Killing Patton

With the fall of Berlin now imminent, top Nazis flee the city, including head of the SS, Heinrich Himmler, Hermann Goering, and Chief of the General Staff, General Alfred Jodl. Hitler though has decided to stay, either because a miraculous victory might still occur, or to preserve the myth that he went down fighting. Eva Braun, Hitler’s mistress, organizes parties in the Fuhrer bunker.

Meanwhile, Stalin directs his armies to conduct the final assault on Berlin. Marshal Georgy K. Zhukov, mastermind of the Soviet victory at Stalingrad, has “the honor of hoisting the Soviet flag atop the German Reichstag” (324). In the Battle of Berlin, two and a half million Soviet soldiers encircle the city, outnumbering the Germans three to one in men, tanks, aircraft, and artillery. German defenders consist only of the Hitler Youth children and Volkssturm militias, poorly equipped conscripts previously judged too old, young, or infirm to fight. Civilians must bear the final onslaught without electricity or gas, and with severely limited medical and food supplies.

On April 30, with the Soviets now in central Berlin, Hitler commits suicide.