The assault on the Reichstag began long before the first soldier charged across the open square. For the Red Army, that battered building was more than a target. It was the symbol of the German state itself, the place where the Third Reich had risen and where it would now be buried. By late April 1945, Berlin was in ruins.
Allied bombing had destroyed most of the city, yet the Reichstag still stood. Its thick walls had survived the raids, and the Germans intended to defend it to the last man. For the Soviets, capturing it before May Day celebrations in Moscow became an obsession. Commanders pushed their men forward, promising glory to whoever planted the red flag first.
On the 29th of April, a young soldier named Vladimir Pereverzev wrote home by candlelight. In his letter, he described the strange mix of fear and bravado that gripped the men. Soldiers drank to steady their nerves, knowing death was only meters away. He wrote that they were tightening the circle around the city center, that he was just 500 meters from the Reichstag, and that they would be inside tomorrow.
The letter ended with a dark joke about not being able to send looted goods home because there was no time. Shortly after finishing it, Vladimir was badly wounded. He died on the day victory was announced. The assault was planned for the early morning of April 30th.
Soviet troops had taken the Ministry of the Interior on the southern side of Moltkestraße, fighting through the corridors with grenades and submachine guns. The open ground of Königsplatz stretched between them and their objective. It was only a few hundred meters, but it was a death trap. The area was riddled with craters, covered in debris, and swept by crossfire from the Reichstag and nearby anti-aircraft positions.
The first attack was torn apart. Men fell in rows as machine guns chattered from the windows above. The assault collapsed under the fire, and the survivors dragged themselves back to cover. A young battalion commander, trying to orient himself near the Ministry of the Interior, hesitated.
His regimental commander demanded to know why he was delayed. The battalion commander shouted that there was a great building in the way. The regimental commander grabbed the map, studied it, and told him what the young man could not see. That building was the Reichstag.
The young commander had not imagined their final objective could be so close. Throughout the day, the Soviets brought up tanks, artillery, and reinforcements. Dozens of heavy guns and rocket launchers pounded the Reichstag without pause. Yet the building refused to fall.
Smoke and dust choked the air, but the German defenders held on. By afternoon, Soviet troops were pinned down again by distant anti-aircraft guns, and the final assault had to wait for nightfall. Among the attackers, competition grew brutal. Every platoon and every banner group wanted the honor of raising the red flag first.
It was a symbolic act that promised lasting glory, and the generals fought over it as fiercely as the men. Some units were chosen for political reasons. A Georgian soldier was deliberately included in one banner group as a gesture toward Stalin. Others, from persecuted ethnic groups, were excluded entirely.
General Vasily Shatilov had already sent a message to Moscow claiming the Reichstag was captured. The news had reached the capital, and there was no taking it back. The lie had to become reality, whatever the cost. He ordered his men to plant the flag on the building at any price.
As evening fell, the sky darkened under the smoke of burning Berlin. Soviet infantry, supported by tanks, launched a full-scale assault. The Germans had fortified the Reichstag heavily. Entrances were blocked with masonry and sandbags, and defenders fired down from balconies and upper floors.
The Soviets blasted their way inside, only to meet a wall of grenades and anti-tank weapons. The fighting became brutal and chaotic. Fire spread quickly through the building, filling the halls with thick, choking smoke. Men fought by the light of flames, unable to see beyond a few meters.
Small groups pushed toward the roof, hoping to raise the flag. One early attempt was cut down by machine-gun fire. Others claimed success before midnight, but those claims are uncertain, likely shaped by propaganda demands. Even if a flag was raised, the battle was far from over.
Fighting continued through the night. German troops counterattacked from the basement while Soviet soldiers fought their way upward. It became close-quarter combat at its most savage. Men dropped grenades through holes in the floor onto enemy positions below.
They fired through walls and fought hand to hand in the darkness. Exhaustion set in, but no one could stop. Water was scarce, and the smoke left throats raw and noses bleeding. Tragic mistakes happened in the chaos.
One Soviet soldier picked up a German grenade to throw it back. It struck the door frame and exploded at his feet, severing them. Still, the fighting went on. Only in the late afternoon of May 1st did the violence begin to subside.
The Germans in the basement called out, asking to negotiate with a senior officer. A Soviet lieutenant, disguised as a colonel with a sheepskin coat to hide his rank, went down to handle the talks. Soon, the Germans began to emerge. They were filthy, unshaven, and dressed in torn uniforms.
They glanced around nervously and surrendered with subdued submission. Around 300 of them laid down their weapons. Nearly 200 more had already been killed in the basement. In a makeshift medical station, about 500 wounded Germans lay crowded together, many injured before the final assault even began.
The Soviets lost 154 men killed and 312 wounded in the battle for the Reichstag. Afterward, soldiers left their names and messages scratched into the walls. On May 2nd, a photographer named Yevgeny Khaldei arrived in Berlin with a large homemade Soviet flag. By the time he reached the Reichstag, Soviet soldiers had already raised several flags during the chaotic fighting.
But Khaldei wanted a powerful, iconic image. He asked a group of soldiers to reenact the raising of the flag on the roof. That photograph became the definitive image of the Battle of Berlin. The photo was later altered.
In the original, one of the soldiers appeared to be wearing multiple wristwatches, likely taken from looted German property. Soviet censors worried it suggested looting, so they edited the image to remove one of the watches. They also added extra smoke in the background to make the scene look more dramatic. Another photo, lesser known, shows a German soldier sitting among the ruins of the Reichstag.
It was likely taken on May 9th and posed for propaganda purposes by the Soviets. Little is known about the soldier in that picture, or what became of him afterward.
