 Only when Soviet artillery was falling around his Berlin headquarters bunker did he begin to perceive the final outcome.The crossing of the Rhine, the encirclement and reduction of the Ruhr, and the sweep to the Elbe–Mulde line and the Alps all established the final campaign on the Western Front as a showcase for Allied superiority in maneuver warfare.Drawing on the experience gained during the campaign in Normandy and the Allied advance from Paris to the Rhine, the Western Allies demonstrated in Central Europe their capability of absorbing the lessons of the past.