Repercussions

(Screen capture from Film)

1Lt Gus Chambers was the Executive Officer, the XO, of Charlie Company. He was running the company for a couple of days as the company commander, Captain Alphonse Josephson was up at regiment, sitting on a court martial for a sergeant from 3rd Battalion, accused of raping a Belgian civilian. As much as Chambers wanted nothing to do with a court martial, he would rather he was there and that the captain was here to deal with this mess.

All of the company's platoon leaders and platoon sergeants were standing in front of him at the moment. The flurry of rifle fire the previous day, the loss of a soldier killed in action, and the loss of another for psychological reasons had landed right in Chambers lap. He was not happy, not at all.

"All right, who the Hell thought it was a good idea to head out into the wild and fill their canteens from a f**king stream? What the G-527¹ not good enough for ya?" Chambers barked at the men in front of him.

No one said a word. Chambers knew the water, if not replenished often enough, tended to taste metallic from the G-527. The water from a running stream did sound nice, but someone had decided that the preference of the men for better water overrode their safety. Didn't they know there was a war on?

SSgt Joe Dubois, 3rd Platoon's platoon sergeant, spoke up, "Sir, I made the suggestion to the lieutenant when Sergeant Davis asked. According to the map, the stream wasn't that far away, I didn't think it would be..."

"Would be what sergeant? Wouldn't be such a bad thing to lose one of the men, maybe two? What the Hell...  Never mind. Dubois, Lieutenant Childreth you stay behind, the rest of you are dismissed. Let me be clear, no one leaves the damned bivouac unless it's on a patrol ordered by me or the CO. Are we crystal clear on that gentlemen?"

"Yes sir!" was barked out by those assembled. They knew the XO was pissed, they knew the captain would be when he returned.

After the others had left, Chambers pointed at Dubois and Childreth, then pointed to the headquarters tent. "Inside," he ordered.

Upon entry the two men began to sit down, 1Lt Chambers barked at them, "Nobody told you to sit, you're at attention."

SSgt Dubois shot a look at his lieutenant, he knew that he had f**ked up, while he didn't really want to take the heat for it, his lieutenant shouldn't either. He started, "Begging your pardon sir, but..."

"Shut the f**k up sergeant. Lieutenant, was it your idea to send two men out to fill the canteens for a single squad. Two men, into unknown territory. Huh?"

"Well sir, Sgt Davis asked if it was okay. It didn't seem to me that..."

"That what lieutenant? That the Germans had surrendered? Do you have some special knowledge of what's going on out here? Huh? Do you? If it was up to me I'd fire both of you, right f**king now. Send you up to regiment to count towels or something. You're of no goddamned use to me when you pull bone-headed stunts like this. YOU GOT ONE OF MY MEN KILLED! Damn it."

Neither Childreth or Dubois spoke. The XO took a deep breath, then said, "Okay, stand at ease. We've all made dumb mistakes before, we probably will again. But you don't send men out on stupid missions like this all by your lonesome. That's our job. Childreth, I expect a nice letter from you to Lederer's parents. Dubois, report to the First Sergeant and tell him you need a new job. You are no longer a platoon sergeant in this company. Both of you, go!"

Outside of the tent, 2Lt Childreth turned to Dubois and said, "I'm sorry about that Joe, I'll talk to the CO when he gets back. It isn't right that..."

"It's okay sir, I f**ked up, not you. I should have told Davis no. I made the call, no need for you to suffer for it. Things will work out, I'm sure."

The jeep rolled to a stop, PFC Billy Matuszak hopped out and turned to the driver, "Thanks for the lift Mac." He then walked up the trail to where his company was bivouacked. He had had a rough night, all he could think of was holding Ozzie's dead body, and the look on the dead German's face. If he hadn't have been screwing off, Ozzie might still be alive. Hell, he'd panicked when he saw the Kraut. Maybe the kid was just waiting for Ozzie to finish up and leave. What if I hadn't fired. What if?

He knew he could drive himself crazy with that sort of thinking. He'd had a brief chat with the chaplain that morning. It had kind of helped, though the man had spouted a lot of platitudes, he had made Billy feel a little bit better. It was war, shit happened. Though the chaplain had phrased it much more nicely than that.

As he headed up the trail he ran into PFC John Malcolm from his squad. "Hey, John." Matuszak was subdued when he spoke, he wasn't sure how the other guys were taking Lederer's death. Though the kid was brand new, the guys liked him right off the bat. Now the kid was dead.

"Billy, tough break, Ozzie was a good kid. Glad you got the Kraut that killed him. Hey, Sgt Davis said that if you came back, see him right away." Malcolm continued up the trail.

Matuszak thought about that as he walked, Sarge was probably going to chew his ass for getting Ozzie killed. Can't say I blame him, Matuszak thought to himself. And what did Malcolm mean by 'if he came back'? Did the guys think that he'd quit on them?

When he got to his platoon's bivouac, the first man he saw was the platoon leader, 2Lt Childreth. "Morning Sir." Matuszak offered.

"Hey Matuszak, you're back. Everything okay. You all right?"

"Yessir, I'm okay, ready to get back into the war. Yesterday was weird, ya know?"

"Sgt Davis will be glad you're back, so am I."

"Uh, thanks lieutenant."

He spotted his squad leader over by one of the cook fires. He headed that way, it struck him that he hadn't eaten anything since the day before.

"Hey Sarge, I'm back."

"'Bout time you goofball, we're short handed." Sgt Davis was smiling when he said that, which eased Matuszak's nervousness, a bit.

"So Billy, you hungry?"

"Sure Sarge, I am."

"C rations are over there, should be something left. Probably the crappy ones, but beggars ya know?"

"Right Sarge, can't be choosers."

"Get something to eat then come talk to me."

"Sure Sarge, be right there."

Sgt Davis was right about the C rations, not much for selection and all that was there were the less popular ones. But hey, he was hungry, better than nothing.

After wolfing down as much as he could, and pleased that it didn't come right back up, he headed over to where he could see his Sergeant, cleaning his rifle. Sitting next to him was Pvt Curt Bixby, drinking coffee.

"Hey Sarge." Matuszak looked for a place to sit.

"Sit there," pointing to the crate upon which the other man was sitting, "Bixby was just leaving. Right Curt?"

"Uh, right Sarge. Hey, Billy, good to see you man."

"Hey Curt." Then Matuszak sat down, fully expecting an ass chewing.

"So Billy, now you know one of war's great mysteries." Sgt Davis said.

"What's that Sarge? I don't understand." He was still braced for an ass chewing but it didn't sound like things were going that way.

"What it's like to kill someone at close range. Face to face so to speak."

"Well, he was back in the shadows when I fired..."

"But you went over to check on him, right?"

"Yeah, he was watching me. I watched the light go out in his eyes Sarge. It was...  I dunno, scary. Ya know what I mean?"

"Not really Billy, I've never killed anyone that close before. Sure there was one guy I think I hit, but Hell it could have been anyone who shot the guy. I was just firing in his direction."

"No kidding?"

"Yup, no kidding. Don't beat yourself up, believe me, that Kraut would have killed you, if you had given him the chance."

"I don't think so Sarge, he had a bunch of canteens with him. I think he was waiting for Ozzie to finish and leave, but when I saw him, I didn't know that, so I fired."

"Yup, you did what the Army trained you to do. That's all it is. You want to feel bad about killing that Kraut? Don't. Guys like Hitler and Mussolini killed that kid, they started the f**king war, not you. But we're here to finish it, you read me?"

"Loud and clear Sarge, loud and clear."

"Good, now go clean your rifle, bet you didn't do it last night, did you?"

"Uh, no, I guess I didn't..."

"Right then, go do it now. Hop to it!"

"Got ya Sarge!"

Though Matuszak still felt guilty for Ozzie Lederer's death, he didn't feel as bad about killing the German. I guess the chaplain was right, he thought, it's war. It's them or us. But I don't have to like it, not at all.

Tomorrow was another day. "Take it stride Billy boy, take it in stride." PFC Billy Matuszak said out loud. He made it through the rest of the day, busying himself with his rifle and his equipment. Perhaps all that had passed would make him a better soldier.

He sure hoped so.





¹ Official designation of the trailer/water tank combination used by the US Army in WWII.