by Eric Meyer
“You know why I came to help you last time, you persuaded me that it was important that you Germans win the war.”
I nodded. “Isn’t that still true?”
“It would be, if it was possible, but Jurgen, you know it isn’t going to happen.”
I thought about her reply. It was true that we’d suffered some reversals on the Eastern Front, but we hadn’t lost yet, I mentioned that to her. She smiled.
“Do you think we don’t listen to the news? We know that the Allies have taken North Africa, they’ve taken Sicily and they’ll soon be on the Italian mainland. Leningrad is holding out, Stalingrad was a terrible defeat and the last battle in the Kursk salient was hardly a victory. The Germans are losing.”
I didn’t agree with her, not entirely. We weren’t winning, certainly, but we weren’t completely losing either, we had massive forces at our disposal.
“I still think we will win eventually, Irina,” I told her earnestly, although as I said it I knew that it was a wildly optimistic statement. We needed to find a counter to the vast and overwhelming numbers that the Soviets could bring to the battlefield and so far, we hadn’t found the solution. We desperately needed the secret weapons the Fuhrer kept promising. When would they come?
“I want you to get me to Germany, Jurgen. When the Russians take Kharkov, you know I’ll be shot as a spy, don’t you?”
“Irina, they haven’t taken Kharkov yet, you’re quite safe.”
She sneered slightly. “You need to wake up, Jurgen, they retook the city before and they’re massing their forces outside the city to take it again. I have to leave before they come back.”
“You’re thinking of Nadia Vlasov, the girl the partisans killed?”
“There have been many such hangings of supposed traitors, so yes, I’m terrified. But Nadia Vlasov wasn’t killed by partisans.”
“But, I saw her hanging there, with a sign on her chest, it had to be partisans!”
She smiled. “That is what it was supposed to look like, but some local people saw it happen, they work inside the hotel. The Germans suspected her of passing information to the Russians, so they murdered her and made it look like a partisan reprisal. It was propaganda, pure and simple, but I suppose if your people hadn’t got her, the Russians would have, sooner or later. I have to get out, Jurgen. Please will you help me?”
I was only half listening to her. Our people had killed Nadia Vlasov. It made no sense, unless it was part of some devious plot by the Gestapo or even more likely, the Sicherheitsdienst. And that meant only one person, the most senior SD officer in Kharkov. SD Obersturmbannfuhrer Walter von Betternich, who had shown himself to be totally capable of arranging a murder if would further his own ends, or the ends of the Third Reich, which was not necessarily the same thing. I realised that Irina was still talking to me.
“Sorry, what was that?”
“Damnit, Jurgen, listen to me! I have to get out of here, can you help me?”
I heard myself telling her that I would find a way to get her back to Germany, but I was still reeling at the thought that von Betternich may have been behind the public hanging of Nadia Vlasov. I knew there would have to be a confrontation with him sooner or later, but one that I would have to prepare for thoroughly, he was a formidable opponent. Would I kill him? It was a tempting thought, he certainly deserved to die, but in the vicious slaughter of the Russian war, perhaps most us were not without blame. I pushed the problems to one side. I needed to concentrate on Irina.
“Yes, I’ll do what I can. If I can possibly find a good reason to get you on a train returning to the Reich you could leave with the correct documentation, I can always say that you are my fiancée. When you get to the Reich, you can find yourself accommodation and work, it won’t be difficult, everyone is desperate for workers these days.”
She smiled. “Your fiancée? That would be wonderful. When are we to be married?”
I nearly choked on my wine. “I only meant...”
“I know what you meant, don’t worry. I thought of going to Berlin.”
“Berlin? You cannot be serious. It’s being bombed to rubble. You need to find somewhere quiet, away from the worst of the bombing. Dresden would be worth considering, it’s a beautiful old city and you’d love it. Very medieval, it’s somehow managed to stay untouched by the war.”
“In that case I shall set up home in Dresden.”
We finished our meal and the band started to play, I took her out onto the dance floor and we held each other tightly, clinging to a little warmth, a little love and hopefully a little more later. I wasn’t to be disappointed.
“Jurgen, when you take me home tonight, I don’t want to be alone.”
“Nor do I, Irina.”
When we got to her house we couldn’t wait to get to the bedroom, there was a thick rug in front of the empty hearth and we tore off our clothes and literally savaged each other’s bodies. It was a lust born of animal need. A lust that understood that tonight, like every other night on the Eastern Front, could be our last. We stroked and caressed our partner’s bodies as if they were a mighty treasure, a golden prize in the lottery of life and one that may only be won once in a lifetime. Afterwards, we lit cigarettes and lay together comfortably on the rug, smoking in silence. Eventually, I had to get up and get dressed.
“So duty has to call again, does it?” she smiled.
“I’m afraid so. Someone has to keep the railway line to Germany safe.”
Her face fell, I realised at once that I shouldn’t have brought the war back to this rare moment. I kissed her goodbye and slipped out.
When I got back to my unit, they were already up and racing to reinforce the defences. I found Muller and asked him what was up.
“The Red Army, that’s what’s up,” he snarled grimly. “Intelligence said that it would be at least two weeks before they were ready to move, the Russians were much too weak after Kursk. Last night, the First Tank Army and the Fifth Guards Tank Army attacked in force. Belgorod has fallen, while adjoining and supporting Soviet forces have widened the gap, they’re converging on Kharkov, Hoffman, I suggest you prepare your men. I’m expecting the city to come under attack later today!”
I found the men and passed on the grim news, but the regimental grapevine had already informed them. We were ordered to move forward to a prepared defensive line five kilometres outside the city and we began to load the half-track with the supplies we would need. A few Panzers rumbled past us heading east to guard the defences, but they were awfully few.
“That was a real work of genius, moving our armour to Italy,” Voss moaned. “We’ll need more than this pitiful bunch to hold back the Reds.”
“They’re all we’ve got, Voss, we’ll just have to manage,” I said curtly. “Besides, it was an order of the Fuhrer that they were transferred to the Western theatre.”
“That’s what I meant,” he said slyly.
I let it go, he had a point, it was poor bastards like him and the rest of us that would bear the brunt of the failure to come to grips with the Soviet hordes, not OKW, OKH or Reichsfuhrer Himmler. We were about to leave when the air raid siren sounded.
“Out, out, take cover!”
We scrambled out of the half-track and jumped into the slit trench. The Soviets were using IL-2 Sturmoviks with a top cover of Yak-1s, not that the escort fighters were needed. Just like our armour, the aircraft losses of the Kursk salient had been crippling and the Luftwaffe were still struggling to catch up. The Soviets seemed to have no such difficulties. They came in huge air fleets while our aircraft were nowhere to be seen. While the Yaks circled overhead the Sturmoviks came in one after the other, dropping their bombs and waiting for their following aircraft to complete their bombing runs, then coming in for a second pass to shatter our position with cannon and machine gun fire. When they’d finished they had the sky to themselves and the Yaks came down on us and shot up the camp. We had two Flakvierlings, the four-barrelled anti-aircraft guns that fired
constantly at the enemy, hurling curtains of shells upwards and bringing down two Sturmoviks in flames, one of the Yaks was also hit and fled east trailing smoke from our gunfire, but when they had gone the damage was incalculable. Our half-track was destroyed, as were most of the vehicles in our unit, including the CO’s armoured reconnaissance car. Smoke and fire was everywhere, much of our stores had been destroyed and the medics were already laying out bodies on the ground where they had taken a direct hit to several of the sandbagged shelters and two of the slit trenches. One of the Flak guns had been destroyed too, smashed into ruin by multiple hits from a cannon. Ten minutes before we’d been an understrength regiment, now, we had barely enough equipment and personnel for a company. Muller came around to check on us, his face was chalk white.
“We lost so many, Hoffman. All gone, men, equipment, everything. How the hell we’re going to stop the Soviets now I don’t know. Glasser’s dead too.”
Glasser, the Regimental adjutant.
“I’m sorry, Sir, we all liked him. We’ll manage, somehow.”
“Will we, Hoffman, will we? I hope so, you’d better proceed independently to the defensive positions, we’re desperately short of men now and they’ll be glad of any they can get. Make sure you take anti-tank weapons.”
“They were in the half-track, Sir.”
He went away, shaking his head.
The men were looking bitterly at the remains of the half-track. “When do we get a replacement?” Mundt asked. The others were watching carefully, waiting on my reply.
“I suspect there won’t be a replacement, Scharfuhrer. We’ll have to walk, like Napoleon’s Grand Army did before us. Let’s get moving, we need to man the defences before the Russian armies arrive. Mundt, see if you can find some anti-tank launchers, we lost all of ours.”
They started to gather equipment and twenty minutes later we marched out of the camp, heading for the city defences. Mundt had found several spare launchers from platoons who would no longer need them and they’d loaded everything onto a two-wheeled cart that they were pulling behind us. We were indeed reduced to a re-enactment of the Grand Army of Napoleon, compelled to travel on foot with a handcart for our supplies. When we reached the defences we were assigned a position on a low hill and we started to dig a slit trench. We were only just in time as in the distance we all heard the rumbling and squealing of tank tracks. I stood up to inspect our defences. We had a STuGIII assault gun to either side of us. A platoon was dug in on a nearby rise with a 3.7cm PAK, and to the front of us were our few remaining Panzers, one Tiger that was dug into a defensive position, clearly it was unable to manoeuvre and was being used as a defensive gun. There were half a dozen Panzer IVs, and two of the new Panzer Vs that presumably had been repaired. I knew that all had broken down during the battle for Kursk.
“It’s not much, is it, Sir?” Mundt said. He’d come up to look with me.
I shrugged. “I wish I could say it’s enough, Willy, but no, it’s not much. We lost so much at Kursk, the Russians don’t seem to have been affected all. We need time, time to recover, to get more men and more tanks to hit back.”
We stood looking at the scratch defences that had been hurriedly thrown together.
“It’s a bit of a merry-go-round, isn’t it?” he said suddenly. “Backwards and forwards all the time, will we ever have enough to beat them with?”
“Perhaps the new secret weapons, Willy.”
He looked pessimistic. “I hear the Fuhrer believes in black magic. Perhaps that’s what he means by secret weapons. Do you believe in all that stuff?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “You mean fairy stories, bolts of fire from the heavens, that kind of thing? I think if we’re reduced to believing in that kind of crap we’re really done for.”
“I hear that Himmler believes in it too, Sir,” he persisted.
“In that case he should grow up and find us some more Panzers and aircraft, Willy. That’s what we need to hold back the Russians, not witches’ spells.”
“But...”
“Shut up, Willy,” I laughed. “Before I get Himmler to turn you into a frog. Now, how are we going to handle these T34s when they come at us?”
He put his attention back to the ground in front of us. “Defence in depth, we need to hit them hard when they come up, then pull back to the next defensive position. Hopefully, we’ll stop them before they reach the city.”
“I agree. I’ll have a word with Muller, he’s probably thinking along the same lines, and ask him to arrange for his Hiwis to start preparing our next defensive position. In the meantime, supposing we arrange a forward position to ambush our Russian visitors? There’s a balka down there that goes all the way forward to that gap between the two ridges, they’ll have to come through there. If we set up a few of our anti-tank launchers we could take out some of their armour and then retreat back down the balka.”
He followed the lines of terrain where I was pointing and nodded.
“It could work, yes, it would certainly knock out some of their armour before it gets here. It’ll be very risky, though, if they’re carrying tank riders, they’ll be all over us.”
“We’d better take the MG34 forward with us, then. I’ll see if Muller can spare another machine gun, then we can keep this position manned, we could do with the extra firepower.”
I went over to Muller’s position and told him what we had planned. “Yes, we’ll be pulling back to the next positions if we can’t hold them here. Are you sure you want to take the chance with that forward ambush?”
“I’m sure, yes, Sir. We need every advantage we can get.”
“Very well, I’ll detail two men to bring over another machine gun. We’ve got two of the new MG42s, you can have one of those, they have a higher rate of fire than the 34.” I thanked him and went back to our unit.
We started to load up our equipment. I took Mundt, Bauer and Wesserman with me. Beidenberg stayed behind to man the position with three other men and Muller’s promised machine gun crew turned up with their MG42 and deployed it ready for use. Laden with anti-tank Panzerfausts, machine pistols and ammunition belts, as well as the MG34, we started down the hill and into the balka. We stumbled along for half a kilometre until we came to a point where there was a natural low bulwark of stone and mud that we could use as a shield.
“Bauer, set up the machine gun but keep out of sight unless we see any infantry. Wesserman, Scharfuhrer Mundt and I will operate the Panzerfausts, if we see any tank riders, Wesserman, leave the Panzerfausts and start loading for Stefan. Any questions?”
“If they pull back in a hurry, it’ll be a bastard lugging that machine gun,” Mundt said.
“You’re right, if we run for it, leave everything, just take the personal weapons.”
We hurriedly deployed. More Panzers were coming up from the Fourth Army and it looked as if we’d have a strong force to hold back the Russians, but of course it was relative. They’d surprised our intelligence people by mounting any kind of a counter-offensive at all so quickly after Kursk, so God only knew what kind of surprise they had in store for us now. We didn’t have long to wait, they started with an artillery barrage, a great rumble in the distance that became a whistling noise in the air and then the ground trembled as the first of the shells landed. We dived to the ground and waited for it to end.
The barrage lasted for two hours, all we could do was huddle in the balka, trying to dig ourselves deeper and deeper to keep out of the flying steel and shattering explosions that threatened to destroy our main defensive position half a kilometre back. Several shells fell short and dropped around us, we had to keep our heads well down to avoid the shards of steel that scoured the battlefield. Then it stopped as suddenly as it had started, but now there was a new sound, the rumble of tank engines, the squeaking and screeching of their tracks. There was no need to say anything, we climbed to the parapet of the ravine that sheltered us and five hundred metres away were the enemy. I estimated about eighty T34s and ha
lf a dozen of the heavy KV-1s, most had troops riding on them. Our own guns opened fire. The Tiger’s 88mm gun bellowed and was joined by the big assault guns of the STuGIIIs. The rest of our armour followed and immediately we scored hits on the Russians. Three of their tanks slewed to a halt, soldiers flung from them like chaff on the wind. The rest of them kept coming, ominously, firing their main guns as they rolled forward. They were firing armour-piercing rounds now, trying to blunt the edge of our armour and our Panzers and assault guns engaged in a duel of increasing intensity as they drew nearer. The Tiger took several hits but seemed to shrug them off, the T34s were faring much worse, the shells from our heavy tanks were starting to thin out their ranks. I pitied the Russian infantry riding on top of the tanks, subjected to the hail of steel that whistled around them and slashed through their ranks. It seemed peculiarly cruel to subject the frail bodies of these brave men to the kind of gunfire that was designed to destroy tanks, an unequal contest between the highest of military destructive arts and the frailties of the human flesh. But the T34s shrugged off the gunfire and came on.
“Time to prepare the Panzerfausts!” I shouted. “Bauer, bring up that machine gun, by the time their tanks are in range, we’ll need to start hitting the infantry.”
We lined up on the lip of the ravine, three of us with a Panzerfaust each. Bauer had the MG34 ready, a belt loaded and boxes of ammunition next to him. Wesserman was ready too, I noted that he had looped several belts of MG34 ammunition around his body, ready to load for Bauer and to keep up with him if they had to change positions in a hurry, as so often happened when the enemy were able to flank your position. Or of course in the case of a counterattack, which was not a likely scenario on this battlefield. The main guns of our Panzers and assault guns knocked out more T34s, but still they got nearer, then they were within range. I sighted the nearest tank and pulled the trigger, seeing my missile launch and fly true towards the Russian. It exploded on the side, a good hit that smashed the track and stopped the vehicle moving any further, but it wasn’t finished, they were still firing their main gun which at this range threatened even the colossal armour of the Tiger tank. Mundt saw the danger and fired at the turret, scoring a hit that stopped the firing, Wesserman shot at another T34 and then a KV-1 saw the danger and lumbered towards us. Tank rider infantry were racing towards our position now, intent on crushing our forward post, but Bauer opened up with the MG34 and mowed several of them down before the rest dropped into cover. The KV-1 was still coming and we launched more Panzerfaust missiles against it, seeing them strike the heavy armour again and again without effect. Mundt managed a hit on one of the track linkages that stopped it dead, but the main gun swung towards us to swat the annoying nest of opposition that threatened their advance. As shells landed around us, we fired missile after missile against the turret, eventually seeing smoke rise as we hit something vital, then the tank simply blew up, taking with it twenty or thirty infantrymen who were crouched nearby. Three T34s started to edge towards us, it was time to move.