The Last Stand: The Battle of the Reichstag, Berlin 1945 (WW2 Documentary)

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By Mid-April 1945, the outcome of  the war in Europe was in no doubt.   On the Italian front the western allies were  pushing into Northern Italy and in the west,   American, British and Canadian Forces  had crossed the Rhine and were poised to   crush the Ruhr pocket and drive across the river  Elbe. Despite the inevitability of the outcome,   Hitler clung on, directing his  last reserves eastwords in vain   hopes of stopping the soviet juggernaught  descending on his crumbling Third Reich. In this video, we will combine the  latest technology, archive footage   and veteran accounts to share the  story of the Battle for Berlin. It was then on the 16th of April, the Soviets  launched the ‘Berlin Operation’ – their plan:   to cross the Rivers Oder and Neisse and  encircle and capture the capital of the   Third Reich. A staggering 2.5 Million men and  6 thousand tanks, backed by massive artillery   and aircraft firepower would begin that  assault westwards. Organised into 3 Fronts,   or Army Groups, the two most important Soviet  formations were the 1st Belorussian Front under   the command of Marshal Georgy Zhukov and the  1st Ukrainian Front under the Marshal Ivan   Konev. Both would vie in the coming weeks for  the honour of capturing Germany’s largest city,   the target which Stalin had chosen as the  symbol for the defeat of Nazi Germany. The defenders, on the other hand, were in a  desperate situation. With a huge disadvantage   in both manpower and materiel, they were  forced to call on mother nature to prop up   their unstable defence. Digging in here on the  Oder-Neisse river line they could still muster   around 1 million men, but of mixed quality,  and with very limited armour and artillery.   The major point of focus for both sides would be  the heart of those German defences, some 60km east   of Berlin – the Seelow Heights. Squarely in the  path of Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front, it was   bitterly contested ground for over fours day of  intense fighting which cost the attackers dearly,   with as many as 66,000 Russians falling in it’s  eventual capture. But captured it was, and by   21st April the route to Berlin was open and Soviet  tanks were racing headlong to surround the city. Slightly further south, Marshal Konev’s 1st  Ukrainian Front had had a somewhat easier   time. Originally, the plan was to skirt south  of Berlin, but with Zhukov’s troubles at Seelow,   Stalin now ordered him to move directly  toward the city from the south-east. Just a few days later on the 25th of  April, Soviet forces met and the city   was finally surrounded by about 1.5 Million  troops, and the siege of Berlin could begin. Inside the encirclement, the situation was  chaotic. Swollen by refugees and relentlessly   bombed by Allied airpower for years, Berlin was  a shell of its former self. Long gone were the   days of triumphant processions down the Unter  Der Linden and through the Brandenburg gate.   Instead, 2.5 Million civilians, living a  mostly a subterranean exisctence, found   themselves trapped in a city desperately short  of supplies and under constant artillery fire.   With the remnants of the nazi leadership fully  involved in preparing makeshift defences,   the city’s population were  left to fend for themselves. Berlin itself had been hastily divided  into different defensive zones,   with the Z or central zone forming the last  bastion around the heart of the city centre.   Those defences, whilst impressive on paper,  were largely ad-hoc last ditch attempts to   slow the enemy down – they rarely did.  Trams filled with rubble and anti-tank   ditches proved a minor convenience at most for  the overwhelming forces descending on the city. Those soldiers manning them too, were  in many cases, of little real threat.   Left to hold the city were a mix of old men and  young boys, and a scattering of admittedly able   veteran units, but often far understrength  and always exhausted from months of fighting. But Berlin itself was far from  an easy prospect to assault,   even for a numerically superior force. Let’s take  a look. As we see here, the city is criss-crossed   by canals and waterways linked by bridges, and  with wide streets surrounded by high buildings   with plenty of windows – often a death trap  for tanks advancing without infantry support. But the soviets, ever resourceful, were adept at  urban fighting by this stage of the war. Their   primary tactic for clearing stubborn defences  was one based on firepower. Heavy artillery,   like this 203mm Howitzer, firing over  open sights directly down streets,   was used to literally pulverize buildings  before infantry and armour drenched an area   with high explosive shells  and sub-machine-gun fire.   Street by street, and house-by-house, the  soviets ground their way towards the Z-zone. So let’s take a quick look at the famous Z-Zone,  the area where the fighting would be fiercest, and   some of the key buildings it contained in 1945… Bounded by the Landwehr Canal in the South and   the Spree river in the North, the zone was roughly  formed along the line of the city’s S-Bahn railway   network. Flying south to North through the  city we see in relatively quick succession;   The site of the Gestapo Headquarters on Prinz  Albrecht Strasse, Goering’s enormous Air Ministry,   which still stands to this day, the sites of the  Old and New Reichs Chancellory, behind which,   approximately nine meters down lay Hitler’s  Fuhrerbunker. This complex was actually two   bunkers, the Vorbunker and then the later addition  of the Fuhrerbunker proper – it was here on 30th   April that Hitler and his new wife would end their  lives. Moving further north across the impressive   modern Holocaust memorial, we find the famous  Brandenburg Gate and Unter Din Linden, on the side   of which is the Hotel Adlon, which at the time  was a makeshift field hospital. But of course,   our target for today, and that of the Soviets in  late April 1945 is this building, the Reichstag. It was this imposing structure which, despite  not being in use during the Nazi dictatorship   after the fire of 1933, was turned into  a political symbol by Soviet propaganda:   “The heart of the fascist state”. And so, it  was of crucial importance for Stalin to raise   the Soviet flag, as a sign of victory over  Nazi Germany, on the roof of the Reichstag. The key to capturing it,  was the then “Königsplatz “. Today the area looks entirely different compared  to 1945. With the new Chancellery building on the   left and the now named ‘Square of the Republic’  in the centre, It's a popular place for tourists.   It is hard to imagine the brutal battle that  took place here in the last days of the Reich.   In this image from the 1930’s, we can see  the old Konigsplatz or Kings Square with the   Reichstag to the right, the Diplomatic  Quarter and the old Interior Ministry. Of course, by 1945, it was far less peaceful and  years of relentless bombing had taken their toll.   But to really understand the fighting around the  Reichstag, we need to understand the battlefield,   so let's move forward to this aerial shot from  April 1945. The Interior Ministry also known   as ‘Himmler’s House’ is to the left, and a bit  nearer us, the site of the Kroll Opera House,   both are heavily damaged but would play  a key part in the fighting to come. The Square looks entirely different as well.  In the centre at the time was a major obstacle,   an abandoned subway construction  site that had filled with water,   serving as a defensive line  in front of the Reichstag. When we move a little further north  to the bend in the Spree river,   we can also see the ruins of the diplomatic  quarter. The only building left here today is   the Swiss embassy, but at the time  it was a fully formed city block,   beyond which were the keys to capturing the  Reichstag, the Moltke and Crown Prince Bridges. Turning now to an incredibly rare piece  of aerial footage and slowing it down,   we can explore the actual battlefield as it  looked shortly after the fighting had ended.   Travelling west-east over Berlin’s main Tiergarten  park towards the Brandenburg Gate, with the camera   pointing left or north outside the aircraft, we  can see; the remnants of the Kroll Opera House   in the foreground, with the shattered Interior  Ministry behind that overlooking the vital Moltke   bridge beyond. On the other side of the Spree  River is the shell of the huge Lehter Bahnhof,   one of the city’s major stations at the time.  The remains of the diplomatic quarter can be   seen to it’s right on the near side of  the river, including the Swiss Embassy.   Moving slightly further east, in the foregound  we see the flooded remains of the subway workings   which formed that unusually shaped defensive  barrier, the other side of which is the open   ground in front of the Reichstag which was  lined with trenches and would play host to   bitter fighting. In the distance stands the  Kronbrinzbrucke over the Spree and finally,   the Reichstag itself comes into view, badly  damaged but clearly recognisable in the shot.   As the aircraft carries on to fly  through the heart of destroyed Berlin,   we can turn back north-westwards to pick  up the story, from the soviet perspective… It was men of the 3rd Shock Army, a part of  Zhukov’s front, which first arrived in this   area from the north on 28th April with the 150th  rifle division lining up along the Spree river.   Their first task: Take the Moltke bridge. A tall order, as the Germans had mined and  barricaded bridge and could overlook it from   defensive positions within the Interior  Ministry and the Diplomatic Quarter. And so, it was around this spot, under a wreath  of heavy smoke covering the entire city, that   the first Soviet attempt to storm the bridge was  made. Repulsed under withering fire and a German   counter-attack, the soviets took heavy losses in  that first direct assault, but, unsurprisingly,   were soon ready to go again. That next attempt  led by soviet armour, including several enormous   Stalin II heavy tanks, now pushed forward. Moments  later huge explosions rocked the bridge as,   according to SS soldier Willi Rogmann, the leading  tanks simply ‘disintegrated’ on the bridge.   But what was the cause of this? Unknown to the  attackers, the Moltke Bridge was actually under   fire from the Germans most potent defences in  the area, several miles away in the grounds of   the Berlin Zoo. It was in fact one of three  huge anti-aircraft flak towers covering the   city which had turned its guns on the bridge.  Encased in reinforced concrete and armed with   four powerful twin 128mm anti-aircraft guns on  its roof, designed to shoot down four-engine   bombers at a height of 20,000 feet, the guns  made short work of the much closer targets.  During the respite between attacks, the Germans  also made an attempt to blow the bridge,   which only partially succeeded, and a narrow strip  of roadway, crossable by tanks, still remained.  But the Soviets tried again in a third attempt.  Eventually, under cover of heavy artillery fire,   Red Army tanks forced a passage and  gained a foothold on the far side of   the bridge as infantry began the process  of clearing the stubborn defences in the   Diplomatic Quarter and Interior Ministry.  By the evening of 29th April both were   largely in soviet hands and for the very  first time, the objective was in sight. Lets just for a moment pause the action to look  at the interior ministry. By this stage of the   war as we know it had been badly damaged and the  fight for these ruins was particularly brutal.   Room by room fighting was the order of the  day, in fact the success here came down to   a single window, forcing a passage into the  building right here on the ground floor corner   over the course of that evening thousands of  Soviet troops passed through this very opening   until by dawn on the following day the area was  secure and the route to the Reichstag was open. An unusual episode took place shortly afterwards  when a group of men, the remnants of the 9th   Fallschrimjager division appeared from the Lehter  train station behind the soviet positions and   rushed through the shocked troops to rejoin  with those fighting around the Reichstag.   Their eventual fate remains unknown, but  likely it was not a positive outcome.  The prospect of taking the final objective for the  attackers was far from straightforward. Let’s take   a look. By the early morning of 30th April,  the situation was something like this. Soviet   troops had crossed the Moltke Bridge here, and  now occupied most of the interior ministry and   diplomatic quarter. But, the Kroll Opera House and  the edge of the Tiergarten park were both still in   German hands. Besides the formidable water-barrier  which bottlenecked the soviet approach, lines   of trenches along with 3 powerful 88’s covered  the front of the building, along with numerous   machine guns and firing positions in the front  façade of the bricked-up and sandbagged Reichstag   windows. Any soviet assault would have to brave a  storm of fire before reaching the main building.  One of the men preparing to take part in the  inevitable assault was Vladimir Pereverzev,   who wrote a letter to his wife  on the eve of the attack from   the ground floor of the interior ministry:  “So far I am alive and healthy, only  I am slightly drunk the whole time.   But this is necessary to keep up your courage.  I am just 500 metres from the Reichstag.   We have already crossed the Spree and in a few  days the Fritzes and the Hanses will be kaput…You   write that part of the kitchen ceiling collapsed,  but that’s nothing. A six-storey building   collapsed on us and we had to dig our boys  out. This is how we live and beat the Germans.” Inside the Reichstag, a Garrison of around 300  men made up the bulk of the defences. Knowing   that only death awaited them, most were prepared  to sell their lives dearly, but, that wasn’t   true of all German defenders in the vicinity. Young conscript Gunter Debski, who had been   assigned to a penal battalion after he had tried  to desert a view weeks earlier, found himself next   to the Reichstag on the 30th of April. Gunter Debski: “We got the order to defend the south side of  the Reichstag – the Russians were not to take it.   There was an SS unit inside the Reichstag,  and we were to be on the southern side.   Then the commanding officer said to us: ‘I have  received an order to send a negotiating party to   the Russians at the other end of the Reichstag.’  My goodness I really thought he was an idiot.   He told me to take off my undershirt, tie it  to a broom handle, and go over with Podgorsky.”  To Debski’s good fortune, the officer was  mortally wounded moments later, so Debski,   along with Podgorsky, considered the order,  which would likely have resulted in their deaths,   as invalid, and retreated out of sight. Let's head back to the soviet perspective.   They were now faced with the prospect of crossing  this 280 metres of largely open ground . Today,   it’s a peaceful 5-min stroll, but in  1945, for a time at least, the most   heavily fought over stretch of ground in Europe. At 4:30am on 30th April the soviets made their   first move to reach the water obstacle. Aided  by smoke and brick dust from the shelling,   they pushed forward, but to no avail. The  German return fire was simply too strong.   At 11:30, the soviets made a second attempt,  but this too was driven back, in part by   the sustained fire from the zoo Flak Tower. Three hours later a third assault was launched,   and this time they did manage to reach the  water obstacle, having knocked out several   key positions and likely the 88’s defending the  front of the Reichstag. Half way down, half to go.  By this time, the soviets had managed to bring  up large concentrations of Field Artillery,   and firing from outside the Lehrter Station,  an area today known as Washingtonplatz,   began to hammer the Reichstag building from  almost point blank range, in an attempt to   diminish the German return fire. Seeing the writing on the wall,   and increasingly desperate, the officer  commanding the defence of the Reichstag,   Gerhard Babick, put in a call for armoured  support, and perhaps surprisingly, received   it. Several Stug III’s and an enormous King tiger  from the SS Nordland Division arrived around this   corner on the Southside of the Reichstag,  where Debski had been a short time earlier.  Inside the King Tiger was commander Georg  Diers. In his memoir he recalled the scene. “The Reichstag building was already badly bombed,  the plenary hall burned out. At the front of   the building we looked over to the Kroll Opera  building, and saw a large number of T 34s sitting   to our right, about thirty of them, their gun  barrels pointing at the Reichstag building, at us.   After a thorough briefing of the crew, we  dared to race around the corner and opened   fire on this large number; with success.” But one king tiger could never make a lasting   difference. More and more soviet armour was  by now pouring across the Moltke Bridge and   the newly captured Kronprinzbrucke to the  north-east. With the northern flank of the   Königsplatz in Soviet hands, the attackers were  ready to make a final push to the Reichstag.  It was no secret that Stalin took a close personal  interest in the fighting at this time. In fact,   he had made it abundantly clear that  he wanted the Reichstag to be captured,   and for the soviet hammer and sickle to fly over  the building by 1st May, international labour day,   an important date in the soviet calendar.  This meant, that several ‘banner parties’   with the express purpose of reaching the roof  of the Reichstag were to now enter the fray.  Unfortunately, further pressure was added when a  mistaken report of a red banner being seen on the   Reichstag at 2:30pm on 30th was transmitted  to Moscow and to the desk of Stalin himself.   When the error was realised, the commanders  responsible, likely, and probably rightly,   fearing the consequences of their mistake  being made known, began concerted efforts   to make it a reality, including trying to drop  a banner on the roof by aircraft. It failed,   and so, with time ever more of the  essence, an all-out attack was launched.  There has long been debate about where exactly  the Reichstag was first entered. Some sources   give a ground floor window on the north side  closest to the river spree, others state an   area on the southern façade, but most likely it  was men of the 756th Rifle Regiment at about 6pm   on 30th April through the main ground floor  entrance. Staff Sergeant Ilya Syanov, awarded   the Hero of the Soviet Union as one of the first  to enter the building, said this of the moment:  Initially we got into a long hallway. It turned  out that the entire enormous building was in   motion. Somewhere steps were heard rumbling,  somewhere people were shouting in German.   It was not immediately possible to take  stock of the situation. One thing was clear,   there were a lot of Germans in the building  and we would have to do some fighting. What Syanov didn’t have, but we do, is a detailed  map showing just how complex the layout of the   Reichstag was. A labrynth of small and large  rooms, extending both above and below ground,   it was a nightmarish prospect  for attacker and defender alike,   and a prolonged and brutal fight began for  control of the building. With long hallways,   wide staircases, hundreds of individuals rooms  and the building on fire in multiple places,   the fight descended into room-to-room and  hand to hand battles for hours on end.  Eventually, the soviets managed to drive  a wedge in the German defences by gaining   control of the ground floor, forcing some  surviving Germans to the upper floors and   others into the multi-storey basement. This  caused artillery to once again take part, with   the soviets shelling the upper floor and the few  remaining German guns targeting the ground floor.  The fight went on throughout the entire evening  of the 30th and long into the night. Again records   are unclear, but it is likely that the first  soviet banner to fly from the Reichstag, sometime   during that night, was actually placed here,  above the main entrance, lashed on with belts.  Despite that hammer and sickle flying, the  fighting was far from over and the last pockets   of die-hard German resistance in the Reichstag  would fight on until 2nd May before finally, out   of ammunition and completely surrounded, they were  forced to surrender. All told the fight inside the   Reichstag would last for more than 30 hours. By the time those last shots had been fired   in the Reichstag, all defenders of Berlin  were emerging from basements and buildings   into a shattered and dust filled city and  the surrendering to the waiting victors.  Let’s head to the roof of the Reichstag  to explore one last iconic photograph.   It is of course this one, taken by Russian  photographer Yvgeny Khaldei - its perhaps the   best known photograph of the entire Second  World War. This image, despite it’s fame,   is of course staged, and whilst it does show  a Red Banner flying over the ruins of Berlin,   it is taken, probably on the 2nd May, some time  after the first banners flew on the building. As   a matter of interest, it was also later edited to  remove one of the two watches worn by the main in   this photograph – a small but important detail  which alludes to the looting and far darker   episodes which would take place in the city in the  days to come – a story perhaps for another day.  For both sides, the cost of the fighting  for Berlin had been incredibly heavy.   Numbers vary, but all told it is believed that  80,000-100,000 Soviet and 100,000 German troops   fell in the fighting, along with perhaps as  many as 20,000 of the civilian population.  In the days that followed the first scenes  of the fighting, and the destruction that   had been wrought would be shown to the world.  The Reichstag, still the centre of attention,   became a mecca for soviet soldiers in Berlin, many  of whom marked their visit by chalking and carving   their names into the walls of the building. It was  still present when the first western newsmen and   women arrived in the city to document the fight  which ultimately brough an end to Nazi Germany.  Of course, the story of Berlin does not end  there. Within months it would once again become   the centre of attention, in the formative months  of the Cold War this time, and would remain so for   the next five decades. Today Berlin as a city is  much changed, and the signs that war passed this   way in 1945 are few and far between. But, if you  look beneath the surface of the modern buildings   and skyscrapers, there are still small symbols to  be found, such as the battle damaged Griffon which   once adorned the Moltke Bridge, the last remnants  of soviet graffiti on the roof of the Reichstag   and of course, the memorials, commemorating  the many thousands who fell here in the closing   days of the Second World War in Europe. That brings us to the end of this video,   we hope you found it interesting. If you  would like to know more about Berlin be   sure to check out the excellent series 16 days  in Berlin from our friends at RealTime History,   which provides in an depth look at the entire  fight for the city. If you would like to support   us in our work to continue to share stories like  this with as wide an audience as possible then   please consider joining our ever-growing Patreon  community, your support is hugely appreciated.  That’s all this time, thanks  again and we will see you soon.
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Channel: Battle Guide
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Length: 23min 26sec (1406 seconds)
Published: Fri Jul 14 2023
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