The Road to Berlin (116 page)

This grand design all too speedily came to grief. General Petrov’s 4th Ukrainian Front ran into difficulties at once, attacking on 10 March and colliding straightway with a well-organized German defence; poor weather conditions deprived Petrov of air support and the artillery failed to dent the German defensive positions. On the eighth day, 17 March, Petrov called a halt; his troops had advanced only a mile or so each day, were only about 6–7 miles into the German positions and no breach had been opened to introduce 5th Guards Mechanized Corps as a ‘mobile group’. The
Stavka
proceeded at once to vent its fury on Petrov and his command: Petrov himself and his Chief of Staff, Lt.-Gen. F.K. Korzhenevich, were relieved of their commands and replaced with Army General A.I. Yeremenko and Col.-Gen. L.M. Sandalov (as Chief of Staff). The
Stavka
accused Petrov of failing to make proper preparation for the offensive, of failing to inform
GHQ
of the inadequate planning, of ignoring measures to conceal his offensive and of failing to request further time to prepare.

Within a week, on 24 March, the 4th Ukrainian Front resumed its offensive after a 45-minute artillery barrage. 38th Army again launched the main attack, reinforced with 127th Mountain Troops and 101st Rifle Corps (bringing the total strength of the army to five corps, plus four independent tank brigades); 5th Mechanized Corps went on the
Stavka
’s orders to the 1st Ukrainian Front in order to stiffen 60th Army. Yeremenko took command and under his direction 38th Army battered its way forward, pushing German troops back to the Oder north-east of Moravska-Ostrava, fighting hundreds of actions amidst the stout and sturdy buildings which abounded; 1st Guards Army pushed on towards Friestadt but 18th Army failed to fight its way through the German defences in the Carpathians. In all the twelve days of the rejuvenated offensive, 4th Ukrainian Front had advanced a mere twenty miles in the direction of Moravska-Ostrava

At least the
Stavka
could calculate that the 4th Ukrainian Front operations, even if they had failed to achieve any substantial success, contributed to drawing off German strength from other sectors. At the same time Malinovskii’s 2nd Ukrainian Front produced some promising results: on the night of 25 March a dozen assault battalions from 53rd and 7th Guards Armies forced the river Hron across a ten-mile front and fell upon an unsuspecting enemy. Alert to this growing threat the German command threw in two divisions of the
Feldherrnhalle Panzer
corps, to which Malinovskii responded by committing Pliev’s 1st Guards Cavalry Mechanized Group (with its two cavalry divisions, six tank and two
SP
-gun regiments, all amounting to 83 tanks and 63
SP
guns). Driving fast and deep, with air support provided by Goryunov’s 5th Air Army, Pliev’s 1st Guards and
7th Guards Armies forced the Nitra and the Vah in turn, driving on Banska Bystrica and Trencin. By the evening of 1 April 25th Rifle Corps (7th Guards Army) was closing on Bratislava, though on receipt of partisan intelligence that the town was well fitted out for defence, Shumilov with 7th Guards decided on outflanking moves to south-east and north-east, assigning the final assault to 23rd Guards Rifle Corps (seconded from 46th Army). Faced with a rapidly changing situation, the
Stavka
on 1 April issued fresh orders to Malinovskii and 2nd Ukrainian Front, instructing him to continue operations north of the Danube with the object of striking in the direction of Malacky-Iiglava, capturing Bratislava no later than 5–6 April and moving on to the Nove Mesto–Malack–river Morava line; Malinovskii’s next objective would be Brno (together with Znojmo and Stokkerau), for which he was to use 1st Guards Cavalry Mechanized Group while he earmarked 46th Army (reinforced with 2nd Guards Mechanized Corps and 23rd Tank Corps transferred from 3rd Ukrainian Front) for the attack aimed at Bruck and Vienna—the latter to be carried out in co-operation with the right flank of 3rd Ukrainian Front. The final stage of Malinovskii’s Front operation involved driving north after the capture of Brno and linking up with 4th Ukrainian Front in the area of Olomouc, thereby isolating those German forces to the south-east and south of Moravska-Ostrava.

Tolbukhin in command of 3rd Ukrainian Front also received special
Stavka
orders on 1 April, specifying that 4th and 9th Guards Armies (with 6th Guards Tank Army) should reach the Tuln/Sankt-Polten/Lillienfeld line no later than 12–15 April, while 26th, 27th, 57th and 1st Bulgarian Armies in advance of these dates would capture Glognitz, Bruck, Graz, Maribor and then dig in along the Mürz, Mur and Drava river lines. While the main body of 2nd Ukrainian Front would attack in the direction of Brno and Bratislava, Petrushevskii’s 46th Army received orders to encircle Vienna from the east, while 4th and 9th Guards Armies swept in from the south and west. These same
Stavka
orders also extended Tolbukhin’s frontage on his right, which from 2400 hours on 1 April ran along a line which brought the southern reaches of Vienna into the operational zone of 3rd Ukrainian Front, an adjustment which obliged Tolbukhin to redeploy 4th Guards and align it with 46th Army.

While adding the final touches to the plan for the Soviet drive on Vienna, the
Stavka
also made some last-minute adjustments to the plan for the destruction of German forces in eastern Czechoslovakia, thereby synchronizing the operations of all four Ukrainian Fronts (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th). It was the lack of progress with 4th Ukrainian Front which produced the problem, for while 1st Ukrainian and 2nd Ukrainian had struck to some depth to the west, 4th Ukrainian had yet to crack the Moravska-Ostrava redoubt. On 3 April the
Stavka
issued its formal directive to Yeremenko at 4th Ukrainian Front, specifying the capture of Opava and Moravska-Ostrava as immediate objectives, followed by an attack in the direction of Olomouc to link up with 2nd Ukrainian Front; Malinovskii had already received corresponding orders (Directive No. 11051) to drive on Olomouc.
Taking no chances this time, the
Stavka
proceeded to reinforce 4th Ukrainian and handed over Kurochkin’s 60th Army from 1st Ukrainian Front to Yeremenko, bringing his total strength to 265,000 men, 6,000 guns and mortars, more than 300 tanks and
SP
guns, supported by 435 aircraft. Both of the assault armies, 60th and 38th, were reinforced with two artillery breakthrough divisions and a tank corps, a total of forty Soviet rifle divisions (and six aviation divisions) facing twenty German divisions with 300 tanks and 280 aircraft.

While Yeremenko made preparations for his offensive, Malinovskii and Tolbukhin struck out for Bratislava and Vienna. On Malinovskii’s Front, Soviet troops were astride the river Vah in a single day (1 April) and Pliev’s mobile group pressed on to Trnava and the ‘Little Carpathians’. While Pliev moved on Malacky and the Morava, swinging an encircling arm round Bratislava from the west, two Soviet divisions (409th Rifle and 4th Guards Parachute/25th Guards Rifle Corps) closed in on Bratislava from the north-east, followed on 3 April by 23rd Rifle Corps attacking from the east. During the night of 4 April Soviet riflemen and paratroopers began their final assault, joined in the morning by 23rd Corps and 19th Rifle Division moving along the bank of the Danube supported by the gunboats of the Danube Flotilla. At 1800 hours on 4 April what remained of the German garrison abandoned Bratislava and fell back behind the river Morava.

While Malinovskii’s men cleared Bratislava, Tolbukhin’s armies raced for Vienna, attacking along several axes: 4th Guards Army received orders to strike for the centre of the city and then advance towards Florisdorf, Kravchenko’s 6th Guards Tank Army (reinforced with 18th Tank Corps and 12th Engineer Brigade) was instructed to use 5th Guards Tank Corps to strike into the south-western sector of Vienna, while 9th Guards Mechanized Corps outflanked the city from the west in order to seal off the western and north-western escape routes. One corps (39th Guards) of 9th Guards Army would follow in the wake of Kravchenko’s tanks and join the assault on the south-western sector, while yet another corps (38th Guards) must sever the Vienna–Linz motor road and employ two divisions to secure the Soviet assault from the west; 37th Guards Corps (also from 9th Guards Army) was allocated to protect the open left flank of the main assault force.

Nothing like the formidable defensive systems of Buda and Pest existed in Vienna, but rearguard detachments of Sixth
SS Panzer
, with elements of
SS Wiking, Adolf Hitler
and 17th Infantry Division, set up frequent ambushes, mined roads and blew bridges in order to hold off Kravchenko’s armour. A stand of sorts was made on the river Leithe line, inflicting more losses on Soviet 6th Guards Tank Army and reducing some tank brigades to a mere 7–10 tanks, but Kravchenko pushed on towards Wiener Neustadt. Soviet infantry pushed in to the east and south of Vienna, while the armour tried to sweep round to the west only to find German resistance stiffening and the whole Soviet advance appreciably slowed. Inside the city, over Easter, fires spread in profusion and
streets became impassable with rubble after American bombing attacks. Baldur von Schirach,
Gauleiter
and newly appointed Defence Commissioner, duly declared Vienna a
Festung
even as party officials and Nazi sympathizers struggled to get clear of the city before the Russians broke in. Von Schirach called out the population to work on defences in the suburbs, digging trenches, barricading streets and setting up anti-tank barriers, though the Viennese at large showed less than enthusiasm for a bitter fight to the death involving the ruination of their city. An Austrian resistance movement—hidden under the code ‘0-5’—devised a plan to circumvent a desperate German defence of the city and managed to make contact with the Soviet command, which received the Austrians with obvious and unallayed suspicion, fearing a devious trap. On 5 April, for those privy to this desperate and complicated manoeuvre on the part of ‘0-5’, it seemed that the mission might well have succeeded, for the sky cleared of aircraft and the Soviet advance appeared to have halted abruptly, two conditions suggested by the Austrian emissaries to Tolbukhin.

It was not, however, Austrian persuasiveness but stiffening German resistance which slowed the Soviet columns. On the evening of 5 April Tolbukhin reviewed operations on his right flank, assigning 4th Guards Army to the eastern and south-eastern sectors of the city, and 9th Guards to an assault from the south as well as an outflanking movement to the west. Kravchenko’s tank army received orders to regroup, then to strike northwards in order to cut escape routes leading from the city in a north-westerly direction, and finally to assault the city from the west in conjunction with 9th Guards Army. The
Stavka
also took a hand, instructing Malinovskii to transfer 46th Army to the eastern bank of the Danube in order to outflank Vienna from the north, while Tolbukhin’s right-flank armies operated to the south of the Danube and completed their outflanking movements from the south-west. The Danube Flotilla promptly set about the task of ferrying some 72,000 men and more than 500 guns to this new deployment.

The Soviet assault on the city opened on the morning of 6 April. Reinforced with 1st Guards Mechanized Corps and operating with 39th Guards Rifle Corps (9th Guards Army), 4th Guards fought its way towards and into the western and southern outskirts of Vienna, starting the first of many street battles fought in winding streets, across small canals and ditches or through factory buildings. Kravchenko’s tanks ground on, with 9th Guards Mechanized Corps sweeping round the city to the west and south-west, after which the corps swung round and launched its own attack from a westerly direction. But losses were biting deep: 46th Guards Tank Brigade making now for the western suburbs mustered a mere thirteen tanks and the heavy
SP
-gun regiment (the 364th) sent as reinforcement could only provide 4–5 ISU-152s. With a reconnaissance detachment in the lead, 46th Brigade, consisting of thirteen tanks, four
SP
guns and twenty-six riflemen mounted on the tanks, crossed the Wiener Wald and entered the western suburbs of the Austrian capital, advancing towards the West Station.
For the moment, however, the Soviet tank troops found their way to the centre barred.

By 8 April the fighting moved closer to the centre. Together with the Arsenal, the South and East Stations were in Russian hands; 5th Guards Tank Corps regrouped in the northern suburbs and attacked to the south-east in order to link up with 1st Guards Mechanized and 4th Guards Army, fighting their way in from the south and south-west. Attempts to set up a hasty defence to the west of Vienna—whence the Russians had appeared as if by magic—failed hopelessly. Members of the Austrian resistance tried to guide Soviet tanks into the centre of the city, others took up rifles to fire at German troops and beleaguered civilians angrily fended off troops trying to set up strong-points in houses and basements. In an attempt to smother this mutiny, Gestapo officers and
SS
troops activated their grim procedures of public hangings, but nothing could now stem the panic, disorder and milling flight.

In an attempt to cover the withdrawal of their tanks across the Danube and the Danube canal, German squads fought fierce street battles with Soviet infantry in the area of the Ringstrasse, with Soviet gunners dragging their guns into the second storeys of buildings in order to fire through windows or gaps in the walls. Artillery and mortar bombardment set scores of buildings ablaze, inflicting heavy damage on the Ring itself, Kärntnerstrasse, the Graben and gutting the Burgtheater and the Opera House. In the centre 20th Guards Rifle Corps (4th Guards Army) fought its way along the Danube through the Prater, meeting heavy resistance as German units tried to block any Soviet advance to the Danube bridges and the sole escape route. The Soviet 46th Army was also pressing down from the north, adding a fresh menace and giving frenzied urgency to this last German defensive effort. During the night of 11 April 4th Guards Army forced the Danube canal and fought a final savage battle on the island created by the Danube and the Danube canal. Only the massive structure of the
Reichsbrücke
remained intact, held until the bitter end to bring the German survivors to the northern bank of the Danube. Behind them Vienna burned, the dead lying out in streets choked with charred and crippled tanks or smashed equipment. At 1400 hours on 13 April the Soviet command declared Vienna cleared of enemy troops and the
Stavka
simultaneously issued fresh operational directives to Tolbukhin’s 3rd Ukrainian Front: the centre and left flank were to move in the direction of Graz, while the right flank invested Sankt-Pölten, whereupon 9th Guards Army was brought into reserve and deployed in the wooded area to the west and south-west of Vienna. Kravchenko’s 6th Guards Tank Army reverted to Malinovskii’s 2nd Ukrainian Front, while Tolbukhin acquired operational control of the Danube Flotilla.