The division was holding positions on the Roer when it was ordered to help contain the German Ardennes offensive. The division fought in eastern Belgium, blunting the German Fifth Panzer Army's penetration of American lines. The division helped reduce the Bulge in January, fighting in the Ardennes forest in deep snow, and cleared the area from Houffalize to the Ourthe River of the enemy. The German 2nd Panzer Division was on its original mission to the Meuse River. Mechanized units of this Panzer Division ultimately ran out of fuel at Celles, where they were destroyed by the U.S. 2nd Armored Division and the British 29th Armoured Brigade. After a rest in February, the division, now commanded by Major General Isaac D. White, drove on across the Rhine on 27 March, and was the first American division to reach the Elbe at Schonebeck on 11 April. It was halted on the Elbe, 20 April. In July the division entered Berlin—the first American unit to enter the German capital city. During World War II, the 2nd Armored Division took 94,151 POWs, liberated 22,538 Allied POWs, shot down or damaged on the ground 266 enemy aircraft, and destroyed or captured uncountable thousands of enemy tanks and other equipment and supplies.