Allies Drive into Rhineland
1945
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This segment of a United News Newsreel shows Allied troops advance in Germany. Soldiers cross a river under a smoke screen.
Transcript
ALLIES DRIVE INTO RHINELANDNARRATOR: On the 3rd Army front in Germany, American soldiers have fought in snow, in ice, in fog, and now, along flooded roads, flooded marshes, flooded streams. The snow in the Eifel and Vosges has melted, torrents of water came down across the roads, and troops and supplies have a hard time moving up. Sometimes, Americans hold one end of a bridge, Germans the other. The enemy has to be bombed or mortared out before the advance can proceed.
Then, a footbridge is built. And the men go over, often under heavy fire from farther up the opposite bank. Over and over, the bridges are hit and smashed. So a smokescreen is laid down to cover the operation and damp rainy weather keeps the oil fog close to the ground.
When the wind shifts, the canisters are floated downstream to the windward.
Ammunition, food stores, and medical supplies are carried across.
The trucks go over too at a second crossing.
The troops advance with the river and smokescreen behind them.
Dead Germans. Live Germans.
Meanwhile, on the northern sector of the front, the Canadian 1st Army under General Crerar attacks east of Nijmegen. Kleve is taken, Goch is taken, the Rhine is reached at Emmerich.
Field Marshal Montgomery, caught in a traffic jam, decides the tanks are a priority and stops for a bite to eat. And the tanks go forward. Here begins the new Allied offensive.
In the first two weeks, the Canadians took 10,000 prisoners. They cleared the Reichswald Forest, cleared a maze of German junctions, broke through three belts of the Siegfried Line. And war comes into the German homeland as it came to other homelands when the Nazis were riding high. Germany is learning what it means to begin a war!
This primary source comes from the Records of the Office of War Information.
National Archives Identifier: 39158
Full Citation: Motion Picture 208-UN-1041; Allies Drive into Rhineland; 1945; Motion Picture Films from "United News" Newsreels, 1942 - 1945; Records of the Office of War Information, Record Group 208; National Archives at College Park, College Park, MD. [Online Version, https://docsteach.org/documents/document/allies-drive-into-rhineland, October 5, 2024]Rights: Copyright Not Evaluated Learn more on our privacy and legal page.
