Army Group Weichsel commented on these battles:
The enemy has mounted strong attacks supported by tanks and ground-attack aircraft against the encircled 9th Army from the east and north. The virtually total failure of air supply has so weakened this bravely fighting army that the successful execution of its task has become questionable should re-supply tonight fail. V Corps has connected with the right-hand attacking group at Mückendorf in its attempt to break out. The left-hand group has thrust through the woods north-east of Baruth. With a view to preventing a breakthrough to the west, the Soviets have also made some strong counterattacks here. They were able to break through the left-hand thrust from the south near Massow forest warden’s lodge and at the autobahn and to penetrate the right-hand thrust at Teupitz from the north. General Busse reports: ‘Holding on and fighting to the last goes without saying for the 9th Army.’[20]
Nevertheless, Busse’s words, like other similar bombastic messages in the Nazi vein by senior German officers during the course of the war, could not disguise the failure of his first attempt at a break-out.
During the night of 25/26 April, Hitler repeated his efforts to get both armies to come to the relief of Berlin. In an order to the 12th Army he demanded: ‘Disregarding your flanks and rear, your attack groups are to act with firmness and determination to form keenly coordinated thrusts.’ To achieve this, it was ordered:
1. The 12th Army with its southern group, abandoning the security of the Wittenberg area, is to reach the line Beelitz–Ferch, thus cutting off the rear communications of the Soviet 4th Tank Army advancing on Brandenburg, and at the same time to pursue the attack eastwards to unite with 9th Army.
2. 9th Army, while holding on to its present eastern front between the Spreewald and Fürstenwalde, is to attack by the shortest route to the west and link up with 12th Army.
3. Once both armies have combined, they are to push northwards and destroy the enemy formations in the southern part of Berlin and establish a solid link with Berlin.[21]
EIGHT
Preparing the Break-Out
26 APRIL 1945
Elements of the von Luck and Pipkorn battlegroups continued fighting around Baruth during the early hours of 26 April, and some of the dug-in Stalin tanks were blown up by specially detailed units, but there was still no follow-up by other units coming from the pocket. Some groups occupied Mückendorf and the woods around it, but concentrated artillery fire prevented any further progress against the 395th Rifle Division, which had moved up from the Golssen area. Shells bursting in the treetops caused many casualties among the German troops and accompanying civilians.
Hans Lehmann described events in Baruth that day:
The Baruth Schloss was occupied by Waffen-SS and Wehrmacht troops of units mainly made up from stragglers on 25/26 April 1945. Heavy fighting broke out, most of the damage coming from Soviet mortars, artillery and tanks. Aircraft were also active over the northern part of the town and the woods. German supply canisters were even dropped on 26 April, and a Ju 52 carrying ammunition and Panzerfausts crashed on the Mühlenberg [hill] that night, having apparently been shot down.
Two temporary cemeteries were established for the fallen Soviet soldiers, one at the crossroads outside the town cemetery and one in front of the Schloss. The remains from both were transferred to the Soviet War Cemetery on the B96 in 1947. There were about 400 Soviet soldiers in the cemetery at the Schloss.[1]
Counterattacks by two other Soviet divisions into the left flank of the German forces caused the latter to split and threw them back into the woods north-east of Baruth, while an attack by 4th Bomber Air Corps with 55 machines at midday had a catastrophic effect. Repeated strikes on the approach routes by 1st and 2nd Air Assault Corps, using between eight and ten aircraft at a time and flying some 500 missions, brought further heavy casualties and chaos to the break-out traffic. In the end these troops were cut off, surrounded and mainly destroyed, although some of the tanks are said to have reached as far as Sperenberg.[2] According to Soviet accounts, this break-out attempt resulted in 5,000 prisoners, 40 tanks and SPGs destroyed and the capture of nearly 200 guns and mortars.
Apparently surprised by the strength and aggressiveness of this attack, Marshal Koniev took further measures to cope with all eventualities. One of these was an attack towards Münchehofe, aiming to penetrate the pocket from the south. More troops were fed in to strengthen the blockade along the Luckenwalde–Märkisch Buchholz front, especially north of the Hammerfliess stream and along the autobahn. The 149th and 253rd Rifle Divisions took up positions along the autobahn from Teupitz to Terpt (due west of Lübbenau), thus also covering the road west to Luckau, and the three divisions of 28th Army’s 3rd Guards Rifle Corps occupied the Lindenbrück–Baruth–Dornswalde stretch of woods immediately west of the autobahn. Elements of 3rd and 4th Guards Tank Armies were also deployed, the 3rd Guards Tank Army contributing 71st Mechanized Brigade, an SPG regiment and a mortar battalion to the Rehagen–Neuhof sector around the Gross Wünsdorfer See facing south, while 68th Independent Guards Tank Brigade deployed along the Kummersdorf Gut–Baruth front facing north-east.
In this way three defensive cordons were established to a depth of 15–20 kilometres. The concentration of armour on the Zossen–Baruth road also included a mobile reserve. Every break-out attempt from now on would be even more difficult and complicated for the German troops.[3]
Busse’s article on 9th Army’s last battle was written in Soviet captivity and published ten years after the event. Of 23 pages, only three are devoted to the pocket and break-out phase and contain chronological errors, dating the main break-out as 26 April instead of 28 April, and what he wrote of 24 April clearly, and totally unfairly, refers to the von Luck/Pipkorn attempt of 25 Apriclass="underline"
The first attempt on 24 April to slip away from the constrictions of the pocket to the west failed. The armoured troops committed to the gap near Halbe did not wait for the arrival of the infantry, as they had been strictly ordered to, but drove on for their own safety. So the Russians closed the breach before the infantry could prop it open and get through. The author has unfortunately forgotten the names of the commanders and units who left their comrades in the lurch on this occasion.[4]
It seems that Busse was trying to cover up his own inadequacy here, for he himself was responsible for issuing the relevant orders, and for organising the follow-up by the infantry that failed to materialise. He was also to blame for not allowing the armoured troops to take ammunition and fuel reserves with them to sustain their action. His failure to have a proper grip on the situation may have been partly due to his headquarters being on the move from the Scharmützelsee railway station to the Hammer forestry office during the night, but still does not excuse him.[5]
SS-Second Lieutenant Porsch of Tank-Hunting Company Dora II continued his account:
21
Förster/Lakowski,