The Red Army was increasingly driving the German hordes out of
this country. It was now clear to all that the aggressor's days were numbered.
What was also very clear, however, was that the enemy would keep fighting
to the end… Realizing this, the Allied powers unanimously agreed that unconditional
German surrender was the only way to end the war.
On June 6, a joint Anglo-American and Canadian force led by General
Dwight Eisenhower landed in Normandy, northern France signaling the start
of the much-debated Operation Overlord. The Germans who had long anticipated
the operation, had painstakingly fortified the coastline but the Allies
managed to mislead the Nazis as to where exactly their main landing was
going to happen. The Germans expected them at the Strait of Dover, the
narrowest part of the English Channel, but the allies came ashore on the
sand beaches of Normandy. Nearly 3 million men backed by 10,000 aircraft
and about a thousand warships took part in the operation whose main goal
was to establish a bridgehead for the main forces. By June 20 this foothold
had already been gained and the Second front finally opened.
In June 1944 the Soviet troops in Byelorussia launched Operation
Bagration. A 100,000-strong German force was eventually encircled and the
Soviet troops rushed into a 400 kilometer opening in the German front.
By the start of the general Russian offensive which came at the end of
the operation, the Soviet territory had almost entirely been liberated
from the Nazi invaders. The Red Army moved into East Prussia and Poland…
In August the US and French troops landed in the south of France.
The Allied offensive coincided with the start of an anti-Nazi uprising.
Soon after, Paris was in rebel hands and when the allies closed in on the
city, the besieged German garrison surrendered. By the year's end, France
and the larger part of Belgium were already liberated. The allied armies
had reached the German border. Unfortunately, the joy of the French could
not be shared by their famous countryman, Antoin de Saint-Exupery. The
talented author and airman perished without a trace during a reconnaissance
flight.
The German and Japanese military setbacks in 1944 further undermined
those countries' military regimes. In Germany things came to a head with
an attempt on Hitler's life carried out by a group of high-ranking Army
officers frustrated by the Fuhrer's refusal to consider surrender and make
peace with the West. On July 20 Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg placed a
bomb concealed in his briefcase under the table during a conference at
Hitler's headquarters in East Prussia. By chance, however, Hitler, although
injured, was not among those killed getting away with minor burns and a
contusion. The masterminds of the failed plot were quickly arrested and,
after a brief probe, 5,000 people, including 56 Generals and a Field Marshal,
were executed. Four Field Marshals took their lives to avoid arrest. The
plotters included the head of Hitler's intelligence and counterintelligence
service, Admiral Wilhelm Kanaris who, like others, was hanged at the Frussenberg
detention canter. The uncovering of the plot against Hitler led to a fresh
new clampdown on dissent. Before long all the jailed anti-fascists were
effectively killed off, among them the outstanding politicians Ernst Thaelman
who had led the German Communist party since 1925 and twice run for presidenship..
After spending more than 11 years behind bars, Thaelman was ultimately
executed at the ill-famed Buchenwald death camp.
By the end of the year Germany was already tattering on the brink
of a catastrophe. The Allied troops had reached the Rhine, but the Wehrmacht
was still going strong with newly-developed FAU missiles falling down on
London and millions more Germans being called up into the army ranks. Meanwhile,
non-stop allied bombings had reduced the life of ordinary Germans to one
big nightmare and 135,000 people died in a single day in the devastating
carpet bombings of Dresden. Hitler and his henchmen, however, were determined
to hold out to the end. In December the German High Command launched its
last abortive counterstroke in the Ardennes. Cutting about a hundred kilometers
deep into the allied lines, the German offensive fizzled but proved once
again that the generally vanquished Wehrmacht was still strong enough to
be reckoned with .
THE 20th CENTURY:YEAR AFTER YEAR series
of historical programs is prepared by Vladimir Zhamkin.
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