World Battlefronts: BATTLE OF GERMANY: Fight or Fizzle?

• Share

In his report to the nation last week President Roosevelt emphasized the existence not only of strategic integration but of tactical, day-by-day coordination between the western Allies and the Red armies. Britain, the U.S. and Russia are fighting on opposite fringes of one great battleground, and they are fighting one great battle.

Barring a sudden internal collapse of the Reich, it has long been apparent that the last great battle of Germany would be fought between the Oder and the Rhine (TIME, Aug. 28). Last week U.S. troops moved up to the Rhine north of Cologne. Marshal Zhukov had been waiting for four weeks on the Oder, opposite Berlin. When the western and eastern armies meet, the Germans north of the junction line can be pinned against the sea and liquidated with relative ease.

The fight in the south may be tougher. Allied victory there is sure, but the shape of victory depends to some extent on the Germans' choice. They may put up a prolonged display of Götterdämmerung fireworks in the mountains of Bavaria and Austria; or they may fizzle out like a wet cannon-cracker.

For the first time, General Eisenhower broadcast an appeal to the German officer corps: "The end is merely a question of time. . . . We cannot expect the German officer to do anything . . . contrary to his honor or his country's interest. It is in Germany's interest to ... end . . . this useless bloodshed. The decision is up to the German officer."