Claws of Steel

by Leo Kessler

  But Jodl was not prepared to comfort him as he had always done at such moments in the past. The Führer would finally have to face up to reality. National Socialist Germany was losing the war.

  Hitler’s restless brain moved more quickly than that of his chief aide.

  ‘Good,’ he said suddenly, stopping and gripping Jodl by the arm. ‘If we cannot put the same kind of armour into the field that the Soviets can, we must compensate some other way.’ He smiled suddenly, the smile of a crazy man. ‘Why didn’t I think of it before?’

  ‘Think of what, my Führer?’ Jodl asked dutifully, his body suddenly tense to face what might soon come. He knew only too well what the Führer’s hunches were like.

  ‘Rudel – Rudel, of course!’ Hitler said eagerly. ‘Colonel Rudel of the Luftwaffe. Whatever else one might say of Goering’s Luftwaffe, there is no denying Rudel’s ability and bravery. How many times has he been wounded since the beginning of hostilities?’

  ‘Nine times, my Führer,’ Jodl answered promptly, wondering again why he, as Chief-of-Staff, should be expected to remember such trivia. Yet at the same time he knew that if he didn’t, he wouldn’t last twenty-four hours in Hitler’s entourage. ‘Twice severely.’

  ‘That just shows,’ Hitler said enthusiastically. ‘A man like that, still flying and fighting after so many wounds.’ He smashed his right fist into the palm of his left hand. ‘A man like that is worth a whole Soviet corps!’ All right, Jodl, inform Luftwaffe headquarters that I want Colonel Rudel’s five squadrons of tank hunters to join the battle immediately – do you understand, immediately?’ But before Jodl could muster the expected enthusiasm, Buechs came running out of the conference room, his face wild with shock.

  ‘My Führer,’ he called. ‘My Führer!’

  ‘What is it, Buechs?’ Hitler snapped.

  The Major thrust the flimsy message into Hitler’s hand. ‘Just arrived from Field Marshal Rommel, my Führer – most immediate,’ he gasped.

  Hitler took it out of his hand, his face still flushed with the enthusiasm of his sudden decision. Awkwardly he fumbled for the gold-rimmed spectacles in which Hoffmann was never allowed to photograph him. Finally he focused them on the message. A long animal groan rose from deep within him. A muscle in the side of his face began to tick dangerously,

  ‘What is it, my Führer?’ Jodl asked in alarm, putting out his hands as if he might have to support his leader.

  Wordlessly Hitler handed the top secret message to him. It was simple and to the point, but Jodl knew Rommel’s handful of words meant the end of the Thousand Year Reich.

  ‘ALLIES LANDED SICILY THIS MORNING.

  ROMMEL.’

  Notes

  1. German Army slang for the female army auxiliaries (transl.)

  TWO

  It was furnace-hot now. The glare cut the eye like a knife. Above the waiting panzers the sky was smoke-coloured and menacing. Through it the sun glittered like a copper coin. But despite the murderous heat, they were ready, the identification panel spread out across the fronts of their tanks, the huge arrows draped over the burned charred grass pointing in the direction of the Soviet lines. The tank hunters could come now.

  ‘There they are!’ Schulze yelled suddenly and pointed up to the west.

  ‘Here they come!’ the men of Wotan took up the cry everywhere, clambering up on the decks of the stalled Tigers and Mark IVs to get a better view, heedless of the fact that there were still Popov snipers about.

  Like black hawks they came roaring in from the sun. A whole squadron of Stuka tank busters. Now they hovered over the battlefield, poised to fall on their prey. Suddenly the leader moved his bent-hawk wings. Once, twice, three times. it was the signal.

  The first flight peeled off. The first black shape came roaring down, its sirens screaming hideously. Immediately the Popov flak beyond the rise snapped into action. Puffballs of cotton-white erupted all around the Stuka, but Colonel Rudel, the Luftwaffe’s ace, pressed home his attack. Just when he seemed about to plunge into the churned, battle-littered earth at 400 mph, he levelled out. A myriad of black eggs fell from the Stuka’s white-painted belly. The earth around the first Popov armoured position vomited upwards in ugly black clouds.

  On the panzers the troopers yelled with joy. As Rudel soared high into the sky, vicious red and yellow flames split the black pall. T-34 after T-34 was hit. White and green tracer ammunition zig-zagged crazily in all directions.

  ‘Go on, give it to the Bolshevik bastards!’ they cried in frenzied excitement as the next Stuka hurtled down.

  The air became a thick choking fog of yellow steppe dust and dense oily smoke. The whole battlefield was one monstrous din through which the SS men could faintly hear the tortured cries of wounded and dying Russians. And then, as suddenly as it had started, the attack stopped. The flak dwindled to isolated bangs. The noise of Stukas grew fainter and fainter as they flew back the way they had come, leaving behind a wrecked Russian first line.

  But Rudel’s tank busters were not finished yet. The Stukas had hardly vanished when there was the drone of fresh planes from the west. Almost instantly two squadrons of Henschel 129 took shape on the horizon. Immediately all eyes flashed in that direction. Von Dodenburg’s dirty face lit up.

  ‘There are more of them. Now we’ll show the Popovs!’

  ‘They’re not tanks though,’ Schulze said dourly, as the roar grew louder. ‘They’re still not tanks.’

  ‘Oh go on, you ray of sunshine,’ von Dodenburg said, shielding his eyes against the glare and studying the cannon-bearing tank busters – eighteen of them in all, already breaking up into their attack formation.

  One flight turned slightly to the east, another swung west while a third kept to the centre so that they were spread out like the three prongs of an enormous hay fork. The Soviet flak swung into action. A Henschel staggered visibly in the sky. Thick white smoke started to pour from its starboard engine. The pilot tried to hold it, but failed. Carefully he began to lose height, obviously nursing his crippled plane down for an emergency landing on the steppe. With anxious eyes the men of Wotan began to follow him down, their sweating fists clenched tensely. Suddenly the Henschel burst into a gigantic ball of flame. It shattered into a million pieces, snuffed out like a candle. The rest of the formation flew on steadily.

  Now they were over the Soviet positions. The leader of the first flight flapped his wings. In the same instant he threw his plane into a dive. At three hundred miles an hour they came roaring down, their cannon firing.

  All hell broke loose in the Soviet lines. The first wave swept in at one hundred and fifty metres, their under-carriages down acting as a brake. The 20 mm shells came streaming from their wings. T-34 after T-34 brewed up suddenly. The watchers on the ground could see panic-stricken Russian tankers abandoning their vehicles even before they were hit. Time and time again the Henschels came in at ground level, twisting and weaving crazily to avoid the Popov flak before pulling up in a back-breaking climb in order to do it again.

  On the waiting Tigers, the crews yelled themselves hoarse, waving their arms frantically, as the Henschels roared in low over their heads, the white blobs of their pilots’ heads clearly visible.

  But this time the Luftwaffe was not going to have it all their own way. The Soviets had been alarmed. From the east swarms of Yak fighters roared into the battle. The sky was criss-crossed from horizon to horizon by scores of white vapour trails, as the planes weaved back and forth in single combat. But the Henschels were no match for the swifter, more nimble Yaks. One after one they were shot from the skies.

  One crippled Henschel, thick white smoke pouring from its riddled engine, came screaming into their laager. It hit the ground, sprang up a good thirty metres, hit the steppe again and somersaulted to a stop. Another crashed between two trees, its wings snapping off like twigs. Its pilot stepped out with a shaky grin on his deathly pale face and asked for a schnapps; then he fainted.

  But he was one of the lucky on
es. The Yaks knocked the slower-moving Henschels out of the sky everywhere, screaming in low over the German tanks, executing flashy barrel rolls to demonstrate their victory to the impotent tankers. And then it was all over and what was left of the Henschels were fleeing to the west, leaving the sky in the hands of the Russians.

  Schulze spat drily into the dust and watched as the smoke began to clear over the Soviet positions. When it did, it was clear that the Popovs had been hurt. Scores of tanks were crippled and burning all over the scorched Steppe. But behind them hundreds more waited, black squat impassive shapes, their cannon now swinging round to face the Germans again.

  ‘Hell,’ he commented sourly. ‘I’ve closed my eyes twice, but the sods won’t go away, Hartmann.’

  The ex-legionnaire’s usual lazy, cynical smile was absent. ‘Well, sarge, if they won’t go away—’ he stopped abruptly and looked Schulze directly in the face.

  ‘I read you, Hartmann,’ Schulze said slowly. ‘You don’t need to send me no telegram. If they won’t go away, we must, eh?’

  Before Hartmann could answer, the officers began blowing their whistles. Tanks’ motors burst into noisy life. Von Dodenburg ran back from the Vulture’s command Tiger, holding on to his pistol holster.

  ‘Mount up,’ he cried. ‘Mount up. We’re going to attack before the Ivans recover again.’

  The bombardment started with the roar of an infuriated beast. Countless flashes of violent fire cut the plain behind them. A deafening thunder. The next instant the whole weight of the corps artillery hit the Soviet first line of attack. The earth shuddered. Even behind the thick armour of their Tiger they could feel the blast. Automatically they opened their mouths to prevent their ear drums being burst.

  ‘Enemy tanks – two o’clock,’ an unknown voice crackled over the radio. ‘Thousands of the bastards!’

  Von Dodenburg flung a quick glance around the gloomy turret. The red control light showed a black FA sign. All guns were cleared. He looked at Schulze crouched over his eyepiece. They were ready for action. He threw a quick glance through the look-out slit. The smoking landscape in front of him was jammed with Soviet tanks and SPs. Tank after tank crawling forward to them.

  Over the radio the Vulture’s voice rasped, almost cheerfully for once. ‘Now, gentlemen, I think it is time that we exercised our calling. Roll them!’

  Hartmaan put the sixty-ton monster in gear. To their left and right the line of Wotan’s tanks began to move out to meet the enemy. There was the typewriter chatter of a Soviet machine gun. The golden-white tracer scudded off their cupola like crazy gold balls.

  ‘Don’t fire, Schulze,’ von Dodenburg ordered quickly. ‘They’re only ranging in.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to, sir,’ Schulze said with unusual quietness. He looked like a man who was fighting some inner battle. But at that moment von Dodenburg had not time enough to concern himself with the problem. His blood-shot eyes were searching their immediate front, while he counted the number of Popov T-34s facing Wotan’s forty odd tanks. When he had reached one hundred and fifty, he gave up in despair.

  Schwarz’s Second began the action. They were slightly to the right and in advance of the rest of the Battalion. As usual, Schwarz was eager for glory and battle. He got both. Suddenly his dozen mixed Tigers and Mark IVs picked up speed and went straight for an enormous concentration of T-34s.

  ‘For Chrissake, Schwarz,’ von Dodenburg began, but the words died on his lips.

  The strange somnambulist advance of the Russians stopped abruptly. Frantically the Soviet gunners swung their 76s round to concentrate on the Germans. Everywhere the commanders were up in their turrets, waving their flags like crazy boy scouts.

  Schwarz’s gunners did not miss the excellent target. Red tracer hissed across the gap between the two groups. Soviet tank commanders went down everywhere. Hastily turret flaps closed and the Soviet gunners pulled their firing levers. Pillars of white smoke flew up on all sides, as the Soviets fired wildly into the daring little handful of Germans. Over the radio, Schwarz’s voice crackled exuberently.

  ‘We’ve got them rattled, men. Come on now. Let’s show them what SS Assault Battalion Wotan is made of!’

  The 88s and 75s burst into life. Solid shot tore flatly through the burning air. The next instant the shells were crashing into the Soviet armour with a sound like a smith beating an anvil. Suddenly the radio was full of orders and cries of rage or triumph. ‘T-34 firing now … by that scrub … hit him low. Fire… . Christ on a crutch, you missed! … Up a hundred … up a hundred! I said … That’s it … fire again!’ Almost at once the battle developed into a confused dogfight. Raw jabs of flame pierced the oily smoke, followed instants later by the great crump of another tank brewing up.

  Schwarz was right in among the Russians now. T-34s were flaming everywhere. But his own tanks were suffering serious casualties. As the rest of the Battalion fringed the skirmish, rolling inexorably to the mass of the Russian attack, they could see how vehicle after vehicle was being hit.

  ‘My Christ, look at that!’ Schulze yelled suddenly and dug von Dodenburg in the ribs painfully.

  The cheerful blond giant who had carried the grenades on the first day of the attack was swaying on the engine covers of a burning Tiger, trying to haul out someone inside. At first von Dodenburg thought he was kneeling. Then he saw his mistake. The giant had balanced himself on the two bloody stumps of what had been his legs. Behind him the wooden boxes containing the 7.62 machine gun ammo were beginning to burn.

  ‘Jump,’ von Dodenburg yelled into the throat mike purposelessly. ‘For God’s sake, jump, man!’

  But the blond giant could not hear. Next instant the nearest wooden box erupted and the giant disappeared in a blinding white blaze.

  Now Schwarz was all alone. His company had vanished, swamped by the sheer weight of the T-34s. On all sides the Russians concentrated their fire on his lone Tiger. Still he did not make smoke and try to retreat. A 76 mm caught him in the flank. The Tiger rocked as if on a rough sea; ugly red sparks flew from the rear sprocket. For a moment it was obscured in smoke. Von Dodenburg, his hands damp with sweat, peered through his periscope helplessly. But when the smoke cleared, the Tiger was still moving forward, though at a reduced speed.

  ‘Lieutenant Schwarz, I order you to break off the action,’ the Vulture’s voice. ‘Do you hear, Schwarz. Break it off now!’

  The only answer was a crazy cackle over the radio, distorted even more by the static as half a dozen T-34s concentrated their fire on the Tiger. The huge tank heeled back and forth. Great gleaming metal scars appeared suddenly all along its right side. A thin white stream of smoke began to escape from the engine cowling. Still the metal monster rolled on, its great gun swinging from left to right, as the gunner attempted to fend off the final attack.

  The Soviet fire intensified angrily. Another T-34 flamed and the crew scrambled madly out of the escape hatches to be mown down without mercy. Then a lucky Soviet shot snapped a track pin on the left track. It flopped out behind the Tiger like a broken limb. The tank gave a great lurch and came to a sudden stop. Schwarz, crazy as he was, reacted at once. He made smoke.

  ‘For God’s sake, run for it, Schwarz!’ the Vulture yelled over the radio as the thick white fumes enveloped the dying Tiger. Schwarz did so. But he was cunning enough to let his crew go first. In a panic-stricken bunch they appeared suddenly out of the white fog to be mown down by the concentrated fire of a dozen Soviet machine guns.

  ‘Arse up, Heil Stalin!’ Schulze cursed, his voice full of helpless bitterness. ‘Why the hell did they bunch like that—’

  He broke off suddenly. Schwarz had appeared from the smoke. He was on his stomach, a Schmeisser in one hand, the other thick with blood streaming from a shattered shoulder. Cautiously he glanced left and right and began to crawl for the cover of a knocked-out T-34, its dead crew sprawled out carelessly around it, Five metres – ten. Schwarz seemed to be in luck. While Wotan rolled ever closer to the mass of the
Soviet tanks, von Dodenburg could not drag his eyes off the little officer squirming his way through the dust to safety. It seemed to him at that moment that if Schwarz made it, they would too.

  Suddenly the Soviets discovered him. Angry tracer sliced the air low. Schwarz stumbled to his feet, his blood dripping into the dust. Awkwardly he began to stagger for cover, lead stitching a fiery trail at his feet.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ von Dodenburg heard himself crying and felt the sweat pour from his body. ‘For Chrissake, Schwarz, do it!’

  But a rapid burst caught Schwarz in the back.

  ‘Sch-warz!’ von Dodenburg bawled. Schwarz’s knees buckled. His arms dangled as his body lost its ability to stay upright. The Schmeisser clattered out of his nerveless fingers. Slowly Schwarz sank to the ground, and as the first of Wotan’s 88s cracked into action, von Dodenburg knew that they could not win now.

  THREE

  Colonel Jodl gave the details with cold clinical precision, while the Führer, his senior generals and the staff listened in stiff-backed, rigid silence.

  ‘Montgomery has put his Eighth Army ashore here. We’ve already identified his 12 and 30 Corps – both from the Desert. That cowboy Patton has landed personally with his Seventh Army here.’ He smiled coldly, but his clever eyes did not light up. ‘No doubt we shall be seeing him do it personally in the next US Army newsreel we capture. That man certainly has an eye for personal publicity.’ He tapped the big man of Sicily with his elegantly manicured hand. ‘They’ve got Syracuse already and undoubtedly they will take Gela soon. No doubt our Allies will put up a show of resistance on the Catanian Plain.’ He did not attempt to hide his contempt at the expense of the Italians. ‘But I’ll give Montgomery a week. As slow as he is, he’ll be on the Straits of Messina, this time next week.’

  ‘So that’s it,’ Model said brutally, summing up what all of them were thinking. ‘We’ve lost Sicily.’ He fixed his monocle more firmly and glared at Hitler as if he were personally responsible. ‘This means the end of Operation Citadel, what?’