From 1815 , the area appeared of minimal strategic importance , as it lay deep within the borders of the German Confederation and ( from 1871 ) of the German Empire , and German military planning presumed any war would be effectively lost long before an enemy reached that far into the homeland . The route became important again at the end of World War II when the U.S. XII Corps used it in their advance eastward in late March and early April 1945 . The U.S. advance had little consequence for Germany 's strategic position ( which was indeed hopeless by that point ) , but it allowed the Americans to occupy vast swaths of territory which the Yalta Conference of February 1945 had assigned to the Soviet occupation zone . This in turn did much to compel the Soviets to honor their commitment to allow the Western Allies access to Berlin in exchange for U.S. withdrawal ( July 1945 ) from this territory
Yalta Conference
Yalta Conference
Fulda Gap