Homeward Bound

Source

Jan Kołodziej groaned and gripped his belly as the train hit another rough section of track. He had been hit, tended to by a Sani then hauled back to an aid station in very short order. He had no idea how lucky he was. His lower intestine had been perforated by metal fragments from his equipment, driven into his body by a Soviet rifle bullet. Had he not been carrying the spare barrel for his squad's MG-34, he would probably have bled out on the battlefield.

The bullet, fired from very close range, had been deflected by the spare barrel, but it had driven metal fragments into his body. The surgeons at the field hospital had patched him up and sent him back to the Reich. The medical staff had given him no more than a 75% chance of surviving.

Infection had been their biggest worry, but so far, Kołodziej's body was successfully fighting to stay alive. But the surgery had required the surgeons to cut into his abdominal muscles and Kołodziej had had no idea how much a man used those muscles.

Just sitting up required assistance. Sleep was nearly impossible as the German military was in the midst of a shortage of medicines. Pain killers were in short supply, morphine was used only on those in such pain as they would scream all night.

Though Kołodziej wanted to scream, he forced himself to bear the pain. One of the orderlies had asked him why.

"If I scream, the army might leave me out here to die. By bearing the pain, I show them I'm a fighter, worth saving."

But the real reason was a letter he'd received, dated August of 1941, it had been from his Elżbieta. The woman he loved more than anything in this world.

The last time he had seen her was in Warsaw, he had been wearing the uniform of the hated Germans. She had recognized him and turned away in shame.

Now, she had written, since that day she had learned much. Poles were survivors, pretend to bend a knee to the conquerors but use the time to prepare to rise up and throw them out. Her own brother had been conscripted into the German Army. Upon that occasion her father had talked long into the night with her.

Elżbieta Chlebek's father had fought in the Austrian Army in the Great War, when their portion of Poland was ruled by the Hapsburgs. As he had put it, "Better to wear an Austrian uniform and fight the Russians, your Jan is doing the same. He is fighting the Russians as well. It's all we can do for now."

Kołodziej had been told that he was being sent back to a hospital in Poland. The Army hadn't decided which one, he was hoping for Warsaw, that's where his Elżbieta was working. She was a nurse there. If only ...

Oskar Olson stepped ashore. He wasn't familiar with this part of Norway, it was much farther north than his home. But the smell of the mountains, the hiss of waves on the shore of the fjord, and the very air itself spoke to him of home.

He had left the country a disoriented conscript. Swept up in the defeat of the Norwegian Army, trapped behind enemy lines with a hodgepodge of British, French, and Norwegian stragglers, he had made it to England where he'd joined the Commandos. Now he was home.

According to the briefing, there was only a small garrison of Germans in the region. They were not frontline troops, but reservists, sent to Norway to free up the more fit troops for the cauldron of the Eastern Front. Perhaps forty men, a platoon, but the Commandos had brought far fewer than that.

Their mission was terror, pure and simple. Slip ashore, kill as many Germans as they could, then leave the way they had arrived, small boats. Head back out to sea and meet up with the Royal Navy destroyer that had launched them.

Olson was an explosives expert now. His job was to booby trap anything which the Germans used. The goal was to have German soldiers dying long after the Commandos had left.

"We might be killing Norwegians as well, Oskar. Do you have a problem with that?"

The Scottish officer had taken him aside to ask that question, he was young, but a good man, he cared about his men.

"Leftenant, I'd rather not kill my own people, but if the Germans hold the country, many more Norwegians might die. We've heard stories of hostages being taken, and killed, for every misfortune the Germans suffer. It's hard to kill one's own, but if we kill more Germans, I can live with myself."

Lieutenant Seamus MacDonald nodded and clapped Olson on the back, "Keep that in your heart all the time laddie, the mission is to make the Germans uncomfortable. Maybe even draw more of them in. If they're occupying Norway, they can't be fighting in Russia or North Africa, might also draw down the forces they have occupying France and Italy. Places we might have a mind to take back one of these days."

Olson nodded as the Lieutenant had directed the men to start loading the boats. They'd be on Norwegian soil within the hour.

Olson watched as the rest of the men came ashore then hid the boats. The night was quiet and bitter cold. Sound would carry a long ways and he had no doubts that the Germans would be indoors next to their fires. Though there might be a sentry or two, they would probably be more concerned with staying warm than watching for attackers.

The first sentry had died under Olson's knife less than 15 minutes later.

Olson had spotted him, pacing back and forth along the town's single, small pier. The man had stopped to piss into the harbor, then moved back to the shelter of the small shed at the foot of the pier. Where he had fallen to Olson's knife.

Lieutenant MacDonald joined the small group shortly thereafter, "Sarn't Magnussen, put out a perimeter, Ollie, get those explosives planted. I want the pier to go up about four hours from now, everything else is a booby trap, someone touches it, they die. Along with everyone around them. Go."

They rendezvoused with their destroyer just before sunrise. In the distance they heard the explosives go off which would destroy the pier. That was meant to draw the Germans to the harbor where they would trip the booby traps Olson had left behind.

The Norwegians were back in the fight.

Preparing for the Return

Source

"Damn it, Gentile, you gotta get lower than that!"

Flavio Gentile grimaced, he didn't think he could get any lower, but damn it, he'd try. As he crawled, lower still, he could hear the zip and whiz of the machine gun rounds whipping by above his head.

The point of the training was two-fold, first it was to induce stress in the men, get them as used to being shot at without actually endangering them. Secondly, assess their agility and ability to function under fire. Again, without actually being under fire.

Some armies trained with live ammunition, he'd been told. Every hundredth round was live, so he'd been told. Recruits actually died in those armies during training, shot by their own during field exercises.

Just as he was reaching the end of the low crawl course, a nearby explosion made him freeze in place. Another recruit, not thinking, jumped up to get away from the blast.

"Cease fire! Cease fire! Goddammit, cease fire!" A number of the drill instructors were screaming at the machine gun team, who had tried to cease firing as soon as they'd seen the recruit jump up. Far too late for the recruit in question.

"Geez Stephen, what are we going to do when we meet the enemy, march around in formation and impress them with our snap?"

Hernandez chuckled, "From what I understand, Juan, it's meant to instill discipline in us and teach us to respond instantly to orders. Even the Germans and the Japanese march around in training, every army worth its salt does it."

The two men had survived the march back from the field problem, now they were drilling not far from the barracks. Left, right, left, platoon halt, platoon march, column left, column right, it was getting so that Hernandez could march in his sleep and stay in formation. It was becoming second nature to him.

"Hernandez! Your other left! Wake the f**k up, recruit!"

Well, almost second nature.

Oskar Olson, late of the Royal Norwegian Army, now a member of Number 5 Troop of Number 10 Commando, was a happy man. After all the screening and investigating of the British which followed after he'd escaped from Norway, they had actually found a Norwegian officer who could positively identify Olson and vouch for him.

The commando training was brutal. Upon arrival at the train station, somewhere in Scotland, Olson wasn't sure where, the recruits had been marched eleven kilometers to where they would begin their training.

It rained a lot and the training was intense. Calisthenics, field problems, learning to read maps and terrain, training on all sorts of weapons, it never seemed to stop. Officers and men trained together, side by side, the instructors treated them all the same, with no mercy.

"Mercy will get you killed you fat Norwegian bastard!" Olson recalled a sergeant screaming at him when he had stopped to help another recruit over a difficult obstacle. "Move, move, move, if the bastard can't keep up, we don't bloody want him in the commandos!"

They even used live ammunition in training exercises, move wrong, stop paying attention, and you could wind up very dead.

But Olson revelled in the training. He couldn't wait to get back to Norway and kill Germans.

Von Lüttwitz stirred, he had been sleeping very deeply, had been dreaming of home, when one of his men started shaking him.

"Wha .. what is it?"

"The Ivans, Sir, they're attacking. Major Hassel wants us in the line!"

Von Lüttwitz dressed, grabbed his gear, and got his wits about him. "Alright lads, don't panic, get your gear and fall out in the trench. Anyone seen Oberleutnant Busch?"

A head poked into the dugout, "Come on Jürgen, what are you waiting for, an engraved invitation from Stalin?" Busch looked exhausted. At least that answered the question of where the company commander was.

Von Lüttwitz gasped as he stepped out of the dugout, when the cold air hit his lungs it actually hurt. He tugged his muffler up over his face and breathed shallowly until the air around his nose and mouth warmed up.

Artillery explosions in the near distance made him realize, this was a serious Russian attack. Where had Ivan gotten the ammunition for this?

"Jürgen, take your boys to the left, set up your machine guns to sweep the ground in front of the burned out T-34. Let's go!"

The 5th company commander was already moving. Von Lüttwitz had his men moving as well. Why did the bastards always attack in the dead of night when it was so damned cold?

The Sting of Winter

Source

"Take him over there!"

The Sanitäter was fairly confident that the wounded soldier would be okay. Though his lower torso was badly torn up, mostly from fragments from the spare barrel container the bullet had hit before going into him, he was certain he'd gotten all the metal fragments out. The bullet had gone completely through the man. He'd patched him up as best as he could, but he needed to get back to a field hospital.

As they started to move the man onto a stretcher, the Sani heard the man groan, "Kurwa, to boli.¹"

"You're Polish?"

One of the stretcher bearers groused at the Sani, "So are we going to stand out in the cold while you two chit-chat?"

The wounded man looked up at the man who had probably saved his life, "Silesian actually. We're an odd bunch of Poles and Germans all intermixed. Name before the Great War was Stellmacher ..."

The Sani chuckled, "Which in Polish is Kołodziej. You lived in Polish occupied Silesia then?"

"Ja, had to learn Polish and German at school," then Kołodziej gripped his side and groaned.

"Yes, that's going to hurt until a surgeon cleans up the wound. Your war might be over."

Nodding to the stretcher bearers, the Sani moved on to the next man.

Mládshiy serzhánt³ Ustin Rodionovich Kazankov wiped his runny nose on the back of his sleeve. His greatcoat was so filthy he doubted anyone would notice. He cocked an eyebrow when two of his three men re-joined the squad.

"Where's Kusma Zakharovich?"

One of the Ukrainians, Efréĭtor Petrenko shook his head. "Poor f**ker took out a German machine gun and its two crewmen, then some more Fascists came up and shot him before he could get away."

"Beriya's dead?" Kazankov was shaken. Beriya had been with him in Finland, now he's dead?

"Damn it, I told you to be f**king careful, Nazar Danylovych!"

"We were, but the Fascists came up very quickly, usually they go to ground and assess the situation before moving. Whoever was leading the other side is either very quick on his feet or very lucky."

Krasnoarmeyets Kyrylo Ihorovych Antonyuk spoke up, "I'd rather be lucky than good."

"Idi na khuy⁴, Antonyuk." Kazankov snapped. Beriya's death hurt.

Leutnant Jürgen von Lüttwitz watched his men closely as they pulled back from the front line. The battalion was going into reserve, division command was trying hard to give the men time off the line, but casualties were high so the respite would be brief.

The men looked bedraggled and exhausted. Winter in Russia will do that, he thought. Most of their casualties were upper respiratory problems and frostbite.

He heard footsteps in the snow behind him, turning he saw his company commander, Oberleutnant Ferdinand Busch.

"How are the boys doing, Jürgen?"

"They're tired, Sir, but game. A few days rest, some hot food, and maybe some fresh clothing and dann will alles in Butter⁵."

Busch chuckled, "That's something my old grandmother liked to say."

Von Lüttwitz smiled, "Mine as well."

¹ F**k,that hurts. (Polish)

² Stellmacher is the German word for "wheelwright," kołodziej in Polish.

³ Junior Sergeant (Russian)

⁴ Go f**k yourself, Antonyuk. (Иди на хуй - Russian)

⁵ German equivalent of "right as rain" - Then everything will be fine.

A New Year

Source

"Hey Gentile! Get your ass over here!"

Flavio Gentile shook his head, why did they insist on pronouncing his name wrong? But here was neither the place nor the time to correct the big sergeant who seemed to delight in tormenting the Italian kid from Philadelphia. Gentile jogged over to the sergeant.

"Yes, Sergeant?" He knew better than to call the man "Sarge," that drove him nuts.

"Yeah, the shitters over in 1st Platoon need cleaning, you go handle that."

"Uh, I'm in 3rd Platoon, can't 1st clean their own shitters? Sergeant?"

Staff Sergeant Vince Magnussen bristled, "Look Gentile, I say jump, you ask how high. I know which f**king platoon you're in. I owe Nelson over in 1st a favor, you're the favor. Now get your ass over there."

"Yes, Sergeant."

Gentile wanted nothing more in the world than to knock Magnussen's block off, but he had no desire to spend time in the stockade either. So for now, he'd tolerate the man. After all, like his buddy Marchetti said, "Training'll be over in a few weeks, why piss anybody off? Save it for the Krauts and the Japs, whichever way we wind up going."

Marchetti was right, Gentile wished that Magnussen was one of those guys who liked to take his trainees out behind the barracks for a little extra training. Shed the stripes, all that man to man stuff, but Magnussen was a coward, he hid behind his stripes.

Every muscle in Stephen Hernandez's body was aching. He was used to hard work but the twenty mile forced march with full gear was much harder than he had expected. Along with the other members of his training platoon he was down on one knee, wheezing like an old man.

"Come on ladies, back on your feet. We need to set up a bivouac."

The men looked at each other, a bivouac, they'd been expecting trucks to take them back to camp.

"Sarge?"

"You do know what a bivouac is, Anderson."

"Uh, yessir, but aren't we going to ..."

"Thinking again, Anderson? What did I tell you about thinking Private Anderson?"

"Uh, I'm not good at it, Sarge?"

"Zackly, now get your shit together. Pitch your shelter halves, get digging a latrine trench, and get set up for the night. This is a field exercise, we march out, do some training in patrolling and such, sleep a couple hours, then march back to camp. Questions?"

Groans went up from the men, but they got to work.

"This is some shit, huh hermano?"

Hernandez turned and grinned at his "battle buddy" Juan Vaca. "Yup, classic Army shit, vato."

Hernandez wondered how his family would react to all of the Mexican slang he was learning and using. There were a quite a few Spanish speakers in the Army, but very few Spaniards. When in Rome ...

The Sanitäter rolled Kołodziej over onto his back, "Easy Jan, it doesn't look too bad, might even be a Heimatschuß¹."

Jan Kołodziej grimaced, no doubt the Sani thought he was being kind, thinking that Kołodziej was German rather than a Pole conscripted into the German Army. But at the moment he didn't really care. They'd never seen the Russian who had spotted them. Guy was a good shot, his first round had killed Paulus outright, his second had gone through Kołodziej's left side, having been deflected by the spare barrel he carried for the machine gun.

Anything to get him away from the vicious fighting against the Soviets would do. With luck, maybe he'd go to the big hospital in Warsaw. At least he'd be back in Poland. But it was a hell of a way to welcome in a new year.

¹ A wound which gets you sent home. Bad enough to require medical care not available at the front.

The Past

Niedersachsenhaus
Baujahr 1779¹
(Source)

Sauer and Schwertfeger found Ziegler, stuffing his face with food the other companies had brought up. Both men stopped and looked on with amused grins.

"Diese Jugendlichen,² I swear Manfred, they can eat their own weight in a day." Schwertfeger said, looking at Sauer.

Ziegler had stopped eating long enough to swallow and reply, "What? I was hungry."

"Do you have siblings, Oskar?" Sauer asked, he did not. Though his father and mother both came from large families, he had many cousins, he had no siblings of his own.

"Two brothers, three sisters, how about you Horst?" Schwertfeger snatched a heel of army bread from Ziegler as he asked that.

"Three brothers, one sister, all younger than me."

"Sauer, have you no siblings?" Ziegler asked.

"None."

The men settled in for the night, though it was snowing on and off, the temperature had risen some. Not quite above freezing, but enough so that they were relatively comfortable. Sauer had moved off on his own, closer to the Soviet lines. He had told the others that he would take the first watch.

In reality the talk of family had depressed him more than he cared to think about.

Manfred Sauer was born in July of 1918. His father and his mother had managed to produce their sole offspring when Sauer the Elder was home on leave from the Saxon Army. Young Manfred grew up with his father's father, Wolfgang Sauer, and his mother, Hilda.

He had no siblings as his father had gone missing in action before Manfred had been born. His mother had never remarried, though she had many suitors. Which would cause problems for the family in later years.

Manfred's childhood was one of hard work and study. His father had wanted to go to university as a young man, his grandfather had told him that as soon as they could find someone to work the farm with them, then young Oswald could go off to school.

"Maybe then we can move to town and not raise pigs anymore! Live the soft life in the city!" old Wolfgang had said.

But the war had come along and ended all such dreams.

Though Manfred spent much of his day tending to the pigs with his grandfather, his mother had insisted he hit the books at night. The boy became a voracious reader.

Then in 1933, the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, the Nazis, had come to power and things went to hell, as Manfred remembered.

He had been almost 15 years of age at the time. Though he considered himself well educated, he had had very little formal schooling. He kept to himself, worked the farm with his grandfather and mother and read at night. History and philosophy were his favorites.

When the "New Order" had started to assert its power in Saxony, one local family, the Gottschalls, had risen to power in local politics, one of the sons, Wolf Gottschall, became Kreisleiter³.

Gottschall was single, his wife had died of influenza in 1919, and he was well known for being something of a womanizer. One thing he was also known for was being a coward. Somehow he had managed to stay out of the army during World War I. His family had always had connections, now those connections went all the way to Berlin.

The Sauer farm was very prosperous by 1936. Old Wolfgang had the means to hire men to work the farm, now he mostly managed the business side of things. He had help from his daughter-in-law who had a good eye for figures. She often lamented Manfred's lack of interest in mathematics.

The Kreisleiter had suggested to the Sauer's that it would be in their best interests to make certain payments to the Gottschall family in order to make things run "smoother."

Old Wolfgang had been incensed, "The bastards want our money without having to earn it!" he had said to Hilda.

"Opa, we can afford it, why make trouble?"

"Because they won't be content with this, it seems reasonable now, doesn't it? But it won't stop there, will it?"

"But Wolf told me that he can keep Manfred out of the army as well. He has connections."

"Mutti, I don't mind going into the Reichsarbeitsdienst,⁴ I'll meet other boys my age, maybe travel ..." Manfred had protested.

"And maybe go off to war and never come home once Hitler gets his war!" old Wolfgang said as he stormed from the room. "I swear boy, you are as stubborn as our pigs!"

Manfred had noticed that his mother's eyes were very wet, that was when he understood. He kept quiet and did as his grandfather and mother wished.

War had broken out in 1939, while other men his age were in the Wehrmacht, fighting and dying in Poland, Manfred was still raising pigs. He was now running the farm but things were getting tougher as many of their laborers were now in the military. The farm's profits were getting smaller.

And of course, the Gottschall's demands for payments had increased, as old Wolfgang had predicted. Which the Sauers were still managing to pay, somehow.

After the war with France, Hitler sought to deal with the Soviet Union which, of course, required a further expansion of the German armed forces, which Manfred had been exempt from, thanks to the manipulations of the Kreisleiter's family.

The day had come when old Wolfgang had decided that enough was enough and he had reported the Gottschalls to the police for "war profiteering." That had backfired however.

The payments to the Gottschalls were ended, as Wolf Gottschall was sent to prison and his family no longer held the office of Kreisleiter. Which was good, it was also bad as not long after Wolf Gottschall was hauled off by the Kripo, Manfred's draft notice had arrived in the post.

So at the age of 22, Manfred Sauer became a soldier. While the farm was still in business, the Wehrmacht consumed a lot of pork, Manfred was sitting in a hole near Leningrad, watching the horizon as it was lit by artillery.

Sauer heard footsteps behind him, he turned, it was Schwertfeger and Ziegler.

"Manfred, ready to go back and get some sleep?" Schwertfeger murmured.

"Ja, it's quiet out there, I think the Ivans are licking their wounds. They're getting pounded by artillery as well. I almost pity them. Why did you bring Ziegler?" Sauer whispered.

"Boy's gotta learn sometime, yes?"

Sauer nodded then slid out of the hole and made his way back to the lines. He realized then, that if the Russians had been active this night, he'd probably be dead by now. Daydreaming about the past wasn't a good idea while on sentry duty.

Thinking about the past at all was a bad idea.

"Live in the moment, in war it's the only safe thing." Sauer thought.

As he went to sleep, he saw his mother's face as he had boarded the train taking him away to the army. It startled him that he couldn't clearly picture her face any more.

His dreams were very troubled that night.

¹ Low Saxony House, built in 1779, (Photo taken in 1895)

² These young people

³ A Kreis in Germany is roughly equivalent to a county, a Kreisleiter was a district leader, responsible for running one of these counties.

⁴ Reich Labor Service, 18 years old boys were conscripted into this at 18, then went into the Army at 19 for a two year period. (Prewar, of course.)

Night

(Source)

Jäger was restless, the sun had gone down at least an hour ago. The snow had stopped and the moon was appearing fitfully between the scudding clouds. Visibility was very good, which was very bad for them. Anything moving across that snowy landscape would stand out like a sore thumb, white camouflage or no.

"Oberfeldwebel Kroemer," he whispered to his sleeping platoon sergeant, nudging him with the toe of his boot at the same time.

"Huh, what ..." Kroemer snapped awake, momentarily disoriented.

Kroemer crawled closer to his lieutenant, something was off. Then he realized what it was, the firing to their south had died down to a few desultory rifle shots and the occasional burst of machine gun fire into no-man's-land. Kroemer realized that he could actually see the tracers in the air.

"Things have changed, Herr Oberleutnant. Do we wait until later, if we go now ..."

"Ja, going now seems like a bad idea."

It was getting closer to midnight and the men were starting to wonder what was going on. Although it wasn't as cold as the past few days had been, it was still below freezing. Sitting still in a frozen trench wasn't conducive to good morale. Jäger was aware of that and had been around to the positions to let the squad leaders know what was going on.

Upon his return to where the platoon CP¹ was set up (really just a wider section of trench) he noticed that one of the runners² was keeping an eye on the terrain between them and the German lines. That man saw something, or thought he saw something.

"Herr Oberfeldwebel, there's someone, or something out there. I saw movement. There, by that low ridge."

Kroemer looked in the direction Schütze Karl-Heinz Berger had indicated. Not much to be seen with the naked eye. He pulled out his field glasses. Yes, there was someone out there!

"Good eyes, Karl-Heinz."

Noticing that the lieutenant had returned, he reported, "Herr Oberleutnant, there's a man working his way in our direction. It's hard to see him clearly but I caught a glimpse of a helmet."

Jäger glassed the area, just in time to see a man rise up out of the ground and work his way to a pile of junk near one of the abandoned shacks. "He's one of ours, or a Russian wearing one of our helmets. I'd bet my life it's a messenger from company, maybe even battalion."

Kroemer passed the word down the line for the men to hold their fire, a single man posed no threat. But he had one of the machine gun teams track the man all the way in.

Gefreiter Wolfgang Brandt was still shaking, he had thought he was close to where the 3rd platoon was supposed to be, but when Kroemer had seemingly risen up from the earth, MP 40 leveled at Brandt's midsection, he had nearly died of fright. Two men had quickly pulled him down into the trench when they had recognized him.

"Jesus, Wolf. You look like you've seen a ghost." Sauer had managed to find his way to the platoon CP when word had reached him what was going on. As he and Schwertfeger were providing security nearby, it wasn't far. Jäger had given him an annoyed look, but had said nothing.

Brandt shook his head, "I thought you guys were further south, when Kroemer came up out of nowhere he scared the shit out of me."

The two men looked over to where Jäger was conferring with his squad leaders. Sauer had a feeling they were going to be out here a bit longer than the plan had called for.

Portion of Oberleutnant Jäger's map
The blue line to the left is old German line, the red is the Soviet line, the blue line to the
right is the proposed new German line. "X" marks 3rd Platoon's position.

"So you see where I've marked it on the map, this slight bulge, battalion wants us to hold here, the remainder of the company will be moving up shortly to join us."

"Uh, what about the Ivans, Sir?" 1st Squad's Feldwebel Brückner wanted to know. The other squad leaders all nodded.

"According to Brandt, the Russians who were attacking  to our south fell back in some disorder. 6th Company is already moving out to take the trench lines which the Reds abandoned. 4th Company will be moving up to our north. It moves Ivan back a ways. Apparently they lost heavily in their attack. Regiment actually managed to bring an Acht-acht³ into the line, the Ivans weren't expecting that. Supposedly that one gun destroyed seventeen T-34s."

"Won't this little salient near our position attract some unwanted attention from Ivan?" Kroemer asked.

"Which is why the rest of 5th Company is moving up to reinforce this section of the line." Jäger told the group. "We need to let the men know that we've got friendly company coming up and to hold their fire if they see something to our rear."

"Brandt!"

"Sir?"

"You can head back now, let Oberleutnant Busch know that we're expecting him."

"Jawohl, Herr Oberleutnant! Oh, before I forget, the password is Balken, the countersign is Kreuz⁴."

As Brandt scrambled out of the trench, the snow was starting up again. Jäger commented, "Excellent, at least the battalion won't be moving up in the moonlight."

The he turned to where he had seen Sauer and Schwertfeger eavesdropping, "Schütze Sauer, a word."

"Heh, you're in trouble Manfred." Schwertfeger muttered.

"Halt die Klappe, go babysit Ziegler or something." Sauer countered as he moved to join the lieutenant, who had moved a short distance away from the CP.

"Sir?"

"I've been watching you Sauer, how long have you been in the army?"

Sauer thought for a moment, "Since May of last year."

That answer surprised Jäger, "Really, you seem old for a new recruit."

"Older than most, yes. It's a long story, Sir. I'd rather not get into it." Sauer looked off into the distance.

"It involves the Party, doesn't it?"

"I really can't say, Sir."

"I see. You are a very good soldier, Sauer. I would like to see you promoted and ..."

"With all due respect, Herr Oberleutnant, I've already turned down a promotion, the Iron Cross as well. There are reasons, but ..."

"You don't want the responsibility, is that it?"

"No Sir, well, yes. My goal is to survive, I know I can't do that alone. I just want to be part of this platoon. We have some good men, if I can help them stay alive ..."

"Your chance of surviving increases, yes?"

"I hope so. I just want to go home to my farm."

Jäger abruptly changed the subject, "How is Ziegler doing. You and Schwertfeger seemed to have taken an interest in him. Is he a mascot of some kind, being so young?"

"No Sir, absolutely not. Ziegler is a good kid, very bright. If we can keep him alive, he might make a good officer."

"What would you know about good officers, Schütze?" Jäger's voice took on a colder, more formal form.

"I have two very good examples here in the battalion, Sir. Oberleutnant Busch and Major Hassel. They give me hope that we might get out of this alive."

"You have no interest in defeating Communism?" Jäger asked, pressing Sauer.

"Not really, Sir. If defeating the Reds gets me home, yes. If not?" Sauer waved a hand in dismissal, seemingly of all politics.

Jäger grinned. "Thank you for being honest with me, Sauer. Let's keep an eye on each other and all of our platoon, Ja?"

Sauer returned the grin, Jäger seemed like a decent sort. "Aber natürlich, Herr Oberleutnant."

They were interrupted by Oberfeldwebel Kroemer, "2nd Platoon coming in, Sir. 1st has already tied in on our left."

"Danke, Oberfeldwebel, see to the MG teams placement. When the Russians wake up to what has happened, they may crash this little party." Jäger got up to speak with his counterparts in the other two platoons. He could see them both waiting at his CP.

"Oh, Sauer, you may return to your squad. And thank you again."

Sauer simply nodded before joining Schwertfeger, who had been waiting not too far away. From the look on Schwertfeger's face, he knew he'd be taking crap for spending time chatting with the platoon commander.

He wasn't disappointed.

¹ Command post

² Each platoon was assigned three Melder, these men were used as runners to carry messages for the platoon commander.

³ Literally "eight-eight" in German, which is what German troops called the 8.8 cm Flak gun which excelled in both antiaircraft and antitank roles in WWII. (There ya go Beans, it was an 88!)

⁴ The pronunciation of "Balken" is similar in Russian and German, though the Russians tend to draw out the "l" and the "k," in German it's more abrupt. "Kreuz" however is very different between the two languages. In Russian it sounds like "cruise" in German it is  roughly "Kroyts" the finial "z" sounding like "ts" as in "its." Also a German would think of the insignia painted on most German vehicles, including aircraft, the "Balkenkreuz."

The Tank

(Source)

"Chto vy zdes' delayete, muzhchiny?¹" Mládshiy serzhánt Petr Semyonovich Shulga thought it odd to see infantry coming from that direction. He had supposed that there was no one left in that section of trench save for a couple of listening posts. This appeared to be an entire platoon.

The man in the lead looked up and said "Privet, tovarishch. Kak vy?²"

Shulga's last thought was, "Something isn't right here."

Sauer opened up on the man sitting atop the T-34, the rounds from his PPSh-41 sweeping the man from the tank. The rest of the squad scrambled out of the trench to go around the vehicle to attack the crew, which they figured had to be on the side opposite to them.

Two screams, a fusillade of rifle shots and it was over.

Jäger came up quickly to assess things, "How many men in a T-34 crew?" He turned to look at Sauer, who clearly didn't know.

Unterfeldwebel Groß spoke up, "Four. Commander, loader, bow machine gunner, and the driver. Looks like we got them all."

Jäger looked in the direction of the fighting. The snow was easing up and visibility was improving. He noticed that his hands were shaking, badly.

He started when Oberfeldwebel Kroemer touched his arm. "We can't stay here, Sir." Jäger turned to look at his platoon sergeant, then he heard something. Tank engines, to their rear.

"More Russian Panzers?"

"Afraid so, Herr Oberleutnant."

Schwertfeger looked at Sauer, "I think we're f**ked. Sounds like more Ivans are on their way to the party."

Sauer nodded, "Yes. By the way, where did you learn to speak Russian?"

Schwertfeger grinned, "I don't, not really. I picked up enough working on the docks unloading Russian ships before the war. The crews on those ships love to trade for things. They don't have shit to offer, other than vodka, but occasionally you'll find a guy with an icon to sell. Sometimes furs."

"Icon?" Sauer asked.

"It's a religious picture." Schwertfeger answered.

"They can be very valuable," Ziegler spoke up. "Some of them are very old."

Groß came running up, "If this university class is over, we need to be moving. More Russian Panzers are moving up."

Kroemer had gone inside the tank, looking for any useful intelligence. He grabbed some papers, not being able to read Russian he wasn't sure if they meant anything, but someone at battalion could figure that out.

As he looked around the turret, an idea struck him. Quickly he scrambled up and out of the vehicle.

"Herr Oberleutnant!" he called to his officer.

"What is it Kroemer? We need to get moving. Those Soviet Panzers will be here in just a few minutes." Jäger was close to panic, but Kroemer didn't notice.

"Why don't we use the Panzer? The gun doesn't look much different from a rifle, well, except that it's single shot. It has a breech, you just push the shell in and point the turret. We could ..."

Feldwebel Hans Brückner, leader of 1st Squad looked at Kroemer for a moment, then spoke, "No disrespect Herr Oberfeldwebel, but do we have anyone who knows how to work the gun, and the turret? Not to mention, there are at least ten Russian Panzers coming this way."

Jäger spoke up, "Let's not be hasty, Brückner, after all we'd have surprise on our side. The Russians wouldn't expect to be fired on by one of their own."

Before he could continue, Sauer and Schwertfeger ran past, they were headed back to their initial entry point into the Russian trench system. As they went past Sauer shouted out, "At least fifteen T-34s and at least a battalion of infantry are coming this way. If you want to die, this is a good place to do it."

Before anyone could respond, Jäger ordered the men to follow Sauer. There was no time to play with the T-34. "Kroemer, give me your grenades."

"Sir?"

"Now, damn it!"

Brückner saw what Jäger had in mind, "I'll take care of the T-34, you get the platoon to safety." Jäger hesitated for just an instant, then handed his grenades to Brückner.

"Be quick about it." Then he was gone with the rest of the platoon.

Brückner scrambled up onto the tank, he thought for a moment about going into the turret. He could place the grenades next to the ammunition rack, but he was not suicidal. He quickly unscrewed the caps on all five grenades and let the beads fall free of the handles.³ Taking a deep breath, he pulled hard on the beads, dumped the grenades into the tank, then slid down to the ground.

He hit the ground running, he heard four thumps, very close together, from inside the tank, then a fifth as the grenades all went off. Not quite together, but close enough. As he ran, he heard a voice cry out, "STOY!⁴" Followed by a fusillade of shots, none of which were close.

As he ran down the trench line, he heard footsteps behind him, then a German voice screamed, "Get down!"

He hit the floor of the trench hard, winding himself. He heard the sound of an MG 34 firing, with attendant screams from behind him as the gun hit several of his pursuers. He was desperately trying to regain his breath when he felt hands grabbing his shoulder straps and load bearing gear.

"Jesus, you need to lose some weight, Herr Feldwebel," he recognized Schwertfeger's voice as the big man pulled him upright and began half-carrying, half-dragging him down the trench.

As they passed 3rd Squad's MG team, Schwertfeger yelled at them, "Let's get the f**k out of here!"

Groß had his MG team, Dietrich and Lang, move up to where the Russians had been stopped cold. There were only five bodies, he'd expected more. Maybe one or two got away? But he figured that the Russian officers would be focused on attacking to their front, not with the presence of German stragglers to their right rear.

"Set up here, ah gut, you brought the spare ammo, Ziegler. Sauer, Schwertfeger, move up towards that small copse of trees." He gestured to his right front.

Sauer and Schwertfeger moved off without a word. Ziegler started to follow.

"Stay here, lad. Just two men are needed to take a peek at the Ivans. They'll be back shortly. As indeed they were.

Groß began to ask for their report when Oberleutnant Jäger spoke from behind him, "Report."

Sauer spoke, "The Ivans are getting their asses kicked, I saw at least six burning T-34s. I bet they'll hold their ground as long as it's daylight, then fall back after dark."

"Why not now, Schütze Sauer?"

"They've gone to ground, a Russian with an entrenching tool can dig himself in like a burrowing badger. If they move in daylight, they'll be exposed."

Jäger nodded, "Makes sense."

"So Herr Oberleutnant, do you know how to use one of these?" he asked as he handed Jäger a weapon.

Jäger looked at it for a moment, then looked at Sauer, "PPD-40, where'd you get it?"

"Let's just say that one of the Ivans brought down by Dietrich and Lang doesn't need it anymore. It's a box magazine, I think the guy was an officer. Take these as well, spare magazines." Sauer pulled a bag from his shoulder and handed it to the lieutenant.

"Thanks. I'll ..."

"Keep yourself alive, Herr Oberleutnant, waving that pistol around makes you a target, and it's useless unless Ivan is close enough to dance with, and he won't be carrying a pistol. Unless he's an idiot."

Jäger's face turned beet red, then he looked down at the snow on the bottom of the trench. "I'll try and live up to your expectations, Sauer."

Schwertfeger chuckled, "You'll be fine Sir, Sauer's expectations of everyone are pretty low."

Jäger flushed again, "Does some Berlin nightclub know that their comedians are missing?"

Sauer guffawed, "You're all right, Sir. You're all right. But what do we do now? We're kind of out on a limb here."

Kroemer spoke up, "Dig in, wait for nightfall ourselves, then head back to our own lines?"

Jäger thought for a moment, "For now that sounds good, get the men positioned for all-round defense. If Ivan sends Panzers we're screwed, but I think they're busy trying to break through our lines. Squad leaders to me, Kroemer, get the men set-up."

"Jawohl, Herr Oberleutnant."

As Sauer and Schwertfeger rejoined their squad, Schwertfeger hissed at Sauer, so that no one could overhear, "Jäger's not a complete ass after all."

Sauer shook his head, "We've got a long way to go before sundown. Ask me what I think of him when we get back to our lines."

Schwertfeger grinned and said, "You said 'when,' not 'if.' You're becoming an optimist Manfred."

¹ What are you men doing here? (Что вы здесь делаете, мужчины?)

² Hello, Comrade. How are you? (Привет, товарищ. Как вы?)

³ Watch this video for details on the German stick grenade.

⁴ Russian for "Stop!" (Стой!)