Wheels of Terror

by Sven Hassel

  ‘Can’t we punish them?’ Porta insisted.

  ‘No, leave that to HQ.’ Von Barring nodded at The Old Un who called in some men, infantrymen from the 67th Regiment. ‘Escort the prisoners to the rear,’ von Barring ordered a sergeant. ‘You’ll vouch with your life for their safety.’

  As they went Tiny prodded his bayonet into the commissar’s thigh.

  The ill-treated man gave off a bellow.

  ‘What’s this?’ Von Barring sounded threatening.

  ‘One of the prisoners stood on a nail,’ answered Porta innocently.

  Without another word, von Barring and the ordnance officer left the bunker.

  ‘Oh, bloody hell,’ swore the Little Legionnaire, ‘we were just getting going. Why must von Barring always interfere in our bits of fun?’

  ‘It’s unfair competition,’ Porta declared and scowled at The Old Un. ‘It’s your work, isn’t it? You told von Barring, eh?’

  ‘Yes, I did,’ answered The Old Un firmly. ‘You’d all have done the same if you hadn’t lost your reason.’

  ‘The next commissar I lay hands on will get a bullet in the back at once,’ Tiny announced, swinging his pistol.

  ‘Maybe we’ll be allowed to deal with those dirty dogs once Hinka’s had his private chat with ’em,’ said the Little Legionnaire speculatively …

  With great difficulty the fighting-group fought its way through the impassable terrain. We moved, groaning, stumbling and tottering, through snow which seemed to suck us down with every step.

  We did not have to walk far before the weaker types threw themselves down weeping, and refused to go another step. The rifle-butts thundered down on them until they again stumbled along. We resembled a flock of small, black ants in the vast white snow-landscape.

  We had to fight for every kolhoz and village. When we thought we had cleaned the enemy out they were again over us like wolves.

  No. 5 Company went into quarters in a kolhoz just southeast of Dzhurzhenzy. We were completely exhausted. We had taken off our greatcoats and equipment and snuggled down in the straw. Then shots rang out. Furious bursts from Russian machine-pistols. We heard shouts and screams.

  ‘Ivan, Ivan, alert, alert!’ our sentries warned us and we jumped into hiding firing at the Siberian rifle-men who were pouring in from all sides.

  ‘Out!’ cries The Old Un and snatches his machine-pistol and some hand-grenades. He charges without his cap and great-coat.

  We stumble about in confusion, but in a few seconds are out in the dark.

  Pluto who has been lice-hunting rushes out dressed in pants and boots only. He races round the house with his machine-pistol and runs smack into three Russians. They hang on to him like limpets, trying to get their combat-knives into him. Roaring like a bull he kicks and bites as he fires with his machine-pistol. One of the Russians slides across the yard on his stomach like a sledge. The other two he grabs by the throat and flings them away. One gets his chest nearly carved in two by my machine-pistol and the other sinks to the ground with Pluto’s flick-knife deep in his chest.

  Porta and the Little Legionnaire are using their automatic weapons like truncheons and raging and swearing.

  ‘Here you are, you Red bitch!’ shouts Porta and a whistling blow hits a Siberian fur-clad head.

  ‘Allah-akbar!’ cries the Little Legionnaire.

  Tiny dashes about among the small Siberians, swinging a Cossack sabre like a scythe. It bites both ways, for Tiny has sharpened both edges.

  More than a third of the company are dead when two hours later we fight the Siberian troops back.

  Again we stumble through the white hell. The fighting-group is slowly but surely being exterminated. The greater part of the troops, frost-curled corpses, lie spread over the snowy wastes.

  Round each the snow slowly grows in a drift like a grave.

  The village of Dzhurzhenzy is a lonely God-forsaken place with one kolhoz and a railway line on its northern fringe.

  Here we have to blow up each little mound and fight for hours for each house. Not one of these Siberian rifle-men from the 32nd Regiment gives himself up. Every one is killed in close combat. They do not yield an inch during the battles.

  In Dzhurzhenzy, Möller, our holy man, falls. He dies in the arms of Tiny and Porta behind a stack of railway sleepers. It is ironic that Porta is the one to say the last Paternoster over him.

  We shovel snow on him before going on with our death march.

  We are so worn out that we let our friends lie in the snow if they cannot resist the temptation to sink into it and sleep to death.

  Almost snow-blinded, sobbing with fatigue and frost pain, we reach something resembling a road indicated by a long row of telegraph poles.

  Then suddenly we see in front of us one, two, three, four, oh my God, five, no, many more tanks looking out of the snow-blizzard. The commander of each vehicle sits in the open turret straining to see through the whipping snow.

  Dead-beat and silent, we sink down and stare in panic at the huge white-painted monsters. They growl their way along with the long cannons pointing like accusing fingers from the turrets.

  Sergeant Kraus from the 104th gunner-regiment stands up and wants to run at them.

  The Old Un has to tug him down in the snow.

  ‘Careful, I think it’s Ivan. Those fellows are certainly neither Tigers nor Panthers. I wouldn’t be far wrong in saying they’re KW2s!’

  The snow incessantly blinds us as we stare at the growling tanks.

  ‘Oh, my hernia-bandage!’ bursts out Porta. ‘They’re Uncle Joe’s lads on a picnic. They’ve got stars on all their vehicles and Adolf doesn’t care for that. So you see, it must be Stalin’s transport-business rolling forward.’

  As soon as we are sure, we start feverishly digging ourselves in. We use even our fingers to get hidden from the tank-commanders.

  We count fifteen T34s and two of the larger KW2s. There may have been more made invisible by the blizzard.

  We glare nervously as they disappear like ghosts.

  Then suddenly it dawns on us in all its horror that they are advancing at Lysenka. There, our whole Ist Panzer Division is preparing to advance and break us out of the net we are in.

  Captain von Barring quickly makes up his mind: we must hurry to Lysenka to warn the Ist Panzer Division of its deadly danger.

  Again we move westward in the ever-increasing snow storm which blows straight at us. To walk eight miles through it weighed down by ammunition and heavy infantry arms is not easy. Even if the enemy tanks are bothered by it they stand a better chance to reach their objective first.

  The storm makes visibility sink to about two yards. Suddenly machine-gun fire rattles at us. Tank-engines get into lower gear and whine like frightened babies.

  Through the blizzard the outlines of tanks show themselves. Our artillerymen and infantrymen run about screaming. They throw away their arms, fall down and are crushed by the heavy caterpillar tracks. Some stop and put their hands up to signal their surrender, but the next moment they are mown down by the whipping machine-gun fire.

  The red star shines coldly and mercilessly at us.

  Stege and I throw ourselves in cover behind some bushes and press ourselves desperately against them. A few yards away the howling T34s race by, churning up the snow in a dense cloud. The hot exhaust from the pipe hits us like a glowing kiss. Our bodies are goose-flesh.

  The rest of the fighting-group run about like scared rabbits. With uncanny precision they are picked off one by one.

  A quarter of an hour later we can hear only a few shots being fired in the distance. Tottering on westward again we run into more tanks. They are chasing some infantrymen from the 72nd Regiment.

  It is a horrible race. The only thought anyone has is: get away from the fire-spraying steel-killers!

  In one place we have to throw ourselves down and let the tanks roll over us, as they told us to do in the training manual.

  Panic-stricken, we press ourselves do
wn. Rumbling, rattling and whirring, the vast tonnage of a T34 thunders over us. Its belly strokes us caressingly as it were, over our backs, while the screaming, clanging chains toll past us on both sides.

  You are no longer normal when an event like this hits you. You shake and tremble. Your speech is confused and slurred. You cannot believe you are still alive.

  Several miles in a south-westerly direction we again make contact with the remnants of the von Barring fighting-group. Only a hundred troops of the five hundred are left. Among the survivors are, to our immense relief, most of our best pals.

  Pluto has got one ear torn off. A small shell did that.

  Porta bandaged him with something closely resembling a mother’s touch.

  ‘What a good thing the pea-shell didn’t hit your behind, my pet. This ear was no use to you, my little bird. You never listened to anything sensible people said. Didn’t your old father tell you war’s disagreeable? But of course you stupid dopes had to go out to get some “Lebensraum”. You see what comes of it, you miserable peasant!’

  Von Barring had re-established contact with HQ and told them that all the companies had had severe casualties. To our astonishment he received the following laconic orders:

  ‘The von Barring fighting-group will join with the remnants of the 72nd Infantry Regiment. The group will go back to Point 108, position Dzhurzhenzy. If the Russians are again in occupation, win it back.’

  ‘God, what idiots,’ shouted Porta. ‘This is just a game of musical chairs. Why the hell don’t they start a regular tram-service?’

  Without any proper Intelligence information or flank-support laid on, we turned apathetically back.

  Porta swore that if he had to run away again he would not stop till he reached Berlin.

  Morning came with thirty degrees below freezing. Seven men froze to death during the night. They were pushed over our snow-parapet and rolled down towards the other side.

  First we examined them to see if it was worthwhile taking their boots off. One of the dead had a pair of almost new felt-boots. They fitted the Little Legionnaire beautifully. He put them on, his face beaming.

  ‘One man’s death, the other man’s boots,’ he grins and stamps radiantly and enthusiastically off.

  We try to dig deeper into the ground, but both spades and picks are useless in the iron-hard earth.

  In the afternoon the Russian infantry again attacks. Huge numbers storm forward with wild hurrahs.

  We open a concentrated fire from our automatic weapons and mortars. Surprisingly the Russians give up soon and withdraw to their own positions.

  We ward off eight attacks in forty-eight hours.

  But worse than the attacks, the cold, hunger, bombs and shells, is the feeling that has taken a grip on us: the fighting-group has been put in a spot which is lost – given up.

  Our call for help to Regimental HQ meets with no response.

  After the fourteenth attack von Barring lets our radio-operator send off a desperate S O S:

  ‘The von Barring fighting-group almost exterminated. Only two officers, six NCOs and 219 troops alive. Send ammunition, bandages and rations. Given up. Waiting orders.’

  The answer from HQ is short:

  ‘Cannot help. Stay to the last man.’

  Army Corps Commander.

  The Russians now try to bomb us out. They hit the village with twelve Martin bombers in low-level attack. The bombers unload their deadly cargo over us.

  The following night despite orders, to die where we stand, Captain von Barring, risking a court-martial and a sentence of death, orders the fighting-group to leave the village, abandoning the mortars and heavy infantry weapons.

  The numerous casualties we place in an even row on the ramparts of our abandoned positions.

  With glazed eyes the dead gunners from the 104th Regiment, the panzer-gunners from the 27th and the old grey infantrymen from the 72nd stare at the Russian positions where the Siberian riflemen sit.

  Man after man falls like a ripe apple from trees in autumn storms. But we are no longer interested in who receives the kiss of death from the frost.

  What’s that coming? Tanks? Hysterical with fatigue, completely worn out, we sink into the icy snow-drifts. The tears stream down our cheeks in desperation. We have only hand-grenades to fight steel juggernauts.

  The engines jeer and whine at us. They sing our elegy. The elegy of the 27th (Penal) Panzer Regiment.

  Without a word we bunch our hand-grenades together. If we are going to die let it be as costly as possible.

  It is lunacy to fight on and equally insane to stop. The sum total is the same. Death under the tracks or by machine-gun bullets.

  ‘Here we come to the end of our war,’ snarls Porta. ‘Just two thousand miles from Berlin. Well, nothing can be done about that. Porta is waiting for you in hell. I’m fed up with this running about.’

  ‘You shan’t wait long,’ Tiny says hoarsely. ‘I’m coming soon, too, but first I’ll fetch one of the Red bastards along with me.’

  ‘Allah is great, but these are greater,’ pronounces the Little Legionnaire and points at the great pack of white-painted tanks which rolls towards us.

  ‘Take care,’ shouts von Barring. ‘Here they come!’

  Stege is about to stand up and run away, but The Old Un and I grab him.

  The machine-guns open up. The men begin to die. A corporal from the 104th sits up and puts his hands to his head, then he folds like a pen-knife.

  The small ordnance officer runs forward and slings a whole bunch of hand-grenades at the nearest tank; he falls and is crushed beneath the tracks. His grenades landed just short.

  Several start to run. Von Barring shouts desperately:

  ‘Lie still, let them roll over. We’ll take ’em from the back. They’ve got no infantry protection!’

  But more and more of our troops are stricken by the tank panic. They run clumsily about until they are mown down by the Russian machine guns.

  Porta prepares his special, home-made bomb, gives it a kiss and throws it. It lands underneath the tracks of the nearest tank. The tank jerks and then stops.

  At the same time Tiny throws his own bomb which also hits its target. He pats Porta’s shoulder in his delight.

  ‘Let’s be quietly crushed now. We must have earned the devil’s warmest greetings!’

  The Old Un shouts:

  ‘Stop, stop, they’re German tanks! Look, there’s the swastika!’

  We stare open-mouthed at them. The Old Un is right. Wild delight. We wave our snow-shirts and steel helmets. The tanks swing round. The hatches in the turrets open. Our tank-comrades wave to us.

  Weeping, we fall into each other’s arms.

  Of the whole fighting-group, thirty-four ‘other ranks’ and only one officer, Captain von Barring, have survived.

  Major-General Bäke jumps out and comes across to us, small and sturdy. He squeezes the hand of everyone of us, then waves his arms and the Ist Panzer Division is on its way to Cherkassy to widen the hole we have made in the net. Inside that net nine divisions are still fighting desperately.

  Oberleutnant Weber has fallen. A German Tiger tank has crushed his body. Never again will he threaten anybody with court-martial.

  Now, like clockwork dolls, we trudge along the road to a village where we will be reinforced – we hope.

  16

  ‘I’ll give you the recipe you down-trodden peasants,’ Porta said loftily. ‘This is the ambrosia of Olympus.’

  And then, of course, our Russian colleagues had to interrupt our lovely gastronomic fantasy.

  Mashed Potatoes with Diced Pork

  On the fringes of a forest some miles north of Popeljna the 27th Regiment was put into peaceful positions with only a little local artillery-fire not worth mentioning.

  Our party was sent on a reconnaissance trip into the forest. With our guns slung carelessly over our shoulders and cigarettes dangling from our mouths we set off.

  Porta ordered a li
ttle rest.

  ‘The bloody war won’t run away if we stop a little here.’

  He was gleefully supported by Tiny and the Little Legionnaire.

  The Old Un shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘It’s all the same to me. There can’t be any Russians or we’d have seen them ages ago.’

  We sat, twelve men, on a fallen tree-trunk like swallows on a telephone-wire.

  Porta started to explain how his favourite dish of mashed potatoes and diced pork ought to be prepared.

  ‘The most important thing is that this dish, which is fit for the gods, should be prepared with feeling.’ He gesticulated. ‘Without feeling it is no use.’

  Tiny interrupted him:

  ‘Half a tick, Porta, I want to write down the recipe.’

  He asked Stege to give him pencil and paper, and Stege obliged grinning.

  Tiny rolled over on his stomach, wetted the pencil and told Porta that he might go on.

  ‘First you pick out some beautiful potatoes. You might steal them in the field or find them in a cellar. Anyway, when you’ve got them you sit on a good chair. If your backside is sore get a cushion. Then you peel ’em. The bad parts, if any, are neatly and lovingly cut off.’

  ‘What badness can you find on a potato?’ Tiny asked.

  ‘Haven’t you ever seen a potato with syphillis?’

  ‘No, I didn’t know potatoes whored.’

  ‘Well, there are many things you don’t know,’ replied Porta with irritated condescension. ‘But do as I tell you. Cut the syphillis out. Drop the peeled potato in a bucket with lovely cold spring water with a saucy little splash like a virgin weeing in a stream on a spring evening while the mosquitoes play in the bushes.’

  ‘My God, Porta, you’re quite a poet,’ laughed The Old Un.

  Porta squeezed up his eyes.

  ‘What’s poet? Anything to do with whoring-boys?’

  ‘It is possible that among them you’ll find a poet,’ grinned The Old Un. ‘But never mind, go on with your cook’s course.’

  ‘When all the spuds are peeled, boil ’em. Then mash them nicely and according to the rules into a porridge. Now take care and listen carefully. It’s most important. Go into a field or a village where the fragrance tells you there’s cattle. Find a female cow. I take it you know the difference between a he and a she. If not just lift the rudder at the back end, but keep your nose away. You see, the exhaust sits just beneath it.