Learn about interesting aspects of the Lake Balaton offensive, an armed conflict that represents an important Nazi advance undertaken against the Red Army, during the development of World War II; Do not miss it.
Lake Balaton Offensive
This battle that took place between March 6 and 16, 1945, was identified as Unternehmen Frühlingserwachen, which when translated into Spanish, meant “Operation Spring Awakening” although it is popularly known as the Lake Balaton offensive.
In short, it was a military operation commanded by the German defense force called the Wehrmacht against the Red Army on behalf of the Soviet forces fighting on the Eastern Front.
It was undoubtedly one of the last major offensives of the Nazis against the Soviets within all the warlike events that took place during the Second World War.
Development of the Lake Balaton offensive
The events took place through an attack by German troops on March 6, 1945, in the areas surrounding Hungary’s Lake Balaton, through the use of armored divisions and forces from its Eastern Front, which had been supplemented with many tricks transferred from its Western Front.
This attack was planned with great care and in secret by the German high command; but even so he could not deceive the Soviet intelligence service, who was in charge of alerting the troops of his high command.
What led to the Germans being at a disadvantage in terms of the number of soldiers and weapons; which led to the defeat of his forces on March 16, 1945, which made it clear that they had an inevitable weakness before their enemy.
Consequence of the Lake Balaton offensive
The effects of this war on the Red Army were not very serious, despite having many casualties; so at the beginning of April they launched their attack on Vienna; so the Germans withdrew their troops from the soil of Hungary.
At that time the interest of the Nazis was focused on the defense of Vienna and the territory of Lower Austria, which was dominated by them.
Meanwhile the panorama presented to the civil population of Hungary because of these final battles was very precarious; even more so when the Soviet officers and soldiers considered them, for the most part, allies of the German Reich.
It is estimated that of the approximately 700 tanks deployed by the German forces, 30% of them were used as part of the Lake Balaton offensive operation and much of this equipment was abandoned during this withdrawal from Germany.
It is certainly worth mentioning that many of the tanks, equipment in perfect condition and heavy weapons, were left on the shores of this lake, remaining there in the hands of the Red Army; some of them did not get to fire a single shot, being later used as units in charge of the Soviet armored companies.
The victory achieved with the Lake Balaton offensive allowed the Germans to take away several oil wells that they controlled in the town of Nagykanizsa, which contributed to aggravate their difficult military situation; since they had to depend almost completely on synthetic fuel.
In short, this battle in the vicinity of Lake Balaton caused more casualties in the Red Army than in the German; It has historically been considered a major offensive action by the troops of the Nazi unified armed forces identified as the Wehrmacht within the development of the events that were part of the Second World War.
However, when Adolf Hitler learned of this offensive failure, he ordered that the men of the Waffen SS Leibstandarte Division be stripped of their emblematic armbands, since they represented their name with them and they had not defended it as they should have done.