p Not all in nazi Germany or in Britain and America were yet able to apprehend that the country was doomed. At the beginning of 1945 Germany proper was still almost entirely unaffected by direct military action. Her armies were still immense. Their combat capacity was still of a high order. And factories in Germany were still turning out arms. Yet total defeat was but four months away. Soviet military strength had grown so that it could wipe out fascism on its own.

p The Polish, Czechoslovak, Bulgarian and Rumanian armed forces participated actively in the concluding stages of the war, contributing greatly to the victory. Fighting shoulder to shoulder with Soviet soldiers, Polish, Czechoslovak, Bulgarian and Rumanian patriots displayed courage, daring and military prowess. Their meritorious conduct in battle was frequently cited in Soviet military orders.

p In the meantime, the rapid succession of defeats on the Soviet-German front sapped the morale of fascist Germany in and behind the battle-lines. A new Soviet offensive would make the situation very desperate. The nazi Kolnische Zefang wrote on February 24, 1945:

p "We can no longer rely on the time factor. We have neither reserves nor fortifications that could inspire the hope of the enemy losing wind. Can we find the line of defence the enemy will not breach in the next 24 hours? We are compelled to commit our last strength."

p The nazis resorted to their favourite “remedy”, redoubling the terror and forcing the soldiers, of whom many were mere boys, to resist to the last. Many youngsters went into battle with tear-stained faces, working the trigger mechanically.

p The German High Command issued a barbarous order to turn the eastern part of the country into a death zone. Special SS units forced people by the millions to evacuate. Hundreds of thousands of sick and old men, women and children filled the country roads in the bitter winter’s cold. For them the retreat was a horrible and agonising trek. Villages were set afire and cattle was driven west. Roads were strewn with dead cows and horses, pigs, sheep and goats, senselessly destroyed.

p The Soviet 1945 offensive was patterned differently than the one of the year before. No longer were the operations successive, but simultaneous, rolling to a start along a vast frontage. The first were the operations known as the VistulaOder and the East-Prussian.

p In the Vistula-Oder Operation in Polish territory, the Red Army tackled Army Group “A”—30 divisions and two brigades, not counting a great number of separate battalions and the divisions that were still in the activation stage, with many divisions at full strength, that is, of 12,000 men.

p The ist Byelorussian (Marshal G. K. Zhukov) and the ist Ukrainian Front (Marshal I. S. Konev) co-operating with the 4th Ukrainian, totalled 163 divisions. The numerical advantage in the main direction—Warsaw and Berlin—was huge: 5.5 : i in men, 7.8: i in guns and mortars, 5.7: i in tanks and 17.6: i in planes.  [216•1  The sword of retribution was raised aloft!

p The Vistula-Oder Operation began on January 12 with the Soviet troops delivering a devastating blow breaching enemy defences along a 5OO-km frontage to a depth of 100-160 km,  [216•2  routing the main Army Group “A” forces and relieving a number of cities, including Warsaw, in the first four or six days.

p In the second stage, the rate of the advance increased. The liberation of Poland was being completed. German troops were invested group after group, and destroyed. On January 29, the ist Byelorussian Front crossed into Germany and early in February reached the Oder, seizing important bridgeheads on its left bank. This crowned the operation. To advance farther required appropriate preparation in face of fresh, hastily brought up enemy troops. In the course of 217 the operation the German Command had shifted units from other sectors, the rear and the West, totalling some 40 divisions.  [217•1 

p In the operation 35 enemy divisions were completely wiped out and another 25 almost completely. Prisoners captured totalled i47,ooo.  [217•2  A huge wedge had been driven into the enemy lines, its tip crossing the Oder near Kustrin. The ist Byelorussian Front was a mere 60 km from Berlin.

p No attack on Berlin was practicable, however, before the nazi East-Prussian group, which imperilled the ist Byelorussian and ist Ukrainian fronts, was put out of action. The East-Prussian nazi fqrce, Army Group Centre, comprised 41 divisions at almost full strength,  [217•3  deployed in powerfully fortified areas built up over decades and strongly supported by naval strength.

p To smash this force was the job of the 3rd and 2nd Byelorussian fronts, which surpassed the enemy 2.8:1 in men, 3.4:1 in artillery, 4.7:1 in tanks and 5.8:1 in planes.  [217•4 

p The East-Prussian Operation went off to a start on January 13, 1945. Despite frantic resistance, the formidable fortifications were crushed and the front breached. Developing the operation according to a well-laid plan, the Soviet troops cut off East Prussia from the rest of the fascist army and slashed it into three isolated sections, the Baltic Fleet, especially its air strength and submarines, taking an active part in the fighting. As a result, the fortified city of Koenigsberg, heart of East Prussia, was blockaded.

p The first stage of the East-Prussian Operation ended early in February, with much of the country cleared of German troops. Nearly 52,000 were taken prisoner, and as many as 67,000 were liberated from concentration camps by the 2nd Byelorussian Front alone.  [217•5 

p In the second stage the invested nazi troops were destroyed, Koenigsberg taken by storm on April 9 and the fortress of Pilau on April 25. Army Group Centre virtually ceased to exist, East Prussia was captured and the way laid open to Berlin from the northeast.

p There was still a large German force in Eastern Pomerania, to which Berlin attached specific importance. Himmler was in command. Clearly, the enemy meant to use the EastPomeranian area for a flanking move against the ist Byelorussian Front, which had reached the Oder. To avert this, the Soviet Command ordered the 2nd Byelorussian and part of the ist Byelorussian Front to destroy it.

p The East-Pomeranian Operation began on February 10, 1945. The enemy had been reinforced, his strength increased to 42 divisions, with a well-fortified defence fine and the Gdynia-Darizig fortified zone.

p The enemy front was breached, cutting Army Group Vistula in two, and isolating each section. But the fighting continued for nearly three months. The men and officers of the ist Polish "Heroes of Westerplatte" Brigade, helped liberate Gdynia and Danzig, displaying dedication and valour.

p The German prisoners ran to 64,000. Meanwhile, 115,000 men and women were freed from concentration camps.  [218•1 

p While part of the Soviet troops was engaged in the EastPomeranian Operation, another part hit out in Silesia. The ist Ukrainian Front freed nearly 114,000 people from concentration camps in that area.  [218•2  In Upper and Lower Silesia, Soviet units drove through a powerful enemy belt along the Oder, annihilating five and routing 28 nazi divisions,  [218•3  and taking up starting positions in the direction of Berlin, Dresden and Prague. In the meantime, the ist Byelorussian Front captured an important operational area at the approaches to Berlin, near Kiistrin, poised to deliver the final blow.

p On the southern wing of the Soviet-German front, the enemy Budapest force was finally crushed and the Hungarian capital cleared of Germans in mid-February. The Red Army drove on to the Austrian border. Eager to retain Austria and at least a part of Hungary, the German Command mounted a large-scale counter-offensive. This began bn March 6 near Lake Balaton, the battles assuming huge proportions.

p In the first ten days of the counter-offensive, a fascist strike force, comprising chiefly SS divisions, managed to advance 20-30 km but fell short of its assignment. The enemy onslaught was frustrated by the joint action of Soviet, Bulgarian 219 and Yugoslav troops. Meanwhile, an offensive operation was mounted in Czechoslovakia, where the Tudor Vladimirescu ist Rumanian Volunteer Infantry Division distinguished itself alongside the Soviet troops.

p Having stemmed the nazi counter-offensive at Lake Balaton, the Soviet 3rd and 2nd Ukrainian fronts, supported by the Danube Flotilla, began the Vienna Operation on March 16, clearing the rest of Hungary and southeast Austria. On April 13, Soviet troops were in full possession of Vienna, capturing 130,000 men and officers.  [219•1  Prisoners of concentration camps, including Mauthausen, regained their freedom.

p At the height of the fighting for Vienna, the Soviet Government issued a statement emphasising that the USSR adhered to "the’Standpoint of the Moscow Declaration of the Allies on the independence of Austria" a’nd would follow it to the letter.  [219•2  An Austrian Provisional Government was formed on April 27.

p The Soviet operations in Hungary and Austria facilitated the actions of the Yugoslav Liberation Army, supported by the Soviet Danube Flotilla, the ships of which were also prominent in the Vienna Operation, giving fire support to the and Ukrainian Front and landing forces on both banks of the Danube.

The war in Europe was approaching its climax. The time of the decisive Berlin Operation had come.