The Battle Of Berlin: April 22nd 1945 – The Red Army Grinds Into Berlin’s Suburbs

Sunday April 22nd 1945 had been the original date outlined in Stalin’s plans for the fall of Berlin – coinciding with what would have been Vladimir Lenin’s birthday.

The troops of commander Georgy Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front, however, were largely still only on the city’s periphery and grinding forwards slowly.

Zhukov had underestimated not only the persistence of the German defenders at the Seelow Heights, that had pushed back his advance by three days, but also the network of streams and canals that crisscrossed the eastern approach to Berlin and the historic territory of the Mark Brandenburg.

Now faced with the task of moving into Berlin, he would command his soldiers to attack in five incisive movements:

While moving into the urban city area, Zhukov was also working to throw a noose around the Nazi capital – restricting movement in and out of the city and denying the defenders any reinforcements.

The spearheads of both the 3rd and 5th Shock Armies, however, would spend much of the day preparing themselves for the street fighting role that was to follow, with artillery shelling the city, but the troops making little effort to push the line forward.

By the end of the day the 1st Belorussian offensive would move into the outskirts of the city, the districts of Weissensee, Pankow, and Lichtenberg in the east. With additional forces crossing the River Havel north of Spandau, while fierce fighting took place in Köpenick throughout the day.

To the south of the city, troops of Ivan Konev’s 1st Ukrainian front were pivoting towards the Teltow Canal near Klein-Machnow to establish the lower half of Zhukov’s noose.

Having travelled nearly three times further than Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front, Konev’s 1st Ukrainian Front was now threatening to reach the Red Army’s final objective – the Reichstag – first.