1st SS Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler - Eastern Front 1945

Eastern Front 1945

Operation Spring Awakening (Frühlingserwachen) (6 March 1945 – 16 March 1945) was the last major German offensive launched during World War II and was an offensive launched by the Germans in great secrecy on 6 March 1945. The Germans launched attacks in Hungary near the Lake Balaton area on the Eastern Front. This area included some of the last oil reserves still available to the Germans. The Operation involved many German units withdrawn from the failed Ardennes Offensive on the Western Front including the 6th SS Panzer Army and the LSSAH. Almost inevitably, Operation Spring Awakening was a failure for the German Army. Despite early gains, the operation was a perfect example of Hitler's increasingly poor military judgement toward the end of the war. Its chief flaw was that the offensive was far too ambitious in scope.

After the failure of Operation Spring Awakening, Sepp Dietrich's 6th SS Panzer Army retreated in stages to the Vienna area. The Germans desperately prepared defensive positions in an attempt to hold the city against the fast arriving Soviets, in what become known as the Vienna Offensive.