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Surrender
Parade of the Generals
On July 17, 1944, the captured generals were driven through the streets of Moscow, a Soviet propaganda coup called the “Parade of the Generals.” Among the highest ranked were generals of the Paul Völckers and Gollwitzer, but also Lieutenant General Hans Traut . The generals were served spoiled food, so that many suffered during the several hours of torture on foot through the city from diarrhea and were further humiliated by self-defilement.

Post War Germany

British Field Marshal Sir Bernard “Monty” Montgomery (17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976) decorates Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Rokossovsky (21 December 1896 – 3 August 1968) with a Knight Commander of The Most Honourable Order of the Bath (K.C.B.) at the Hindenburg Platz near Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, 12 July 1945, while other Soviet generals are waiting for their turn.

British Field Marshal Sir Bernard “Monty” Montgomery (17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976) decorates The Deputy Supreme Commander in Chief of the Red Army, Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Zhukov (1 December 1896 – 18 June 1974) with the sash of the Knight Grand Cross of The Most Honourable Order of the Bath (G.C.B.) at the Hindenburg Platz near Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, 12 July 1945.

British Field Marshal Sir Bernard “Monty” Montgomery (17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976) decorates Soviet generals at the Hindenburg Platz near Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, 12 July 1945. The Deputy Supreme Commander in Chief of the Red Army, Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Zhukov (1 December 1896 – 18 June 1974), the Commander of the British 21st Army Group, Field Marshal Sir Bernard Montgomery, Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Rokossovsky (21 December 1896 – 3 August 1968) and General of the Army Vasily Sokolovsky (21 July 1897 – 10 May 1968) of the Red Army leave the Brandenburg Gate after the ceremony. Zhukov (Commander of 1st Belorussian Front), on Montgomerys left, was presented with the sash of the Knight Grand Cross of The Most Honourable Order of the Bath (G.C.B.), while Rokossovsky (Commander of 2nd Belorussian Front), on Montgomery right, was made a Knight Commander of The Most Honourable Order of the Bath (K.C.B.). Sokolovsky (Deputy Commander of 1st Belorussian Front), in the background between Montgomery and Rokossovsky was made a Knight Commander of The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (K.B.E.). The same was Colonel General Mikhail Malinin (28 December 1893 – 24 January 1960) who is standing just behind Rokossovsky.

With such vast destruction, there was a severe shortage of apartments and living space in Germany immediately after the war. Many Germans had to live in Nissenhütten (in 1946). Others hold up in their largely destroyed homes. This particular camp was the temporary home of the German soldiers who had returned from the front.

For many modernist city planners, the destruction in Germany. In both East and West Germany, planners set about creating a “break” from the past. Pictured her is the monumental boulevard Karl Marxallee (originally Stalinallee) in East Berlin. The demonstrators are marching on the occasion of Stalin’s death in 1953.

Even during World War II, the Nazi planners began to move around. Moderately so called for a departure from the medieval city centers which had dominated Germany for centuries. The results were not always pretty. Pictured here is Germany’s first high-rise apartment complex, Hamburg’s Grindelberg, built in 1957.
Return to Germany – Release from P.O.W. Camps
Bombing Photos

In a seemingly endless catalog of annihilation, Berlin, Cologne, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Hamburg, Kiel, Lubeck, Munster, Munich, Frankfurt, Wurzburg, Mainz, Nuremberg, Xanten, Worms, Brunswick, Hanover, Freiburg and Dresden were all devastated. This image shows a view of the city of Mainz from its cathedral.

Taken in 1943, this image shows a view of the destroyed city from Hanover’s market church church. The entire country was buried under rubble – more than 400 million cubic meters of it alone. Additional damaged buildings were to be demolished, and still others were destroyed to make way for reconstruction.

After the war, a debate broke out in Germany over whether to rebuild exact copies of old buildings or to radically depart from pre-war Germany. Many felt that it was not. Others felt that radical modernism ignored centuries of pre-war German history. Some projects, like the New Museum in Berlin, pictured here after a 1943 bombing raid.
Color Photos

Beginning on the night of February 13, 1945, more than 1,200 heavy bombers dropped nearly 4,000 tons of high-explosive and incendiary bombs on the city in four successive raids. An estimated 25,000 people were killed in the bombings and the firestorm that raged afterward. More than 75,000 dwellings were destroyed, along with unique monuments of Baroque architecture in the historic city center. The scale of the death and destruction, coming so late in the war, along with significant questions about the legitimacy of the targets destroyed have led to years of debate about whether the attack was justified.

The day after his official surrender, German Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring (center, Oberbefehlshaber Heeresgruppe Süd) poses with American Major General Maxwell D. Taylor (right, Commander of 101st Airborne Division) and Brigadier General Gerald J. Higgins (left, Assistant Commander 101st Airborne Division) at Berchtesgaden, Germany, May 10, 1945. Kesselring surrendered to an American major at Saalfelden, near Salzburg, in Austria on 9 May 1945. He was taken to see Major General Taylor, who treated him courteously, allowing him to keep his weapons and field marshal’s baton, and to visit the Eastern Front headquarters of Heeresgruppe Mitte and Süd at Zeltweg and Graz unescorted! Taylor then arranged for Kesselring and his staff to move into a hotel at Berchtesgaden.