Air Operations, CBI

• More than 40 10th Air Force fighter-bombers attack troops and other targets directly behind the Japanese Army battle lines.
• 7 427th Night Fighter Squadron P-61s attack a number of tactical targets with cannon, rockets, and napalm.

• 2 308th Heavy Bomb Group B-24s attack shipping in the South China Sea.
• 5 341st Medium Bomb Group B-25s attack rail facilities at Hsuchang.
• 39 14th Air Force fighter-bombers attack numerous targets.
• 20 V Bomber Command B-24s attack a depot in Shanghai and shipping at Yulin, Hainan.
• B-25s attack Hanian and Woody islands.

• 24 90th Heavy Bomb Group B-24s attack warehouses, oil stores, dry docks, and the naval base at Saigon.

Air Operations, East Indies

• XIII Bomber Command B-24s attack the Jesselton and Sepinggang airfields on Borneo and shipping in the Makassar Strait.
• Fleet Air Wing 10 PVs based on Palawan attack various targets on Borneo.
• XIII Fighter Command P-38s attack Tarakan with napalm.

Air Operations, Europe

• 148 Lancasters of No. 5 Group set out to attack the railway yards and port area at Flensburg, but the operation is abandoned because of cloud which covers the target on the bomb run.
• All aircraft return safely.

• 60 Mosquitos are sent to Kiel.
• There are no losses.

• 38 Mosquitos are sent to Rendsburg, 32 to Travemünde and 8 to Schleissheim airfield, and there are 35 Mosquito patrols and 45 RCM sorties.
• There are no losses.

Air Operations, Formosa

• 38th Medium Bomb Group B-25s attack rail yards at Shinei.
• 9 B-25s destroy an alcohol and sugar plant at Hokko.
• V Fighter Command P-51s attack the airfield at Karenko.
• P-38s attack various targets of opportunity.

Air Operations, Philippines

• V Fighter Command fighter-bombers support US 6th Army ground forces on Luzon.
• 1st Marine Aircraft Wing PBJs, SBDs, and F4Us support the US X Corps on Mindanao.

Air Operations, Ryukyus

• US Navy and Marine Corps aircraft support the US 10th Army on Okinawa.
• Task Unit 52.1.3 TBMs and F6Fs attack airfields in the Sakishima Islands.
• A VMF-224 F4U downs a D3A 'Val' dive bomber at sea at 0630 hours.
• A VF-47 F6F downs a D4Y 'Judy' dive bomber over the Kikai Shima airfield at 0650 hours.

Baltic Sea

5 German merchant ships are hit by the RAF Coastal Command.

Britain, Home Front

Black-out restrictions are cancelled.

Eastern Front

Hitler officially takes over command of the defense of Berlin. He tells Goebbels to announce that he will never leave the city. This gives the struggle the quality of the supreme defense of European cultural values against Bolshevism, their mortal enemy. The city's garrison, reinforced by troops withdrawn from the Oder, by 32,000 policemen, old men, women and the Hitlerjugend armed with the Panzerfaust (anti-tank gun), amounts to about 300,000. The defensive perimeter is held in the east by the Münchberg Panzer Div and the Panzergrenadiere Nordland Div, in the west by the 20th Motorized Div; the 18th Panzer is held in reserve. The capital is meant also to be reinforced by the 200,000 men of the Frankfurt-Guben Group, currently southeast of the city and surrounded by the Russians, with their 2,000 guns and 200 tanks; by the Steiner operational group, currently north of the capital; and by Gen Walther Wenck's 12th Army, which on the 24th is ordered to make for the Brandenberg area, east of the capital. But the expected reinforcements are unable to get through.

The armies of the 1st Belorussian Front, advancing from Spremberg, have reached the eastern border of Berlin, while the armies of the 1st Ukraine Front are swarming up from the south. In the south the Germans are resisting on the line Beelitz-Trebbin-Tetlow-Dahlewitz, but the Russians are on the point of closing the circle around the city, reaching the Havel River, west of Potsdam, from north and east.

Southeast of Berlin the 1st Ukraine Front takes Cottbus, already bypassed and surrounded since the breakthrough on the Spree.

In Czechoslovakia the struggle goes on south of Brno and northwest of Moravska-Ostrava (Ostrava), with Ferdinand Schörner's Army Group Center facing the 4th Ukraine Front and 2nd Ukraine Front.

The 5th Guards Army, 1st Ukraine Front, advances from Eberswalde and makes firmly for the Elbe. Other forces of the 1st Ukraine Front take Oranienburg, north of Berlin, and bypass Frankfurt-on-the-Oder. The 1st Ukraine Front seizes Pulsnitz, northeast of Dresden.

The 69th Army captures Frankfurt and the 3rd Guards Army takes Cottbus. A counterattack by the weakened 4th Panzer Army causes the Polish 2nd and Soviet 52nd Armies some initial discomfort.

The Soviet 6th Guards and 53rd Armies assault Brno, shattering the German 8th Army.[MORE]

Germany, Politics

Göring sends a message to Hitler offering to take over the leadership of the Reich if Hitler is unable to continue with that task when he is besieged in Berlin. Hitler is furious at Göring's presumption and orders his arrest, which is carried out the next day.

Italy

The IV Corps, US 5th Army, cross the Po near Guastalla and Luzzara.

In the British 8th Army sector, the XIII Corps establishes several bridgeheads over the Reno, while the 8th Div, V Corps, reaches Ferrara and the Po at Pontelagoscuro.

Occupied Czechoslovakia

The Government-in-Exile calls for a final national uprising.

Okinawa

In the area between Nishibaru and Tanabaru, the US 96th Div captures several hills; Japanese resistance seems to be weakening.

Pacific

The German submarine U-183 is sunk by the US submarine Besugo (SS-321) in the Java Sea.

Philippines

On Luzon after a violent air bombardment of the area of Mount Mirador, southwest of Baguio, units of the 37th Div, US I Corps, advance as far as the cemetery at Baguio, where they are held up by Japanese fire. In the XI Corps sector, the 6th Div carries on with the assault on Mount Pacawagan, liquidating the Japanese strongpoints one after another. The XIV Corps keeps up its pressure on enemy positions on Mount Mataasna Bundoc.

Units of the US 24th Div take Kabacan, on Mindanao Island.

Western Front

The XII Corps, British 2nd Army, reaches the Elbe opposite Hamburg.

The whole of the Dessau sector is in the hands of the 3rd Arm Div, VII Corps, US 1st Army. The XV and XXI Corps, US 7th Army, push on toward the Danube, while the VI Corps continues its offensive across the river.

Images from April 23, 1945

RAF Bristol Beaufighters from the Dallachy Wing attacking enemy vessels sheltering beneath the 3,000ft cliffs of Sognefjord in Norway, 23 April 1945

Attacking Enemy Ships in Norway

Soviet troops reaching Berlin, 23 April 1945

Soviet Troops Reaching Berlin

A Churchill tank halts near infantry of the 1st London Irish Rifles near Tanara during the advance to the River Po, Italy, 23 April 1945

The Advance to the River Po

T-34-85 tanks of the 7th Guards Tank Corps in the suburbs of Berlin. In the foreground is the burning skeleton of a German car

Soviets in the Suburbs of Berlin

Soviet tank T-34-85 accompanied by infantry moves down the street on the outskirts of Berlin.

Soviets on the Outskirts of Berlin

Jewish refugees, approaching allied soldiers, become aware that they have just been liberated, April, 1945

Liberated Jewish Refugees

A tank battalion leads an advance on Baguio in the Philippines, 23 April 1945

Tank Battalion Leads an Advance on Baguio

M4 Sherman Tank Berg Ehingen Donau Bruckenstrasse, 23 April 1945

M4 Sherman Tank Crossing the Donau