Forgotten Soldier (29 page)

For us there was the heat of the Russian summer, which followed the winter with practically no spring in between. There were the storms, with their torrents of rain. There were our tender-skinned shoulders rubbed raw by our straps, particularly at the point which bore the weight of the gun. There were kicks and scuffs, and for many of us, the whip. There were mess tins half-filled with tasteless pap. There was the fear of failure and of the disciplinary battalion, and the fear of ultimate success as a dead hero. There were our heads, emptied of every thought, and the fixed, staring eyes of comrades who no longer saw anything but the earth on which we had to crawl. There were also two letters from Paula, which my heavy, exhausted eyes could no longer make any sense of, and my remorse at being unable to reply during my eight hours of rest.

Two thousand miles to the west, people were complaining because at certain hours it was impossible to find anything to drink at the Paris bistros. It still makes me laugh to hear how bitterly this abstinence made them suffer.

Throughout the war, one of the biggest German mistakes was to treat German soldiers even worse than prisoners, instead of allowing us to rape and steal-crimes which we were condemned for in the end, anyway.

One day we were given anti-tank exercises-defensive and counterattack. As we had already been taught to dig foxholes in record time, we had no trouble opening a trench 150 yards long, 20 inches wide, and a yard deep. We were ordered into the trench in close ranks, and forbidden to leave it, no matter what happened. Then four or five Mark-3s rolled forward at right angles to us, and crossed the trench at different speeds. The weight of these machines alone made them sink four or five inches into the crumbling ground. When their monstrous treads ploughed into the rim of the trench only a few inches from our heads, cries of terror broke from almost all of us. Even today, I am fascinated by the sight of a bulldozer at work: its treads remind me of those terrifying moments. We were also taught how to handle the dangerous Panzerfaust, and how to attack tanks with magnetic mines. One had to hide in a hole and wait until the tank came close enough. Then one ran, and dropped an explosive device-unprimed during practice-between the body and the turret of the machine. We weren't allowed to leave our holes until the tank was within five yards of us. Then, with the speed of desperation, we had to run straight at the terrifying monster, grab the tow hook and pull ourselves onto the hood, place the mine at the joint of the body and turret, and drop off the tank to the right, with a decisive rolling motion. Thank God, I myself never had to mine a tank coming straight at me. Lensen, who was promoted to ober, and then sergeant, partly because of his prowess in this exercise, gave us a demonstration which no suspense film could ever hope to equal. His assurance was partly responsible for his horrible end a year and a half later.

There was a but in the courtyard-a roof supported by four stakes -for those who retained some trace of individualism or disobedience. Under the roof there were some empty boxes which served as benches. This structure was familiarly known as "Die Hundehiitte." I never saw anyone there, but heard enough about the treatment dished out to men who were being punished to realize that this was in an entirely different category from the punishment huts in France, where the fellows spent their time lying on a mattress. At Camp F, soldiers being disciplined spent their thirty-six hours of active training like everyone else. However, at the end of this period they were led to the Hundehutte and chained, with their wrists behind their backs, to a heavy horizontal beam. Their eight-hour rest period would be spent in this position, their backsides supported by an empty box. Soup was brought to them in one of the big tureens for eight, from which they had to lap like dogs, as their hands were immobilized behind their backs. Suffice it to say that after two or three sessions in this chalet, the wretched victim, denied a rest which was absolutely essential, lapsed into a coma, which would put a merciful end to his sufferings. He would then be sent to the hospital. There was a horrible story about a fellow named Knutke, who had been to the but six times but who still refused, despite kicks and beatings, to follow the section out for training. One day, they took the dying man to the foot of a tree and shot him.

"That's what the hut leads to," everyone said. "You've got to avoid it." So, despite groans of pain, everyone marched.

It surprises me most of all that at that time we thought we were useless, impossibly inferior, and that we would never make decent soldiers. Despite our desperate life, we really tried, with the best of wills, to do better and better. But Herr Hauptmann Fink had his own ideas about "better," which could lead to the brink of death.

Toward the middle of July, only a few days before the battle of Belgorod, the captain Kommandant of Camp F swore us into the infantry at an open-air ceremony. We dedicated ourselves to the Fuhrer in front of a stand, made of branches and decorated with flags, which held the officers of the camp. One by one, we marched alone, in parade step, to the level of the stand, made a quarter-turn, and marched toward it. When we had reached the stipulated distance-about seven or eight yards-we snapped to attention, and declared in a loud, clear voice:

"I swear to serve Germany and the Fuhrer until victory or death."

Then we executed another quarter-turn to the left, and joined the ranks of those who had already completed the ceremony, in a high state of emotion, ready to convert the Bolsheviks, like so many Christian knights by the walls of Jerusalem.

For me, only half German, this ceremony may have had even more significance than for the others. Despite all the hardship we had been through, my vanity was flattered by my acceptance as a German among Germans, and as a warrior worthy of bearing arms.

Then-a miracle. Fink produced a glass of excellent wine for each of us, and lifted his own glass along with ours, to a chorus of "Sieg Heils." Then he walked through our ranks, shaking each of us by the hand, thanking us, and declaring himself equally pleased with us and with himself. He said that he felt well satisfied that he was sending a good group of soldiers to the division. I really don't know whether we were good soldiers or not, but we had assuredly been through the mill. We had all lost pounds, which was evident in our sunken eyes and lined faces. But all that had been foreseen. Before we left the camp, we were given two days of complete rest, which we used to maximum advantage. It seems scarcely credible that by the time we left we all nourished a certain admiration for the Herr Hauptmann. Everyone, in fact, dreamed of someday becoming an officer of the same stripe.

BELGOROD

On a hot evening in the summer of 1943, we found ourselves once again in the immediate vicinity of the front.

Belgorod had recently been retaken by the Russians, who had set up their advance positions just beyond the town, inside our own lines. The front, which ran through Belgorod, from Kharkov to Kursk, was more or less quiet. The campaign, which had continued almost without a break since our withdrawal from the Belgorod-Voronezh-Kursk triangle, had been exhausting. The Russians were now catching their breath and collecting their innumerable dead, before launching an even stronger attack against our positions in September. Kharkov had remained in our hands after the slaughter at Slaviansk, and the Russian breakthrough on our Southern Front had finally been stopped somewhere near Kremenchug.

The Soviets had regained some of their strength, and had forced the German and Rumanian troops to withdraw from the Caucasus and the Kalmuck plain. They had also pushed us back from the Donets. However, the situation was not yet entirely in their hands, and strong counter-attacks from our side often broke their frantic thrust. Belgorod, Kharkov, and Stalino all figure prominently in any account of German counter-attacks. Sixty thousand troops took part in the battle of Belgorod. I was one of them.

Eighteen thousand Hitlerjugend had also arrived from Silesian camps to receive their baptism of fire in this unequal combat, in which a third of them lost their lives. I can remember their arrival very well, in brisk columns, ready for anything. Some units carried flags with inscriptions embroidered in gold letters: JUNGE LOWEN, or THE WORLD BELONGS TO US. Platoons of machine gunners arrived, and infantry regiments loaded with bandoliers stuffed with grenades, and motorized regiments with all their heavy equipment. The plain was covered with soldiers, and for the next three or four days more and more came ...

Then everything quieted down. By regiment, section, and group we were all directed to precise locations, where we settled down to an armed watch. Once again, I speak as though we knew of the impending attack. In fact, we engaged in these preparations as part of the normal routine.

As in the past, I and my comrades were used for a thousand and one chores, which reminded us of the old days in the Rollbahn. It was suffocatingly hot, and the dried yellow grasses of the steppe did not hold down the dust, which was stirred up in clouds by the slightest movement.

In the evenings we sat beside enormous campfires and talked or sang. The front was some fifteen miles away, so fires were permitted. There was plenty of time for an abundant correspondence with Paula, and I thought about her constantly.

Then, one afternoon, we were assembled for distribution of ammunition.

Each man was given 120 cartridges and four grenades. Ten of us-nine men and a noncom-were organized as an assault group. Hals was a machine gunner, one of two men with F. M. spandaus, each with a number-two man. There were three men with rifles, one of them me, two grenadiers armed with automatics and heavy bags of grenades, and a noncom. In total silence, and with every possible precaution, we were led to a shelter near a large farm, right behind the front line. An armored section of the Gross Deutschland was next to us, with Tiger tanks and heavy howitzers pulled by tractors and camouflaged by real and artificial leaves. We walked past a table set up near one of the buildings, and a fat clerk took down our identification numbers. At another table, a lieutenant in the cavalry was studying a map, surrounded by other Panzer officers and a couple of noncoms. With painstaking precision we were taken from the farm to the place marked for us on the map. Suddenly, at the edge of some woods, I recognized the wide communication trenches which led to the front line, and I think we all had the same thought: now we're in for it. All around us, other groups were taking up their positions.

We formed part of Company 5, which was sent down a communications trench cutting in at right angles and leading to the brush where the trees stopped. The engineers must have really sweated, cutting through all those roots. Everywhere, sections were settling in, improving and deepening their shelters. It was about six o'clock in the evening, and the heat of the day was beginning to slacken off.

We followed the trench out of the woods and across a range of low hills with wooded crests. An officer with his eyes glued to a map showed us the way. We turned off to the right, which brought us back under the trees, where the heat was trapped and much more oppressive than out in the open. Everywhere, men pouring with sweat were jostling each other, looking for their positions. Finally, we came to a large half-covered shelter packed with young soldiers from the Hitlerjugend.

"Halt!" shouted the noncom who'd been leading us. "You'll split up here, and take your positions when the order's given. Your feldwebel will explain what's expected of you."

He saluted, and left us with the Hitlerjugend, who were sitting on the ground or squatting on their haunches, talking gaily. I went over to Hals, who had just put down his MG-42, and was wiping the sweat from his face.

"Hell," he said. "I was better off with my Mauser. This damn thing weighs a ton."

"I'll be with you, Hals. It seems we're part of the same group." We compared left hands, which had both been stamped 5 K. 8.

"What does that mean?" asked Olensheim, who had just come up.

"Our group number, Gefreiter," said Hals. "If you're not in the 8th, we don't know you."

Olensheim looked anxiously at his hand.

"Damn-I'm eleven. Do you know what that means?"

"Not I," said Hals. "But ask Corporal Lensen. He must have an inside tip."

"We're going on a picnic," Lensen said, laughing, secretly displeased that his rank did not let him in on the secrets of the gods.

One of the Hitlerjugend came over to us, as pretty as a ripe young girl.

"Do the Soviets hang together in combat?" he asked, as though he were inquiring about an opposing football team.

"Extremely well," said Hals, sounding like an old lady in a tearoom.

"I was only asking because I thought you looked experienced," he said. We were all about the same age.

"Let me give you a piece of advice, young man," said Lensen, whose tiny promotion was after all worth a little something. "Fire on anything

Russian without the least hesitation. The Russians are the worst sons of bitches the world has ever seen."

"Are the Russians going to attack?" Olensheim looked very white. "We'll surely attack first," said the beautiful young man, whose Madonna face was incapable of a ferocious expression. He walked back to his gang of boy companions.

"Do you think someone will tell us what all this is about?" Lensen said, in a voice loud enough to be overheard by the feldwebel.

"Shut up," shouted a real veteran, sprawled full length on the ground. "You'll know soon enough where they're going to do you in."

"Hey," one of the Hitlerjugend took him up. "Who's the shit talking like that?"

"You shut up too, you crap heads," said the veteran, an old man in his thirties, who must have been taking it for several years now.

"We'll have enough of listening to you when you get your first scratch."

One of the Junge Lowen got up and walked over to the veteran.

"Sir," he said in the assured voice of a law or medical student, "will you please explain your defeatist attitude, which is sapping the morale of everyone here?"