The Germans were hoping for a peace with the West, and possibly the ability to continue to fight the Soviets. Ironically, they only managed to insure the Soviets had a better position at the bargaining table.
Too little too late. Somewhere I heard the Americans were pumping out a B52 every 35 minutes. The Germans were done by mid 1944 but just didn’t know it yet.
Stalin came to the bargaining table with the frame of mind that... ‘we negotiate from where we stand...’.
All the other allies packed up and went home after the war... only the Russians stayed and held onto the places the ‘liberated’. If you read Churchill’s bio, he sounded like he was way to lenient with old Joe.