title: The American President

text: William Richert sued the Writers Guild of America over not being credited on the screenplay of the film. Richert claimed Sorkin's screenplay was a thinly veiled plagiarism of Richert's 1981 screenplay "The President Elopes". After Guild arbitration, Sorkin was awarded full credit on "The American President". Richert also claimed that the television series "The West Wing" was derived from part of the same screenplay.


title: The American President

text: "The American President" grossed $60.1 million in the United States, and $47.1 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $107.9 million.


title: The American President

text: The film grossed $10 million in its opening weekend (finishing third), $9.7 million in its second weekend, and $5.3 million in its third (finishing sixth both times).


title: The American President

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 91% based on 55 reviews, with an average rating of 7/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "A charming romantic comedy with political bite, Rob Reiner's "The American President" features strong lead performances and some poignant observations of politics and media in the 1990s." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 67 out of 100, based on 21 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.


title: The American President

text: It received praise and "Two Thumbs Up" from Siskel and Ebert who were surprised by how good the film was considering Rob Reiner's previous film, "North", was both of their selections for the worst movie of the year. Ebert said after detesting "North" he was very happy and pleased to give Reiner's next film a unanimously positive review. Siskel praised Douglas and Bening for their performances.


title: The American President

text: The screenplay for the film inspired many aspects of Sorkin's later television drama "The West Wing". The two productions follow the staff of a largely idealized White House, and like many of Sorkin's projects, share ideologies. Even the set of the Oval Office in "The American President" was later used in "The West Wing".


title: The American President

text: The film's influence can be seen most clearly in early episodes of the series; some dialogue in the two are nearly identical. Sorkin has been known to say that much of the first season was actually taken from material he edited out of the first draft of "The American President" script.


title: The American President

text: One of the issues touched on in the film and developed in the series relates to gun control bills, developed in "Five Votes Down". While the bill is ultimately withdrawn by President Shepherd because it is ineffectual, on the series President Bartlet and his staff work hard to pass their bill even though it is badly flawed (and end up doubly unhappy when VP John Hoynes, whom the President and senior staff are feuding with, clinches the bill for them by persuading an influential southern Democrat to support it).


title: The American President

text: More significant is the issue of a "proportional response" to military attacks on American assets abroad. In "The American President", Andrew Shepherd finds himself in the Situation Room having to order such an attack against Libya's intelligence headquarters after they bombed a missile defense system called "C-STAD" (Capricorn Surface-to-Air Defense) which had been positioned by the U.S. in Israel. He muses for a single line "Someday, someone's gonna have to explain to me the virtue of a proportional response", before giving the order. In "A Proportional Response", President Bartlet finds himself in similar circumstances (Syrian intelligence shot down a U.S. plane in Jordan and killed numerous Americans, including a young Naval officer who the President had decided would be his personal physician) and, seated in the White House Situation Room with his own National Security Council asks: "What is the virtue of a proportional response?" In both cases, the President chooses a military response that is relatively measured, but in the movie President Shepherd never considers a "disproportionate" response while President Bartlet plans such an action to destroy a large civilian airport in Syria; he eventually gives the green light for a strike similar to the one used in the movie.


title: The American President

text: The Global Defense Council, the fictional environmental lobby where Sydney Wade worked, is also featured in the "West Wing" episode called "The Drop-In", and is often referred to in other episodes.


title: The American President

text: In "The American President", Sydney Ellen Wade is ultimately fired from her lobbyist position because the president has brokered a deal that causes her legislative effort to fail. Similarly, in the final episode of the third season of "The West Wing", Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman uses the same tactic and ends up getting Amy Gardner fired from her position at the Women's Leadership Conference. Josh and Amy are dating when this takes place, just as the main characters are here. However, on the TV series it is Amy who tries to scuttle a bill (welfare reform) and Josh refuses to accept the demands of three Republican Congressmen because they amount to blackmail.


title: The American President

text: "The American President" includes mention of a Governor Stackhouse, while there is a Minnesota senator Howard Stackhouse (George Coe) in the two "West Wing" episodes "The Stackhouse Filibuster" and "The Red Mass". In the same way, the French President attending a state dinner in "The American President" seems to be the same President d'Astier that is often referred to in the "West Wing".


title: The American President

text: Several actors from "The American President" reappear in "The West Wing", including Martin Sheen (whose character in "The American President", A.J., is at one point accused by Shepherd of lacking the courage to run for office himself) as President Josiah Bartlet, Anna Deavere Smith as National Security Advisor Dr. Nancy McNally, Joshua Malina as White House Communications Director Will Bailey, Nina Siemaszko as Ellie Bartlet, Ron Canada as Under Secretary of State Theodore Barrow, and Thom Barry as Congressman Mark Richardson.


title: The American President

text: Portrayals of the president as idealistic but indecisive are also similar. In "The American President," Shepherd has to be convinced by his staff to stand up to his Republican opponent and pursue gun control and environmental legislation decisively. In "The West Wing," Bartlet is sometimes referred to as “Uncle Fluffy” when endorsing moderate views that are more conciliatory and less resolute (for example, in the episodes “Let Bartlet Be Bartlet” and “The Two Bartlets”). More generally, both presidents are former university professors (history in the movie, economics in the show) with no military experience and a low tolerance for political expediency.


title: The American President

text: The concept for the television show "Spin City" was set in motion after the writers had seen Michael J. Fox in "The American President" playing one of the President's political aides. They wanted him to play a similar character for television.


title: The American President

text: In January 2012, while criticizing then-leader of the opposition Tony Abbott in a speech at the National Press Club in Canberra, Australian Federal Minister Anthony Albanese plagiarised several lines from "The American President".


title: The American President

text: In April 2013, "New York Times" columnist Maureen Dowd drew a sharp contrast between President Obama's unsuccessful effort to secure passage of expanded background-check legislation in the Senate, on one hand, and the all-out vote-gathering effort in "The American President". The President responded to the column at the 2013 White House Correspondents' Dinner, noting the criticism and posing a series of rhetorical questions to Michael Douglas, who he said was in the audience, including, "Could it be that you were an actor in an Aaron Sorkin liberal fantasy?"


title: The American President

text: In the 2016 Presidential election candidate Ted Cruz paraphrased a portion of "The American President" when fellow candidate Donald Trump insulted Cruz's wife. Cruz stated, "...and if Donald wants to get into a character fight, he’s better off sticking with me because Heidi is way out of his league,” referencing the speech President Shepherd made about Rumson's attacks on Sydney Ellen Wade.


title: The American President

text: The film is recognized by the American Film Institute as #75 in its 2002 list of 100 Years...100 Passions.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazilians (, ) are the citizens of Brazil. A Brazilian can also be a person born abroad to a Brazilian parent or legal guardian as well as a person who acquired Brazilian citizenship. Brazil is a multiethnic society, which means that it is home to people of many ethnic origins, and there is no correlation between one's stock and their Brazilian identity.


title: Brazilians

text: Being Brazilian is a civic phenomenon, rather than an ethnic one. As a result, the degree to which Brazilian citizens identify with their ancestral roots varies significantly depending on the individual, the region of the country, and the specific ethnic origins in question. Most often, however, the idea of ethnicity as it is understood in the anglophone world is not popular in the country.


title: Brazilians

text: In the period after the colonization of the Brazilian territory by Portugal, during much of the 16th century, the word "Brazilian" was given to the Portuguese merchants of Brazilwood, designating exclusively the name of such profession, since the inhabitants of the land were, in most of them, indigenous or Portuguese born in Portugal or in the territory now called Brazil.


title: Brazilians

text: However, long before the independence of Brazil, in 1822, both in Brazil and in Portugal, it was already common to attribute the Brazilian gentile to a person, usually of clear Portuguese descent, resident or whose family resided in the State of Brazil (1530–1815), belonging to the Portuguese Empire. During the lifetime of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves (1815–1822), however, there was confusion about the nomenclature.


title: Brazilians

text: According to the Constitution, all people who hold Brazilian citizenship are equal, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender or religion.


title: Brazilians

text: A foreigner can apply for Brazilian citizenship after living for four uninterrupted years in Brazil and being able to speak Portuguese language. A native person from an official Portuguese language country (Portugal, Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, and East Timor) can request the Brazilian nationality after only 1 uninterrupted year living in Brazil. A foreign born person who holds Brazilian citizenship has exactly the same rights and duties of the Brazilian citizen by birth, but cannot occupy some special public positions such as the Presidency of the Republic, Vice-presidency of the Republic, Minister (Secretary) of Defense, Presidency (Speaker) of the Senate, Presidency (Speaker) of the House of Representatives, Officer of the Armed Forces and Diplomat.


title: Brazilians

text: In 2021, the population in Brazil is 214 million people. The number is updated live by Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE - Census). Brazil is the sixth most populous country in the world, large waves of immigration in the past and current immigration and refugee movements to Brazil, consolidate the country in the top positions of inhabitants in the world.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazilians are mostly descendants of Portuguese settlers, post-colonial immigrant groups, enslaved Africans and Brazil's indigenous peoples. The main historic waves of immigration to Brazil have occurred from the 1820s well into the 1970s, most of the settlers were Portuguese, Italians, Germans, and Spaniards, with significant minorities of Japanese, Dutch, Armenians, Romani, Greeks, Poles, Russians, Ukrainians, and Levantine Arabs.


title: Brazilians

text: There are different estimates for the Indigenous population around 1498, when the cohort commanded by Duarte Pacheco Pereira first set foot in Brazilian territory, followed by Pedro Álvares Cabral and Amerigo Vespucci in 1500 and 1502, with figures revolving between 2.4 million and 3.1 million.


title: Brazilians

text: What is more accurate is that about three quarters of them died from contracted diseases brought by colonizers (the flu, smallpox, measles, scarlet fever and tuberculosis) and conflicts (besides the numerous deaths in different tribal groups by forging alliances with the Portuguese, French and Dutch to fight each other, ending in genocide, the abortion rate also increased among Indigenous women after the arrival of the colonizers), while the remaining were pushed to the Amazon Basin, sometimes migrating beyond the borders with Hispanic provinces.


title: Brazilians

text: It is also important to mention that a strong assimilation by miscegenation with local populations occurred, where Natives living under Jesuit protection and having a monastic life decided to leave for the life in towns. The European diseases spread quickly along the indigenous trade routes, and whole tribes were likely annihilated without ever coming in direct contact with Europeans. Today, 517,000 Indigenous people live in reservations and 160 thousand speak assorted Native languages, whereas millions of Brazilians have at least some degree of Amerindian ancestry due to the mentioned interracial encounters.


title: Brazilians

text: Portugal remained the only significant, but not an exclusive source of European immigration to Brazil until the early 19th century.


title: Brazilians

text: It is estimated that more than 20,000 Dutch entered Brazil, however, both groups had been forced out of the country after the rule's end. The remaining families mostly fled to remote parts of the interior of Northeastern Brazil (mainly in the states of Pernambuco, but also Paraíba, Rio Grande do Norte, Ceará and others) or changed their names to Portuguese ones. The proven excess of Y-chromosomes of the haplogroup 2 in northeasterners probably results from the high miscegenation of Dutch settlers with the local population.


title: Brazilians

text: The Jews who mostly left Brazil took off to what was then named New Amsterdam, today New York City, and founded the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States, the Congregation Shearith Israel. The ones who stayed, converted into Christianity and were then known as New Christians or Marranos, who sometimes practiced Crypto-Judaism.


title: Brazilians

text: Even if the Jewish population under Dutch Brazil not surpassed a few thousand individuals, a considerably higher number of New Christians, in the past simply absorbed as Portuguese colonizers, arrived in Colonial Brazil - especially in the first centuries after 1500. They entered Brazil fleeing from the Inquisition or were deported by the Kingdom of Portugal and also Spain, latter being known as Degredados, someone who was sentenced or forced to exile.


title: Brazilians

text: This also included Romani People from the Iberian Peninsula, what partially explains the curiously high numbers for a western country. Brazil has the second largest Gypsy population in the Americas after the United States, having also received Roma people from Central and Eastern Europe, as well as the Baltic countries during the 20th century.


title: Brazilians

text: In 1808, the Portuguese court moved to Brazil, bringing thousands of Portuguese again and afterwards opened its seaports to other nations starting from 1820. This caused the biggest wave of immigration which the country has seen until then.


title: Brazilians

text: In this period, people from all over the world officially entered Brazil, the vast majority of them Europeans.


title: Brazilians

text: Between 1820 and the 1950s, Brazil received around 5,686,133 European immigrants, including a thriving Jewish population. In addition, 950,000 Asians settled in Brazil throughout the 20th century, including considerable numbers of Middle Easterners or Christian Levantine Arabs and 270,000 Japanese, the highest figure among East Asians.


title: Brazilians

text: Portuguese people have been present since the discovery of the country, and therefore it is difficult to estimate a more accurate number of descendants. Millions of White Brazilians descend from recent Portuguese immigration from between the 1870s and 1975. In addition, many multiracial Brazilians partially descend from Portuguese people, caused by the high intermarriage rates.


title: Brazilians

text: Most of them came from the historical provinces of Minho, Trás-os-Montes, Beira, Estremadura (North and Central Portugal). Northeastern Brazil traditionally received the first waves of immigrants, but during the Great Immigration, the Southeast received the biggest influx. São Paulo (state) received the most, followed by Rio de Janeiro (city), which is considered the largest Portuguese city outside of Lisbon. The second former capital of Brazil once also was the capital of Portugal, the only European capital outside of Europe.


title: Brazilians

text: The accent in the city of Rio de Janeiro subsequently reminds the 19th century innovations that took place in the European variety of the language, while the prosody of the rest of the country, besides some local varieties, has rather conservative phonetics rooted in the 1600s. Other states with significant numbers were Minas Gerais, Pará, Rio Grande do Sul, Pernambuco and Bahia. Nowadays, they naturally live throughout Brazil and compose the majority of White and also Multiracial Brazilians in many states.


title: Brazilians

text: Today, millions of Italian-Brazilians make Brazil their home, as they usually brought the whole family and had high birth rates. Regarding the total numbers, this probably represents the biggest Italian diaspora outside of Italy. Contrary to other countries, more than half of the Italians immigrated from the North, mostly composed by people from Veneto and Lombardy, followed by people from Central Italy. The state of São Paulo had the strongest and a more diverse influx, with many also coming from Southern Italy, especially to the eponymic capital.


title: Brazilians

text: Italians mostly went to São Paulo (state), which received half of the overall immigrants. The others mainly went to the states of southern Brazil, where they also composed the biggest European immigrant group. Other notable influxes occurred in two other southeastern states, here Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo and the Central-West region, mainly to Mato Grosso do Sul and Goiás. Comparatively small numbers went to Pernambuco and Bahia, both in the Northeast. Nowadays the descendants mostly live in mentioned areas, but the sheer amount and internal migrations made the Italilan diaspora spread out and nowadays they are scattered all over Brazil.


title: Brazilians

text: Several million Brazilians have Spanish ancestry. Most Spaniards settled in the past century, where they chiefly headed to São Paulo, then Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais. Most notably from Andalusia (South), others from the provinces of Galicia, Castile and León and Catalonia (North and East Spain) followed. Galicians were also present throughout Colonial Brazil, as the province shares borders and linguistic ties with Portugal, and once was part of the country.


title: Brazilians

text: Spanish Brazilians in the other states mainly have origins in Galicia, which arrived in earlier occasions. Many of them went to the first capital Salvador and its state Bahia, but also Pernambuco (Northeast), Pará (North), Espírito Santo (Southeast), and Rio Grande do Sul (South).


title: Brazilians

text: Note: Brazil is also home to other Southern European populations, mainly Greeks (around 150,000 descendants), but they are by far the smallest groups with origins in South Europe.


title: Brazilians

text: 2) The remaining 30 % were composed of Other Europeans, Asians (Western and Eastern Asia), Africans (many European descended Africans, Jews, Berbers and others) and Americans (South and North Americans).


title: Brazilians

text: - Western Europeans were very present, as around 240,000 Germans settled, 198,000 Austrian and 52,000 Swiss; Luxembourgers and Volga Germans were also documented, but in comparatively low numbers. German speaking nationalities were the fourth largest European immigration group and today German is the second most spoken mother tongue in the country. In addition, 150,000 French immigrants entered Brazilian ports, where Belgian and Dutch (not to be confused with Dutch Brazil) settlers also were listed.


title: Brazilians

text: - Eastern Europeans were relatively numerous, with more than 350,000 listed immigrants. This included 154,000 Poles, around 40,000 Ukrainians and smaller numbers of Russians. These immigrants were searching for better opportunities - a few thousand Belarusians were also among them. Slavs from other regions migrated as well, here mainly South Slavs like Bulgarians and Croats, but also Czechs and Slovaks, with moderate numbers of Slovenes and others. Hungarians and Romanians were among the non-Slavic Eastern Europeans and were the biggest groups after the Poles, Russians and Ukrainians.


title: Brazilians

text: - Northern Europeans were the least numerous, but also present. More than 78,000 Britons, mainly under English passports, and Scots entered the country. They dispersed to different regions: a few Irish people went to already urbanized regions. Scandinavian people, mainly Swedes and Norwegians, were both listed and sent over 40,000 immigrants each, as well as around 17,000 Danes. 3,400 Estonians and a rather small number of Finns were also present. Even smaller and therefore often forgotten, an influx from Icelanders and Faroese was recorded, but they still left few thousand descendants. The Baltic region was also entirely present, where Lithuanians composed the most numerous group, with over 50,000 entrances, followed by a much smaller number of Latvians.


title: Brazilians

text: - European Jews of Ashkenazi origin, more precisely around 48,000 people from several countries, chose Brazil as their destination. Ashkenazi Jews were first documented during Imperial times, when the liberal second emperor of Brazil welcomed a few thousands of families facing persecution in Europe during the 1870s and 1880s. Two heavier influxes took place during the 20th century. The earliest right after the Great War and the second inrush between the 1930s and 1950s.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazil has also seen an influx from North African Jews of Sephardic origin coming from mainly Morocco and Egypt, which were counted extra.


title: Brazilians

text: - Arab equally arrived in large numbers, chiefly Lebanese and Syrians, both surpassing 200,000 entrances throughout the 20th century, with mentionable numbers of Armenian, Georgian and some Iranian immigrants from the Caucasus region.


title: Brazilians

text: - East Asians, the majority composed of Japanese immigrants, also arrived in formidable numbers, where the first ship landed in 1908, surpassing 250,000 immigrants. But Chinese and Koreans also have traditions of immigrating to Brazil, especially after the 1950s, with around 50,000 and 20,000 immigrants respectively.


title: Brazilians

text: - North Americans also formed the melting pot that is Brazil, with the country being one of the few which received Americans who fled the American Civil War, settling in Southeastern and Southern Brazil during the American reconstruction period. In addition, smaller numbers of North Americans immigrated after 1808. The descendants of those Confederate colonies are culturally known as the Confederados sub-group, especially in the countryside of São Paulo, where they founded towns and their presence was stronger - Brazilians of American descent can be found throughout the country, resulting from other periods and the dispersion of the Confederados descendants, who are nowadays mostly mixed with other groups and sometimes mistaken for descendants of British immigrants. Ethnically the Confederados were mostly English-Welsh, Scottish, Irish, German and Scandinavian.


title: Brazilians

text: - South Americans were strongly represented by Argentines since the 18th century and always had a strong community in the country. They still form one of the largest South American immigrant groups in Brazil, nowadays only surpassed by Bolivians (see modern times). Uruguayan citizens after the country's independence from the Empire of Brazil were also noticeable throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.


title: Brazilians

text: - North African regions, historically distinguished from Sub-Saharan Africa, also sent immigrants. This time they mainly came from Egypt, with around 10,000 people, than the Maghreb region, especially Morocco (mostly Jews who went to Northern Brazil). Therefore, a stronger influx from other cultures occurred, contrary to Colonial Brazil, where most Africans were forced labor work brought from the Black populations.


title: Brazilians

text: - Other Africa-born people mainly include Dutch South Africans (Boeren or Afrikaners) and people from the former Portuguese Empire, mainly Angola (during the Great Immigration, but especially after the Civil Wars post-independence). Here people of several ethnicities immigrated (mainly Africans of European descent, but also Blacks and Coloured people).


title: Brazilians

text: Note: Dozen other immigrant groups form sizable communities with some varying number of descendants (5,000 to + 30 million). Only in this period, the port of Santos, São Paulo, which was widely known as the most important entrance of immigrants in Brazil, received people from more than 60 countries. Other important ports, which occasionally received other immigrant groups as the before mentioned, were the ones in the cities of Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre, Vitória, Recife etc.


title: Brazilians

text: Not to be compared with the great immigration before, a still ongoing influx from Africa (Angola, Senegal) and South America and the Caribbean (Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, Chile, Uruguay, Venezuela, Haiti, Suriname, Jamaica, Barbados) is happening since the late 1960s. Asian immigrants (from Palestine, China, South Korea, returning Japanese Brazilians, Dutch Indonesians, Afghans and immigrants from Vietnam, Iran, Pakistan, the Philippines and others) as well as European immigrants (Portugal due to ties, young qualified professionals from Western Europe, especially after 2008, Northern Europeans who seek warmer weather and several Eastern Europeans) are thriving in varying numbers.


title: Brazilians

text: After 1975 large groups of Dutch Surinamese or Boeroes immigrated to Brazil due to the independence in Suriname. Most of them settled in the countryside of São Paulo and Paraná where there are thriving Dutch Brazilian colonies.


title: Brazilians

text: These numbers could be higher, as there are many undocumented people in Brazil as well. For both documented and undocumented migrants, most of the foreigners come from Portugal, Bolivia, China, Paraguay, Angola, Spain, Argentina, Japan and the United States. The major work visas concessions were granted for citizens of the United States and the United Kingdom in 2009.


title: Brazilians

text: Lusitanian immigration never ceased throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Portuguese people in diaspora settled in Brazil especially during the 1970s coming from former Portuguese colonies like Macau or Angola after its independence.


title: Brazilians

text: An additional figure of 1.2 million Portuguese arrived between 1951 and 1975 to settle mostly in the Southeast.


title: Brazilians

text: Nowadays, Lusitanians constitute the biggest group of foreigners living in the country, with over 690,000 Portuguese nationals currently living in Brazil. The vast majority arrived in the last decade. The first semester of 2011 solely had an increase of 52 thousand Portuguese nationals applying for a permanent residence visa while another large group was granted Brazilian citizenship.


title: Brazilians

text: Today, people of more than 220 nationalities have communities in Brazil, 40 of them more than 10,000 people.


title: Brazilians

text: In 2014, Brazil was home to 5,208 refugees from 79 nationalities. The three largest refugee ancestries were Syrian (1,626), Colombian (1,154) and Angolan (1062). In addition to these numbers, there are several thousand people who had entered the country and are still waiting for the government to acknowledge their refugee status, as 1,830 people from Bangladesh in 2013 alone and other 1,021 people from Syria and 799 people from Senegal, for example.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazil is today home to 4.5 thousand Afghans and was a destination for Vietnamese boat people in the past.


title: Brazilians

text: Although most Brazilians identify as white, mixed or black, genetic studies shows that the overwhelming majority of the citizens are actually triracial at some degree.


title: Brazilians

text: The other two Southeastern states, Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo, are around 50% White (the Southeast region also includes Levantine Arabs). São Paulo has the largest absolute number with 30 million Whites, followed by Minas Gerais, Rio Grande do Sul, Rio de Janeiro and Paraná, while Santa Catarina, where 86% of the population has European phenotype, reaches the highest percentage.


title: Brazilians

text: The cities of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre, Curitiba, Brasília and Belo Horizonte have the largest populations of Ashkenazi Jews.


title: Brazilians

text: Most East Asians, especially Japanese Brazilians, the largest group, live in São Paulo and Paraná. Most Koreans also live in São Paulo whereas the Chinese diaspora is spread particularly throughout the Southeast. Rio de Janeiro has a large Chinese population following São Paulo.


title: Brazilians

text: The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) classifies the Brazilian population in five categories: "brancos" (white), "negros" (black), "pardos" (multiracial), "amarelos" (yellow) and "índios" (amerindian), based on skin color or race.


title: Brazilians

text: The last detailed census (PNAD) found Brazil to be made up of c. 91 million white people (White Brazilian), 79 million multiracial people (Pardo), 14 million black people (Afro-Brazilian), 2-4 million yellow people (East Asian descent; see Asian Brazilian) and 807,900 indigenous (Amerindian) people.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazil is said to be among the most miscegenated countries in the world, as since the country was discovered and during the colonial period intermarriage between races was never illegal and common. Those of full ancestry are usually the Brazilians who can trace back their ethnicity to more recent immigration from the monarchical period in the 19th century until the Republican 20th and 21st centuries.


title: Brazilians

text: Still, many Brazilians can not trace back their real origin easily. For instance, European family names which were difficult to pronounce were commonly changed to easier Portuguese surnames. In basic terms, it could be said that half of Brazilians are descendants of populations from the colonial era and the other half made of modern immigration. Brazil is a true melting pot of Europeans, Asians, Africans and Indigenous people, who either are in the single group or a mixture of various backgrounds and races.


title: Brazilians

text: Whites constitute the plurality of Brazil's population regarding the total numbers within a single racial group, having the most numerous population in the Southern Hemisphere. These are people who have origins in any of the white populations of Europe, North Africa and West Asia.


title: Brazilians

text: The country has the second largest White population in the Americas, after only the United States, with around 91,051,646 people.


title: Brazilians

text: And White Brazilians make up the third largest White population in the world, after only the United States and Russia, also counting in total numbers.


title: Brazilians

text: The majority of European Brazilians came from the Great Immigration period, which was the large European influx after steps had been taken for "whitening policies" during the Monarchy and Early Republican periods. Those policies also sought labor and also were made in order to avoid the foreign invasion threat of sparsely populated areas in the South. Various other groups derive from colonial times and post-war decades.


title: Brazilians

text: There are people of European descent distributed throughout the entire territory of Brazil, however, Southeast and South Brazil have the largest White populations. Whereas the Southeast region has the largest absolute numbers, 79.8% of the population in the three southernmost states has European or Caucasian phenotype.


title: Brazilians

text: The state of "Santa Catarina" in Southern Brazil has the highest percentage, being almost 90% European. "São Paulo" in the Southeast has the fourth highest rate, but is the state with the most Whites in absolute numbers of 30 million Whites, mainly from Europe, also having largest Levantine Arab and Jewish populations.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazil is home to 240 immigrant or extoctone languages, most of them European languages. Standard German and German dialects make the second most spoken language in Brazil with around 4 million bilingual speakers or 2% of the population, other Caucasoid immigration languages are Italian, Venetian or Talian dialect, Polish, Castilian, Ukrainian, Russian, Dutch, Hebrew, Yidish, Lithuanian and Lettish, French, Norwegian, Swedish, English,


title: Brazilians

text: Assorted German dialects (including the ancient East Pomeranian dialect, practically extinct in Europe) and Venetian or Talian share "co-official status" with Portuguese in several municipalities.


title: Brazilians

text: Multiracials constitute the second largest group of Brazil, with around 84.7 million people. The term "Pardo" or mixed race Brazilian is a rather complex one. Multiracial Brazilians appear in hundreds of shades, colours and backgrounds. They are typically a mixture of colonial and post-colonial Europeans with descendants of African slaves and the Indigenous peoples of the Americas.


title: Brazilians

text: Some individuals may also descend from Maghreb people, Jews, Middle Eastern and Egyptian people, or a more recent ancestry from East or South Asia. Skin colours can vary from light to dark. The "caboclo" or "mestiço" population, those who are a miscegenation of Native and European, revolves around 43 million people. Genetic studies conducted by the geneticist Sergio D.J. Pena of the Federal University of Minas Gerais have shown that the Caboclo population is made of individuals whose DNA ranges from 70% to 90% European (mostly Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, French or Italian 1500s to 1700s male settlers) with the remaining percentage spanning different Indigenous markers.


title: Brazilians

text: Similar DNA tests showed that people self-classified as "Mulatto" or White and Black mix, span from 62% to 85% European (mostly descendants of Portuguese, Dutch and French settlers during the colonial period in the Northeast). The "Pardo category" in Brazil also includes 800 thousand Gypsies or Roma people, most of them coming from Portugal but also countries in Eastern Europe and the Baltics. Eurasians can also be classified as Pardo. The majority of them consisting of Ainoko or Hafu, individuals who are a miscegenation between Japanese and European.


title: Brazilians

text: Recent research has suggested that Asians from the early Portuguese Eastern Empire, known as Luso-Asians first came to Brazil during the sixteenth century as seamen known as Lascars, or as servants, slaves and concubines accompanying the governors, merchants and clergy who has served in Portuguese Asia. This first presence of Asians was limited to Northeast Brazil, especially Bahia, but others were brought as cultivators, textile workers and miners to Pará and other parts of the Northeast.


title: Brazilians

text: The largest populations with Pardo individuals are found in northern and northeastern Brazil, with many inhabiting the states of Mato Grosso, Goiás, Espírito Santo, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro State, São Paulo State and Paraná State, as well as the Federal District. While the occurrence of Pardos is not uniform across the country, there are states with more people of mixed background than others. It also can happen that Pardos constitute significant numbers within single regions in states.


title: Brazilians

text: Blacks constitute the third largest ethnic group of Brazil with around 14.5 million citizens or 7.6 % of the population. These are people who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa, although that is not exclusive to this group. In the country, these are generally used for Brazilians with at least partial Sub-Saharan African ancestry. Most Brazilians of African ancestry are the direct descendants of captive Africans who survived the slavery era within the boundaries of the present Brazil, but also with considerable European and Amerindian ancestry. Afro-Brazilians might not directly be compared to Pardo-Brazilians, as typically their skin colour is darker compared to mixed-race Brazilians. Brazil, followed by the United States, has the largest African diaspora in the Americas.


title: Brazilians

text: Today most Blacks are either Catholic or Evangelical. Smaller groups are Irreligious including Atheists and a number of African traditional religions can be found especially in Bahia, notably Candomblé and Umbanda. The latter being a syncretism of Roman Catholicism, African traditions, Spiritism and Indigenous beliefs. A minority of Blacks follows Kardecism, which is a blend of Christianism and Spiritualism founded in France.


title: Brazilians

text: The black population is dispersed throughout the country, but it is a particularly important component of the demographics of northeastern states such as Bahia and coastal regions, such as the former capital of Rio de Janeiro.


title: Brazilians

text: In Brazil, the term "amarela" (yellow) refers to East Asians, and they constitute constitute the fourth largest ethnic group of Brazil with 2.2 million people. The largest group of East Asian ancestry in the country is the Japanese community.


title: Brazilians

text: Brazil has the largest population of people of Japanese ancestry outside Japan, whether by percentage or absolute numbers.


title: Brazilians

text: The number of Japanese Brazilians revolves around 2 million descendants and the Japanese community also comprises around 50 thousand Japanese nationals. According to Ethnologue over 400 thousand people speak Japanese in Brazil.


title: Brazilians

text: Other important immigrant groups have been those of Chinese, Taiwanese and South Korean origins. The recent immigration of Chinese citizens to Brazil makes them currently the fastest growing population of East Asian roots in the country.


title: Brazilians

text: There are large groups of East Asian Catholics as well as non-religious East Asians Brazilians. Buddhism in Brazil is common amongst East Asians and non-East Asian Brazilians, with Japanese Buddhism being the most usual and oldest form. Shinto practices involving life style and funerals are very common in Nipponese families of São Paulo and Paraná states.


title: Brazilians

text: Shinto-derived Japanese New Religions are reasonably popular in the country, particularly in the South East, and may be practiced in syncretism with Christianity, Afro-Brazilian religions and Spiritism. The largest Nipponese new religions are Seicho-no-Ie, Tenrikyo, Perfect Liberty Kyodan and Church of World Messianity. Korean Confucianism and Chinese Confucianism are also found in the country, particularly in the city of São Paulo.


title: Brazilians

text: Indigenous people constitute the fifth largest ethnic group of Brazil, with around 800,000 individuals. This is the only category of the Brazilian "racial" classification that is not based on a skin color, but rather on cultural and ethnic belonging.


title: Brazilians

text: It is the oldest ethnic group in the country, but nowadays its population is mainly located in the surroundings of the Amazon basin inside the Amazon Forest but also in various reservations throughout the five geographical regions. Compared to the total population of the country the number might seem small, but millions of Brazilians actually have some Indigenous ancestry. This happened mainly because of the miscegenation of indigenous tribes with colonial settlers.


title: Brazilians

text: Around 180 Native or autochthone languages are spoken in Brazil by 160 thousand people, many of them have threatened status. Most Natives can communicate in Portuguese language and tribes in reservations have their mother tongue and Portuguese language taught at schools. Today 517 thousand people live in Indigenous reservations.


title: Brazilians

text: Genetic studies have shown the Brazilian population as a whole to have European, African and Native Americans components.


title: Brazilians

text: A 2015 autosomal genetic study, which also analyzed data of 25 studies of 38 different Brazilian populations concluded that: European ancestry accounts for 62% of the heritage of the population, followed by the African (21%) and the Native American (17%). The European contribution is highest in Southern Brazil (77%), the African highest in Northeast Brazil (27%) and the Native American is the highest in Northern Brazil (32%).


title: Brazilians

text: An autosomal study from 2013, with nearly 1,300 samples from all of the Brazilian regions, found a pred. degree of European ancestry combined with African and Native American contributions, in varying degrees. Following an increasing North to South gradient, European ancestry was the most prevalent in all urban populations (with values up to 74%).


title: Brazilians

text: The populations in the North consisted of a significant proportion of Native American ancestry that was about two times higher than the African contribution. Conversely, in the Northeast, Center-West and Southeast, African ancestry was the second most prevalent. At an intrapopulation level, all urban


title: Brazilians

text: populations were highly admixed, and most of the variation in ancestry proportions was observed between individuals within each population rather than among population.


title: Brazilians

text: An autosomal DNA study (2011), with nearly 1000 samples from every major race group ("whites", "pardos" and "blacks", according to their respective proportions) all over the country found out a major European contribution, followed by a high African contribution and an important Native American component.


title: Brazilians

text: "In all regions studied, the European ancestry was predominant, with proportions ranging from 60.6% in the Northeast to 77.7% in the South". The 2011 autosomal study samples came from blood donors (the lowest classes constitute the great majority of blood donors in Brazil), and also public health institutions personnel and health students.


title: Brazilians

text: According to an autosomal DNA study from 2010, a new portrayal of each ethnicity contribution to the DNA of Brazilians, obtained with samples from the five regions of the country, has indicated that, on average, European ancestors are responsible for nearly 80% of the genetic heritage of the population.


title: Brazilians

text: The variation between the regions is small, with the possible exception of the South, where the European contribution reaches nearly 90%. The results, published by the scientific magazine "American Journal of Human Biology" by a team of the Catholic University of Brasília, show that, in Brazil, physical indicators such as skin color, color of the eyes and color of the hair have little to do with the genetic ancestry of each person, which has been shown in previous studies (regardless of census classification).


title: Brazilians

text: Ancestry informative SNPs can be useful to estimate individual and population biogeographical ancestry. Brazilian population is characterized by a genetic background of three parental populations (European, African, and Brazilian Native Amerindians) with a wide degree and diverse patterns of admixture.


title: Brazilians

text: In this work we analyzed the information content of 28 ancestry-informative SNPs into multiplexed panels using three parental population sources (African, Amerindian, and European) to infer the genetic admixture in an urban sample of the five Brazilian geopolitical regions. The SNPs assigned apart the parental populations from each other and thus can be applied for ancestry estimation in a three hybrid admixed population.


title: Brazilians

text: Data was used to infer genetic ancestry in Brazilians with an admixture model. Pairwise estimates of F(st) among the five Brazilian geopolitical regions suggested little genetic differentiation only between the South and the remaining regions. Estimates of ancestry results are consistent with the heterogeneous genetic profile of Brazilian population, with a major contribution of European ancestry (0.771) followed by African (0.143) and Amerindian contributions (0.085). The described multiplexed SNP panels can be useful tool for bioanthropological studies but it can be mainly valuable to control for spurious results in genetic association studies in admixed populations".


title: Brazilians

text: It is important to note that "the samples came from free of charge paternity test takers, thus as the researchers made it explicit: "the paternity tests were free of charge, the population samples involved people of variable socioeconomic strata, although "likely to be leaning slightly towards the "pardo" group"".


title: Brazilians

text: An autosomal DNA study from 2009 found a similar profile "all the Brazilian samples (regions) lie more closely to the European group than to the African populations or to the Mestiços".


title: Brazilians

text: According to another autosomal DNA study from 2008, by the University of Brasília (UnB), European ancestry dominates in the whole of Brazil (in all regions), accounting for 65.90% of ancestry of the population, followed by the African contribution (24.80%) and the Native American (9.3%). A more recent study, from 2013, found the following composition in São Paulo state: 61,9% European, 25,5% African and 11,6% Native American.


title: Brazilians

text: A 2014 autosomal DNA study, which analysed data from 1594 samples from all of the Brazilian regions, found that Brazilians show widespread European ancestry with the highest levels being observed in the south. African ancestry is also widespread (except for the south) and reaches its highest values in the East of the country. Native American ancestry is highest in the north-west (Brazilian Amazon).


title: Brazilians

text: Haplogroup frequencies do not determine phenotype nor admixture. They are very general genetic snapshots, primarily useful in examining past population group migratory patterns. Only autosomal DNA testing can reveal admixture structures, since it analyses millions of alleles from both maternal and paternal sides. Contrary to yDNA or mtDNA, which are focused on one single lineage (paternal or maternal) the autosomal DNA studies profile the whole ancestry of a given individual, being more accurate in describing the complex patterns of ancestry in a given place.


title: Brazilians

text: According to a genetic study in 2000 who analysed 247 samples (mainly identified as "white" in Brazil) who came from four of the five major geographic regions of the country, the mtDNA pool (maternal lineages) of present-day Brazilians clearly reflects the imprints of the early Portuguese colonization process (involving directional mating), as well as the recent immigrant waves (from Europe) of the last century.


title: Brazilians

text: According to a study in 2001, the vast majority of Y chromosomes (male lineages) in white Brazilian males, regardless of their regional source, is of European origin (>90% contribution), with a very low frequency of sub-Saharan African chromosomes and a complete absence of Amerindian contributions. These results configure a picture of strong directional mating in Brazil involving European males, on one side, and European, African and Amerindian females, on the other.


title: Brazilians

text: In a study from 2016, the authors investigated a set of 41 Y-SNPs in 1217 unrelated males from the five Brazilian geopolitical regions. A total of 22 haplogroups were detected in the whole Brazilian sample, revealing the three major continental origins of the current population, namely from America, Europe and Africa. The genetic differences observed among regions were, however, consistent with the colonization history of the country.


title: Brazilians

text: The Central-Western and Southern samples showed the higher European contributions (95.7% and 93.6%, respectively). The Southeastern region presented significant European (86.1%) and African (12.0%) contributions. Portugal was estimated to be the main source of the male European lineages to Central-West, Southeast and South Brazil.


title: Brazilians

text: The North and the Northeast showed the highest contribution from France and Italy, respectively. The highest migration rate from Lebanon was to the Central-West, whereas a significant migration from Germany was observed to the Central East, Southeast and South. The sample from the Northern region presented the highest Native American ancestry (8.4%), whereas the more pronounced African contribution could be observed in the Northeastern population (15.1%).


title: Brazilians

text: In the Brazilian "white" and "pardos" the autosomal ancestry (the sum of the ancestors of a given individual) tends to be in most cases predominantly European, with often a non European mtDNA (which points to a non European ancestor somewhere down the maternal line), which is explained by the women marrying newly arrived colonists, during the formation of the Brazilian people.


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: "Bette Davis Eyes" is a song written and composed by Donna Weiss and Jackie DeShannon in 1974. It was originally recorded by DeShannon in that year for her album "New Arrangement" but it was made popular by American singer Kim Carnes in 1981 when it spent nine non-consecutive weeks on top of the U.S. "Billboard" Hot 100. The song was #1 for five weeks, interrupted for just one week by "Stars on 45" before it returned to the top spot for another four weeks and became "Billboard"'s biggest hit of the year. The single also reached No. 5 on "Billboard"s Top Tracks charts and No. 26 on the Dance charts. It was also a No. 1 hit in 21 countries and peaked at No. 10 in the United Kingdom, to date her only Top 40 hit in that country. It also reached No. 2 in Canada for twelve consecutive weeks, and was the No. 2 hit of 1981 in that country after "Stars on 45".


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: The song won the Grammy Awards for Song of the Year and Record of the Year; it also ranked at No. 12 on "Billboard"'s list of the Top 100 songs in the first 50 years of the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart.


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: The song was written in 1974 by Donna Weiss and Jackie DeShannon, the latter of whom recorded the song that same year on her album "New Arrangement." In this original incarnation, the track is performed in an 'R&B lite' arrangement, featuring a prominent uptempo piano part, as well as flourishes of pedal steel guitar and horns. However, it was not until March 1981, when Kim Carnes recorded her version of the song in a radically different synthesizer-based arrangement, that "Bette Davis Eyes" became a commercial success.


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: According to producer Val Garay, the original demo of the tune that was brought to him sounded like "a Leon Russell track, with this beer-barrel polka piano part." The demo can be heard in a Val Garay interview on TAXI TV at 21:50. Keyboardist Bill Cuomo came up with the signature synth riff, using the Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 synthesizer, which now defines Carnes's version. The song was recorded in the studio on the first take.


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: Actress Bette Davis was 73 years old when Kim Carnes's version became a hit. She wrote letters to Carnes, Weiss, and DeShannon to thank all three of them for making her "a part of modern times" and stated that her grandson now looked up to her. After their Grammy wins, Davis sent them roses as well.


title: Bette Davis Eyes

text: American actress Gwyneth Paltrow recorded a cover of "Bette Davis Eyes" that was included on the soundtrack to the 2000 road trip film "Duets". It was released as a single in Australia on March 26, 2001, debuting and peaking at number three on the ARIA Singles Chart on April 8, 2001. It spent nine weeks in the top 10. Paltrow's cover ended 2001 at number 35 on Australia's year-end chart and earned a platinum certification from the Australian Recording Industry Association for shipments exceeding 70,000 units.


title: The Masked Singer (British series 3)

text: The third series of the British version of "The Masked Singer" premiered on ITV on 1 January 2022, following a Christmas singalong episode which aired on 25 December 2021, and concluded on 12 February 2022. The series was won by singer Natalie Imbruglia as "Panda", with singer Charlotte Church finishing second as "Mushroom", and singer Mark Feehily placing third as "Robobunny".


title: The Masked Singer (British series 3)

text: Prior to the airing of the second series' finale, panellist Jonathan Ross revealed that the programme would be returning for a third series. Filming for the series took place between 1 and 13 November 2021.


title: The Masked Singer (British series 3)

text: Following the announcement of the series, it was confirmed by ITV that Joel Dommett would return to present the series, whilst Jonathan Ross, Davina McCall, Rita Ora and Mo Gilligan would all return to the panel.


title: The Masked Singer (British series 3)

text: Guest panellists included Olly Alexander in the sixth episode, Joan Collins in the seventh episode and series two winner Joss Stone in the eighth episode.


title: The Masked Singer (British series 3)

text: Official ratings are taken from BARB, utilising the four-screen dashboard which includes viewers who watched the programme on laptops, smartphones, and tablets within 7 days of the original broadcast.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: "Forever Young" is a song by German synth-pop band Alphaville from their 1984 debut studio album of the same name. The single was successful in Scandinavia and in the European German-speaking countries in the same year.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The single achieved more success in the United States than in the United Kingdom, but it failed to reach the American top 40 despite three separate US single releases. Though not the group's highest-charting single in Europe, "Forever Young" was one of the band's signature songs and has been covered by numerous artists. It also formed the basis of Jay-Z's song "Young Forever". "Forever Young" is written in the key of C major.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: Originally released by Alphaville as a single in 1984, "Forever Young" was available in both its original mix and in a dance version, entitled the "Special Dance Mix". Over the years, the band has released several remixes and demo versions of the song.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The single initially reached number 93 in 1985 on the US "Billboard" Hot 100 and the top 40 on the U.S. Hot Dance Music/ Club Play Singles. When re-released in 1988, it peaked at number 65 on the Billboard Hot 100.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The song's music video, directed by Brian Ward, shows the band performing in one of the halls at Holloway Sanatorium in Virginia Water, England. A number of people from children to the elderly, dressed in ragged finery, awake to watch the band, then walk through a diamond-shaped glowing portal.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The "Special Dance Version" and the B-side "Welcome to the Sun" were both included on "so80s presents Alphaville" (2014).


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: In 2001, Alphaville released a new set of remixes in a "limited fan edition" called "Forever Young 2001". This single contained three music tracks, one spoken word track, and a PC-only track.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: This CD was released to fans for free, only postage needed to be paid. The names of every fan who had requested a copy were printed on the inside cover. Copies were hand-signed by the band. The remixes that appear on the single have not appeared on other releases.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: Released in 2006, this CD contains two new remixes by notable remix artist Bill Hamel. It also includes a digitally remastered version of the original album version of the song. The remix reached number 31 on the Australian ARIA Singles Chart, peaking higher than the original version in 1986, which only charted at number 47.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: In 1994, German electronic group Interactive released a cover which reached number 7 in Germany and number 10 in Denmark and the Netherlands. It also made the top 20 in five other countries and on the Eurochart Hot 100, the song reached number 34. This electronic dance version does not contain most of the song's lyrics and only includes a slightly modified chorus as the sole vocals. In 2002, German DJ and music producer Kosmonova remixed their version of "Forever Young". The remix peaked at number 21 in Germany and number 37 in the UK.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The music video for "Forever Young" was directed by Basil Schlegel. It features kids attending and partying in a night club.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: In 2005, Australian rock band Youth Group were asked by the producers of the American television series "The O.C." to record a version of "Forever Young" for use in the show, following a positive response to the use of their single "Shadowland" in a previous episode. Their version of "Forever Young" was used in the show and the show's trailers, and was included on the soundtrack album "". Released as a single in Australia on 6 March 2006, the song reached number one on the ARIA Singles Chart for two weeks. The track was included on Youth Group's album "Casino Twilight Dogs", released later that year.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: In 2020, British singer Becky Hill released a cover version of the song. It was released on 13 November 2020 by Polydor Records and Eko Records. The song was selected as the soundtrack to the 2020 McDonald's Christmas advert in the UK.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: The song raised money for FareShare, in which McDonald's donated five million meals for charity. Hill also donated 10p from every download, going to food charity FareShare. She said on her Twitter account, "'forever young' is bigger than just a nice christmas advert & song. @mcdonaldsuk has committed to funding @fareshareuk to redistribute over 5 million meals by April 2021 to families in need. at least 10p of every download goes towards a great cause. no child should be hungry".


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: In 2010, American electronic music group Cash Cash released a cover of the song. It was released on 8 March 2010 through Universal Records. The song was serviced to radio in the United States on 12 May 2010.


title: Forever Young (Alphaville song)

text: A music video for the song was released via YouTube on 29 June 2010. As of 2014, the video has since been removed.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The Western Allied invasion of Germany was coordinated by the Western Allies during the final months of hostilities in the European theatre of World War II. In preparation for the Allied invasion of Germany east of the Rhine, a series of offensive operations were designed to seize and capture the east and west bank of the Rhine: Operation Veritable and Operation Grenade in February 1945, and Operation Lumberjack and Operation Undertone in March 1945, these are considered separate from the main invasion operation. The Allied invasion of Germany east of the Rhine started with the Western Allies crossing the river on 22 March 1945 before fanning out and overrunning all of western Germany from the Baltic in the north to the Alpine passes in the south, where they linked up with troops of the U.S. Fifth Army in Italy. Combined with the capture of "Berchtesgaden", any hope of Nazi leadership continuing to wage war from a so-called "National redoubt" or escape through the Alps was crushed, shortly followed by unconditional German surrender on 8 May 1945. This is known as the Central Europe Campaign in United States military histories.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: By early 1945, events favored the Allied forces in Europe. On the Western Front the Allies had been fighting in Germany with campaigns against the Siegfried Line since the Battle of Aachen, the Battle of Metz and the Battle of Hürtgen Forest in late 1944 and by January 1945 had pushed the Germans back to their starting points during the Battle of the Bulge. The failure of this offensive exhausted Germany's strategic reserve, leaving it ill-prepared to resist the final Allied campaigns in Europe. Additional losses in the Rhineland further weakened the German Army, leaving shattered remnants of units to defend the east bank of the Rhine. On 7 March, the Allies seized the intact bridge across the Rhine at Remagen, and had established a large bridgehead on the river's east bank. During Operation Lumberjack, Operation Plunder and Operation Undertone in March 1945, German casualties during February–March 1945 are estimated at 400,000 men, including 280,000 men captured as prisoners of war.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On the Eastern Front, the Soviet Red Army (including the Polish Armed Forces in the East under Soviet command) simultaneously with the Western Allies, had taken most of Poland, launched an offensive into East Prussia and began their invasion into Eastern Germany in February 1945, and by March were within striking distance of Berlin. The initial advance into Romania, the First Jassy–Kishinev Offensive in April and May 1944 was a failure; the Second Jassy–Kishinev Offensive in August succeeded. The Red Army also pushed deep into Hungary (the Budapest Offensive) and eastern Czechoslovakia and temporarily halted at what is now the modern Germany–Poland border on the Oder–Neisse line. These rapid advances on the Eastern Front destroyed additional veteran German combat units and severely limited German Führer Adolf Hitler's ability to reinforce his Rhine defenses. With the Western Allies making final preparations for their powerful offensive into the German heartland, victory was imminent.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: At the very beginning of 1945, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force on the Western Front, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, had 73 divisions under his command in North-western Europe of which 49 were infantry divisions, 20 armored divisions and four airborne divisions. Forty-nine of these divisions were American, 12 British, eight French, three Canadian and one Polish. Another seven American divisions arrived during February, along with the British 5th Infantry Division and I Canadian Corps, both of which had arrived from the fighting on the Italian front. As the invasion of Germany commenced, Eisenhower had a total of 90 full-strength divisions under his command, with the number of armored divisions now reaching 25. The Allied front along the Rhine stretched from the river's mouth at the North Sea in the Netherlands to the Swiss border in the south.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The Allied forces along this line were organized into three army groups. In the north, from the North Sea to a point about north of Cologne, was the 21st Army Group commanded by Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery. Within 21st Army Group the Canadian First Army (under Harry Crerar) held the left flank of the Allied line, with the British Second Army (Miles C. Dempsey) in the center and the U.S. 9th Army (William Hood Simpson) to the south. Holding the middle of the Allied line from the 9th Army's right flank to a point about south of Mainz was the 12th Army Group under the command of Lieutenant General Omar Bradley. Bradley had three American armies, the U.S. 1st Army (Courtney Hodges) on the left (north), the U.S. 3rd Army (George S. Patton) on the right (south), and the U.S. 15th Army (Leonard T. Gerow). Completing the Allied line to the Swiss border was the 6th Army Group commanded by Lieutenant General Jacob L. Devers, with the U.S. 7th Army (Alexander Patch) in the north and the French 1st Army (Jean de Lattre de Tassigny) on the Allied right, and southernmost, flank.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: As these three army groups cleared out the "Wehrmacht" west of the Rhine, Eisenhower began to rethink his plans for the final drive across the Rhine and into the heart of Germany. Originally, Eisenhower had planned to draw all his forces up to the west bank of the Rhine, using the river as a natural barrier to help cover the inactive sections of his line. The main thrust beyond the river was to be made in the north by Montgomery's 21st Army Group, elements of which were to proceed east to a juncture with the U.S. 1st Army as it made a secondary advance northeast from below the Ruhr River. If successful, this pincer movement would envelop the industrial Ruhr area, neutralizing the largest concentration of German industrial capacity left.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Facing the Allies was "Oberbefehlshaber West" ("Army Command West") commanded by Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring, who had taken over from Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von Rundstedt on 10 March. Although Kesselring brought an outstanding track record as a defensive strategist with him from the Italian campaign, he did not have the resources to make a coherent defense. During the fighting west of the Rhine up to March 1945, the German Army on the Western Front had been reduced to a strength of only 26 divisions, organized into three army groups ("H", "B" and "G"). Little or no reinforcement was forthcoming as the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) continued to concentrate most forces against the Soviets; it was estimated that the Germans had 214 divisions on the Eastern Front in April.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On 21 March, Army Group H headquarters became "Oberbefehlshaber Nordwest" ("Army Command Northwest") commanded by Ernst Busch leaving the former Army Group H commander—Johannes Blaskowitz—to lead "Army Command Netherlands" (25th Army) cut off in the Netherlands. Busch—whose main unit was the German 1st Parachute Army —was to form the right-wing of the German defenses. In the center of the front, defending the Ruhr, Kesselring had Field Marshal Walther Model commanding Army Group B (15th Army and 5th Panzer Army) and in the south Paul Hausser's Army Group G (7th Army, 1st Army and 19th Army).


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: After capturing the Ruhr, Eisenhower planned to have the 21st Army Group continue its drive east across the plains of northern Germany to Berlin. The 12th and 6th Army Groups were to mount a subsidiary offensive to keep the Germans off balance and diminish their ability to stop the northern thrust. This secondary drive would also give Eisenhower a degree of flexibility in case the northern attack ran into difficulties.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: For several reasons, Eisenhower began to readjust these plans toward the end of March. First, his headquarters received reports that Soviet forces held a bridgehead over the Oder River, from Berlin. Since the Allied armies on the Rhine were more than from Berlin, with the Elbe River, ahead, still to be crossed it seemed clear that the Soviets would capture Berlin long before the Western Allies could reach it. Eisenhower thus turned his attention to other objectives, most notably a rapid meet-up with the Soviets to cut the German Army in two and prevent any possibility of a unified defense. Once this was accomplished the remaining German forces could be defeated in detail.In addition, there was the matter of the Ruhr. Although the Ruhr area still contained a significant number of Axis troops and enough industry to retain its importance as a major objective, Allied intelligence reported that much of the region's armament industry was moving southeast, deeper into Germany. This increased the importance of the southern offensives across the Rhine.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Also focusing Eisenhower's attention on the southern drive was concern over the "National redoubt." According to rumor, Hitler's most fanatically loyal troops were preparing to make a lengthy, last-ditch stand in the natural fortresses formed by the rugged alpine mountains of southern Germany and western Austria. If they held out for a year or more, dissension between the Soviet Union and the Western Allies might give them political leverage for some kind of favorable peace settlement. In reality, by the time of the Allied Rhine crossings the "Wehrmacht" had suffered such severe defeats on both the Eastern and Western Fronts that it could barely manage to mount effective delaying actions, much less muster enough troops to establish a well-organized alpine resistance force. Still, Allied intelligence could not entirely discount the possibility that remnants of the German forces would attempt a suicidal last stand in the Alps. Denying this opportunity became another argument for rethinking the role of the southern drive through Germany.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Perhaps the most compelling reason for increasing the emphasis on this southern drive had more to do with the actions of Americans than those of Germans. While Montgomery was carefully and cautiously planning for the main thrust in the north, complete with massive artillery preparation and an airborne assault, American forces in the south were displaying the kind of basic aggressiveness that Eisenhower wanted to see. On 7 March, Hodges's U.S. 1st Army captured the last intact bridge over the Rhine at Remagen and steadily expanded the bridgehead.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: To the south in the Saar-Palatinate region, Patton's U.S. 3rd Army had dealt a devastating blow to the German 7th Army and, in conjunction with the U.S. 7th Army, had nearly destroyed the German 1st Army. In five days of battle, from 18 to 22 March, Patton's forces captured over 68,000 Germans. These bold actions eliminated the last German positions west of the Rhine. Although Montgomery's drive was still planned as the main effort, Eisenhower believed that the momentum of the American forces to the south should not be squandered by having them merely hold the line at the Rhine or make only limited diversionary attacks beyond it. By the end of March, the Supreme Commander thus leaned toward a decision to place more responsibility on his southern forces. The events of the first few days of the final campaign would be enough to convince him that this was the proper course of action.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: When Allied soldiers arrived in a town, its leaders and remaining residents typically used white flags, bedsheets, and tablecloths to signal surrender. The officer in charge of the unit capturing the area, typically a company or battalion, accepted responsibility over the town. Soldiers posted copies of General Eisenhower's "", which began with "We come as a victorious army, not as oppressors." The proclamation demanded compliance with all orders by the commanding officer, instituted a strict curfew and limited travel and confiscated all communications equipment and weapons. After a day or two, specialized Office of Military Government, United States (OMGUS) units took over. Soldiers requisitioned housing and office space as needed from residents. At first, this was done informally with occupants evicted immediately and taking with them few personal possessions, but the process became standardized, with three hours' notice and OMGUS personnel providing receipts for buildings' contents. The displaced residents nonetheless had to find housing on their own.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On 19 March, Eisenhower told Bradley to prepare the 1st Army for a breakout from the Remagen bridgehead any time after 22 March. The same day, in response to the 3rd Army's robust showing in the Saar-Palatinate region, and to have another strong force on the Rhine's east bank guarding the 1st Army's flank, Bradley gave Patton the go-ahead for an assault crossing of the Rhine as soon as possible.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: These were exactly the orders Patton had hoped for; he felt that if a sufficiently strong force could be thrown across the river and significant gains made, then Eisenhower might transfer responsibility for the main drive through Germany from Montgomery's 21st Army Group to Bradley's 12th. Patton also appreciated the opportunity he now had to beat Montgomery across the river and win for the 3rd Army the coveted distinction of making the first assault crossing of the Rhine in modern history. To accomplish this, he had to move quickly.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On 21 March, Patton ordered his XII Corps to prepare for an assault over the Rhine on the following night, one day before Montgomery's scheduled crossing. While this was short notice, it did not catch the XII Corps completely unaware. As soon as Patton had received the orders on the 19th to make a crossing, he had begun sending assault boats, bridging equipment and other supplies forward from depots in Lorraine where they had been stockpiled since autumn in the expectation of just such an opportunity. Seeing this equipment moving up, his frontline soldiers did not need any orders from higher headquarters to tell them what it meant.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The location of the river-crossing assault was critical. Patton knew that the most obvious place to jump the river was at Mainz or just downstream, north of the city. The choice was obvious because the Main River, flowing northward east of and parallel to the Rhine, turns west and empties into the Rhine at Mainz and an advance south of the city would involve crossing two rivers rather than one. However, Patton also realized that the Germans were aware of this difficulty and would expect his attack north of Mainz. Thus, he decided to feint at Mainz while making his real effort at Nierstein and Oppenheim, south of the city. Following this primary assault, which XII Corps would undertake, VIII Corps would execute supporting crossings at Boppard and St. Goar, northwest of Mainz.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The terrain in the vicinity of Nierstein and Oppenheim was conducive to artillery support, with high ground on the west bank overlooking relatively flat land to the east. However, the same flat east bank meant that the bridgehead would have to be rapidly and powerfully reinforced and expanded beyond the river since there was no high ground for a bridgehead defense. The importance of quickly obtaining a deep bridgehead was increased by the fact that the first access to a decent road network was over inland at the town of Groß-Gerau.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On 22 March, with a bright moon lighting the late-night sky, elements of U.S. XII Corps' 5th Infantry Division began the 3rd Army's Rhine crossing. At Nierstein assault troops did not meet any resistance. As the first boats reached the east bank, seven startled Germans surrendered and then paddled themselves unescorted to the west bank to be placed in custody. Upstream at Oppenheim, however, the effort did not proceed so casually. The first wave of boats was halfway across when the Germans began pouring machine-gun fire into their midst. An intense exchange of fire lasted for about thirty minutes as assault boats kept pushing across the river and those men who had already made it across mounted attacks against the scattered defensive strongpoints. Finally, the Germans surrendered, and by midnight units moved out laterally to consolidate the crossing sites and to attack the first villages beyond the river. German resistance everywhere was sporadic, and the hastily mounted counterattacks invariably burned out quickly, causing few casualties. The Germans lacked both the manpower and the heavy equipment to make a more determined defense.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: By midafternoon on 23 March, all three regiments of the 5th Infantry Division were in the bridgehead, and an attached regiment from the 90th Infantry Division was crossing. Tanks and tank destroyers had been ferried across all morning, and by evening a Treadway bridge was open to traffic. By midnight, infantry units had pushed the boundary of the bridgehead more than inland, ensuring the unqualified success of the first modern assault crossing of the Rhine.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Two more 3rd Army crossings—both by VIII Corps—quickly followed. In the early morning hours of 25 March, elements of the 87th Infantry Division crossed the Rhine to the north at Boppard, and then some 24 hours later elements of the 89th Infantry Division crossed south of Boppard at St. Goar. Although the defense of these sites was somewhat more determined than that XII Corps had faced, the difficulties of the Boppard and St. Goar crossings were compounded more by terrain than by German resistance. VIII Corps crossing sites were located along the Rhine Gorge, where the river had carved a deep chasm between two mountain ranges, creating precipitous canyon walls over high on both sides. In addition, the river flowed quickly and with unpredictable currents along this part of its course. Still, despite the terrain and German machine-gun and anti-aircraft cannon fire, VIII Corps troops managed to gain control of the east bank's heights, and by dark on 26 March, with German resistance crumbling all along the Rhine, they were preparing to continue the drive the next morning.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On the night of 23/24 March, after the XII Corps' assault of the Rhine, Bradley had announced his success. The 12th Army Group commander said that American troops could cross the Rhine anywhere, without aerial bombardment or airborne troops, a direct jab at Montgomery whose troops were at that very moment preparing to launch their own Rhine assault following an intense and elaborate aerial and artillery preparation and with the assistance of two airborne divisions, the American 17th and the British 6th.Montgomery was exhibiting his now-legendary meticulous and circumspect approach to such enterprises, a lesson he had learned early in the North African campaign. Thus, as his forces had approached the east bank of the river, Montgomery proceeded with one of the most intensive buildups of material and manpower of the war. His detailed plans, code-named Operation Plunder, were comparable to the Normandy invasion in terms of numbers of men and extent of equipment, supplies, and ammunition to be used. The 21st Army Group had 30 full-strength divisions, 11 each in the British Second and U.S. 9th Armies and eight in the Canadian First Army, providing Montgomery with more than 1,250,000 men.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Plunder called for the Second Army to cross at three locations along the 21st Army Group front—at Rees, Xanten and Rheinberg. The crossings would be preceded by several weeks of aerial bombing and final massive artillery preparation. A heavy bombing campaign by USAAF and RAF forces, known as the "Interdiction of Northwest Germany", designed primarily to destroy the lines of communication and supply connecting the Ruhr to the rest of Germany had been underway since February. The intention was to create a line from Bremen south to Neuwied. The main targets were rail yards, bridges, and communication centers, with a secondary focus on fuel processing and storage facilities and other important industrial sites. During the three days leading up to Montgomery's attack, targets in front of the 21st Army Group zone and in the Ruhr area to the southeast were pummeled by about 11,000 sorties, effectively sealing off the Ruhr while easing the burden on Montgomery's assault forces.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Montgomery had originally planned to attach one corps of the U.S. 9th Army to the British Second Army, which would use only two of the corps' divisions for the initial assault. The rest of the 9th Army would remain in reserve until the bridgehead was ready for exploitation. The 9th Army's commander, Lieutenant General William Hood Simpson and the Second Army's Lieutenant-General Dempsey took exception to this approach. Both believed that the plan squandered the great strength in men and equipment that the 9th Army had assembled and ignored the many logistical problems of placing the 9th Army's crossing sites within the Second Army's zone.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Montgomery responded to these concerns by making a few small adjustments to the plan. Although he declined to increase the size of the American crossing force beyond two divisions, he agreed to keep it under the 9th Army rather than Second Army control. To increase Simpson's ability to bring his army's strength to bear for exploitation, Montgomery also agreed to turn the bridges at Wesel, just north of the inter-army boundary, over to the 9th Army once the bridgehead had been secured.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: In the southernmost sector of the 21st Army Group's attack, the 9th Army's assault divisions were to cross the Rhine along an section of the front, south of Wesel and the Lippe River. This force would block any German counterattack from the Ruhr. Because of the poor road network on the east bank of this part of the Rhine, a second 9th Army corps was to cross over the promised Wesel bridges through the British zone north of the Lippe River, which had an abundance of good roads. After driving east nearly , this corps was to meet elements of the 1st Army near Paderborn, completing the encirclement of the Ruhr.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Another important aspect of Montgomery's plan was Operation Varsity, in which two divisions of Major General Matthew Ridgway's XVIII Airborne Corps were to make an airborne assault over the Rhine. In a departure from standard airborne doctrine, which called for a jump deep behind enemy lines several hours prior to an amphibious assault, Varsity's drop zones were close behind the German front, within Allied artillery range. Additionally, to avoid being caught in the artillery preparation, the paratroopers would jump only after the amphibious troops had reached the Rhine's east bank. The wisdom of putting lightly-armed paratroopers so close to the main battlefield was debated, and the plan for amphibious forces to cross the Rhine prior to the parachute drop raised questions as to the utility of making an airborne assault at all. However, Montgomery believed that the paratroopers would quickly link up with the advancing river assault forces, placing the strongest force within the bridgehead as rapidly as possible. Once the bridgehead was secured the British 6th Airborne Division would be transferred to Second Army control, while the U.S. 17th Airborne Division would revert to 9th Army control.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Plunder began on the evening of 23 March with the assault elements of the British 2nd Army massed against three main crossing sites: Rees in the north, Xanten in the center, and Wesel in the south. The two 9th Army divisions tasked for the assault concentrated in the Rheinberg area south of Wesel. At the northern crossing site, elements of British XXX Corps began the assault (Operation Turnscrew) about 21:00, attempting to distract the Germans from the main crossings at Xanten in the center and Rheinberg to the south. The initial assault waves crossed the river quickly, meeting only light opposition. Meanwhile, Operation Widgeon began north of Wesel as the 2nd Army's 1st Commando Brigade slipped across the river and waited within of the city while it was demolished by one thousand tons of bombs delivered by RAF Bomber Command. Entering in the night, the commandos secured the city late on the morning of 24 March, although scattered resistance continued until dawn on the 25th. The 2nd Army's XII Corps and the 9th Army's XVI Corps began the main effort about 02:00 on 24 March, following a massive artillery and air bombardment.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: For the American crossing, Simpson had chosen the veteran 30th and 79th Infantry Divisions of the XVI Corps. The 30th was to cross between Wesel and Rheinberg while the 79th assaulted south of Rheinberg. In reserve were the XVI Corps' 8th Armored Division, and 35th and 75th Infantry Divisions, as well as the 9th Army's XIII and XIX Corps, each with three divisions. Simpson planned to commit the XIX Corps as soon as possible after the bridgehead had been secured, using the XIII Corps to hold the Rhine south of the crossing sites.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: After an hour of extremely intense artillery preparation, which Eisenhower himself viewed from the front, the 30th Infantry Division began its assault. The artillery fire had been so effective and so perfectly timed that the assault battalions merely motored their storm boats across the river and claimed the east bank against almost no resistance. As subsequent waves of troops crossed, units fanned out to take the first villages beyond the river to only the weakest of opposition. An hour later, at 03:00, the 79th Infantry Division began its crossing upriver, achieving much the same results. As heavier equipment was ferried across the Rhine, both divisions began pushing east, penetrating into the German defensive line that day.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: To the north, the British crossings had also gone well, with the ground and airborne troops linking up by nightfall. By then, the paratroopers had taken all their first day's objectives in addition to 3,500 prisoners.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: To the south, the discovery of a defensive gap in front of the 30th Infantry Division fostered the hope that a full-scale breakout would be possible on 25 March. When limited objective attacks provoked little response on the morning of the 25th, the division commander Major General Leland Hobbs formed two mobile task forces to make deeper thrusts with an eye toward punching through the defense altogether and breaking deep into the German rear. However, Hobbs had not fully taken into account the nearly nonexistent road network in front of the XVI Corps bridgehead. Faced with trying to make rapid advances through dense forest on rutted dirt roads and muddy trails, which could be strongly defended by a few determined soldiers and well-placed roadblocks, the task forces advanced only about on the 25th. The next day they gained some more ground, and one even seized its objective, having slogged a total of , but the limited progress forced Hobbs to abandon the hope for a quick breakout.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: In addition to the poor roads, the 30th Division's breakout attempts were also hampered by the German 116th Panzer Division. The only potent unit left for commitment against the Allied Rhine crossings in the north, the 116th began moving south from the Dutch-German border on 25 March against what the Germans considered their most dangerous threat, the U.S. 9th Army. The enemy armored unit began making its presence felt almost immediately, and by the end of 26 March, the combination of the "panzer" division and the rough terrain had conspired to sharply limit the 30th Division's forward progress. With the 79th Infantry Division meeting fierce resistance to the south, Simpson's only recourse was to commit some of his forces waiting on the west bank of the Rhine. Late on 26 March, the 8th Armored Division began moving into the bridgehead.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Although the armored division bolstered his offensive capacity within the bridgehead, Simpson was more interested in sending the XIX Corps across the Wesel bridges, as Montgomery had agreed, and using the better roads north of the Lippe to outflank the enemy in front of the 30th Division. Unfortunately, because of pressure from the Germans in the northern part of the 2nd Army bridgehead, the British were having trouble completing their bridges at Xanten and were, therefore, bringing most of their traffic across the river at Wesel. With Montgomery allowing use of the Wesel bridges to the 9th Army for only five out of every 24 hours, and with the road network north of the Lippe under 2nd Army control, General Simpson was unable to commit or maneuver sufficient forces to make a rapid flanking drive.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Adding to the Germans' woes, the 6th Army Group made an assault across the Rhine on 26 March. At Worms, about south of Mainz, the 7th Army's XV Corps established a bridgehead, which it consolidated with the southern shoulder of the 3rd Army's bridgehead early the next day. After overcoming stiff initial resistance, XV Corps also advanced beyond the Rhine, opposed primarily by small German strongpoints sited in roadside villages.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: By 28 March, the 8th Armored Division had expanded the bridgehead by only about and still had not reached Dorsten, a town about east of the Rhine, whose road junction promised to expand the XVI Corps' offensive options. On the same day, however, Montgomery announced that the eastbound roads out of Wesel would be turned over to the 9th Army on 30 March with the Rhine bridges leading into that city changing hands a day later. Also on 28 March, elements of the U.S. 17th Airborne Division operating north of the Lippe River in conjunction with British armored forces—dashed to a point some east of Wesel, opening a corridor for the XIX Corps and handily outflanking Dorsten and the enemy to the south. Simpson now had both the opportunity and the means to unleash the power of the 9th Army and begin in earnest the northern drive to surrounding the Ruhr.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Simpson began by moving elements of the XIX Corps' 2nd Armored Division into the XVI Corps bridgehead on 28 March with orders to cross the Lippe east of Wesel, thereby avoiding that city's traffic jams. After passing north of the Lippe on 29 March, the 2nd Armored Division broke out late that night from the forward position that the XVIII Airborne Corps had established around Haltern, northeast of Dorsten. On the 30th and 31st, the 2nd Armored made an uninterrupted drive east to Beckum, cutting two of the Ruhr's three remaining rail lines and severing the autobahn to Berlin. As the rest of the XIX Corps flowed into the wake of this spectacular drive, the 1st Army was completing its equally remarkable thrust around the southern and eastern edges of the Ruhr.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The 1st Army's drive from the Remagen bridgehead began with a breakout before dawn on 25 March. German Field Marshal Walter Model, whose "Army Group B" was charged with the defense of the Ruhr, had deployed his troops heavily along the east–west Sieg River south of Cologne, thinking that the Americans would attack directly north from the Remagen bridgehead. Instead, the 1st Army struck eastward, heading for Giessen and the Lahn River, beyond Remagen, before turning north toward Paderborn and a linkup with the 9th Army. All three corps of the 1st Army participated in the breakout, which on the first day employed five infantry and two armored divisions. The U.S. VII Corps, on the left, had the hardest going due to the German concentration north of the bridgehead, yet its armored columns managed to advance beyond their line of departure. The U.S. III Corps, in the center, did not commit its armor on the first day of the breakout, but still made a gain of . The U.S. V Corps on the right advanced , incurring minimal casualties.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: Beginning the next day, 26 March, the armored divisions of all three corps turned these initial gains into a complete breakout, shattering all opposition and roaming at will throughout the enemy's rear areas. By the end of 28 March, Hodges' 1st Army had crossed the Lahn, having driven at least beyond the original line of departure, capturing thousands of German soldiers in the process. Nowhere, it seemed, were the Germans able to resist in strength. On 29 March, the 1st Army turned toward Paderborn, about north of Giessen, its right flank covered by the 3rd Army, which had broken out of its own bridgeheads and was headed northeast toward Kassel.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: A task force of the VII Corps' 3rd Armored Division, which included some of the new M26 Pershing heavy tanks, spearheaded the drive for Paderborn on 29 March. By attaching an infantry regiment of the 104th Infantry Division to the armored division and following the drive closely with the rest of the 104th Division, the VII Corps was well prepared to hold any territory gained. Rolling northward without casualties, the mobile force stopped for the night from its objective. Taking up the advance again the next day, it immediately ran into stiff opposition from students of an SS "panzer" replacement training center located near Paderborn. Equipped with about 60 tanks, the students put up a fanatical resistance, stalling the American armor all day. When the task force failed to advance on 31 March, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton Collins, commander of the VII Corps, asked Simpson if his 9th Army, driving eastward north of the Ruhr, could provide assistance. Simpson, in turn, ordered a combat command of the 2nd Armored Division, which had just reached Beckum, to make a advance southeast to Lippstadt, midway between Beckum and the stalled 3rd Armored Division spearhead. Early in the afternoon of 1 April elements of the 2nd and 3rd Armored Divisions met at Lippstadt, linking the 9th and 1st Armies and sealing the prized Ruhr industrial complex, along with Model's "Army Group B", within American lines.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: As March turned to April the offensive east of the Rhine was progressing in close accordance with Allied plans. All the armies assigned to cross the Rhine had elements east of the river, including the Canadian 1st Army in the north, which sent a division through the British bridgehead at Rees, and the French 1st Army in the south, which on 31 March established its own bridgehead by assault crossings at Germersheim and Speyer, about south of Mainz. With spectacular thrusts being made beyond the Rhine nearly every day and the enemy's capacity to resist fading at an ever-accelerating rate, the campaign to finish Germany was transitioning into a general pursuit.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: In the center of the Allied line, Eisenhower inserted the new 15th Army, under U.S. 12th Army Group control to hold the western edge of the Ruhr Pocket along the Rhine while the 9th and 1st Armies squeezed the remaining German defenders there from the north, east, and south. Following the reduction of the Ruhr, the 15th Army was to take over occupation duties in the region as the 9th, 1st and 3rd Armies pushed farther into Germany.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: On 28 March, as these developments unfolded, Eisenhower announced his decision to adjust his plans governing the future course of the offensive. Once the Ruhr was surrounded, he wanted the 9th Army transferred from the British 21st Army Group to the U.S. 12th Army Group. After the reduction of the Ruhr Pocket, the main thrust east would be made by Bradley's 12th Army Group in the center, rather than by Montgomery's 21st Army Group in the north as originally planned. Montgomery's forces were to secure Bradley's northern flank while Devers' 6th U.S. Army Group covered Bradley's southern shoulder. Furthermore, the main objective was no longer Berlin, but Leipzig where a juncture with the Soviet Army would split the remaining German forces in two. Once this was done, the 21st Army Group would take Lübeck and Wismar on the Baltic Sea, cutting off the Germans remaining in the Jutland peninsula of Denmark, while the 6th U.S. Army Group and the 3rd Army drove south into Austria.


title: Western Allied invasion of Germany

text: The British Prime Minister and Chiefs of Staff strongly opposed the new plan. Despite the Russian proximity to Berlin, they argued that the city was still a critical political, if not military, objective. Eisenhower, supported by the American Chiefs of Staff, disagreed. His overriding objective was the swiftest military victory possible. Should the U.S. political leadership direct him to take Berlin, or if a situation arose in which it became militarily advisable to seize the German capital, Eisenhower would do so. Otherwise, he would pursue those objectives that would end the war soonest. In addition, since Berlin and the rest of Germany had already been divided into occupation zones by representatives of the Allied governments at the Yalta Conference, Eisenhower saw no political advantage in a race for Berlin. Any ground the Western Allies gained in the future Soviet zone would merely be relinquished to the Soviets after the war. In the end, the campaign proceeded as Eisenhower had planned it.