Week 30
On 16 December 1944, Germany made a last attempt on the Western Front by using most of its remaining reserves to launch a massive counter-offensive in the Ardennes and along with the French-German border to split the Western Allies, encircle large portions of Western Allied troops and capture their primary supply port at Antwerp to prompt a political settlement.[271] By January, the offensive had been repulsed with no strategic objectives fulfilled.[271] In Italy, the Western Allies remained stalemated at the German defensive line. In mid-January 1945, the Soviets and Poles attacked in Poland, pushing from the Vistula to the Oder river in Germany, and overran East Prussia.[272] On 4 February Soviet, British, and US leaders met for the Yalta Conference. They agreed on the occupation of post-war Germany, and on when the Soviet Union would join the war against Japan. In February, the Soviets entered Silesia and Pomerania, while Western Allies entered western Germany and closed to the Rhine river. By March, the Western Allies crossed the Rhine north and south of the Ruhr, encircling the German Army Group B. In early March, in an attempt to protect its last oil reserves in Hungary and to retake Budapest, Germany launched its last major offensive against Soviet troops near Lake Balaton. In two weeks, the offensive had been repulsed, the Soviets advanced to Vienna, and captured the city. In early April, Soviet troops captured Königsberg, while the Western Allies finally pushed forward in Italy and swept across western Germany capturing Hamburg and Nuremberg. American and Soviet forces met at the Elbe river on 25 April, leaving several unoccupied pockets in southern Germany and around Berlin. Soviet and Polish forces stormed and captured Berlin in late April. In Italy, German forces surrendered on 29 April. On 30 April, the Reichstag was captured, signalling the military defeat of Nazi Germany,[275] Berlin garrison surrendered on 2 May. Several changes in leadership occurred during this period. On 12 April, President Roosevelt died and was succeeded by Harry S. Truman. Benito Mussolini was killed by Italian partisans on 28 April. Two days later, Hitler committed suicide in besieged Berlin, and he was succeeded by Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. Total and unconditional surrender in Europe was signed on 7 and 8 May, to be effective by the end of 8 May. (Wikipedia)
REQUIRED READING
RECOMMENDED READING
We want to recommend to you for extra reading about the Third Reich, the three-volume study written by Cambridge historian Richard J. Evans. It has been his work of a lifetime and it is now complete and available in fine quality paperback editions or in used/new hardcover. (I would buy the "used" hardcovers since they are like new and often prices are the same as a new paperback) Let me print here some reviews of the first volume and then we will list all three volumes for your attention.
Review
"Richard J. Evans's The Coming of the Third Reich . . . gives the clearest and most gripping account I've read of German life before and during the rise of the Nazis." —A. S Byatt, Times Literary Supplement
"Richard J. Evans's The Coming of the Third Reich is an enormous work of synthesis—knowledgable and reliable." —Mark Mazower, New York Times Book Review
"[A] first-rate narrative history that informs and educates and may inspire readers to delve even deeper into the subject." —Booklist
"Brilliant.” —Washington Post
“The generalist reader, it should be emphasized, is well served. . . . The book reads briskly, covers all important areas—social and cultural—and succeeds in its aim of giving “voice to the people who lived through the years with which it deals.” —Denver Post
“One finally puts down this magnificent volume thirsty, on the one hand, for the next installment in the Nazi saga yet still haunted by the questions Evan poses and so masterfully grapples with.” ―Abraham Brumberg, The Nation
“This first part of what is Evans’ three-volume history of Hitler’s regime is the most comprehensive and convincing work so far on the gall of Weimar and Hitler’s rise to power.” ―Foreign Affairs
