Conquest of Tempelhof Airport

On 26 April 1945, Berlin Tempelhof Airport came under the control of 8th Guards Army led by General Vasily Chuikov. With ready for take-off aircraft parked in underground hangars, Tempelhof provided the last escape route for the Nazi leadership and was therefore a priority in Chuikov’s attack plans.

Chuikov’s troops had routed the German 7th Army at Stalingrad in 1942/43. On 22 April 1945, after the battle of the Seelow Heights in which they had sustained heavy losses, Chuikov’s forces pushed forward into the southernmost districts of the German capital and advanced towards the south of the airfield.

The German troops opposing them were a hodgepodge of SS units, an armoured division, local flak units and the airbase garrison. They resisted stubbornly for several hours. Only after intensive aerial bombardment and massive artillery fire from reinforcing units, Tempelhof Airport was taken. A few days later, the Soviet war photographer Yevgeny Khaldey shot his famous photograph showing Soviet troops under their victory banner standing next to the Nazi eagle on the roof of Tempelhof Airport.

On 4 July 1945, the American Independence Day, U.S. troops officially took charge of their occupation sector in southwest Berlin and, the same day, took over control of Tempelhof Airport.