The ETO

bigpigeon.us webpage WWII - Germany > ETO > Rhineland 1945, updated by RAC 17 May 2022.  Incomplete.

By the end of January 1945, Germany forces had given up their gains from the massive Ardennes counteroffensive of December and retreated back to the defensive fortifications known as the Siegfried Line or West Wall.

The Western Allies Rhineland Campaign, suspended in mid-December 1944, then resumed.

General Eisenhower, commanding Allied ground forces, envisaged a two-step approach to taking the war to the German heartland east of the Rhine River.

1. First the seven armies under his command would secure the entire west bank of the Rhine.
2. Then a massive crossing of the lower Rhine would deposit a large mobile force on the east bank. That force could then race across the north German plain and meet Soviet forces advancing from the east.

Two fortuitous events altered Eisenhower's grand plan:

1. The First Army seized a bridge across the Rhine on 7 March.
2. The Third Army crossed the Rhine by boat at multiple locations late in March.

I have broken the massive Rhineland Campaign of the late winter 1945 into four components:

• North Rhineland, February-March 1945 - the Ninth and First Armies in February and early March.
• Mid Rhineland, February 1945 - the Third Army.
• Mid Rhineland March 1945 - the First and Third Armies in early March.
• South Rhineland March 1945 - the Seventh and Third Armies in mid and late March.

Links to The Rhineland 1945 subordinate webpages: (to be removed)

• Ninth & First Armies - during the Rhineland Campaign, advanced to the lower Rhine between Wesel and Remagen.
• Third & Seventh Armies - during the Rhineland Campaign, advanced to the middle Rhine between Coblenz and Mannheim.

In early February, the western Allies faced two physical obstacles as they began major offensive action eastwards against the Wehrmacht:

• The Siegfried Line, also known as the West Wall, a fortified region near the western German border.
• The Rhine River, which flowed northward from Switzerland through western Germany before entering the Netherlands.

At the beginning of February, Allied lines were generally near the Westwall with two exceptions:

• In portions of the northern part of the US sector, the Siegfried Line had been penetrated in the Fall of 1944 and the front lay further east along the Roer River and the edge of the Hürtgen Forest.
• In the south, where the Rhine River forms the border between German and France, German forces still occupied portions of of Alsace.

The Rhineland Campaign's goal in early 1945 was to break through the Siegfried Line and occupy the left bank of the Rhine. This would be followed by a Rhine crossing in the northern Rhineland.

The Westwall & the Rhine River

The Rhineland Campaign Overview
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The arrows on the accompanying Canadian map show the major actions of the seven Allied armies during the Rhineland Campaign, starting on 8 February. The heavy dashed line shows the situation on 23 March 1945, with three Rhine crossings already in place. US sources generally use 21 March as the Rhineland Campaign ending date.

My report ETO Ground Forces Outline includes the corps that comprised each of the four United States armies during February and March 1945. 

General Eisenhower preferred to capture all of the Rhine's left bank before attempting a crossing. Crossing plans were based on a massive amphibious and airborne operation in the vicinity of Wesel at the top of the map. Thus the Rhineland Campaign was initially planned with the future Wesel crossing in mind, with priority to Montgomery's 21st Army Group in the north. Bradley's 12th Army Group in the middle was initially cast in a supporting role. Dever's 6th Army Group in the south was recovering from recent battles and did not participate in the Rhineland Campaign until mid March. 

As the Rhineland Campaign progressed, events caused drastic changes in the original plans. Apropros of this, it was General Eisenhower who passed into common parlance the saying "Plans are worthless, but planning is everything".

The Rhineland Campaign Overview

I conceptualize the Rhineland Campaign of 1945 as consisting of three phases. To demark each phase, I've used the date on the accompanying map.

First Phase, 8 Feb - 5 Mar 1945, Advance past the Roer River in the north & the Siegfried Line in the middle.

Summary of US Army major actions: 

• Ninth Army crossed the Roer River and advanced towards the Rhine, reaching the Rhine in early March.
• First Army's northen sector, supporting the Ninth Army's right flank, crossed the Roer and advanced to the Rhine, siezing Cologne/Køln, Germany's 4th largest city, on March 5.
• Third Army smashed through the Siegfried line throughout its sector.
• Seventh Army (not shown on the map) remained largely static.

By March 5, as shown by the solid red line on the Siegfried Line Smashed map, the stage was set for some remarkable episodes in the European Theater, summarized in the subordinate webpages.

The Siegfried Line Smashed, February 1945

Second Phase, 6 - 10 Mar 1945, Close to the Rhine in the North, breakout in the middle:

• Ninth Army occupied most of the Rhine left bank in its sector.
• First Army: III and V Corps sent columns southeast, occupied the northern Eifel and crossed the Rhine in one location.
• Third Army sent columns northeast through the southern Eifel to the Rhine.
• Seventh Army (not shown on the map) remained largely static.

The joint First and Third Army operation summarized above is sometimes called Operation Lumberjack. It cleared German troops from the Eifel Plateau area north of the Moselle River. 

• Early on 7 March, elements of the First Army's 9th Armored Division arrived on heights over Remagen on the Rhine River and discovered an intact bridge across the Rhine. More in the Crossing the Rhine webpage.
• To spearhead the Third Army's contribution to Operation Lumberjack, General Patton chose combat commands from two armored divisions to advance in parallel, the 11th Armored from east of Prum and the 4th Armored from east of Bitburg. Elements of the 4th Armored arrived three miles from the Rhine, also on 7 March.

The Eifel Plateau Overrun

Third Phase, 11-24 Mar 1945, Clear the Palatinate and Saarland in the south:

Ninth Army prepared for the pending Rhine Crossing.
First Army prepared for a breakout from the Remagen Bridgehead.
Third Army bridged the Moselle River in various locations and raced southeast, both to different Rhine crossing sites and to support the Seventh Army offensive.
Seventh Army's offensive , Operation Undertone, began on 15 March. Note on the accompanying map that Seventh Army still had to advance through northeastern Alsace, and then through the Siegfried Line. Considering these difficulties, the Seventh Army turned over additional portions of the Palatinate to the Third Army. The revised army boundary passed through Kaiserslautern as shown on the accompanying map.

Operation Undertone, the official Seventh Army offensive, began on 15 March and ended on 24 March. 

The Palatinate Cleared - status on 21 March

The Rhineland Campaign Ends

When the Rhineland Campaign officially ended on 21 March 1945, the Western Allies front lines lay on the Rhine River with two exceptions:

• The Remagen Bridgehead, established by the first Rhine crossing on 7 March, contained five First Army divisions on the Rhine's right bank.
• Further south, upstream on the Rhine, the Wehrmacht still held a portion of the Siegfried Line in the southern Palatinate. This outlier would disappear in the next several days and by the end of 25 March organized German Army presence west of the Rhine would be gone, except for the Channel Islands and the several Atlantic ports that they still occupied.

In the next two days, two new Allied bridgeheads would appear on the east bank of the Rhine:

• 22 Mar late - Third Army's first Rhine crossing,  5th Division at Oppenheim begins.
• 23 Mar late - Operation Plunder, major Rhine crossing at Wesel, begins.

​The final European Theater campaign of WW II, the Central Europe Campaign, officially began on 22 March 1945.

The End of the Official Rhineland Campaign, 21 March 1945

Sources for the WW II - The Rhineland Campaign 1945 webpage:

• My major source for the Rhineland Campaign was The Last Offensive by Charles B. MacDonald, on-line at https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-E-Last/index.html#index.
• The The Westwall & the Rhine River map is courtesy of https://www.vewa-ev.de.
• The Rhineland Campaign Overview map is courtesy of the Canadian website tothosewhoserved.org.
• The Sixteen German Federal States index map is courtesy of the Nations Online Project. (not being used)
• The Siegfried Line Smashed, Eifel Plateau Overrun, and Palatine Cleared maps are courtesy of the United States Military Academy.
• The End of the Official Rhineland Campaign map is courtesy of the United States Military Academy. I do not believe the death figures in small type are all correct.