Race to Berlin

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The Race to Berlin refers to the competition of Allied generals during the final months of World War II to enter Berlin first.

In early 1945, with the war coming to an obvious conclusion and the Eastern Front, Soviet leader Josef Stalin purposely set his two generals Georgy Zhukov and Ivan Kunov in a race to capture Berlin. The two men and their separately commanded armies were pited against one another, ensuring that they would drive their men as fast and a far as possible to a quick victory. This led to a climax in the bloody Battle of Berlin

The Soviet advance and ultimate capture of the German capital was virtually unopposed by the Western Allies. In order to attempt to avoid a diplomatic issue, Allied General Dwight Eisenhower had ordered his forces into the south of Germany to cut off and wipe out other pieces of the German Army. The failure of Operation Market Garden in late 1944 may have played a key role in this decision however.

The decision to leave Eastern Germany and the city of Berlin to the Red Army had eventually serious repercussions as the Cold War emerged and expanded in the post war era.