Vienna

=== Anschluss and World War II===
{{Main|Anschluss}}
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 146-1972-028-14, Anschluss Österreich.jpg|thumb|Crowds greet [[Adolf Hitler]] as he rides in an open car through Vienna in March 1938.]]
In 1938, after a triumphant entry into Austria, the Austrian-born [[German Chancellor]] [[Adolf Hitler]] spoke to the [[Austrian Germans]] from the balcony of the Neue Burg, a part of the [[Hofburg Imperial Palace|Hofburg]] at the [[Heldenplatz]]. In the ensuing days the new Nazi authorities oversaw the harassment of Viennese Jews, the looting of their homes, and their on-going deportation and murder.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Erlanger |first1=Steven |title=Vienna Skewered as a Nazi-Era Pillager of Its Jews |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/07/world/vienna-skewered-as-a-nazi-era-pillager-of-its-jews.html |work=The New York Times |access-date=11 May 2017 |date=7 March 2002 |archive-date=2 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220702054818/https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/07/world/vienna-skewered-as-a-nazi-era-pillager-of-its-jews.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Expulsion, Deportation to concentration camps and mass murder – History of the Jews in Vienna From racist mania to genocide |url=https://www.wien.gv.at/english/culture/jewishvienna/history/nationalsocialism.html |access-date=11 May 2017 |work=wien.gv.at |quote=The entry of Hitler's army into Austria in March 1938 triggered unprecedented suffering and hardship for Vienna's Jews. Grave acts of violence against the Jewish population began to proliferate. |archive-date=20 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220320223715/https://www.wien.gv.at/english/culture/jewishvienna/history/nationalsocialism.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Between 1938 (after the [[Anschluss]]) and the end of the [[Second World War]] in 1945, Vienna lost its status as a capital to [[Berlin]], because Austria ceased to exist and became part of [[Nazi Germany]].

During the November pogroms on 9 November 1938, 92 synagogues in Vienna were destroyed. Only the city temple in the 1st district was spared, as the data of all Jews in Vienna were collected in the adjacent archives. [[Adolf Eichmann]] held office in the expropriated Palais Rothschild and organized the expropriation and persecution of the Jews. Of the almost 200,000 Jews in Vienna, around 120,000 were driven to emigrate and around 65,000 were killed. After the end of the war, the Jewish population of Vienna was only about 5,000.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.doew.at/erkennen/ausstellung/1938/die-verfolgung-der-oesterreichischen-juden |title=DÖW – Erkennen – Ausstellung – 1938 – Die Verfolgung der österreichischen Juden |website=www.doew.at |access-date=3 February 2021 |archive-date=6 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220706103854/https://www.doew.at/erkennen/ausstellung/1938/die-verfolgung-der-oesterreichischen-juden |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.xn--jdische-gemeinden-22b.de/index.php/gemeinden/u-z/2087-wien-oesterreich |title=Jüdische Gemeinde – Wien (Österreich) |website=www.xn—jdische-gemeinden-22b.de |access-date=3 February 2021 |archive-date=10 June 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220610035119/https://www.xn--jdische-gemeinden-22b.de/index.php/gemeinden/u-z/2087-wien-oesterreich |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.wien.gv.at/english/culture/jewishvienna/ |title=Jewish Vienna |website=www.wien.gv.at |access-date=11 May 2017 |archive-date=19 June 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220619120020/https://www.wien.gv.at/english/culture/jewishvienna/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.zeit.de/2018/11/nationalsozialismus-oesterreich-anschluss-antisemitismus-adolf-eichmann/komplettansicht |title=Hitlers willige Vasallen |newspaper=Die Zeit |date=12 March 2018 |access-date=3 February 2021 |archive-date=5 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220505105703/https://www.zeit.de/2018/11/nationalsozialismus-oesterreich-anschluss-antisemitismus-adolf-eichmann/komplettansicht |url-status=live |last1=Riedl |first1=Joachim }}</ref>

Vienna was also the center of the important resistance group around [[Heinrich Maier]], which provided the Allies with plans for V-1, [[V-2 rocket]]s, Peenemünde, [[Tiger tank]]s, [[Messerschmitt Bf 109]], [[Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet]] and other aircraft. The information was important to [[Operation Crossbow]] and [[Operation Hydra (1943)|Operation Hydra]], both preliminary missions for [[Operation Overlord]]. In addition, factory locations for war-essential products were communicated as targets for the Allied Air Force. The group was exposed and most of its members were executed after months of torture by the Gestapo in Vienna.<ref>Christoph Thurner "The CASSIA Spy Ring in World War II Austria: A History of the OSS's Maier-Messner Group" (2017), pp 35.</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.dday-overlord.com/en/d-day/preliminary-operations/crossbow |title=Operation Crossbow – Preliminary missions for the Operation Overlord |date=19 February 2016 |access-date=8 February 2021 |archive-date=20 February 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180220112540/http://www.dday-overlord.com/en/d-day/preliminary-operations/crossbow |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Peter Broucek "Die österreichische Identität im Widerstand 1938–1945" (2008), p. 163.</ref><ref>Hansjakob Stehle "Die Spione aus dem Pfarrhaus (German: The spy from the rectory)" In: Die Zeit, 5 January 1996.</ref> The group around the later executed [[Karl Burian]] even tried to blow up the Gestapo headquarters in the Hotel Metropole.<ref>Karl Glanz "Die Sozialdemokratie", 2020, pp 28.</ref>
	
On 2 April 1945, the [[Soviet Red Army]] launched the [[Vienna Offensive]] against the Germans holding the city and besieged it. British and American air-raids, as well as artillery duels between the Red Army and the [[SS]] and [[Wehrmacht]], crippled infrastructure, such as tram services and water- and power-distribution, and destroyed or damaged thousands of public and private buildings. The Red Army was helped by an Austrian resistance group in the German Wehrmacht. The group tried under the code name Radetzky to prevent the destruction and fighting in the city. Vienna fell eleven days later.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.wienerzeitung.at/archiv/139520-Der-Kampf-um-Wien-im-April-1945.html |title="Operation Radetzky" verhinderte das Ärgste – Der Kampf um Wien im April 1945 |first=Friedrich |last=Weissensteiner |website=Archiv |date=26 March 2005 |access-date=3 February 2021 |archive-date=21 April 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210421144903/https://www.wienerzeitung.at/archiv/139520-Der-Kampf-um-Wien-im-April-1945.html |url-status=live }}</ref> At the end of the war, Austria again became separated from Germany, and Vienna regained its status as the capital city of the Republic of Austria, but the Soviet hold on the city remained until 1955,<ref>{{Cite web |date=20 September 2021 |title=The Soviet Occupation of Austria |url=https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/soviet-occupation-of-austria |access-date=11 August 2023 |website=The National WWII Museum {{!}} New Orleans |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=24 May 2007 |title=The Soviet occupation of Austria, 1945–1955 |url=https://www.eurozine.com/the-soviet-occupation-of-austria-1945-1955/ |access-date=11 August 2023 |website=www.eurozine.com}}</ref> when Austria regained full sovereignty.