On April 30, 1945, Adolf Hitler took his life in his subterranean Berlin bunker. The impact of his suicide on the war was more emotional than strategic. He killed himself because he understood that surrender and capture were inevitable. Still, in the aftermath of Hitler's suicide, there were many consequences and reactions on an individual and a collective level. Individual German government figures and the German people had radical and diverse reactions to the news of his demise. Some officials rightfully anticipated that it was time to vanish to avoid arrest and responsibility for the unspeakable crimes of the Third Reich. Here are some of the causes of the things that happened immediately after.