By Phil Kohn
Dedicated to the memory of his father, GM3 Walter Kohn, U.S. Navy Armed Guard, USNR, and all men and women who have answered the country’s call in time of need. Phil can be contacted at ww2remembered@yahoo.com.
The Second Shock Army of the Soviet 2nd Belorussian Front captures Danzig, along with 45 U-boats and 10,000 prisoners, on March 30, 1945. In Austria, Soviet troops enter the outskirts of Vienna. The Red Army’s 2nd Ukrainian Front is approaching Bratislava, the capital of the Slovak Republic, a client state of Nazi Germany.
Gen. Eisenhower on March 31 broadcasts a demand over the radio for the Germans to surrender. In Asia, the British 26th Division reaches the Burma Road at Kyaukme, about 69 miles northeast of Mandalay, marking the end of eight months of fighting. The Burma Road is now clear of Japanese forces from Mandalay to Lashio.
“Operation Iceberg” — the invasion of Okinawa — takes place on April 1, 1945. The U.S. Tenth Army — a combined Army-Marine joint force comprising the Army’s 7th, 27th, 77th and 96th Infantry Divisions, along with the 1st, 2nd and 6th Marine Divisions — with 1,457 ships in support, invades Okinawa, which is 325 miles from Japan. Okinawa, in the Ryukyu Islands, is one of Japan’s southern prefectures. The Allies intend to use the island as the leaping-off point for an invasion of the Japanese main islands. To their surprise, 50,000 troops land on the western shore unopposed and establish an eight-mile bridgehead. Awaiting them, though, are some 130,000 Japanese troops well-entrenched in concealed positions and caves. Complicating the situation are the 450,000 civilians who live on the 70-mile-long by 10-mile-wide island. In Europe, the Soviet 1st Ukrainian Front captures Sopron, Hungary, a vital road junction between Budapest and Vienna.
The Red Army on April 2 launches its “Vienna Offensive” against German forces in and around the Austrian capital. Meanwhile, in Germany, German Army B, in the Ruhr, is surrounded by Allied forces. The first U.S. units reach the east coast of Okinawa.
U.S. Gen. of the Army Douglas MacArthur is appointed commander-in-chief of land forces in the Pacific on April 3. (“Island-hopping” Army and Marine amphibious forces remain under U.S. Navy command.) The Soviet 2nd Ukrainian Front advances close to Vienna. Soviet military authorities and Austrian resistance leader Carl Szokoll confer about co-operation in the Red Army’s offensive against Vienna. Vienna-born Szokoll — incredibly, a major in the Wehrmacht while secretly a member of the resistance in the Third Reich — is one of the few conspirators in the July 20 Plot to assassinate Hitler who manages to elude arrest and punishment. Thousands of prisoners at the Buchenwald concentration camp in central Germany are forced to evacuate the camp and march away from the Allied advance.
The Soviets complete the liberation of Hungary on April 4. Bratislava, the capital of the Slovak Republic, is overrun by the Red Army. The Ohrdruf death camp, near Weimar, Germany, is liberated by Allied troops. The U.S. 90th Infantry Division, part of the U.S. Third Army, captures Merkers, in central Germany, roughly midway between Leipzig and Frankfurt am Main. Following up on local rumors, the troops open up a sealed salt mine nearby and discover the Nazi gold reserves (250 tons of gold bars and coins), currency (32.5 billion Reichsmarks and 98 million French francs) and thousands of crates of artworks, much of which has been stolen or otherwise looted.
In northern Italy, the Allies begin the Po Valley Campaign on April 5. The U.S.S.R. informs Japan that it does not intend to renew the non-aggression treaty that the two nations had signed in 1941. The new Czechoslovak government demands that ethnic Germans and Hungarians be expelled from the country.
On April 6, preceded by a tremendous artillery and air bombardment, the 3rd Belorussian Front — with four armies, 137,000 men, 530 tanks and 2,400 aircraft — begins its final assault against Königsberg, in East Prussia, which is held by 35,000 German troops. The Japanese battleship Yamato, accompanied by a cruiser and eight destroyers sets sail on a suicide mission, codenamed “Floating Chrysanthemum I.” Yamato carries only enough fuel to get to Okinawa. The plan is to beach the vessel and fight any Allied forces in the area using its shipboard armament. In Austria, the battle for Vienna begins. On Bougainville, in the Solomon Islands, the Battle of Slater’s Knoll ends in a decisive Australian victory.
The Battle of the East China Sea begins on April 7 as aircraft from U.S. Navy Task Force 58 sink the Japanese super-battleship Yamato in a three-hour battle, 60 miles southeast of Japan. Japanese casualties are reported as 2,488 sailors killed, the cruiser Yahagi and four destroyers sunk, and 58 aircraft destroyed. In Tokyo, Kantarō Suzuki is named prime minister of Japan, to replace Kuniaki Koiso, who resigned following the threat to Okinawa and Japan’s latest losses. A former highly decorated admiral in the Japanese Navy, Suzuki has opposed Japan’s war with the United States both prior to and during the hostilities.
British paratroops on April 8 drop into the eastern portion of the Netherlands, to clear the way for Canadian ground troops who are moving northward. In Germany, the British Second Army reaches Hildesheim, while the U.S. Seventh Army captures Pforzheim, near the upper Rhine. Heavy fighting is reported in the center of Vienna.
In East Prussia on April 9, the Battle of Königsberg ends in a Soviet victory. Meanwhile, at Kiel, north of Hamburg, Germany, on the Baltic Sea, heavy bombing by the RAF destroys the German pocket battleship (heavy cruiser) Admiral Scheer. The British Eighth Army launches an offensive in Italy with a 1,500-gun bombardment of the German positions east of Bologna. The RAF provide air support with 1,800 planes. The U.S. Fifth Army begins its own offensive toward Bologna and the Po River valley. In Yugoslavia, German Army Group E is now completely isolated from the main German forces, but continues its struggle against Tito’s Partisan forces.
Buchenwald concentration camp, in Germany, is liberated by American troops on April 10. Hanover falls to the U.S. XIII Corps, part of the U.S. Ninth Army. In England, Winston Churchill reveals British Empire casualty figures up to this point as 306,984 killed. Total casualties are 1,126,802, with the merchant navy losing 34,161 dead or captured. Civilian casualties are 59,793 killed and 84,749 injured. The RAF attacks Kiel, Germany, again, while the U.S. 8th Air Force launches its heaviest raid to date — 1,232 bombers — against Berlin.
On April 11, Japanese kamikaze attacks on American naval vessels continue during the Battle of Okinawa. The battleship USS Missouri is hit, and the carrier USS Enterprise is damaged. The Soviets reach the center of Vienna, capturing the parliament and town hall buildings. Vessels of the British Royal Navy in the Indian Ocean open fire on Japanese positions at Sabang, on Sumatra, in the East Indies. Chile declares war on Japan. Col.-Gen. Heinrich von Vietinghoff, commander-in-chief of Army Group C (all German forces in Italy), decides that he will not obey Hitler’s scorched-earth policy. Vietinghoff is also privy and a party to the ongoing secret negotiations in Switzerland between SS Lt.-Gen. Karl Wolff and U.S. representative Allen Dulles regarding an early surrender of German forces in Italy.
U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt dies suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage at his home in Warm Springs, Georgia, on April 12, at the age of 63. Vice President Harry S. Truman assumes the presidency. In one of his most-controversial decisions of the war, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces, orders the Western Allies to slow their advances and stop at the River Elbe, thereby allowing the Red Army to capture Berlin. (Some historians say Eisenhower wished to limit Allied casualties by avoiding the vicious house-to-house street-fighting that would be faced if troops entered Berlin. However, Eisenhower himself tells journalists that there are three reasons for standing on the Elbe: Firstly, his armies are already well beyond the line of the Western occupation zones that had been agreed upon with the Soviets. Why take casualties for land that would have to be handed over? Secondly, he had always worried about his troops meeting the Soviets on the run around a corner. He thought it safer to meet them with a broad river between. And, finally, he said: “Berlin is only a political objective, not a military objective.”)
