On 30 April 1945, the day after Munich’s city center had been taken, additional units of the US 7th Army — led by the 42nd “Rainbow” and 45th “Thunderbird” Infantry Divisions — pushed into the city through the northwestern districts. The Dachauer Straße formed the direct link between the Dachau concentration camp, liberated the previous day, and the center of Munich, and was one of the main axes of the US advance. The image brings the extent of Munich’s wartime destruction to the foreground: a US soldier in front, behind him civilians standing in front of rubble piles and burned-out rows of houses. By the end of the war, Munich had suffered severe damage from 71 bombing raids; much of the city center was destroyed or severely damaged.