The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich Chapter 30: The Conquest of Germany Summary

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Shirer begins Book Six: The Fall of the Third Reich by describing the Allied and Soviet offensives that swept through Nazi-occupied Europe in the summer and autumn of 1944.
By September 1944, many of the men in Hitler's top Army and Navy brass believed that the war had been lost, but Hitler was determined to continue the war.
The German Army was scrambling to find new recruits as the Allied and Soviet forces converged on Germany itself. Yong teens and
The Army also chose to institute extraordinary penalties for desertions. Clearly, desperation was setting in.
But suddenly, in the middle of September 1944the Allied advances slowed, giving the Germans a much-needed chance to regroup.

Hitler's Last Desperate Gamble

The sudden slowing of the Allied advance in September 1944 not only gave the German Army a chance to regroup, but allowed it launch a surprise offensive as Christmas approached.
That surprise was the "last desperate gamble" that Hitler cooked up as he tried his best to win the war. It's gone down in history as the Battle of the Bulge.
Hitler made plans for a big winter offensive, but the German Army generals were worried that their dwindling forces weren't strong enough to carry it out.
The first days of the offensive began well for the Germans, but quickly took a turn for the worse.
As usual, when the German Army generals realized that the battle wasn't going their way, Hitler refused to let his troops withdraw. Instead, he ordered that the battle be continued into the new year.
All was definitely not quiet on the Western Front.
By middle of January 1945, the German Army was forced back to the line where they started the offensive.
There were staggering German losses in men, ammunition, and machinery.
The defeat sealed the fate of Germany's forces on the Eastern front, which were now much too scarce to halt the advancing Russian troops.

As Shirer says in the opening line of this section: "The end came quickly for the Third Reich in the spring of 1945." (6.30.84)
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Germany's dwindling fuel supplies gradually brought the nation's armies to a standstill, and the German supply chain was weakened by Allied attacks and Nazi mismanagement.
It soon became clear, Shirer argues, that Hitler "was determined to go down, like Wotan at Valhalla, in a holocaust of blood—not only the enemy's but that of his own people." (6.30.91-99)
Hitler's physical and mental health was worsening, and he ordered "scorched earth" policies in late March 1945.
The directive ordered the destruction of "all industrial plants, all important electrical facilities, water works, gas works, food stores and clothing stores; all bridges, all railway and communications installations, all waterways, all ships, all freight cars and all locomotives" in Germany, with the intention of keeping them out of enemy hands. (6.30.125)
It might have kept things out of enemy hands, but it also ensured that the German people would have nothing left after the end of the war to rebuild their nation.
Shirer concludes by describing the Allied and Russian advances that finally succeeded in cutting off North and South Germany, and in trapping Hitler—once and for all—inside Berlin.