Ivan S Konev

The Eastern Front had been relatively stable since the end of Operation Bagration in late 1944. The Germans had lost Budapest and most of Hungary. Romania and Hungary were forced to surrender and declare war on Germany. The Polish plain was open to the Soviet Red Army.

Adolf Hitler had convinced himself by December 1940 that England lay prostrate before German air power. November had seen the worst of the air attacks; acres of England’s cities were reduced to rubble. Hitler believed she would never rise again to threaten Germany.