NOTE: Free essay sample provided on this page should be used for references or sample purposes only. The sample essay is available to anyone, so any direct quoting without mentioning the source will be considered plagiarism by schools, colleges and universities that use plagiarism detection software. To get a completely brand-new, plagiarism-free essay, please use our essay writing service.
One click instant price quote
Tide of Allied Victory The Allied landing in Normandy began on June 6, 1944. The bulk of invasion force consisted of American, British and Canadian troops. Against 50. 000 Germans that were defending Normandy, Allies had 120 Divisions with over 2 million men. Allies were also enjoying a complete dominance in the air. After the beginning of invasion, Hitler dismissed it as a decoy operation, on the part of allies, and only on June 9, he realized that he was wrong. However, the critical phase of Overlord operation was over by that time.
Allies were able to secure their beachheads. Allies sustained very heavy losses, during the landing, because the rough sees prevented British fleet from bombarding German coast defenses. However, by the end of the first day, most of Allied objectives were accomplished even, though that city of Caen did not fall to Americans, as it was originally planned. By June 26, Americans captured city of Cherbourg, which had a large port. Even though that Germans had destroyed ports infrastructure, before retreating, Allies were able to renew ports operation in about one month, which allowed them to assure a steady flow of supplies. Allied firepower, improved tactics, and numerical superiority eventually resulted in a breakout of American mechanized forces at the Western end of the Normandy pocket in Operation Cobra on July 23.
Upon hearing about American breakout, Hitler ordered 6 th Panzer Division Hitler youth to launch a counter-offensive. However, the low flying American Thunderbolts destroyed half of German tanks, before they even reached their destination. The Battle of Normandy ended up in 50. 000 German soldiers being captured. It deprived Germans of their hopes of containing Allied advances with the mean of forming new defense lines. By the end of second week, after the beginning of invasion, Allies were 600 kilometers deep into France. Germans had no choice but to retreat into Northern France, Holland and Belgium.
At the same time, French Riviera was being invaded by American troops, stationed sin Italy. By August 19, 1944, they finally linked up with Allied forces that were advancing from Normandy. This coincided with beginning of French uprising in Paris. By August 25, German occupation of France was over.
Germans were placing high hopes on their new secret weapons: V- 1 flying bombs and V- 2 ballistic missiles, which they began firing on London in autumn of 1944. Yet, it did not seriously undermine the morale of British people, because Germans failed to use them on massive scale, as it was originally planned. At the same time, the strategic bombing of Germany by Allies was gaining more momentum. Thousand planes bomb raids become quite usual. Americans were bombing German cities in daytime, while British were doing the same at night. The Allied bombing campaign culminated on February 13, 1945, when city of Dresden was turned into the heaps of smoldering debris.
Three hundred thousands civilians were being murdered in cold blood. Hitler was well aware of the fact that alliance between Soviet Union and Western powers was utterly unnatural. This led him to conclude that a decisive victory over Allies was needed on Western front, in order to be able to negotiate truce with them, which would allow Germany to focus on defending itself against Soviet hordes. He began planning the counteroffensive operation, which was to take place before the end of 1944. The attacks objective was to capture the city of Antwerp.
Not only would the capture or destruction of Antwerp prevent supplies reaching the allied armies, it would also split allied forces in two, while demoralizing the alliance. For the attack, Hitler concentrated the best of his remaining forces, launching the attack through the Ardennes in southern Belgium, a hilly and heavily wooded region. Dense cloud cover denied the Americans the use of their reconnaissance and ground attack aircraft. The head of Hitlers commandos, Otto Skortseny was given the task of finding volunteers, who spoke English, in order for them to be dressed in American uniform and dropped behind the front line, where they would begin spreading panic. Initially, German offensive began developing as planned. However, German tanks had run out of fuel, just before they reached Bastogne, and had they to be abandoned.
In addition, on the fifth day, after the beginning of German offensive, the skies cleared up, this enabled Allies to begin exploiting their air superiority once again. Nevertheless, modern historians admit that Hitler almost succeeded in reaching all of his tactical goals, during the Ardennes offensive. Churchill and Roosevelt became gravely concerned over this fact, which prompted Churchill to personally ask Stalin to begin his winter offensive on Germany 20 days earlier than it was originally planned, in order to relieve German pressure on Allied forces. The Soviet offensive began on January 12, 1945.
Russian had deployed against Germans 5 armies with more than 3 million men. Against German 650 tanks on Eastern front, Stalin had 20. 000. Eighteen thousands planes were to support Soviet offensive. Therefore, it does not come as a surprise that Soviets were able to penetrate 160 kilometers into the German held territory, after beginning of their attack.
By January 17, Zhukov captured Warsaw. The Soviet offensive went on without any complications, before finally halting on Oder River, 60 kilometers away from Berlin. Even though that Zhukov had promised Stalin to capture Berlin before beginning of spring, the fierce German resistance prevented him from doing this. The discipline among Russian soldiers began to deteriorate to such a degree that soldiers often refused to fight.
The mass rape of civilians and drunken debaucheries became strongly associated with the advance of Stalin's liberators into the Europe. Germans were quick to realize that the large quantities of unattended alcohol was a much more effective mean of stalling Russian offensive than Tiger tanks, which they began to use for their advantage. Nevertheless, the overwhelming numerical superiority of Red' Army, did not leave Germans much of a chance. On February 13, Russians captured Budapest.
By the end of February, Soviet troops occupied Hungary, which deprived Hitler of his last source of oil. From this time on, the German defeat was only the matter of time. On March 30, Russians entered Austria. They were able to capture Vienna on April 13. By the beginning of April, Nazi Germany was reduced to a narrow strip between Allied advancing forces from the West and Soviet army moving from the East. Zhukov wanted to impress Stalin; this is why he insisted on attacking the Berlin, even though that it was much wiser to wait for its surrender, because Berlin was completely encircled, at the time.
This would allow Red Army to avoid sustaining large casualties, which are always associated with street fighting. However, the value of soldiers life in Soviet army has always been low, that is why the decision was made to proceed with attack. Russians began its Berlins offensive on April 16. Against countless Russian hordes, Hitler only had 15 tanks, and a few regiments of Hitler youth and Folksturm. Nevertheless, Soviets paid dearly, before they were able to captured Berlin. 360. 000 Soviet soldiers were killed. Schoolchildren with panzefausts destroyed more than five thousands Russian tanks on the streets of Berlin.
What is very symbolic is that about a half of Berlins defenders consisted of foreign volunteers from France, Sweden, Netherlands and Spain. Just as in 945 A. D. , Europeans became united in their will to defend culture against barbarians that were moving from the East. Still, the opposing forces were utterly unequal. After having realized that the Providence is not going to intrude to save Germany this time, Hitler had committed suicide, along with Eva Braun, whom he married a day before. On May 2, 1945, the remaining German troops in Berlin surrendered to Russians.
The German High Command under Alfred John surrendered unconditionally all remaining German forces on May 7 in Rheims, France. However, some SS regiments continued to fight up until late into the May. Allies divided Germany on occupation zones. Still, almost immediately after the end of WWII, Britain and United States started to become alienated from Soviet Union, which strived to establish a Communist puppet regime in Germany. Therefore, we can say that the immediate consequence of the end of WWII was beginning of Cold War. Bibliography: Stokesbury, James.
A Short History of World War 2. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1980.
Free research essays on topics related to: soviet union, allied forces, hitler youth, soviet army, end of wwii
Research essay sample on End Of Wwii Allied Forces
