Twilight of Gutenberg

by Hitoshi Goto

  Driven into a corner, Germany was mobilising young boys and older men. The newspapers were saying they were even conscripting men who had already been deemed too old for the draft in World War I. I couldn’t tell whether some reports were satire or truth.

  I was also distressed about the situation in my homeland. After the fall of Saipan and Guam, the Americans landed on Leyte in the Philippines, and then continued on to Luzon. It was reported that Japan had started deploying kamikaze pilots, suicide attacks by pilots who would never return alive from their sole mission. Flying the planes were not the high level military men directing the war, but young boys would have been filled with hopes for the future had it not been for the war. Why were youths being sent off to die when the people who started the war weren’t? Someone had the authority to do this, and was exercising that authority.

  Since coming to England I’d been reading history books, and there was a word I’d come to really like: noblesse oblige, the responsibility that comes with privilege. That is, the high morals and social obligation that is required of those who are in a higher position than others. The British aristocracy might be the upper class, but when the country goes to war, they fight on the frontline and suffer a high death rate. They do not glamorise death, and conduct themselves as military personnel with integrity and gentlemanliness.

  Precisely the opposite happened in the case of the kamikaze pilots: the elites and leaders merely sent out their subordinates to die, while they themselves survived. This rang hollow to me, and I felt a fierce rage.

  The Soviets, too, launched their winter offensive on the Eastern front in mid-January, and quickly reached the River Oder. Berlin was within hailing distance.

  Even with an amateur’s eye it was clear that Germany wouldn’t be able to hold out for long. In which case, it wouldn’t be long before I would have to act. And that day came while I was still dithering.

  †

  There were three light knocks on the door, and then it opened.

  I glanced up from where I sat listening to the BBC on the radio. Simon Walker came into the room.

  “You’re listening very intently, Yasuo,” he said, hanging his hat on the stand in the corner. “What’s it about? The fate of your country?”

  He shook my hand, smiling.

  “Simon, they’re saying that Iwojima has fallen. Iwojima… where is that?”

  “It’s an island 750 miles south of Tokyo,” he answered immediately. “It’s exactly the midpoint between Saipan and Tokyo.”

  “That’s about 1,250 kilometres, isn’t it?”

  “It’s possible to carry out air raids on Tokyo from Saipan, but many planes were lost on the return leg because of the distance. By occupying Iwojima, the US has got their hands on the perfect relay base. If Japan doesn’t surrender soon, Tokyo will be reduced to ashes by the American bombing raids. This is no empty threat – just look at Berlin and Dresden. I know how patriotic you are, but if you really love your country you won’t want to expose innocent people to any more suffering.”

  “So what you’re saying is that the time has come, aren’t you?” I asked.

  “Yes. We’re really hoping you’ll agree to go.”

  “I’ve given it a lot of thought, but it’s just too dangerous.”

  “Can I ask you to just let me tell you about something else?”

  “As long as you understand the answer is still no.”

  Simon nodded his acceptance, and then began talking.

  “The bridge in Remargen that the US army crossed on the seventh of this month finally collapsed, but our British forces conducted an airborne operation and built a bridgehead on the far bank of the Rhine. The capture of the Ruhr region is only a matter of time. It looks like Hitler’s latest offensive in Hungary has also failed. We predict that that Nazi Germany will only be able to continue their organised resistance for another two or three months. Which means that there is a high possibility of Romulus being moved.”

  “So you still haven’t determined where he is?”

  “We’ve been putting all our efforts into it, but no luck yet. We’ve observed various movements among the top ranking Nazis, as if they know the war is lost. Himmler has already been sounding out a peace deal via Sweden.”

  “Himmler – you mean the head of the SS?” I asked, the vision of Sonnenberger’s black uniform crossing the back of my mind.

  “That’s right. Rats deserting the sinking ship don’t care whether they’re black or grey. Specific information hasn’t reached me yet, but there are rumours that Göring is also seeking peace. Given that the Soviets will reach Berlin soon, Hitler himself has already nominated Göring as his successor.”

  “But to what end? Does he really believe the Allies will allow him to become Führer after Germany loses the war?”

  “Well, of course that’s absurd. And maybe Himmler and Göring don’t see it that way either. They probably believe that they are working hard to achieve peace.”

  “Is Hitler in Berlin now?”

  “Yes. He went back there when the counter offensive on the western front was halted in January, and has been in the Reich Chancellery ever since. There’s a bunker below the chancellery that is strong enough to withstand any bombardment, so he’s probably holed up in there. By the way, your brother-in-law is still in Berlin. When it comes to the crunch, the German government will probably evacuate to the Alpine Fortress in the south, and the diplomatic corps will probably move with them. If we assume that a submarine will be used to get Romulus out, it will happen before then, so even if you do go to Berlin, you’ll be able to get out with the diplomatic corps. Once the war is over, we can guarantee your safety, so I don’t think it’s all that dangerous.”

  I laughed. “It’s all very well for you to say that, but what about the Russians? They’ve already reached the River Oder, and we don’t know when they’ll storm Berlin—and it’s no exaggeration to say the allies are in full control the air space. It’s a hell of a lot more dangerous than staying here.”

  He looked uncomfortable. “It’s true that we can’t say it’s completely safe. You’re Japanese, and a civilian at that, so you are under no obligation to take orders from us. I can’t force you to go.”

  “Do you have a backup plan?”

  “German U-boat bases in Germany and Norway are currently under close intelligence by the RAF and intelligence personnel on the ground, so they will follow any suspicious vessels.”

  He carried on talking for a while, although he seemed to have given up. Or maybe he was staking everything on one last card up his sleeve.

  He started to stand up, then stopped. “Oh, by the way,” he said, taking a document out of his bag. “Here’s the information you requested.”

  “You mean on the Guesthouse outside Potsdam?”

  “Yes, but as you know it’s still enemy territory so there are limits as to what we can find out,” he said, passing the typewritten pages to me.

  I grabbed them and immediately started reading.

  “You were right about the sewer, you know,” he said behind me. “It was installed when the Guesthouse was originally built in the 19th century. There’s a magnificent sewer running from the building to a nearby river.”

  “What about the air raid shelter?”

  “It seems the pipes from the shower and toilet in the bunker are connected to the main building sewer. Our man on the ground managed to get copies of the plans, so I think you can count on it.”

  “Do you know the dimensions of the sewage pipes?”

  “The copy is included here, so you can check it for yourself.”

  I looked closely at the plan he’d given me. The sewage pipe ran from the shower and toilet downwards. Converting from the scale, I figured the diameter must be about 10 cm. On the plans, the pipes extended outside the bunker and connected to the main sewage pipe from the Gue
sthouse building.

  Assuming that the Manteuffels had been murdered, I had thought that the only escape route for the murderer would have been through the sewers, but as far as I could see from the plans, the pipes weren’t big enough for a person to pass through them.

  So maybe it had been suicide after all…

  “Oh, and something else,” Walker said, as if he’d just remembered. “That butler by the name of Otto Priess. We determined his true identity.”

  “His true identity?”

  “Yes. He’s from the Reich Main Security Office. From the department responsible for Inland Security, to be precise. There is no doubt about it.”

  “Which means?”

  “It means his boss is Klaus Sonnenberger.”

  †

  It was already 8 April. I’d just heard the sad news that the battleship Yamato had been sunk by American bombers off the coast of Japan when I departed from London.

  The flight route was over territories already liberated by the Allies and the Americans and British ruled the skies, so we didn’t encounter any problems along the way. I was taken to the airport at Zurich, in neutral Switzerland, where I was met by naval commander Giichi Fujimura, who had only recently moved to his new post from Berlin.

  When I got off the plane, Fujimura came running over to me and clasped my hands. I could feel some kind of inner determination in his grip, but it was only later that I found out he was conducting peace negotiations with America in absolute secrecy, and I would never have imagined it at the time. He had graduated from the same naval academy as Kenichi, although one cohort later.

  He expressed his joy at my having been released from the POW camp, and handed me a telegram from Kenichi. As expected, the message said there was no need for me to come to Berlin. I should remain in neutral Switzerland until the end of the war.

  However, I had made up my mind when I left London. I decided to ignore his advice and cross over the border into Germany.

  I had been vacillating for so long about going to Berlin, but in the end it was something Catherine said that prompted me to make up my mind.

  When I told her I was agonising over whether or not to accept, to my surprise she strongly urged me to go to Berlin. This came as a shock since I had been so sure she would oppose it, and I had the feeling I was seeing a part of her that I hadn’t known before.

  She was very clear about it. “Yasuo, I don’t want to lose you. I want you to stay here for Erika and me. But I don’t want another war. And I hate the Nazis. You would be going to Berlin to put an early end to the war and make sure the Nazis could never come back. If the war finishes even one day earlier, the lives of hundreds or thousands—no, tens of thousands of innocent people will be saved. It’s really unlike you to put the happiness of just two people first when you’re in a position to accomplish such a great mission.”

  After so many years in France I’d come to believe that the French placed far more importance on personal happiness than Japanese people did, and I hadn’t expected her reproach.

  She was right. This was a case of noblesse oblige, and I was being tested. I was just an artist, with no authority and no need for a high position in society. If I stayed put in England I would almost certainly survive until the war ended, however long it took. And I would be able to put my rejection of the mission behind me, and go back to my life as an artist in Paris without a second thought.

  But what about my duty as an individual? Could I really save myself and pretend not to see all those people whose lives could probably have been saved? Surely Commander Yagyu and all those young people who had lost their lives in this war hadn’t died in vain? Their deaths should be valued as the foundations for future generations to live in happiness.

  And frankly, there was quite a high chance that I would return safely to Catherine.

  My mind was now firmly made up.

  Three days before my departure, Catherine and I held a hasty marriage ceremony. She had asked Simon to help find a Catholic church that would perform it for us, and he’d eventually managed to come up with a small redbrick chapel in a cosy neighbourhood in northwest London.

  “No way, that won’t do. This is Henry VIII’s fault too,” she’d fumed, but she cheered up when she heard the Italian priest also spoke French.

  The only guests were Simon and three more British military officers, and a few French friends Catherine had made in England. Erika slept peacefully on the first row pew.

  Catherine had managed to procure a pure white wedding dress from somewhere, and her veil was held in place by a sparkling tiara. She looked stunning, if I do say so myself.

  †

  I crossed the German border to find the country utterly changed since last time I’d been there. It had only been one year earlier, but the eastern and western fronts had at that time been far away, and the effects of the war hadn’t yet reached there. This time the journey to Berlin took almost two days. The train was full, and the carriage I was in was full of men clutching their draft papers. Many of them were a lot older than I was, and didn’t look at all well. Were these exhausted men really going to be sent to fight the Russians?

  From time to time there was an air raid warning, and we all crawled under the train and waited for the all clear. After a long journey taking many detours, we finally arrived in Berlin on the 11 April.

  The train arrived at the Grunewald Bahnhof in the west of the city. Kenichi was there to meet me, but he looked stunned that I’d actually come. And when I asked whether we were far from their house, he replied that Setsuko had already evacuated to the outskirts because of the air raids. Just the day before, the city had been hit by the biggest air raid of the war, with over a thousand allied bombers, and I was relieved to hear that my sister was safe.

  I didn’t say much as we got into the car. Berlin had completely changed in the past year. There were still some sturdy buildings standing, but if you looked closely they had all sustained damage to a greater or lesser degree. And many had been reduced to heaps of grey rubble. The area was dotted with many buildings that only had part of the outer walls and chimneys standing.

  What was surprising was that there were so many people out on the streets. Everywhere I looked there were large numbers of people walking. At first I thought there must be some kind of meeting or distribution of supplies, but it didn’t seem so. But the reason quickly became clear. There were practically no taxis or cars on the streets, and no buses at all, and there were no people coming in and out of the U-Bahn stations we passed so the underground trains probably weren’t running either. In other words, the people had no option but to walk.

  We also came across barricades made from damaged vehicles, collapsed walls, or damaged furniture, and manned by soldiers that were either boys or old men. Even to my amateur eyes, the guns they were equipped with were old-fashioned.

  Driving along Tiergarten Strasse headed for the Brandenburg Gate, I saw the Japanese Embassy was as magnificent as ever. We passed by a lot of trucks and carts. The soldiers riding on the carts were even older than those I’d seen on the train. To put it bluntly, they were senior citizens.

  Here too people were trudging along in droves, now and then ignoring the traffic signs to cross the road. What had happened to German orderliness?

  Berlin was clearly much weakened.

  Since Setsuko and Kenichi were busy with the preparations to evacuate, this time I would stay in a hotel and Kenichi took me straight to the Adlon. Not unreasonably, he was moody and hardly spoke along the way.

  The area around the hotel was piled high with sandbags in preparation for the air raid, but it had withstood the onslaught and was still open for business. I quickly unpacked and went back downstairs, where Kenichi was waiting for me.

  “I’m so glad you were released from the POW camp, and I understand your not wanting to go back to Paris where the situation is st
ill so unsettled, but the safest option would have been to stay in Switzerland. Why on earth were you so hell bent on coming here, in these conditions?” he demanded disagreeably.

  It was a reasonable question, and I had come to Berlin at this difficult time against his advice. He must have been appalled at how unconcerned—or simply foolish—I was being.

  They had already been advised on 7 April by the Foreign Ministry’s Department of Protocol to relocate to Bad Gastein south of Salzburg. Most of the attachés and embassy staff under Ambassador Oshima would be departing within a few days. Of the navy staff, the plan was for one group to go south, another to stay in Berlin, and another to escape by ship to Sweden. Kenichi was to go south, and Setsuko would accompany him.

  “So what about you? Will you come with us?” He sounded angry, but of course it was out of concern for me as part of his family.

  I braced myself and invited him for a drink at the hotel bar.

  And then I told him everything.

  April 1945

  Führerbunker, Berlin ~ Port of Kiel

  The Führerbunker, Hitler’s bunker in Berlin, was very different from what we normally imagine from the word “bunker.” It was designed by Albert Speer, Minister for Armaments and War Production, who was also an architect, and building work started on it from mid-1944. It was located deep below the Old Reich Chancellery, with Hitler’s bedroom and office situated in the deepest, innermost part.

  It was fitted with an air filter to protect against a poison gas attack, could withstand a direct hit by a large bomb, and was equipped with conference rooms as well as a communications room, communal dining room, kitchen, and surgery.

  Furthermore the bunker had corridors leading to the Propaganda Ministry and Foreign Ministry, and was connected to a huge underground fortress under the New Reich Chancellery parallel to Voss Strasse that had a field hospital, secret car park, various large and small rooms. About five hundred people lived here.

  This was Hitler’s Valhalla.