The Red Effect (Cold War)

by Black, Harvey

  Keifer felt a sudden pressure on his fingers and immediately withdrew the probe, before moving it forward again with extreme care until it came up against the tripwire. He felt Adali close behind him and eased her back gently before crouching down to confirm that it was indeed a tripwire. He felt a chill as he disturbed the fine mist that blanketed the ground around his feet. He prayed for dense fog, but knew that would be too much to ask for. He felt around with the tips of his fingers until they touched the thin, taut wire that was only a few centimetres off the ground. He whispered instructions into Adali’s ear, rallying her at the same time. Both stepped over the tripwire carefully before making their way to the other side of the strip, Keifer checking for further traps, coming up against the most daunting barrier of all: the four-metre high metal fence. It was formidable, constructed from several overlapping, horizontal tiers of expanded steel-mesh fencing.

  Keifer was confident about scaling the fence, but less confident about Adali. He indicated for her to crouch down, the mist swirling about her as she disturbed it. They both removed their ghillie suits. They had served their purpose and would just hinder the rest of their progress. Speed and agility was of the essence now. Once they were discarded, he rummaged in his rucksack again and removed the contents he would need next. Not only was the fence forbidding but it had added danger. Mines! He undid the drawstring on the soft pouch and opened it up, removing the collection of wires and the device they were attached to, something he had built weeks earlier. Copper wire coiled around a magnet taped up and connected, by bell wire, to a home-made circuit board of transistors, capacitors and diodes powered by a nine-volt battery. A set of earphones, from his personal transistor radio and which would receive the feedback for him to listen to, completed the gadget.

  He told Adali to wait where she was and plugged the earphones into his ears, turning on the detector. There was a satisfying hum transmitted through to his eardrums followed by a higher-pitched tone as he held the magnet closer to the fence. Holding the device about fifteen-centimetres away from the fence, he slowly waved it up and down as he moved along it until he found what he was looking for, the squealing in his ears signalling the discovery of a Splitter mine. He could just make out the darker shadow of the cone-shaped mine. The SM-70 was a directional anti-personnel mine. Activated by a tripwire connected to a firing mechanism, once detonated, the cone-shaped charge, filled with 110 grams of TNT, imbedded with eighty small, sharp-edged cubes of steel, would explode and spray its deadly load along the line of the fence with a lethal range of over thirty metres. Sixty thousand of these deadly Soviet-made mines had been laid along the Inner German Border. Other anti-personnel mines, over one million, had been laid along the border to deter escapers. Keifer couldn’t dismantle it, he didn’t know how, but at least he could ensure they were to the left and at the furthest distance from SM-70 further to the south.

  He went back to get Adali and walked her to the point where they would climb over. Picking up the rucksack again, he removed the next, and last, of the items they would need to continue their journey.

  “Here’s your overshoes. Make sure your boots are laced up tight before you put them on. Once the overshoes are on, make sure they’re tight as well. If they’re loose, it will make it harder to climb.”

  “Check them for me when I’m done,” she suggested, a tremble in her voice.

  “We’ll check each others, OK?” he said with a smile and a sound of confidence in his voice, although doubts were starting to cloud his thoughts.

  Pushing the dark notions aside, he bent down to sort out his own boots. There were two straps: one went over the top of the front of his foot then under the sole, the other just in front of the ankle, wrapping around his foot beneath the arch. Both affixed on one side to a third strap that circuited the entire diameter of the edge of the boot’s sole, supported behind the heel. A buckle on each strap connected them, securing them to his boot. At the toe, a hook jutted out. He tightened the buckle of the single strap that circuited his boot then the two buckles of the upper straps, tugging them hard to ensure they wouldn’t slip when he put his full weight on the hooks. The holes in the fence were deliberately made too small to allow a foot or hand to get a grip and climb. The hooks were the only solution he could think of. It was too strong to cut through or pull the overlapping layers apart, and it was sunk into the ground preventing an escapee from easily tunnelling underneath it. He did the same with his second boot then made sure Adali’s were fitted correctly and were secure. They both faced the fence, ready for the climb, a small bale hook in each hand.

  “You go first, Addi. Don’t forget to keep your body away from the wires, OK? Keep that bum of yours stuck out. Don’t catch it with your boots or hooks. I’ll help you up.”

  She didn’t respond. Had it been daylight, he would have seen her face frozen in fear. But, behind her dilated pupils, there was a determination to see it through; a resolution not to let her fiancé down, to start their new life in the West.

  She went first, throwing her right arm up, followed by her left and hooking the fence with both. She gripped the wooden toggles tightly until her knuckles were white and lifted her right leg. Guided by Keifer, hooking the boot into the fence, she heaved herself up. With Keifer’s hands either side of her slim hips, his shoulder providing additional leverage, she brought up her left boot. Clinging on and jutting outwards, avoiding the double strand of wire, supported by fifteen-centimetre prongs, in front of her. One at a time, she unhooked each hand and extended them further up the four-metre fence, straightening her knees, her fiancé ensuring they didn’t touch the wires. Again guided by Keifer, she lifted her feet over the wires, eventually above and free of them, her head less than two-metres from the top. He urged her on and started the climb himself, hanging outwards to avoid the tripwires that could easily set off the deadly mines. It took them twenty minutes to get over the top. Suddenly he heard her yelp. He jerked his head down and saw her left leg and arm flaying about, free of the fence, eventually swinging back crashing into it, the wires vibrating on the other side from the force of the strike. The silence was sudden, both breathing deeply, ears pricked for the sound of discovery.

  “Quickly, we need to get down now!” hissed Keifer.

  Adali climbed down, lowering her tired body the last metre, collapsing to the damp, grassy earth in exhaustion.

  Keifer crouched down beside her. “Come on, Addi, we need to move. One fence left; then it’s freedom.”

  The two border guards had reversed direction and were now patrolling south again, their ultimate destination a concrete bunker overlooking the control strip where Becker could finally partake in the smoke he was so desperate for. They were so occupied in their heated debate about whether Magdeburg was worth a weekend away that they missed the darker patch of footprints that snaked across the raked control strip, partially hidden by the low-lying mist.

  Keifer and Adali were now at the last obstacle: just one fence keeping them from escape. Once across, they would be able to sprint for the freedom they had talked about incessantly for months. There were no mines on this fence. It was just a case of clambering over it, using their special boots and hooks, and dropping down the other side. Keifer led the way this time and was quickly at the top, watching Adali as she soon joined him there. He climbed down and dropped the last metre, turning round ready to support his fiancée as she still had over two metres to go before she too could put her feet on solid ground. He felt good. All his meticulous planning and preparation had paid off. They were close to setting foot in the Federal Republic of Germany. She removed the left-hand bale hook from the fence, then her left boot hook and lowered both before resinking the two spikes into the small gaps lower down in the fence. Trusting in the security of her position, Adali then loosened and released her right hand and foot, and repositioned them lower down. As she did so, the hook of her left boot, which had only just tagged the join of the overlapping fences, suddenly gave way unexpectedly. With mo
st of her weight still on her left leg, it shot downwards. The sudden shock caused her to let go of the left bale hook as she swung outwards in a half-star shape, left arm and leg adrift. The force of the unexpected move twisted her right ankle and wrist, the bale hook was forced from her right hand, and her body arced downwards. Keifer rushed to help arrest her downward fall as her upper body slowly passed the one boot that was still attached. He grabbed for her outflung arm as it sped past, slowing her fall slightly, but not enough as, now upside down, he heard the sickening crack of her shattered ankle still trapped in the fence above her. A long, drawn-out scream of agony emanated from her pained mouth and, along with the rattle of the fence as she thudded against it, broke the silence.

  Both Becker and Holzmann snapped their heads round at the sound of the blood-curdling scream, followed by the noise of the reverberating fence. With assault rifles unslung, they ran across the control strip, tripping a flare as they went, heading for the point where they thought the sound had come from. As a consequence of the dazzling light, they could see two shadowy figures on the other side of the outer fence. Fear suddenly welled up inside Becker, not because of the escapees but because the two figures had got that far without being discovered at the same time as he and his companion were patrolling the fence. There would be consequences when this was all over. Becker cocked his rifle, raised it at an angle and fired two shots into the air.

  “Halten sie, halten sie,” he bellowed at the top of his voice.

  “Shall we open fire on them?” asked a panicky Holzmann, fumbling with his AK, eventually managing to cock it and put a round up the spout.

  “Don’t be stupid, Burlin. There’s two bloody fences in the way.”

  Crack. Crack. “Halten sie, halten sie,” he called again after firing two more shots into the air.

  The lieutenant in command of this section of the wire was talking to his opposite number in command of the engineers, trying to ascertain what the point was of their current activity. Why were they effectively dismantling the border crossing, yet making it look fully functional? Although being evasive with his answers, the engineer actually had no idea himself. He had been given his orders and ordered not to discuss their activities with anyone. In fact, his engineers and the border guards in this vicinity had been confined to barracks, unless on duty.

  Both started when they saw a flare burst into light, closely followed by the sound of two gunshots. The one thousand watt beam of the suchscheinwerfer (searchlight) stabbed the darkness and was immediately rotated around, by the tower guards, towards the sound of the gunfire. It immediately bathed the two escapees in its glow. One, a young man, suddenly blinded by the intense glare, shielded his eyes with his arm. The other, in front of him, was suspended from the fence, upside down, her twisted leg the only thing holding her up.

  “Baer, the Jeep!” yelled the Grenzer leutnant. “Schnell!”

  The Unterfeld, junior sergeant, ran for the Jeep, practically throwing himself into the driver’s seat, and turned the ignition, the engine roaring into life as he gunned it. He called to two other border guards to join him. The leutnant dropped down into the passenger seat and slapped the dashboard. “Go, go!”

  He undid his holster and pulled out his service pistol, cocking the weapon. The two grenzer in the back did the same with their AKs. They sped off, heading north along the patrol road then turned left onto the road that would take them across the border. A guard at the border crossing point lifted the barrier and the Jeep shot past, heading west towards the currently unmanned West German border control. The Jeep raced through the channel, smoke belching from its exhaust as it tore along the road, passing the death strip, the first fence and, finally, the last fence. The driver swerved left and bounced onto the verge that would take them around the unmanned West German barrier which, once passed, would allow the Jeep to swing right, back onto the road. The occupants searched ahead and to the left, looking for any signs of the escapees.

  Crack. Crack.

  “Foot down!”

  “I’m going as fast as I can, sir.”

  “Left, left, down the track.”

  The Jeep turned south, leaving the road, and traversed left, heading for a rough track that ran alongside the outer East German border fence. The vehicle travelled down the bumpy track that was barely inside the East German border, running parallel with the fence line; to their right, another patrol road used by the West German border patrols: either the Bundesgrenzschutz (BGS), the Federal Border Protection, or even by military forces from the British Army of the Rhine or the British Frontier Service. The beam of the Jeep’s headlights danced across the landscape, like theatre lights, picking out elements of the route and border barricade before being whipped elsewhere as the vehicle careered erratically down the track. The occupants were jolted from side to side as the Grenzer raced to head off the escapees.

  Hubert Schiffer put the binoculars back into the car through the driver’s open window and was about to open the door and climb back in when...Crack. Crack.

  Mauer, who was sitting in the passenger seat, threw the door open. “Bloody hell, what was that?” He went to get out.

  Schiffer pulled the driver’s door open, moved the binoculars to the dashboard, and dropped into his seat. “Get back in, Nicklas!” he called urgently. “It’s an escape. Sounds like it came from the south.”

  His colleague slammed his door shut and Schiffer revved the engine. The front wheels spun as he accelerated along the patrol road towards the sound of the gunfire. Crack. Crack.

  “I think you could be right, Hubert.” Mauer pulled out his service pistol, released the magazine, checked the rounds and slotted it back in with a click. Then, pulling back on the working parts, it loaded one of the eight 9mm rounds into the breech.

  Schiffer looked across at his partner. “You won’t need that. They don’t come across the border.”

  “Even after an escapee?”

  “No. I’ve seen a couple and the Grenzer always stay over on their side.”

  “But doesn’t part of the land on this side of the fence belong to the DDR?”

  “I know.”

  “What’s that?” Mauer pointed at a pair of headlights running parallel to them, but slowly gaining ground.

  Schiffer groaned. “Oh God, that doesn’t look good.”

  Zip, zip. Two further bullets zipped above the heads of the young couple, followed by two cracks from the assault rifles behind them. Keifer supported Adali’s body as best he could while he undid the straps of the overboot. The hook trapping her foot needed to be released. She shifted slightly and whimpered as the first buckle was released. As the last buckle was detached, her boot now free of its grip, she crashed to the ground in a heap, a long wail of pain escaping her lips. Keifer knew they had to move. Although they were on the far side of the fence, they still had at least forty or fity metres to the actual FRG border.

  “Come on, Addi, we have to move.”

  Her eyes were full of tears, the pain of her shattered ankle imprinted on her face. “I can’t, it’s so painful.”

  “Fifty metres, Addi, fifty metres. That’s all.”

  “I can’t...”

  He pushed his hands beneath her armpits and heaved her up, turning her slightly so he could position his shoulder beneath her arm and pull it around his neck. She screamed again as her fractured ankle dragged along the ground. He hoisted her higher up onto his shoulder and placed his left hand around her waist, her right arm around his neck, supporting as much of her weight as he could. He shuffled them both forward and she hopped on one foot as best she could, although her ankle was swelling rapidly as she groaned with pain every time her ankle was jolted. They had gone no more than twenty metres when they were both suddenly dazzled by headlights.

  “There they are!” called Baer. He slammed on the brakes and the Jeep slid to a halt on the stony ground. All four were out in seconds, rifles at the ready.

  “Halten sie, halten sie! Grenztruppen der DDR.
Halten sie!” the Grenzer leutnant bellowed.

  Schiffer swerved the police car left. The binoculars slid along the dashboard, hit the other end and clattered to the floor, settling in the passenger footwell by Mauer’s feet. “Get ready,” he shouted, too loudly. The adrenalin was pumping. Their car headlights picked out the two East Germans. One seemed to be supporting the other as they stumbled south attempting to put some distance between themselves and the DDR Jeep. Both policemen got out of the car, engine still running, doors left ajar, headlights behind them projecting their shadows ahead as they strode forward, guns at the ready, to intercept the East German border guards who were now walking quickly towards the young couple.