Campaign for the USSR "End of War".  

As part of the campaign:
1. Balaton - Rules map, SSB mission
2. Kyustrinsky bridgeheads - map Rules, mission S.Alex
3. Lauban - Rules map, SSB - Inductor mission (help with IS texts).
4. Operation "Solstice" - map Rules, mission S.Alex
5. Danzig - Rules map, S.Alex mission (download the corrected version separately here)
6. Encirclement of Berlin - SSB map, SSB mission

Successful attacks by the enemy, the need to change plans and the form of operations on the fly set the intrigue during the Battle of Germany. The first months of 1945 for Germany, just like the summer of 1941 for the USSR, were not boring baby beatings. The march of batteries, the preparation of positions, a heavy battle with German tanks rolling over the positions of artillerymen, semi-encirclement, uncertainty - all this could have happened not only in December 1942 near Stalingrad, but also in February 1945 near Arnswalde. ©

The campaign is dedicated to the father of the SSB - Son Boris Mikhailovich, a lieutenant of communications of tank troops in 1941 and a major of communications of artillery of the reserve of the main command during the storming of Berlin, on the streets of which he was and left his painting on the Reichstag building.

1. The Battle of Lake Balaton.
January-March 1945

... On December 27, 1944, the encirclement ring around Budapest finally closed, the total number of Hungarian units and formations surrounded in Budapest was 55,100 people. German units and formations numbered 42,600 people. From near Warsaw, the IV SS Panzer Corps was transferred to the south. Liberation from the blockade of Budapest was more important to Hitler than the defense of East Germany.

In January-March 1945, in the area of ​​Lake Balaton, a chain of battles unfolded, which, in fact, became the last offensive of the Wehrmacht and the SS units in the Second World War. They ended in the complete defeat of the tank elite of the III Reich by the Red Army units of the 2nd and 3rd Ukrainian fronts.

2. Kustrinsky bridgeheads.
February-April 1945

... In the course of a successful advance within the framework of the Vistula-Oder operation, the troops of the 5th Shock Army N.E. Berzarina on January 31, 1945 reached the Oder River northwest of the city of Kustrin and captured a bridgehead on its left bank. On February 3, bridgeheads south of the city of Kustrin captured the advanced detachments of the 8th Guards Army under the command of V. I. Chuikov.
The German command, instead of the planned maneuver battle on the right bank of the Oder, is now forced to ram the defenses of the captured bridgeheads. Recovering from the initial shock, German aircraft attacked those who crossed the Oder.

The position of the Soviet units turned out to be extremely difficult. Artillery of high power and armored vehicles, due to lack of fuel, lagged far behind the troops. Aviation, due to the rapid advance and the lack of a sufficient number of prepared airfields, cannot provide sufficient support. Problems with the supply of ammunition significantly reduce both the defense capability of the troops and their ability to expand bridgeheads.

3. Battle of Lauban
February-March 1945

The beginning of February 1945 was a time of hope for I. S. Konev. The front commander was well aware that stopping the further offensive meant a long-awaited pause for the enemy to stabilize the front and improve the defense. The initial plan for the operation, called the Lower Silesian, was presented by the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front to Headquarters on January 28, ten days earlier than Zhukov's plan to capture Berlin. In February, Konev planned to make up for lost time due to the need to concentrate efforts against the enemy grouping in the Silesian industrial region.

True to his principle of using tank armies, I. S. Konev set the task for the tank armies to break through the enemy defenses together with the combined arms armies, and then to break ahead and develop success.

4. Operation Solstice
February 1945

... In February 1945, in Eastern Pomerania and Silesia, intensive preparations were underway for flank attacks, through which it was supposed to defeat the Soviet troops that had reached the Oder and threatened Berlin. Thus, the Wehrmacht command intended not only to improve its strategic position, but also to keep economically and militarily vital areas. Eastern Pomerania, with its large industrial enterprises, warehouses and arsenals, well-equipped airfields, ports and naval bases, was of great importance for Nazi Germany.

The flanking operation was codenamed "Solstice" (Sonnenwende). The core for its implementation was the 11th SS Panzer Army (TA SS) Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner. It consisted of elite formations and units of the SS tank-grenadier divisions (TGD SS) "Nederland" and "Nordland", the elite Wehrmacht division (pd) "Escort of the Fuhrer", the SS division "Fuhrer Grenadiers", the 503rd battalion of heavy tanks and etc. The main blow of the enemy was taken by the Soviet units of the 61st Army, the 2nd Guards Tank Army, and the 3rd Shock Army of the 1st Belorussian Front under the command of Marshal of the Soviet Union K.K. Rokossovsky.

5. Capture of Danzig.
February-May 1945

... On February 10, the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front went on the offensive without a pause after the 1st stage of the East Prussian operation of 1945. After the troops of the 2nd Belorussian Front entered the Baltic Sea near Keslin, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command, by directive number 11035, set before K.K. Rokossovsky the task of defeating the enemy grouping in the area of ​​Danzig, Stolp, capturing the cities of Danzig, Gdynia and, no later than March 20, go out along the entire front line on the coast of the Baltic Sea.

Cut off from the main forces of Army Group Vistula by the breakthrough of Soviet troops to the Baltic Sea, formations of the German 2nd Army, which opposed the 2nd Belorussian Front, still retained their combat capability in mid-March. The defense of Danzig and Gdynia from land was based on a system of air defense posts built to defend the base from the air. They encircled the city in a continuous ring within a radius of 12-15 km from its center. The location of air defense points on the heights dominating the terrain, the presence of ready-made artillery positions and permanent structures, a ready-made observation and communications network gave undeniable advantages to the defenders. The air defense system of the naval base was supplemented with a network of trenches, anti-tank obstacles and barbed wire. Anti-aircraft artillery with a caliber of up to 128 mm was prepared for firing at ground targets.

Powerful artillery support for the Wehrmacht was also provided by the Kriegsmarine ships stationed in the bays of Danzig and Gdynia.

6. Encirclement of Berlin.
April-May 1945

.... The Berlin strategic offensive operation is one of the last strategic operations of the Soviet troops in the European theater of operations, during which the Red Army occupied the capital of Germany and victoriously ended the Great Patriotic War. The operation lasted 23 days - from April 16 to May 8, 1945, during which the Soviet troops advanced westward at a distance of 100 to 220 km. The Berlin operation is the largest battle in the history of mankind. About 3.5 million people, 52 thousand guns and mortars, 7750 tanks and 11 thousand aircraft took part in the battle on both sides.