Taking Berlin in 1945: the Russians Always Respected Power Over Bravado

In 1949, General Dwight Eisenhower was asked about one of the most controversial decisions made in 1945, the taking of Berlin. Eisenhower’s answer was based on military considerations, yet he conceded that political issues – already agreed to at the earlier Yalta Conference, influenced the decision. Eisenhower’s decision to halt the Allied advance at the Elbe River ultimately supported Soviet domination of what would come to be called “Eastern Europe,” a region separated by what Winston Churchill labeled an “Iron Curtain.” Would the taking of Berlin have changed that?

 

The Allied Invasion of Nazi Germany 1944-1945

 

By the fall of 1944, it had become obvious that German resistance was weakening. Aachen became the first German city occupied by allied troops on October 21. Subsequent strategy called for smashing through the Siegfried Line and crossing the Rhine River for the final push to Berlin. Even as allied troops were accomplishing these goals in early 1945, the Soviet army under Marshall Zhukov was closing in on Berlin.

 

Beginning with Omar Bradley’s 12^th Army Group Rhine River crossing on March 7^th, the allies spectacularly advanced into the heart of Germany through March and into April 1945. Field Marshall Montgomery’s “Market Garden” operation, though not entirely successful, ultimately resulted in the encirclement of Field Marshall Model’s army group, the last field army to stand between Eisenhower and Berlin.

 

But on March 28^th, Eisenhower changed the plan. Although nothing stood between the allies and Berlin, army groups were ordered to secured the Baltic port cities like Lubeck, as well as moving into the Leipzig-Dresden area where German war industrialization was still in progress. The British were outraged; Field Marshall Montgomery stated afterwards that he could have taken Berlin before the Russians.

 

Effects of Eisenhower’s Decision

 

Eisenhower reasoned that the Russians were only 35 miles from Berlin while the bulk of his forces were 285 miles from the German capital. Additionally, taking Berlin might have cost 100,000 lives. Finally, Eisenhower was under pressure to end the European war quickly so that resources could be diverted to the Pacific theater.

 

It is also a fact, however, that American advance units were already in Potsdam and General William Simpson’s 9^th US Army had crossed the Elbe River. Simpson later wrote that, using the German autobahn, his army could have been in Berlin in 24 hours. The Russians, in contrast, had not yet crossed the Oder River. In essence, American units were only 53 miles from Berlin on April 11^th.

 

On April 12, however, Franklin Roosevelt collapsed and died. This act of destiny neutralized the vigorous efforts of Prime Minister Churchill and British military planners. On April 14, General Eisenhower ordered a halt at the Elbe River and called back American units that had already crossed. In 1949, Eisenhower stated, “The political heads of our government had already agreed that our line of occupation would be way back, starting at the north at Denmark, with Linz on the south, so what good would it have done us to capture Berlin?”

 

Both the political and military consequences would be played out after Germany surrendered. Soviet troops occupied large areas of middle Europe, establishing pro-Russian governments. Stalin looted these countries, dismantling factories and deporting populations to Siberia. He excused these actions as reparations of war.

 

Could Taking Berlin have Limited Stalin’s Gains?

 

If the allied leaders at Potsdam followed the agreements and protocols of the Yalta Agreements (February 4-11, 1945), it would not have made a difference which country actually “took” Berlin. But as Churchill had shown early in 1945 with the bombing of Dresden, the Soviets responded to a show of force and respected power. The new American President, Harry Truman, might have been able to call Stalin’s bluff, particularly with the success of the atomic bomb test in New Mexico.

 

Sources:

 

Douglas Botting, From the Ruins of the Reich: Germany 1945-1949 (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1985)

Klaus P. Fischer, Nazi Germany: A New History (New York: Continuum, 1995)