April 2, 1945: On the western front, the British 2nd Army continues its advance north of the Ruhr River. Munster is taken. The Canadian 1st Army also begins to move north and east from between Nijmegen and Emmerich, attacking toward Arnhem, Doesburg, and Zutphen. US 9th Army is attacking around Muenster and Neuhaus and , along with US 1st Army, tightening its grip on the Ruhr pocket. Patton’s US 3rd Army attacks into Kassel, Grimmenthal, and Vachdorf and mops up previously bypassed pockets. US 7th Army continues attacking Aschaffenburg while pushing toward Wuerzburg, Marienburg, Koenigshofen, Homburg, Heilbronn, and Bockingen. French 1st Army expands its bridgehead and conducts new assault across the Rhine near Leimersheim.
Above Germany, US 15th Air Force attacks rail yards and bridges with nearly 600 bombers while RAF Bomber Command sends 54 aircraft to attack Berlin overnight and 50 aircraft to attack Magdeburg overnight.
On the eastern front - with assistance from Bulgarian units, 57th Army of Soviet 3rd Ukrainian Front captures the main Hungarian oil production area near Magykanizsa, while in Slovakia, Kremnica is captured. Troops from the 46th Army of Soviet 2nd Ukrainian Front captures the Hungarian industrial zone of Mosonmagyarovar. 6th Guards Tank Army of 3rd Ukrainian Front reaches Lake Neuseidler. Soviet troops capture Wiener Neustadt, Eisenstadt, Neunkirchen, and Gloggnitz in southern Germany, and are now threatening Vienna. Soviet artillery continues pounding Koenigsberg in preparation for major assault.
Round-the-clock work on a vast new Fuehrerbunker southeast of Weimar near the Ohrdruf slave labor camp in eastern Germany come to an end when 9,000 inmates are forced-marched to the parent Buchenwald death camp 32 miles away. It was from this still unfinished headquarters that Hitler and other Nazi leaders had hoped to strike a deal with the western Allies to join the remnants of the Wehrmacht in fighting the “Jewish-Bolshevik†Soviet Union.
Folke Bernadotte meets with Heinrich Himmler at the SS Hohenlychen sanatorium in Lychen, Germany; Himmler is unsuccessful in convincing Bernadotte to help seek a peace between Germany and the Western Allies. Meanwhile, Martin Bormann orders Germany to fight until victorious or until death.
In his bunker, Hitler predicts the complete destruction of Germany
In Italy, Operation Roast continues as British 8th Army successfully captures the bridgehead west of Lake Comacchio. Overhead, US 12th Air Force aircraft attack transportation lines, supply depots, methanol plants, and other targets in the Po valley and elsewhere in northern Italy, including Fornovo di Taro, San Michele all'Adige, Colle Isarco, and other targets.
Pictured: 11th Armored Division tanks entering Bavaria, Germany, enjoying the great roads.; British 6th Airborne Division crosses the Dortmund-Ems Canal ten miles south of Osnabruk. Ittenbach, Germany.: the ceremony for Major General Maurice Rose, who was killed in action on March 30, 1945, in the advance on Paderborn, Germany. Only 45 years old at the time, had led his 3rd Armored "Spearhead" Division through France and Belgium, and then becoming the first Allied ground force to invade German soil in WWII. Later in 1945, his body was re-interned in Margraten, The Netherlands, as all American servicemen buried in Germany were re-interned outside of Germany; Situation map from April 2, 1945.
