1945: Americans find intact bridge over Rhine

In a major coup for the Allied war effort, the U.S. Army reaches the Rhine River at the small German town of Remagen and find the Ludendorff Bridge still standing. Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler, planned on using the Rhine as a formidable natural obstacle against the advancing Allied troops, and ordered all bridges across the river destroyed. German troops were preparing to blow up the Ludendorff Bridge when American forces captured it on 7 March, under heavy fire. Hitler was furious, and fired General Gerd von Rundstedt as commander of his forces in the west. Over the coming days, the Germans desperately tried to destroy the bridge but the Allied bridgehead steadily grew as troops and vehicles poured across the Rhine. On 17 March, the Ludendorff Bridge finally collapsed under strain from heavy use and German artillery, killing some two dozen Americans. By that time, however, the Allies had built several pontoon bridges across the Rhine and had a strong bridgehead on the east shore. Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight Eisenhower later said that the discovery of the intact bridge put victory just around the corner.