Fox at the Front (Fox on the Rhine) (8 page)

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Authors: Douglas Niles,Michael Dobson

BOOK: Fox at the Front (Fox on the Rhine)
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“Frank? This is Bob,” crackled the radio. In the chaos of the last day, the division had failed to announce a new code for wireless communications. The two colonels solved that problem by the simple expedient of first names.
“Go ahead. It’s getting a little noisy here,” replied Ballard, the acting CCA commander.
“Frank, I can’t aim my tank guns downward enough to hit those damn panzers that are heading toward you. I can place some fire along their path as they move in, but once they’re past Rue des Orlevres, they’re invisible to me.”
“Got it, Bob. How many are getting through?”
“I’ve counted about ten of the large panzers so far.”
“Damn,” replied Ballard. “I don’t have that many more Shermans left.”
“I’m sending you a company of CCB tanks. Throw them into the line wherever you need them,” said Bob Jackson.
“How long before I get them?”
“Those damn streets are filled with curves. Probably fifteen minutes. How are you doing with the friendly Germans?”
“They’re sending down some panzers, but we’re all running low on ammo.”
“Good luck. See you shortly,” replied Jackson.
“CCA out.”
Frank Ballard began to run forward from his CP to where his tanks and infantry were dug in, accompanied by his driver and orderly Sergeant Brown. As soon as the enemy had opened fire, his own armor roared back its response. His infantry were taking opportunity shots at German infantry on the advance.
Bullets winged by as he approached his own front line; a shell burst nearby. He put his head up cautiously over a pile of rubble and used his binoculars to scout out the situation. The intelligence assessment he’d gotten from Bob Jackson wasn’t able to reveal just how much depth the Germans had in their attack force; he could see units only as they rounded the crest in range of his citadel post.
Defense being the stronger position, he could handle a large attack, especially as it could advance only on such a narrow front: Dinant at this point was only a few blocks wide before it began to climb the mountainous hillside leading away from the river. His big problem was ammunition and supply. He could hold out only so long. He’d tried to raid Panzer Lehr for supplies, but they didn’t have much to spare, and their ammunition wouldn’t fit his guns anyway.
Suddenly a shell burst in among his forces from a new direction—it was artillery coming from the waterfront, just a mile or so up the Meuse!
“What the hell was that?” he called on the radio.
“Enemy has set up an artillery position,” reported Jackson calmly—after all, it wasn’t his ass on the firing line. “They’re firing at the pontoon bridge and at Rommel’s HQ. Looks like a stray shell landed over in your position. We’re getting their range now and we’ll get ’em knocked out of action shortly.”
Frank Ballard looked around at his tactical situation once more. The narrow battlefront meant that he, too, was limited in the number of tanks and guns he could position for defense. And because he couldn’t yet tell how large the opposing force would turn out to be, he quickly decided that he had better start building secondary lines of defense so he could fall back if necessary. “Back to the church,” he told Sergeant Brown. “We’ll start moving tanks into position as a second line, and I also want you to receive CCB tanks and ammo.”
“Yes, sir,” acknowledged Brown. The two got up and prepared to run.
The ground shuddered underfoot, the effect of a huge explosion. A fireball bloomed from the narrow streets wending their way down from the citadel. “Goddamn!” groaned Ballard. “That’s got to be the ammo truck. Shit!”
The force of the explosion triggered a rockslide on the cliff front. He watched with amazement as several Shermans were swept off the narrow streets and began to tumble side-over-side down the hill. More tank shells were coming inbound from the enemy attack, and seeing the damage done, the enemy artillery fire was now redirected right into his formation.
Ballard was standing, looking, figuring which way to go next, when suddenly a shell exploded near him, the blast knocking him to the ground. As he stood up shakily, he noticed a mass of blood and torn uniform scraps where moments before his sergeant had stood.
He retched as he saw a torn-off arm pouring its remaining blood into the shattered street; then he straightened himself and began moving back toward the church to direct reinforcements to his secondary line.
Erwin Rommel was in his element as shells from the enemy bombardment landed in the headquarters compound. Blooms of huge explosions shot up showers of dirt and rock. The haze of battle smoke was already forming. The noise of shelling mixed with increasing numbers of panzer motors revving up made the ground shake; it was a noise that penetrated the body, became part of the new reality of his existence.
He could see his own troops running for cover, running for their panzers
and half-tracks. He jumped up on the hood of a half-track so he could see more clearly, and began to direct traffic.
“You—get five panzers up here on the double! I want a defensive line established over here, behind these barrels. Infantry—move up past the pontoon construction area. Opportunity-fire at approaching enemy.”
His eye fell on the major whose area of responsibility included headquarters support. “Why weren’t scouts out?”
“They were, Herr Generalfeldmarschall,” said the major, trying hard not to cringe under the bombardment. “We were in regular contact with them and had no reports of this force coming toward us.”
Rommel glowered. This was not professional. “And why aren’t our troops already in position like the Americans?”
“The American general asked, but as he did not have the authority—”
“
What?
How could you be so idiotic?” Here was a specific failure he could reprimand, and he laid into the major with relish. “Number one, we have surrendered. The American generals are now in your chain of command. Number two, being ready for this kind of trouble is your fundamental responsibility. Number three, we will
not
be caught in any way doing a less competent job than our American captors. Is that fully understood, Major?”
The hapless major quailed at Rommel’s tongue-lashing, undoubtedly realizing that any additional protest or argument would be the end of his career. “I apologize, Herr Generalfeldmarschall. I will get things moving immediately.”
Rommel’s glower followed the major as he ran to do his duty. The Desert Fox hated stupidity and lack of imagination and vision above all else. He had been trying to beat those skills into his officers for years, with marginal success.
He looked up, saw the Americans occupying the citadel targeting the enemy and returning fire. Now, those, he thought, were professional troops. He was furious that any force under his command could be any less competent. This was an embarrassment he could not stand.
At last some panzers moved forward, though still far too slowly to suit him. He waved furiously, shouting, trying to move his force into position by sheer act of will. “Do you want the Americans to think you’re soldiers, or just civilians in uniform?” he screamed. Finally, he was pleased to see his own troops firing back. The first of his panzer shells were blasting the advancing enemy.
“Schnell machen!”
he roared. “Move quickly!”
Shells splattered into the river uncomfortably close to the bridge. Spumes of water shot up, drenching the engineers in frigid wetness. Two men had slipped
and fallen into the water; now one was shivering of hypothermia and the other was slowly slipping into shock. No one was available to remove him to an aid station.
Everyone on the bridge knew that one lucky hit would spell the end for them. They continued working quickly, laying long metal sheets over the strung-together floats.
A German officer in a flapping greatcoat appeared at the west end of the bridge. He waved his hands to direct a force of German engineers who began bridging from the west, moving toward the sections the Americans had completed.
One of the American engineers looked up. “You know who that is?” he said to the soldier working next to him.
“Naw. Who is he?”
“That’s the goddamn Desert Fox himself! Field Marshal Rommel.”
The soldier looked up with mild interest. “No shit?” he said with a complete lack of emotion, then returned to his work.
“I can’t believe you.”
“Yeah? Is he planning to do some work on this bridge? If not, who gives a fuck?”
The first engineer was about to answer when an artillery shell crashed down on their section. The explosion tore a huge hole in the bridge, and sent shards of shrapnel to rip smaller, but even more lethal, holes through his body.
Jochen Peiper was very satisfied with the progress of the battle, but realized that resistance was substantially heavier than he had initially thought as enemy shells began slamming into his advancing panzers. Diefenthal’s battery had been smothered by fast and accurate counterbattery fire. He had no idea whether his mission to kill the Desert Fox had been successful, but he knew he had inflicted additional damage on the Americans and successfully delayed their ability to pursue. That looked to be the best he was likely to achieve, and it seemed a reasonable success. It was time to withdraw.
“Potschke, Diefenthal—all task forces begin withdrawal, passing to the west of the agreed-upon position.” The acknowledgments came in from Potschke, who had farthest to go. But he reported progress along the road to Saint-Vith. There was no reply at all from Task Force Diefenthal, and Peiper assumed the worst. He would have to provide cover, to allow a successful withdrawal from the field.
A calculated risk had been taken and been achieved, he thought with pride. Kampfgruppe Peiper and the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler continued to serve the führer and the Reich with distinction.
As Peiper gave the order to fall back, an enemy shell burst in front of his
command tank. A shard from the shell tore across the left side of his face, shredding his cheek, removing his ear, and sending gouts of blood spurting into his eye. He screamed with pain and shock, and a member of his tank crew, a feldwebel
,
quickly pulled him down and began applying dressings to the wound. It looked horrific but not fatal.
“Hang on, mein Obersturmbannführer. You’re all right. We’ll get medical treatment shortly.” The feldwebel turned to the driver. “Get us out of here, like the obersturmbannführer said.”
Peiper was able to whisper one more command. “For the time being Potschke is in command. Radio him.”
“Jawohl, mein Obersturmbannführer,”
said the feldwebel.
Peiper closed his one good eye and tried to conquer the pain.
“General, they’re withdrawing,” came Bob Jackson’s voice over the walkie-talkie.
“Hell, they did most of what they came for,” growled Wakefield in response. “But good riddance anyway. Kick them in the ass as they’re going, will you?”
“You got it, General. CCB continues to fire on retreating forces. Jackson out.”
The fire into the headquarters compound was diminishing but had not yet stopped. It became more scattered and more random as it came from moving enemy units firing backward to cover their retreat.
Wakefield looked around. The road down from the citadel was demolished, the pontoon bridge had buckled near the far shore, and parts of Armeegruppe B headquarters had been shelled into rubble. The German equivalent of “Medic!” could be heard from wounded soldiers in the compound. Infantry moved forward, and the panzers were finally turning into a fighting force. But Rommel and Patton were alive, his forces were slapped around a bit but largely intact, and it looked as if they were going to be able to put together a pursuit. “I guess that about does it for right now,” he said.
Patton, who had been watching Wakefield run the battle, interjected. “Henry, when did you first figure out what was going to happen?”
“I didn’t, General. I figured I was paid to think about trouble before it found me, and so I moved some stuff around just in case.”
“Well, hell, Henry—you’ve only done one thing wrong that I can see,” growled Patton.
“What’s that?” asked Wakefield, his eyes narrowing slightly. He and Patton went way back before the war, and their relationship had been characterized mostly by a series of fights. Patton’s enmity had kept Wakefield in a training command and out of the real war until after D-Day.
Patton grinned. “You didn’t leave me anything to do. I feel like tits on a bull right now.”
Wakefield grinned back. That was okay. “The rest of Third Army should keep you busy enough.”
“All right. I think I’ll get back to the office and start moving some tanks around. And Henry, this is the damndest order I’ve ever given, but I’m going to attach you to Rommel for a while. Technically he’s still surrendered, but it looks like he’s going to do some fighting on our side. I’ll straighten everything out with Ike … as soon as I can get in touch with him.” He smiled at that, and Wakefield knew that he intended to delay telling Eisenhower as long as possible.
“You need anything from me, you holler. Got it?”
“Got it, General.”
“Hell, call me George. See you later, Henry. Good hunting.” He turned to leave.
“Hey, George,” Wakefield called. Patton turned around.
Wakefield held out one of his stogies, “Have a cigar.”
Patton took the cigar and sniffed it. “Jeezus, Henry, what the hell do you pay for these things? Fifty cents a dozen?”
Wakefield snorted. “Hell, no. Too rich for my blood.” He let out a cloud of blue smoke.
Patton laughed and lit the cigar. “I oughta put you on report for trying to assassinate a superior officer, Henry.” He punched Wakefield on the arm, got into his jeep with the three-star flag, and waved at his sergeant to move out.
Chuck Porter, who had discreetly moved back but stayed within eavesdropping distance, thought about writing the exchange down, but realized he’d never get anybody to believe it.
Patton waved for his driver, and his jeep with the three stars began to move out.

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