taken out of the army altogether by December. In October and November 1944 beforehand, the division would fighting defensive actions in The Netherlands against the combined efforts of British, Canadian, Polish, American and Dutch forces in Operation Pheasant, most notably defending areas around Breda and Standaarbuiten against elements of the Polish 1st Armored Division and U.S. 104th Infantry Division. Hungary and Ukraine The reason for this was the approaching Red Army, which by now had re-claimed much of the Polish territory the Soviet Union had lost in 1941. Specifically, they had been moved to defend their Hungarian and Slovakian allies. Ordered to move into Hungary in late December with IV SS-Panzer Corps under Hitler's orders, the force was put under the command of Herbert Otto Gille of the SS. Contact was lost with the 711th, and the divisional forces did not regroup until January 8. The division aided in the recapture the city of Esztergom two days earlier, which had been under the Red Army's 3rd Ukrainian Front for just over a fortnight. Launching an attack from Esztergom on January 9, the force trying to defend Hungary made their way to Budapest. They were stalled by Soviet shelling from the Danube, reaching as far as Dobogókő, which the 711th recaptured. Now part of the 6th Army's I Cavalry Corps, the division was joined by remnants of the Hungarian 1st Hussar Division and the 6th Panzer Division. The 6th Army's commander, General Hermann Balck, informed Army Group South's high command that he was sending the corps over to aid the IX Mountain Corps, envisioning a joint-strike of the 711th and 96th Infantry Divisions with the Panzer Division; however, he grossly-misjudged the number of tanks the 6th Panzer Division was equipped with in comparison to the number of tanks needed. Even worse, the Red Army's 2nd Mechanized Corps was approaching their position. Czechoslovakia In a shake-up of the 8th Army, a detachment of the division, "Kampfgruppe 711. Infanterie-Division" was transferred into this unit along with LXXII Corps on April 12. Lieutenant General Reichert ceased to command the division on 14 April when he was injured in an automobile accident. With the chain of command breaking, colonels von Watzdorf and von Bosse were all that remained to take charge of the remnants, which had again been transferred to a new unit in March, XXIV Corps of the 1st Panzer Army. The division finally