US Forces Enter Nazi Germany

On March 7, 1945, the first soldiers of the United States Army captured and crossed the Ludendorff Bridge, one of the few remaining bridges over the Rhine, entering Germany for the first time during World War II. The bridge withstood numerous attempts by German forces to destroy it until March 17, when it collapsed suddenly into the Rhine. By then, American forces were moving over other pontoon bridges steadily into their established bridgehead in Germany.