Soviet troops launched an offensive against the encircled group, trying to cut and destroy it piece by piece. The enemy not only offered stubborn resistance, but also made repeated attempts to break through to the west. So, parts of two infantry, two motorized and tank divisions struck at the junction of the 28th and 3rd Guards armies. Having created a significant superiority in forces, the Nazis broke through the defenses in a narrow area and began to move west. During fierce battles, Soviet troops closed the neck of the breakthrough, and the part that had broken through was surrounded in the Barut region and almost completely eliminated. The ground forces were greatly assisted by aviation, which made about 500 sorties during the day, destroying the enemy's manpower and equipment.

In the following days, the Nazi troops again tried to connect with the 12th Army, which, in turn, sought to overcome the defenses of the troops of the 4th Guards Tank and 13th Armies, operating on the outer front of the encirclement. However, all enemy attacks during April 27-28 were repelled. Given the likelihood of new attempts by the enemy to break through to the west, the command of the 1st Ukrainian Front strengthened the defenses of the 28th and 3rd Guards armies and concentrated their reserves in the areas of Zossen, Luckenwalde, Yuterbog.

The troops of the 1st Belorussian Front at the same time (April 26-28) were pushing the encircled enemy grouping from the east. Fearing complete elimination, the Nazis on the night of April 29 again tried to break out of the encirclement. By dawn, at the cost of heavy losses, they managed to break through the main defensive zone of the Soviet troops at the junction of two fronts - in the area west of Wendisch Buchholz. On the second line of defense, their advance was stopped. But the enemy, despite heavy losses, stubbornly rushed to the west. In the second half of April 29, up to 45 thousand fascist soldiers resumed their attacks on the sector of the 3rd Guards Rifle Corps of the 28th Army, broke through its defenses and formed a corridor up to 2 km wide. Through it they began to retreat to Luckenwalde. The German 12th Army attacked in the same direction from the west. There was a threat of a connection between two enemy groups. By the end of April 29, the Soviet troops by decisive actions stopped the advance of the enemy at the line of Shperenberg, Kummersdorf (12 km east of Luckenwalde). His troops were dismembered and surrounded in three separate areas. Nevertheless, the breakthrough of large enemy forces into the Kummersdorf area led to the fact that the communications of the 3rd and 4th Guards Tank, as well as the 28th Army, were cut. The distance between the forward units of the group that had broken through and the troops of the enemy's 12th Army advancing from the west was reduced to 30 km.

Especially intense battles unfolded on April 30. Regardless of the losses, the Nazis continued the offensive and advanced 10 km to the west in a day. By the end of the day, a significant part of the troops that had broken through had been eliminated. However, one of the groups (numbering up to 20 thousand people) on the night of May 1 managed to break through at the junction of the 13th and 4th Guards Tank Armies and reach the Belitsa area, now only 3-4 km separated it from the 12th Army . To prevent the further advance of these troops to the west, the commander of the 4th Guards Tank Army advanced two tank, mechanized and light artillery brigades, as well as a motorcycle regiment. During fierce battles, the 1st Guards Assault Aviation Corps rendered great assistance to the ground forces.

By the end of the day, the main part of the Frankfurt-Guben grouping of the enemy was liquidated. All hopes of the fascist command to unblock Berlin collapsed. Soviet troops captured 120,000 soldiers and officers, captured more than 300 tanks and assault guns, over 1,500 field guns, 17,600 vehicles and a lot of various military equipment. Only the killed enemy lost 60 thousand people. Only insignificant scattered groups of the enemy managed to seep through the forest and go to the west. Part of the troops of the 12th Army who survived the defeat retreated to the left bank of the Elbe along the bridges built by the American troops and surrendered to them.

In the Dresden direction, the fascist German command did not abandon its intention to break through the defenses of the Soviet troops in the Bautzen area and go to the rear of the shock group of the 1st Ukrainian Front. Having regrouped their troops, the Nazis launched an offensive on the morning of April 26 with the forces of four divisions. Despite heavy losses, the enemy did not reach the goal, his offensive was stopped. Until April 30, stubborn battles continued here, but there was no significant change in the position of the parties. The Nazis, having exhausted their offensive capabilities, went over to the defensive in this direction.

Thus, thanks to stubborn and active defense, the Soviet troops not only thwarted the enemy’s plan to go behind the lines of the shock group of the 1st Ukrainian Front, but also captured bridgeheads on the Elbe in the Meissen and Riesa area, which later served as a favorable starting area for an attack on Prague.

Meanwhile, the struggle in Berlin reached its climax. The garrison, which was constantly increasing by attracting the population of the city and the retreating military units, already numbered 300 thousand people. It was armed with 3 thousand guns and mortars, 250 tanks. By the end of April 25, the enemy occupied the territory of the capital, together with the suburbs with a total area of ​​325 square meters. km. Most of all, the eastern and southeastern outskirts of Berlin were fortified. Strong barricades crossed the streets and lanes. Everything adapted to the defense, even the destroyed buildings. The underground structures of the city were widely used: bomb shelters, metro stations and tunnels, sewers and other objects. Reinforced concrete bunkers were built, the largest for 300-1000 people each, as well as a large number of reinforced concrete caps.

By April 26, the troops of the 47th Army, the 3rd and 5th shock, the 8th Guards Combined Arms, the 2nd and 1st Guards Tank Armies of the 1st Belorussian Front, as well as 3rd and 4th Guards Tank Armies and part of the forces of the 28th Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front. In total, they included about 464 thousand people, over 12.7 thousand guns and mortars of all calibers, up to 2.1 thousand rocket artillery installations, about 1500 tanks and self-propelled artillery installations.

The Soviet command abandoned the offensive along the entire circumference of the city, as this could lead to excessive dispersal of forces and a decrease in the pace of advance, and concentrated its efforts on separate directions. Thanks to this peculiar tactic of "driving" deep wedges into the enemy's position, his defense was divided into separate parts, and command and control was paralyzed. This mode of action increased the pace of the offensive and ultimately led to effective results.

Taking into account the experience of previous battles for large settlements, the Soviet command ordered the creation of assault detachments in each division as part of reinforced battalions or companies. Each such detachment, in addition to infantry, included artillery, tanks, self-propelled artillery mounts, sappers, and often flamethrowers. It was intended for action in any one direction, which usually included one street, or the assault on a large object. To capture smaller objects from the same detachments, assault groups were allocated from a rifle squad to a platoon, reinforced with 2-4 guns, 1-2 tanks or self-propelled artillery mounts, as well as sappers and flamethrowers.

The beginning of the actions of assault detachments and groups, as a rule, was preceded by a short but powerful artillery preparation. Before attacking a fortified building, the assault detachment was usually divided into two groups. One of them, under cover of tank and artillery fire, burst into the building, blocked the exits from the basement, which served as shelter for the Nazis during the artillery preparation, and then destroyed them with grenades and bottles of flammable liquid. The second group cleared the upper floors of submachine gunners and snipers.

The specific conditions of warfare in a large city led to a number of features in the use of combat arms. Thus, artillery destruction groups were created in divisions and corps, and long-range groups in combined arms armies. A significant part of the artillery was used for direct fire. The experience of previous battles has shown that tanks and self-propelled artillery mounts can only advance if they cooperate closely with the infantry and under its cover. 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. Therefore, the main forces of bomber and attack aircraft were used to destroy the Frankfurt-Guben grouping, and fighter aircraft carried out an air blockade of the Nazi capital. The most powerful strikes on military targets in the city were delivered by aviation on the 25th and on the night of April 26th. The 16th and 18th air armies carried out three massive strikes, in which 2049 aircraft took part.

After the Soviet troops captured the airfields in Tempelhof and Gatow, the Nazis tried to use Charlottenburgstrasse for landing their planes. However, these enemy calculations were thwarted by the actions of the pilots of the 16th Air Army, who continuously patrolled over this area. Attempts by the Nazis to parachute cargo to the encircled troops were also unsuccessful. Most of the enemy transport aircraft were shot down by anti-aircraft artillery and aviation while they were still approaching Berlin. Thus, after April 28, the Berlin garrison could no longer receive any effective outside help. The fighting in the city did not stop day or night. By the end of April 26, Soviet troops had cut off the Potsdam grouping of the enemy from Berlin. The next day, formations of both fronts penetrated deeply into the enemy's defenses and began hostilities in the central sector of the capital. As a result of the concentric offensive of the Soviet troops, by the end of April 27, the enemy grouping was compressed in a narrow strip (from east to west it reached 16 km). Due to the fact that its width was only 2-3 km, the entire territory occupied by the enemy was under the continuous influence of the fire weapons of the Soviet troops. The fascist German command tried by all means to help the Berlin grouping. “Our troops on the Elbe,” the OKB diary noted, “turned their backs on the Americans in order to alleviate the position of the defenders of Berlin with their offensive from the outside.” However, by the end of April 28, the encircled grouping was divided into three parts. By this time, attempts by the Wehrmacht command to help the Berlin garrison with strikes from outside had finally failed. The political and moral state of the fascist troops fell sharply.

On this day, Hitler subordinated the General Staff of the Ground Forces to the Chief of Staff of the Operational Command, hoping to restore the integrity of command and control. Instead of General G. Heinrici, accused of unwillingness to help encircled Berlin, General K. Student was appointed commander of the Vistula Army Group.

After April 28, the struggle continued with unrelenting force. Now it has flared up in the Reichstag area, for which the troops of the 3rd Shock Army began fighting on April 29. The Reichstag garrison, consisting of 1 thousand soldiers and officers, was armed with a large number of guns, machine guns and faustpatrons. Deep ditches were dug around the building, various barriers were set up, machine-gun and artillery firing points were equipped.

The task of taking over the Reichstag building was assigned to the 79th Rifle Corps of General S. N. Perevertkin. Having captured the Moltke bridge on the night of April 29, by 4 o’clock on April 30, parts of the corps captured a large resistance center - the house where the Ministry of the Interior of Nazi Germany and the Swiss Embassy were located, and went directly to the Reichstag. Only in the evening, after repeated attacks by the 150th and 171st rifle divisions of General V.M. Shatilov and Colonel A.I. D. Plekhodanov and the chief of staff of the regiment, Major VD Shatalin, burst into the building. Soldiers, sergeants and officers of the battalions of captains S. A. Neustroev and V. I. Davydov, senior lieutenant K. Ya. Samsonov, as well as separate groups of Major M. M. covered themselves with unfading glory. Bondar, Captain V.N. Makov and others.

Together with the infantry units, the Reichstag was stormed by the valiant tankmen of the 23rd Tank Brigade. The commanders of tank battalions, Major I. L. Yartsev and Captain S. V. Krasovsky, the commander of a tank company, Senior Lieutenant P. E. Nuzhdin, the commander of a tank platoon, Lieutenant A. K. Romanov, and the assistant commander of a reconnaissance platoon, Senior Sergeant N. V. glorified their names. Kapustin, tank commander senior lieutenant A. G. Gaganov, drivers senior sergeant P. E. Lavrov and foreman I. N. Kletnay, gunner senior sergeant M. G. Lukyanov and many others.

The Nazis offered fierce resistance. Hand-to-hand fighting ensued on the stairs and in the corridors. The assault units meter by meter, room by room cleared the Reichstag building from the Nazis. The fighting 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.

Early in the morning of May 1, on the pediment of the Reichstag, near the sculptural group, the Red Banner was already fluttering, handed over to the commander of the 150th Infantry Division by the Military Council of the 3rd Shock Army. It was hoisted by scouts of the 756th Infantry Regiment of the 150th Infantry Division M.A. Egorov and M.V. Kantaria, headed by Lieutenant A.P. Berest, deputy battalion commander for political affairs, with the support of machine gunners of the company I. Ya. Syanov. This Banner symbolically embodied all the banners and flags that were hoisted by the groups of Captain V.N. Makov, Lieutenant R. Koshkarbaev, Major M.M. Bondar and many other soldiers during the most fierce battles. From the main entrance of the Reichstag to the roof, their heroic path was marked by red banners, flags and flags, as if now merged into a single Banner of Victory. It was the triumph of the victory won, the triumph of the courage and heroism of the Soviet soldiers, the greatness of the feat of the Soviet Armed Forces and the entire Soviet people.

“And when a red banner hoisted over the Reichstag, hoisted by the hands of Soviet soldiers,” said L. I. Brezhnev, “it was not only the banner of our military victory. It was the immortal banner of October; it was the great banner of Lenin; it was the invincible banner of socialism - a bright symbol of hope, a symbol of freedom and happiness of all peoples!

On April 30, the Nazi troops in Berlin were actually divided into four isolated units of different composition, and command and control of the troops was paralyzed. The last hopes of the fascist German command for the liberation of the Berlin garrison by the forces of Wenck, Steiner and Busse were dispelled. Panic began among the fascist leadership. To avoid responsibility for the atrocities committed, on April 30, Hitler committed suicide. In order to hide this from the army, the fascist radio reported that the Fuhrer had been killed at the front near Berlin. On the same day in Schleswig-Holstein, Hitler's successor, Grand Admiral Doenitz, appointed a "provisional imperial government", which, as shown further developments, tried to reach contact with the USA and England on an anti-Soviet basis.

However, the days of Nazi Germany were already numbered. By the end of April 30, the position of the Berlin grouping had become catastrophic. At 3 o'clock on May 1, the chief of the general staff of the German ground forces, General Krebs, by agreement with the Soviet command, crossed the front line in Berlin and was received by the commander of the 8th Guards Army, General V. I. Chuikov. Krebs announced Hitler's suicide, and also handed over a list of members of the new imperial government and the proposal of Goebbels and Bormann for a temporary cessation of hostilities in the capital in order to prepare the conditions for peace negotiations between Germany and the USSR. However, this document did not say anything about surrender. This was the last attempt by the fascist leaders to split the anti-Hitler coalition. But the Soviet command unraveled this plan of the enemy.

Krebs' message was reported through Marshal G.K. Zhukov to the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. The answer was extremely brief: to force the Berlin garrison to surrender immediately and unconditionally. The negotiations did not affect the intensity of the fighting in Berlin. The Soviet troops continued to actively advance, striving for the complete capture of the enemy capital, and the Nazis - to put up stubborn resistance. At 18 o'clock it became known that the fascist leaders had rejected the demand for unconditional surrender. In this way, they once again demonstrated their complete indifference to the fate of millions of ordinary Germans.

The Soviet command ordered the troops to complete the liquidation of the enemy group in Berlin as soon as possible. Half an hour later, all the artillery hit the enemy. The fighting continued throughout the night. When the remnants of the garrison were divided into isolated groups, the Nazis realized that resistance was useless. On the night of May 2, the commander of the defense of Berlin, General G. Weidling, announced to the Soviet command that the 56th Panzer Corps, which was directly subordinate to him, had surrendered. At 6 o'clock, having crossed the front line in the band of the 8th Guards Army, he surrendered. At the suggestion of the Soviet command, Weidling signed an order for the Berlin garrison to cease resistance and lay down their arms. Somewhat later, a similar order on behalf of the "provisional imperial government" was signed by Goebbels' first deputy G. Fritsche. Due to the fact that the control of the Nazi troops in Berlin was paralyzed, the orders of Weidling and Fritsche could not be brought to all units and formations. Therefore, from the morning of May 2, separate groups of the enemy continued to resist and even tried to break out of the city to the west. Only after the announcement of the order on the radio did mass capitulation begin. By 15 o'clock the enemy had completely ceased resistance in Berlin. On that day alone, Soviet troops captured up to 135 thousand people in the city area.

The figures cited convincingly testify that the Hitlerite leadership attracted considerable forces for the defense of its capital. The Soviet troops fought against a large enemy group, and not against the civilian population, as some bourgeois falsifiers claim. The battles for Berlin were fierce and, as Hitler's general E. Butlar wrote after the war, "cost heavy losses not only to the Germans, but also to the Russians ...".

During the operation, millions of Germans were convinced by their own experience of the humane attitude of the Soviet army towards the civilian population. Fierce fighting continued on the streets of Berlin, and Soviet soldiers shared hot food with children, women and the elderly. By the end of May, ration cards were issued to the entire population of Berlin and food distribution was organized. Although these norms were still small, the inhabitants of the capital received more food than recently under Hitler. No sooner had the artillery salvos died down than work began on the establishment of the urban economy. Under the guidance of military engineers and technicians, Soviet soldiers, together with the population, restored the metro by the beginning of June, and trams were launched. The city received water, gas, electricity. Life was back to normal. The dope of Goebbels' propaganda about the monstrous atrocities that the Soviet army allegedly brings to the Germans began to dissipate. “The innumerable noble deeds of the Soviet people will never be forgotten, who, while still holding a rifle in one hand, were already sharing a piece of bread with the other, helping our people overcome the terrible consequences of the war unleashed by the Hitlerite clique and take the fate of the country into their own hands, clearing the way for the enslaved and enslaved by imperialism and fascism to the German working class ... "- this is how, 30 years later, the Minister of National Defense of the GDR, General G. Hoffmann, assessed the actions of Soviet soldiers.

Simultaneously with the end of hostilities in Berlin, the troops of the right wing of the 1st Ukrainian Front began to regroup in the Prague direction to complete the task of completing the liberation of Czechoslovakia, and the troops of the 1st Belorussian Front advanced westward and by May 7 reached the Elbe on a broad front .

During the assault on Berlin in Western Pomerania and Mecklenburg, a successful offensive was launched by the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front. By the end of May 2, they reached the coast of the Baltic Sea, and the next day, advancing to the line of Wismar, Schwerin, the Elbe River, they established contact with the 2nd British Army. The liberation of the islands of Wollin, Usedom and Rügen ended the offensive operation of the 2nd Belorussian Front. Even at the final stage of the operation, the troops of the front entered into operational-tactical cooperation with the Red Banner Baltic Fleet: the aviation of the fleet provided effective support to the ground troops advancing in the coastal direction, especially in the battles for the naval base of Swinemünde. Landed on the Danish island of Bornholm, the amphibious assault disarmed and captured the Nazi troops stationed there.

The defeat of the enemy's Berlin grouping by the Soviet army and the capture of Berlin were the final act in the struggle against fascist Germany. With the fall of the capital, she lost all possibility of conducting an organized armed struggle and soon capitulated.

The Soviet people and their Armed Forces, under the leadership of the Communist Party, won a world-historic victory.

During the Berlin operation, Soviet troops defeated 70 infantry, 12 tank, 11 motorized divisions and most of the Wehrmacht aviation. About 480 thousand soldiers and officers were taken prisoner, up to 11 thousand guns and mortars, more than 1.5 thousand tanks and assault guns, as well as 4.5 thousand aircraft were captured as trophies.

Together with the Soviet soldiers, soldiers and officers of the Polish Army took an active part in the defeat of this group. Both Polish armies operated in the first operational echelon of the Soviet fronts, 12.5 thousand Polish soldiers participated in the storming of Berlin. Above brandenburg gate next to the victorious Soviet Red Banner, they hoisted their national banner. It was the triumph of the Soviet-Polish military commonwealth.

The Berlin operation is one of the largest operations of World War II. It was characterized by exceptionally high intensity of the struggle on both sides. Poisoned by false propaganda and intimidated by cruel repressions, the fascist troops resisted with extraordinary stubbornness. The heavy losses of the Soviet troops also testify to the degree of fierceness of the fighting. From April 16 to May 8, they lost more than 102 thousand people. Meanwhile, the American-British troops on the entire Western Front lost 260,000 men during 1945.

As in previous battles, in the Berlin operation, Soviet soldiers showed high combat skill, courage and mass heroism. More than 600 people were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov was awarded the third, and Marshals of the Soviet Union I.S. Konev and K.K. Rokossovsky the second Gold Star medal. The second Gold Star medal was awarded to V. I. Andrianov, S. E. Artemenko, P. I. Batov, T. Ya. Begeldinov, D. A. Dragunsky, A. N. Efimov, S. I. Kretov, M. V. Kuznetsov, I. Kh. Mikhailichenko, M. P. Odintsov, V. S. Petrov, P. A. Plotnikov, V. I. Popkov, A. I. Rodimtsev, V. G. Ryazanov, E. Ya. Savitsky, V. V. Senko, Z. K. Slyusarenko, N. G. Stolyarov, E. P. Fedorov, M. G. Fomichev. 187 units and formations received the names of Berlin. Only from the composition of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts, 1141 thousand soldiers were awarded orders and medals, many units and formations were awarded orders of the Soviet Union, and 1082 thousand participants in the assault were awarded the medal "For the Capture of Berlin", established in honor of this historical victory.

The Berlin operation made a significant contribution to the theory and practice of Soviet military art. It was prepared and carried out on the basis of comprehensive consideration and creative use of the richest experience of the Soviet Armed Forces accumulated during the war. At the same time, the military art of the Soviet troops in this operation has a number of features.

The operation was prepared in a short time, and its main goals - the encirclement and destruction of the main enemy grouping and the capture of Berlin - were achieved in 16-17 days. Noting this feature, Marshal A.M. Vasilevsky wrote: “The pace of preparation and implementation of the final operations indicates that the Soviet military economy and the Armed Forces had reached such a level by 1945 that it made it possible to do what would previously have seemed like a miracle.”

The limited preparation time for such a major operation required commanders and staffs of all levels to adopt new, more efficient forms and methods of work. Not only in the fronts and armies, but also in the corps and divisions, the parallel method of work of commanders and staffs was usually used. In all command and staff instances, the rule worked out in previous operations was steadily observed to give the troops as much time as possible for their direct preparation for combat operations.

The Berlin operation is distinguished by the clarity of the strategic plan, which fully corresponded to the tasks set and the specifics of the current situation. It is a classic example of an offensive by a group of fronts, carried out with such a decisive goal. During this operation, Soviet troops surrounded and eliminated the largest grouping of enemy troops in the history of wars.

The simultaneous offensive of three fronts in a 300-kilometer zone with six strikes fettered the enemy's reserves, contributed to the disorganization of his command and in a number of cases made it possible to achieve operational-tactical surprise.

The Soviet art of war in the Berlin operation is characterized by a decisive massing of forces and assets in the directions of the main strikes, the creation of high densities of means of suppression and the deep echeloning of combat formations of troops, which ensured a relatively quick breakthrough of the enemy’s defenses, the subsequent encirclement and destruction of his main forces and the preservation of general superiority over enemy throughout the operation.

The Berlin operation is very instructive from the experience of the diverse combat use of armored and mechanized troops. It involved 4 tank armies, 10 separate tank and mechanized corps, 16 separate tank and self-propelled artillery brigades, as well as more than 80 separate tank and self-propelled artillery regiments. The operation once again clearly demonstrated the expediency of not only tactical, but also operational massing of armored and mechanized troops in the most important areas. The creation in the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts of powerful success development echelons (each consisting of two tank armies) is the most important prerequisite for the successful conduct of the entire operation, which once again confirmed that tank armies and corps, if used correctly, are the main means of developing success.

The combat use of artillery in the operation was characterized by its skillful massaging in the directions of the main strikes, the creation of artillery groups in all organizational units - from the regiment to the army, the central planning of the artillery offensive, the wide maneuver of artillery, including large artillery formations, and the steady fire superiority over the enemy. .

The art of the Soviet command in the use of aviation was manifested primarily in its massing and close cooperation with the ground forces, to support which the main efforts of all air armies, including long-range aviation, were directed. In the Berlin operation, Soviet aviation firmly held air supremacy. In 1317 air battles, 1132 enemy aircraft were shot down. The defeat of the main forces of the 6th air fleet and the Reich air fleet was completed in the first five days of the operation, and subsequently the rest of the aviation was finished off. In the Berlin operation, Soviet aviation destroyed the enemy's defenses, destroyed and suppressed his firepower and manpower. Working closely with combined-arms formations, she struck at the enemy day and night, bombarded his troops on the roads and on the battlefield, when they advanced from the depths and when leaving the encirclement, disrupted control. The use of the Air Force was characterized by the centralization of their control, the timeliness of redeployment, and the continuous buildup of efforts in solving the main tasks. Ultimately, the combat use of aviation in the Berlin operation most fully expressed the essence of that form of warfare, which during the war years was called an air offensive.

In the operation under consideration, the art of organizing interaction was further improved. The foundations of strategic cooperation were laid down during the development of its concept through careful coordination of the actions of the fronts and services of the Armed Forces in the interests of successfully accomplishing the main operational-strategic tasks. As a rule, the interaction of the fronts within the framework of a strategic operation was also stable.

The Berlin operation gave an interesting experience in the use of the Dnieper military flotilla. Noteworthy is its skillfully carried out maneuver from the Western Bug and Pripyat to the Oder. In difficult hydrographic conditions, the flotilla made more than 500-kilometer passage in 20 days. Part of the ships of the flotilla was transported by rail over distances exceeding 800 km. And this took place in conditions when there were 75 operating and destroyed crossings, railway and highway bridges, locks and other hydraulic structures on the way of their movement, and in 48 places clearing of the ship's passage was required. In close operational-tactical cooperation with the ground forces, the ships of the flotilla solved various tasks. They participated in artillery preparation, assisted the advancing troops in forcing water barriers and actively participated in the battles for Berlin on the Spree River.

The political bodies showed great skill in ensuring the combat activity of the troops. The intense and purposeful work of commanders, political agencies, party and Komsomol organizations ensured an exceptionally high morale and offensive impulse among all the soldiers and contributed to the solution of the historical task - the victorious end of the war with Nazi Germany.

The successful conduct of one of the last operations of the Second World War in Europe was also ensured by a high level of strategic leadership, the art of military leadership by the commanders of the fronts and armies. Unlike most previous strategic operations, where the coordination of the actions of the fronts was entrusted to representatives of the Headquarters, in the Berlin operation, the overall command of the troops was carried out directly by the Supreme High Command. The Headquarters and the General Staff have shown particularly high skill and flexibility in leading the Soviet Armed Forces. They timely set tasks for the fronts and services of the Armed Forces, refined them during the offensive depending on changes in the situation, organized and supported operational-strategic cooperation, skillfully used strategic reserves, continuously replenished the troops with personnel, weapons and military equipment.

Testimony high level Soviet military art and the skill of military leaders in the Berlin operation was a successful solution to the complex problem of logistical support for the troops. The limited time for preparing the operation and the high expenditure of material resources, due to the nature of the hostilities, required great tension in the work of the rear services of all levels. Suffice it to say that during the operation, the troops of the three fronts used up over 7,200 wagons of ammunition and from 2-2.5 (diesel fuel) to 7-10 (aviation gasoline) front-line fuel refueling. The successful solution of logistic support was achieved mainly due to the sharp approach of material reserves to the troops and the widespread use of road transport to bring in the necessary supplies. Even during the preparation of the operation, more materiel was brought by road than by rail. Thus, 238.4 thousand tons of ammunition, fuel and lubricants were delivered to the 1st Belorussian Front by rail, and 333.4 thousand tons by front and army vehicles.

Military topographers made a great contribution to ensuring the combat operations of the troops. In a timely and complete manner, the military topographic service provided the troops with topographic and special maps, prepared initial geodetic data for artillery fire, took an active part in deciphering aerial photographs, and determined the coordinates of targets. Only the troops and headquarters of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts were issued 6.1 million copies of maps, 15 thousand aerial photographs were deciphered, the coordinates of about 1.6 thousand support and artillery networks were determined, geodetic binding of 400 artillery batteries was made. In order to ensure the fighting in Berlin, the topographic service of the 1st Belorussian Front prepared a relief plan of the city, which proved to be of great help to the headquarters in preparing and conducting the operation.

The Berlin operation went down in history as a victorious crown of that difficult and glorious path that the Soviet Armed Forces, led by the Communist Party, traveled. The operation was carried out with the full satisfaction of the needs of the fronts with military equipment, weapons and material and technical means. The heroic rear supplied its soldiers with everything that was necessary for the final defeat of the enemy. This is one of the clearest and most convincing testimonies of the high organization and power of the economy of the Soviet socialist state.