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Battle of Stalingrad
Seeing their chance, the Soviets came together to make a counter against them in November. What they did was trap the German army inside Stalingrad. This means the Germans started to run out of supplies over time. Weak from the freezing cold winter and the lack of food, the majority of the German army surrendered. The Germans were led by General Friedrich Paulus. The general was promoted to Field Marshall right before he went off to the Soviet Union and surrendered to the Russians. Hitler was hoping that the promotion would boost his morale and cause him not to surrender. So when Paulus did surrender, Hitler was furious. He expected the general to either fight to his death or commit suicide, but not surrender. Paulus had not only surrender, but also spoke out against the Nazi's while in Soviet captivity. This surrender was on February 2, 1943 to General Georgy Zhukov, who led the Soviet Union army.
Both countries had large armies of over 1 million troops and each had hundreds of tanks and over 1,000 planes. It is roughly guessed that around 750,000 soldiers from the German army died and nearly 500,000 Russians, and around 91,000 German soldiers were captured at the end of the battle. Adolf Hitler was very angry at General Paulus for losing the battle. He stripped Paulus of his rank and held a national day of mourning for the shame Paulus had brought on Germany by losing, and after the victory Stalingrad’s name was changed to Volgograd, meaning Volga City, in 1961. |
D-Day: The Invasion of Normandy
This battle took place on June 6, 1944 when the Allied Powers of America, Britain, France, and Canada attacked Germans on the coast of Normandy, France. With an impressive force of over 150,000 troops, the Allies had attacked and won the battle. This famous battle is sometimes called D-Day or the Invasion of Normandy. The Germans already knew an invasion was to coming. This was because of all the forces that were grouping in Britain as well as by the increase in air strikes, but they didn't know was where the Allies would strike. As preparations, the Allies had been gathering soldiers and equipment in Great Britain, and increasing the number of bombings and airstrikes in German territory. Before the invasion started, over 1 thousand bombers were hitting German targets a day. Railroads, airfields, bridges, and other strategic places were bombed to slow down and set back the German forces. So to confuse the Germans, Allies had tried to have it seem as if they were going to the north of Normandy at Pas de Calais.
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It almost got cancelled because of bad weather and overcast skies, but to attack, they needed the light of a full moon. Meaning there were only a small amount of days in the months to do this and the invasion was led despite the weather. Even though it affected the Allies, it also caused Germany to think no attack was coming and they weren’t as prepared. The first attack was by paratroopers. They jumped out of planes using only parachutes. They had jumped in the dark at night and landed behind the enemy’s lines. They were to destroy major targets and capture the bridges for the main force to come up on the beach. Close to a thousand dummies were dropped to draw the fire and confuse enemies. Next, the planes dropped bombs on Germany’s defenses. Then warships in water started to bomb the beach.
While this was happening, French Resistance members underground had damaged the Germans by wrecking railroads and cutting their telephone lines. For the main invasion force, more than 6,000 ships with troops, equipment, tanks, and weapons aboard began to approached the beaches of Normandy. This overall was called "Operation Overlord" and the landings were called "Operation Neptune". The Allies planned to attack during the high tide because this helped to avoid obstacles in the water. American soldiers landed at the Utah and Omaha beaches. The Utah landing was a success, but Omaha’s fighting was fierce. Many of the U.S. soldiers died there, but we had at last been able to conquer the beach. At the end of D-Day, over 150,000 soldiers had landed in Normandy, France.They pushed inland to allow more troops the ability to land over the next few days. By June 17th, more than half a million Allies had arrived and began to move the Germans out of France. |
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Battle of the Bulge
The battle was Germany's last try to get the Allies off of Europe and most of the soldiers involved on the Ally side were Americans. This is one of the greatest battles fought by the U.S. military. Early morning on December 16, 1944, Germany launched a big attack. The battle ended up lasting for one month as the American forces fought to keep Germany's army from overruling Europe. The Battle of the Bulge happened in the Ardennes Forest in Belgium. The Germans pushed back the center of the Allied forces' line when they attacked. If you were to see the battle on a map, the Allied army front would have a bulge where the Germans had attacked. This is how the battle was named. When the Germans attacked they had over 200,000 soldiers and just about 1,000 tanks to go through the U.S. lines. It was the winter and the weather was very snowy and cold. Americans were not ready for an attack so the Germans were able to break through the line and kill close to thousands of Americans. Germany was really trying to advance quickly.
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The Germans had a pretty good plan that consisted of spies that spoke English go behind the enemy’s lines. These spies were in American uniform and started rumours to confuse the American troops on what was going on. Many American troops held their ground, despite Germany's quick advance and their big forces because they didn’t want Hitler to take over everything. This battle is mostly remembered for all the small groups of American soldiers that attacked and harassed Germans soldiers as they were advancing. Over 600,000 troops from America fought in the Battle of the Bulge while there was 89,000 U.S. victims including 19,000 who were killed. One famous small fight happened at Bastogne, Belgium, a key crossroad. The U.S. soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division and of the 10th Armored division had gotten surrounded by Germans and were forced to die or surrender. United States General Anthony McAuliffe didn't wish to give up so easily, so he told them "Nuts!" After that declaration, his soldiers held out until more U.S. reinforcements could arrive.
Within few days of the start of the attack, General George Patton's 3rd Army was capable of reinforcing the lines. It was those small pockets of American soldiers throughout the war front, who had gotten in and put up with fighting until they could be reinforced, that won the battle for the Allies. These people’s courage and strong fighting not only won the battle, but also sealed finished off Hitler and the Nazi's in World War II. One main reason the Germans lost was because their tanks did not have enough fuel for the American soldiers and bombers had destroyed all the Germans fuel depots they could and soon enough the German tanks had run out of fuel. After the Allies won the battle, Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of Great Britain said, “Care must be taken in telling our proud tale not to claim for the British Army an undue share what is undoubtedly the greatest American battle of the war, and will, I believe, be regarded as an ever famous American victory.” |
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Battle of Berlin
The battle began on April 16, 1945. This battle was mostly fought between the Soviet Army and the German Army, and about 150,000 Polish troops fought next to the Soviet Union. The Soviet army in this battle outnumbered the Germans, and the Soviets had more than 2,500,000 troops, 7,500 aircrafts, and 6,250 tanks while the Germans had about 1,000,000 troops, 2,200 aircrafts, and only 1,500 tanks. Many of the German soldiers at this point in the war were wounded, sick, or starving. Desperate for soldiers, the German army included young boys and old men. The battle started when the Soviets invaded near the Oder River close to Berlin and they quickly began to defeat the Germans outside Berlin and move into the city.
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April 20th is when the Soviets started to bomb Berlin. They had gone around the city to have it completely surrounded in a couple of days and this is when Hitler realized that he wasn’t going to win this battle. In desperation he tried to get a German army to Berlin from western Germany to save Berlin. With the city in rubble and ruins, tanks became useless and most of the fighting was either hand-to-hand or building-to-building. By April 30th, the Soviets went towards the center of the Berlin and the Germans were starting to run out of ammo. Adolf Hitler admitted to defeat and soon after committed suicide with his new wife, Eva Braun.
It was the night of May 1st when most of the Germans tried to escape out of the city and to the western front, but very few of them were successful. The next day, the generals for Germany surrendered to the Soviets. On May 7, 1945 the last of Nazi Germany’s leaders signed a surrender to the Ally Powers, ending the war in Europe. It was an outstanding victory for the Allies and the Soviet Union, but the battle took its toll on both sides. About 81,000 Soviet Union troops died and another 280,000 were injured while about 92,000 German troops died and another 220,000 injured. The city of Berlin turned to ruins and rubble after the battle and around 22,000 civilians there were killed. This battle left over a million German civilians without food, clean water, or homes. |