Robert Conroy - Red Inferno

Truman seemed mollified. “You are right, of course. I just don’t want another Pearl Harbor.”

Nor did Marshall. He still churned inside whenever he thought of the time lost in warning the Pacific Fleet a little less than four years ago.

“Then what are their real intentions?” Truman asked the room, dismay evident on his face. “Do they really want war with us?” He stared at Burke. “You’re the one who got the message, and Marshall seems to be impressed with you. What are your thoughts, Colonel?

Burke was having difficulty breathing. The atmosphere had just gotten rarefied. “Presuming the warning is true, sir, an attack will be their version of a shot across the bow, a potentially very bloody and stern message, if you will, that we are to stay away. Very simply, sir, a paranoid Stalin does not believe our communications with them. He believes his own fears, and what’s being printed in some of our newspapers about the motives behind our drive on Berlin supports that.”

American and British newspapers had cheered the thought of American troops heading toward Berlin and getting there ahead of the Russians. One had even suggested that Hitler be held as a prisoner at Sing Sing.

Truman nodded sadly and cupped his chin in his hands. The enormity of his decision to send troops was weighing heavily. “But we cannot let our boys be slaughtered. If attacked they will fight back and we will try to save them, won’t we, General?”

Marshall’s face was set even more firmly then usual. “Yes, sir,” he said slowly.

Major General Christopher J. Miller sucked on his pipe and exhaled a small cloud of smoke from his dwindling supply of Virginia tobacco. It was this virtually continuous act that had given him his nickname of “Puff” early on in his military career. He had hated it, as he felt it made him seem soft. Now it no longer bothered him, and anyone who dealt with him knew that while he was polite, considerate, and even gracious, he was far from soft. He had to admit, though, that the additional pounds he had recently added to his five-foot-six-inch frame were also making him look just a little puffy.

Miller tapped his pipe against the heel of his boot and knocked out a clot of ashes as he watched a column of vehicles arrange themselves along the highway a few yards away. They were no longer advancing.

Now, only a few miles from their goal of Berlin, General Miller was not a very happy man as he contemplated the two messages he’d received. The first was an administrative one. The move on Berlin had been thrown together so quickly that there had been no time to name it. The two divisions had each belonged to two different corps and their being together was a marriage of military necessity. Thus, instead of creating a new corps, they had initially named the group Miller Force and now it was confirmed. It was unusual for a group that size to be named after an individual, but it indicated the temporary nature of the situation.

Miller supposed he should have been flattered. For an intoxicating moment, he had allowed himself to visualize the headline “Miller Force Takes Berlin.” For a career that had been undistinguished for almost thirty years since his graduation from Texas A amp;M, it would have been a crowning achievement and a fitting end. At the war’s beginning, he had been an overage major with little hope of promotion. For a moment he allowed his imagination to run wild and he visualized another headline: “Miller Captures Hitler.” Damn it all, his family would have been so proud.

Then he got the second message.

It had come moments later and directly from Omar Bradley, bypassing Simpson. It said the Russians might attack him and he should circle the wagons and prepare to fight a defensive battle. But how the hell did he do that? The two divisions were strung out for a score or more miles and were vulnerable at a number of places. He was prepared for an attempt by the Germans to cut the column, but Russian military capabilities were far different and much stronger than the collapsing Germans. Additionally, the message said he should not start anything. If the Russians wanted a fight, they were going to be allowed to get in the first punch. It didn’t seem fair, but he had his orders.

Miller heard a buzzing sound overhead and saw yet another Russian airplane flying parallel to the column. It was a Stormovik, a heavily armored tank killer designed for ground support. He couldn’t fire at it since it hadn’t done anything yet. Nobody had. It was simply watching. So too were American planes, and they had reported heavy concentrations of Soviet armor moving toward him. What the Air Corps couldn’t tell him was their intentions.

What the air force also couldn’t promise him was continuous cover. The speed of the American advance meant that airstrips were well behind the lead tanks of Miller Force. Without drop tanks, American planes would not be able to linger long over his men. He was beginning to feel naked and he didn’t like it at all.

Puff Miller had done what he could. He had ordered the column to halt and ordered each of his units to assume whatever defensive formation was logical under the strung-out circumstances. It seemed likely that any defensive alignments were going to be highly fragmented and rarely more than company or battalion strength, if that.

Miller turned to his radio operator. “Did anyone make contact with Colonel Brentwood?” The radioman, busy with his dials and switches, nodded affirmative.

Brentwood had the point of the column. His tanks and vehicles were closer to Berlin than anyone else, and that concerned Miller. Actually, Brentwood concerned Miller. He was a fire-breather who thought Patton was the new messiah and attack was the only way to wage war. Even though he had yet seen little or no combat, Brentwood was consumed with the urge to be the first American in Berlin and had volunteered for the point position. Miller had acquiesced and now wondered if he hadn’t made a mistake.

Miller had heard the jokes that Brentwood wanted to run for Congress after the war. Under other circumstances, Brentwood would have been an ideal leader for the column. Now, however, things had changed. Yesterday they needed someone with a little daring. Today they needed utmost caution, and that was not Colonel Thomas Brentwood. However, his unit now led Miller Force and his tanks were rumbling toward Berlin.

“Son, does he understand he is to stop immediately?”

“Yes, sir. He was given your order in clear terms.”

“I assume you did not actually speak to him.”

“No, sir, but I did spell it out in no uncertain terms to his radio operator.”

Miller wasn’t confident. “Son, get him on the line directly.”

A few moments later, the radio operator said he couldn’t make contact, and Miller felt a chill going up his spine.

Miller nodded and walked a few steps away from his command vehicle. To his rear was the river, the Havel. To his right was the small, ruined, and nearly abandoned city of Potsdam. To his front he could see the rolling clouds of smoke in the distance that marked the dying of the Third Reich in Berlin. He wondered which curl of smoke might be Hitler. Serve the bastard right if he toasted, Miller thought.

In front of him was the autobahn and it was choked with American trucks and tanks. Groups of civilians, refugees from Berlin, trudged slowly on the grass alongside the road. All they wanted to do was get away from the war. Miller wondered what they would do if they knew they might be moving right back into it.

He looked up again. A couple more Stormoviks had appeared above the column. Why did they remind him of vultures gathering over a kill? Would they recognize the change in the American stance? If they did, would it make a bit of difference?