The unexpected availability of a bridgehead on the eastern side of the Rhine more than two weeks in advance of Operation Plunder allowed Allied high commander Dwight Eisenhower to alter his plans to end the war.

[24] During the two weeks that the valley was flooded, Hitler refused to allow Gerd von Rundstedt, Commander-in-Chief of the Western Front, to withdraw German forces to the east side of the Rhine.

"[33] In the last week of February, Colonel Charles G. Patterson, the anti-aircraft artillery officer for III Corps, led a meeting for brigade and group commanders during which they discussed what they would do if they were lucky enough to capture a bridge intact.

[34][35][36] When the First Army captured Cologne and reached the west bank of the Rhine, it was greeted as a major success of the Allied campaign, but German engineers dropped the Hohenzollern Bridge on 6 March, shortly before the 3rd Armored Division arrived.

[33] General Gustav von Zangen's Fifteenth Army staff believed that the Allies would cross the Rhine using the open terrain of the Rheinbach Valley near the Ahr River.

He argued with German Army Group B commander Field Marshal Walter Model, "The Americans would have to be stupid not to take advantage of this hole and push tanks toward the Rhine.

Zangen tried and failed to persuade Model to block the Americans by withdrawing two corps from the West Wall defenses along the German frontier and placing them at Remagen to protect the Ludendorff Bridge.

It would have been logical to fall back to the east side of the Rhine and regroup, but Hitler absolutely refused to allow a retreat and irrationally demanded that his Army recapture the territory it had lost.

[2] During 6 March, the III Flak Korps anti-aircraft gun crews emplaced on top of the 180-meter-high (590 ft) Erpeler Ley, strategically overlooking the Ludendorff Bridge, had been ordered by the Luftwaffe to help defend Koblenz.

[44] Soon after the American troops arrived on the ridge overlooking Remagen, German forces on the west bank near the town were alerted to the approaching enemy armor and raced back across the bridge.

Corporal Anton Faust volunteered to leave the tunnel under Erpeler Ley to manually light the primer cord to the explosives attached to the eastern pier that had been placed earlier in the day.

[69][70] They also conducted numerous raids on German vehicles, armor, railroad lines, and marshalling yards in the vicinity of Remagen, knocking out trains, transports, tanks, supply trucks, and reinforcements headed towards the bridgehead.

Like most of the German leadership in the area, he was on the move, in his case trying to save portions of the LXVI and LXVII Armeekorps which had been pushed up against the west bank of the Rhine by the 4th Armored Division above Andernach.

On 9 March, the 67th Infantry Regiment tried to stop the American progress, but their attacks were too weak and piecemeal to ensure success, as "overcast skies and limited visibility restricted aerial support during the day.

When the 9th and 11th Panzer finally attacked the American 311th Regiment at Bad Honnef 4 miles (6.4 km) downstream from Remagen on 11 March, they were ineffective and consumed dwindling supplies of gasoline without result.

However we must succeed, for if the Americans continue to hold out on the right bank of the Rhine they have a base for a further advance and from the small beginning of a bridgehead such as we now see, a running sore will develop—as so often before—the poison from which will soon spread to the Reich's vitals.

In an indication of their dire military situation, Hermann Göring initially sought volunteers from among Messerschmitt 262A pilots for suicide missions to attack the bridge, but the aircraft's bomb targeting sight prevented their use in this way.

[7][8][77] When fully loaded with external bombs, the bombers were capable of flying at over 660 km/h (410 mph), faster than almost all Allied aircraft except the latest Tempest Mark V,[78] and so fast that the American anti-aircraft units had trouble tracking them.

[9] The Luftwaffe's 14th Flieger Division under Oberst Lothar von Heinemann attacked the bridge with a variety of propeller-driven aircraft, including Messerschmitt Bf 109s, Focke-Wulf Fw 190s, and even the antiquated Ju 87D "Stuka" dive-bombers.

The range for its lightest shell of 1,250 kg (2,760 lb) was just over 10 km (6.2 mi), but after only 14 rounds that missed all of the bridges and only damaged a handful of random houses, the weapon had to be moved to the rear for repairs.

Directed by forward artillery observers positioned on the steep hills overlooking the river, the Germans continually pounded the engineers, soldiers, and vehicles on the bridges and the roads leading to them.

[10] The 51st Engineer Combat Battalion, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Harvey Fraser, built a Class 40, 25 Ton 969-foot (295 m) reinforced heavy pontoon bridge 3.2 kilometers (2.0 mi) upstream on the bank of the Rhine between Kripp to Linz.

Hodges also complained later that Millikin repeatedly disobeyed his orders including a directive to drive his forces north along the east bank and open a crossing for VII Corps, and that he failed to attach enough infantry support to the 9th Armored Division.

Patton's headquarters boasted to Bradley that, "Without benefit of aerial bombing, ground smoke, artillery preparation, and airborne assistance, the Third Army at 2200 hours, Thursday evening, 22 March, crossed the Rhine River.

[118]Dissenting voices include that of German general Friedrich von Mellenthin, who said:[121] The importance of this incident has been unduly magnified; the American High Command made no immediate attempt to exploit success here, and at first was content to put four divisions into the bridgehead and tell them to hang on.

The bridgehead dealt a serious blow to German morale that may well have been partly responsible for lackluster resistance at other points, and it served as a magnet to draw a measure of fighting strength from other sites.

[118] LT Hugh Mott of the 2nd Platoon, Company B, 9th Armored Engineer Battalion, led Sergeants Eugene Dorland and John A. Reynolds onto the bridge to remove live demolition charges while under fire.

The men who in the face of scattered fire and the great threat of the bridge blowing up under them, raced across and cut the wires have materially shortened a struggle in which every minute means lost lives.

[144] The local art and cultural company "Ad Erpelle", founded in 2006, purchased the east bridge towers and the tunnel under Erpeler Ley in 2011 for use as a performance space, preserving it for public access.

Gestiftet von Staatsminister a.D. Heinz Schwarz MdB 1945 Luftwaffenhelfer an der ehemaligen Ludendorffbrucke 1972–76 Innenminister des Landes Rheinland-Pfalz Peace Without Freedom Is Not Peace—Konrad Adenauer.