The Battle of Remagen was a World War II battle between the forces of the United States of America and Nazi Germany in and around the German town of Remagen, particularly centred on the Ludendorff Bridge, the short-term reason why the Americans were fighting the Germans in Remagen.
The fighting resulted in the capture of the German Ludendorff Bridge by American forces and allowed the Western Allies to commence their first major crossing of the River Rhine the last natural line of defence that the Germans thought could be used to substantially hold up the Western Allied advance. The bridge allowed, for the first time, armour to cross from the west bank of the River Rhine, into Germany proper whereas before, crossings had been limited to small infantry reconnaissance patrols by boats or maybe by pontoon bridges. Importantly, the battle convinced the Allied high command in Western Europe that they could envelop the German industrial area of the Ruhr as opposed to focusing primarily on the British general Bernard Montgomery's plan, Operation Plunder, which would bring the British 21st Army Group across the River Rhine into northern Germany.
The battle started on 7 March 1945, when the American troops entered Remagen, on the south side of the river. The German soldiers assigned the task of blowing up the bridge were on the north side of the river. They wanted to wait until all those Germans, who were on the south side of the river, to cross the bridge before they destroyed it. Just as the Americans approached the bridge the Germans set off the explosives, but for some unknown reason, most of the explosives failed to detonate, and the damage to the bridge, while significant, could still be quickly repaired. After the Americans captured the bridge, the German attempted to destroy the bridge through a variety of methods, including air attacks by Me 262 jet fighter-bombers, V-2 balistic missiles and frogmen trying to implant explosives. The battle ended on 25 March 1945 when the American forces started to break out of their bridgehead and advance into the rest of Germany, thus destroying any chance that the Germans had to eradicate the bridgehead.
The bridge collapsed, due to structural damage, on 17 March, after six US divisions were in place in the bridgehead. By then the Americans had already built 3 pontoon bridges, about 1,000 yards down river from the bridge. The German soldiers who were assigned the task of blowing up the bridge were immediately court-martialed by the Nazis for their failure to blow up the bridge. They were convicted, sentenced to death, and were executed within four days.
The bridge was not rebuilt after the war. However, the towers for the bridge are still there, and can be visited.
The battle was pictured in a novel The Bridge at Remagen by Ken Hechler, later adapted into a film The Bridge at Remagen.