Spring Awakening begins

Operation Spring Awakening began officially at 04:30 hours on 6 March, with a massive barrage from the artillery of the Sixth SS Panzer Army. First to move forward were the panzergrenadiers of the Leibstandarte, whose first task was to open several lanes through a Russian minefield before they could begin clearing an extensive system of trenches and strongpoints at bayonet point. This took all morning, and then the division's panzer kampfgruppe was able to race forward. But as its tanks and armoured halftracks tried to deploy off the roads to engage the enemy anti-tank guns, they started to get stuck in axle-deep mud. The panzergrenadiers had to press home their attacks without armoured support. Not surprisingly, the rate of advance was unimpressive.

Advancing on the Leibstandarte's left, the Hitlerjugend Division found the going equally hard. II SS Panzer Corps' attack did not even reach its assembly area until well after dark. Thanks to their successful initial defence, the Russians were able to deploy an extra infantry corps, with limited tank support, across the path of I SS Panzer Corps. They did not move their main armoured reserves, but kept them around Budapest in preparation for their own offensive.

The fight for the Danube

On 7 March the German attack began to gather momentum, as both the Leibstandarte and Hitlerjugend Divisions at last broke through the Soviet defences and were able to launch their panzer kampfgruppen into action to exploit the breaches created by the panzergrenadiers. As dawn broke on 8 March, German fortunes looked as if they had changed. The Hitlerjugend surged 16km (10 miles) forward until it ran into a pak-front dug-in on ridge lines. The division's reconnaissance battalion was ordered to take the position in a night attack, to allow the advance to begin again at first light. A dozen Jagdpanthers and Jagdpanzer IVs formed a panzerkeil which charged up the hill and routed the defenders. The reconnaissance battalion's halftracks followed close behind, and the Waffen-SS troopers machine-gunned and grenaded the fleeing Russian troops as they drove among them.

Bittrich's men, spearheaded by Das Reich, now ran headlong into the Soviet XXX Corps and XVIII Tank Corps, which battled furiously to hold them back from the Danube. The Russians even resorted to using their heavy anti-aircraft artillery in the direct-fire mode against German tanks. The next day the Hohenstaufen and Wiking Divisions joined the attack, driving a wedge 24km (15 miles) into the Soviet line.

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