Operation David

(Source)

"Come on McLaren, ye move like my old Gran!" Lance Corporal Billy Wallace was getting tired of Private Robert McLaren's lagging behind the rest of the squad. Sgt. Greaves grinned, not six months ago it would have been Wallace getting yelled at.

The men were loading up to move into Belgium, the Germans had crossed into that small country that very morning. The word was that the Belgians were not holding the line and were falling back in the face of attacks by artillery, tanks, aircraft, and infantry. The key fort of Eben-Emael had fallen and the Germans were heading for Brussels.

The British Expeditionary Force was adhering to the plan devised by the French High Command to meet the German advance deep inside of Belgium. Officially it was meant to help the Belgians, in reality the French did not want another war on the soil of France.

As the trucks began to move Private Horace Webb asked, "Sar'nt Greaves, think we'll get a spot of leave to see Brussels?"

Before Greaves could answer Billy piped up, "Are ye bloody daft, Webb? D'ye think we're going on holiday? We're off to fight the bloody Huns!"

"Lance Corporal Wallace is correct, we're going to be near Brussels but we won't have a chance to visit the city. By this time tomorrow we'll be knee deep in Germans I should think." Greaves gave Billy a look, they were all nervous. He'd have a chat with the lad later on, once they were settled into their new positions near the town of Wavre.

Caporal Guillaume Micheaux and his squad were part of a long column of French infantry marching into Belgium. The day was overly warm and the road was dusty, the air seemed to be only slightly less thick than the ground they marched upon.

Guillaume realized that he was heading into battle much the same way as the armies of Napoléon had, on foot. In fact, had his father been alive, he would have seen very little difference from his days in the Great War. Other than the occasional motor vehicle that is.

Guillaume had heard that the British were fully motorized, the Germans less so but more than his own army (a rumor which was most assuredly not true). He was nervous, the things they had heard about the German attacks in Poland and Norway, and now in the Low Countries, made him picture swarms of aircraft and tanks moving towards them as they headed deeper into Belgium.

Fortunately they didn't have far to go, they were more or less the hinge upon which the left flank of the Allied armies swung into Belgium. On their right were the forested hills of the Ardennes, to the left was the bulk of the mobile forces.

For some reason Guillaume was nervous about the Ardennes. He had heard the officers discussing the inability of the Germans to move through there with their motorized units. He wasn't so sure, he had visited the Ardennes before the war. Once you got past the forests along the border with Germany, it was pretty open with a good road network.

But no doubt the officers knew more about it than he did. Or so he hoped.

Jürgen von Lüttwitz, had he known him, no doubt would have sympathized with Caporal Micheaux. His unit was also marching into Belgium on foot. After the bloodless success at the border, the men were in a good mood. As they marched they did as German infantry had done for centuries, they sang.

Jürgen sang along as well, it helped ease the monotony of the march. It was such a beautiful day that he found it hard to believe that a war was taking place. But in the distance he could hear the rumble of artillery.

"Herr Unteroffizier, do you think the Belgians will surrender?" Schütze Bodo Hermann asked. So far all this man had seen of war was the Belgians fleeing from his unit and the prisoners captured by the Fallschirmjäger at the fort on the border. He had heard shots fired in anger, but outgoing, not incoming.

"I don't know Bodo, but if they do, I'll let you know. I would think that they would need to stand and fight first before they surrender." Jürgen was still unsure of himself with these men, most of whom were older than him by at least five years.

The 223rd had been formed from reservists recalled to the colors just before the invasion of Poland. The General Staff were rapidly expanding the army, knowing that Hitler had planned on attacking France as soon as he could settle things in the east. They were going to need as many infantry divisions as they could field. Not all of the generals placed their faith in the new Panzer and motorized units.

The youngest soldier, other than himself, was Gefreiter Johannes Grüner, who was twenty-seven. The oldest, at thirty-two, was Schütze Michael Offenbach. All of these men had seen some service in the mid-30s, but that was six years and more ago. While they readily obeyed him, Jürgen still felt they didn't completely trust his leadership.

Their actual squad leader was still leading the platoon, for now the squad was Jürgen's. He didn't want to let the men down. As he marched he thought long and hard about his squad, he had some very good men. The marches were hardening them, even the somewhat portly Christoph Groß had shed a few pounds, his tunic was much looser than it had been back in late April when Jürgen had joined the unit.

A few more days and the men might be ready for combat, real combat against an enemy who fought back.

Fairey Fox of the Belgian Air Force

Pierre Schoukens, flying his obsolescent British built Fairey Fox biplane, had gone up on patrol with his flight lead not 30 minutes ago. They had been jumped by a flight of German aircraft over Liège, in the twisting turning fight which had followed he had become separated from his lead.

He knew he was lost, but he kept his head and looked for a familiar landmark below. He was a bit high, so he chopped the throttle and let his aircraft drop. Had he given it even a moment's thought, he would have kept his speed up. He had forgotten the old saw, "speed is life!"

He saw a road below, then a crossroads with a few houses that he recognized. "Ah ha! The airfield is just north of here!" He shouted above the roar of the engine. As he began to bank the aircraft he saw something on the other road leading to the crossroads. Troops! A long column of them. They had to be German.

He prepared himself, he would strafe these Boche bastards then go home to tell his flight lead how bad he felt for getting separated from him. Perhaps killing some Germans would be penance enough.

Jürgen had seen the aircraft and had assumed it was one of the little Fieslers¹ that some generals used for surveying the lines. It was high winged and had fixed landing gear, much like the aircraft that was even now turning in their direction.

Then, as the plane got lower, he noticed that it had a lower wing as well, it was a biplane. He had seen the little Heinkel 51s before the war, but he was sure that they were no longer in service. Then he saw lights winking on the aircraft's nose, immediately he screamed, "TAKE COVER!"

Pierre was grinning from ear to ear as the rounds from his twin machine guns walked right up the road, causing the Germans to scatter. Some collapsed where they had been marching, cut down by Pierre's guns.

He wished he had brought his observer along, but the order had been to leave them behind. More weight meant less time over the front, so his back-seater, Bruno Pascal, had stayed at the field. Having him now would have been excellent, he could have killed Germans while he was coming and going!

He pulled the nose up and decided to make another pass. Gaining altitude he saw something sparkle in the corner of his eye, tracers?

Before he could form another thought he was punched hard in his lower back. He momentarily lost control of the aircraft as the pain hit him. The controls felt sluggish as he re-gained his grip on the control stick. Looking down, he wondered what the slippery mass in his lap was.

The small biplane slammed into the ground and exploded before Sous-Lieutenant Pierre Schoukens could realize that he had been disemboweled.

Some of the men cheered when the Messerschmidt Bf-109 fighter had come out of nowhere to swat the small Belgian fighter from the sky. Jürgen had no time for that.

He was cradling the head of one of his men, one of the older men, Kurt Hecher. Schütze Hecher had been hit in the lower abdomen and was bleeding faster than the Sani could patch him up.

Jürgen felt the man grip his hand and say, "Uffz², am I dying?"

Jürgen looked at the Sani, Willi Baumann, who shook his head.

"No Kurt, you'll be fine. Just rest a bit, Klar?"

"Ja, I feel sleepy, can I sleep now Uffz?"

Before Jürgen could answer the man, the grip on his hand had loosened, Kurt's jaw had gone slack and his eyes had lost their focus.

Kurt Becher was not the first man Jürgen had lost, and he wouldn't be the last. But it didn't hurt any less.

"Sani, thanks for trying. Wolf! Karl! Come here and help me get Kurt out of the road!"

Just outside of Wavre, which 2nd Lieutenant Miles-Roberts had told them was the site of a battle during the Waterloo campaign, Billy Wallace's unit was digging in. The Germans were rumored to be on their way. A number of reconnaissance flights had been seen throughout the day, checking them out.

"Bloody Hell, Sar'nt Greaves, where's the bloody RAF?" Billy wanted to know.

"They're out there Billy, they're probably covering the advance into Belgium. Ya know what the Leftenant told me today?"

"Nah, what's that Sar'nt?"

"This operation actually has a name, makes it all official, right? This move into Belgium is called Operation David. I wonder why they picked that name."

Billy looked at his sergeant, then tipped his helmet back, "Too bloody obvious, innit?"

Greaves looked puzzled for a moment, then a look came over his face, "Bloody Hell. David and Goliath."

"Ye can bet we're not bloody Goliath either." Billy said, then spat into the dirt.

"David won though, don't forget that."

"I'll try not to, but I don't see any bloody slingshots around either, just us and our .303s. Which, I might add, won't stop a bloody tank!"

Greaves looked thoughtful, "They wouldn't just throw us away would they?"

"Why not? You remember the bleedin' Somme? My Da' was there, a right bloody cock-up if there ever was."

Greaves shivered and said, "Billy Wallace, you think too bloody much."

¹ Fieseler Fi 156 Storch (Stork)

² Uffz, short for Unteroffizier