Heinrich Gerlach: Breakout at Stalingrad

‘This business with Russia,’ said Endrigkeit, puffing thick clouds of pipe smoke across the table, ‘really goes against the grain where I’m concerned. It was just sheer stupidity to get involved!’

In saying this, he was simply voicing an insight that many a German soldier on the Eastern Front had arrived at through bitter experience. Fröhlich, though, had a different take on things.

Piqued, Fröhlich rose to the challenge. ‘And what was so stupid about it, might I ask? Should we just have waited until we were overrun by Bolshevism? We know the Russians have had just one goal in mind for ever and a day – world domination.’

‘Do you really know that for sure, old man?’ asked Endrigkeit. ‘Now,’ he continued, without waiting for an answer, ‘I know that your lot up there on the Baltic are naturally a bit jittery about the Reds. They haven’t exactly treated you with kid gloves, have they? But look at the Russians’ preparations for war. What have they actually done? Built a couple of bunkers, like they were perfectly entitled to do. But all the things they needed for a war of aggression, like modern tanks and a proper air force, well, they only began building those once the war had started! No, my dear fellow, things really aren’t that simple!’

Endrigkeit produced a grey checked handkerchief, gave his nose a loud, long blow, and then carefully wiped his beard.

‘And then there’s that whole story about our war aims,’ he went on. ‘First they were telling us it was about “wiping out Bolshevism”, and then suddenly all the talk is of “Lebensraum”. All of a sudden, it turns out the German people can’t survive unless our frontier’s at the Urals!’

‘“The German spirit will heal the world!”’ rejoined Fröhlich, quoting an old nationalist slogan.

‘But what if the patient isn’t ill in the first place? The doctor only goes where he’s called to… And are you really saying that if you were a German farmer or a tenant landholder or a forester, you’d want to be living here, with the woods teeming with partisans?’

‘We Balts have always been pioneers of civilization,’ Fröhlich replied vehemently. ‘If Russia’s worth anything at all, then it’s ultimately thanks to us!’

‘And in recompense for your evidently totally selfless services, they threw you out,’ laughed the captain. ‘No, no, my dear chap, it’s surely not as simple as that! And you can tell that old Adolf wasn’t exactly sure what he was up to from the fact that he kept us in the dark right up to the last minute with his so-called “Eastern Campaign”. Just look at all the fibs they told us: Stalin was joining a Triple Alliance with Germany and Italy! Molotov was supposedly planning a “national revolution” and had offered us a couple of divisions as a friendly gesture of support! The Russians were allowing our forces safe passage through to Iran, and German military transport trains had already been on the move through the Ukraine for weeks! And who was it who was peddling all this nonsense? Some really serious people, local National Socialist group leaders, heads of the SA, railway chiefs! I got a letter from my niece Emma from Berlin at the time, telling me that the paper mill she worked at had received an order from the Party for two thousand red paper flags with the Soviet Red Star on them for people to wave when Stalin came on an official visit to Berlin! That’s right: direct from the Party, an order slip with a genuine stamp of the regional propaganda department on it! What was all that about, do you suppose? It was because they knew no one was really willing to go along with this war, and that there’d be an almighty stink if it went ahead!’

‘The Captain will excuse me,’ Fröhlich responded very formally, ‘if I take a fundamentally different view of the matter. But it’s all a moot point now, anyhow. The Führer has deemed this war necessary, in order to rid the world once and for all of the Bolshevik pestilence, and it’s our duty to prosecute it to its victorious conclusion!’

‘There you go, my dear Fröhlich,’ said Endrigkeit in a spirit of good-natured mockery. ‘We’re completely in accord on that score. We’ve made our own bed and now we must lie in it. It’s clear that we need to win the war, even if it costs us our shirts. And I also believe that we’ll achieve a halfway decent peace. I can tell you one thing for sure, though: time was when I’d sit in my old wood at Johannisberg and not give a fig for politics. Perhaps that was a mistake. But when we get back home again, we’re going to need to clear the stable out a bit… Don’t look so glum there, pour me another cup of coffee, why don’t you?’

Saying this, he pulled a large fob watch from his trouser pocket. ‘Oh, hell and damnation!’ he exclaimed in alarm. ‘It’s half-seven already! We’ve wasted almost two hours gassing away here!’

From outside came the sound of a door slamming, then voices growing louder in the anteroom. First Lieutenant Breuer came in. He looked exhausted and angry.

‘Thank goodness you’ve finally turned up, Lieutenant, sir!’ said Fröhlich, who was relieved to see Breuer for various reasons. ‘We’ve been waiting here for hours to show the film. There’s still time, though. After dinner we can have a nice evening showing.’

‘Film? Film?’ groaned Breuer, who by this time had shed his outer garments. He flung himself down on the straw mattress and stared at the ceiling. ‘I’m afraid you can forget the film, matey!’

‘How’s that then?’ enquired Endrigkeit, shocked. ‘What’s up?’

‘Oh, there’s not much up, truth to tell. But Unold’s completely hacked off. If you start pestering him now about the film, he’ll turf you out with a flea in your ear.’

‘So couldn’t we just go ahead without—?’ Fröhlich began.

‘No!’ the first lieutenant cut him off brusquely. ‘If the division’s about to go into action – and it’s possible that there’s some heavy fighting on the horizon – then we can’t just swan about here having fun.’

‘Right, so I’d better tell my lads to disperse that crowd in front of the cinema and tell them to go home,’ said Endrigkeit glumly. ‘The shit’ll really hit the fan, I tell you! They’ve been pushing and shoving out there for the past three hours.’

He went outside briefly and ordered one of his men to go over to the church. Breuer stood up and poured himself a cup of coffee. Presently, the two slices of cake that Corporal Herbert had had the foresight to save for him loosened his tongue.

‘So there wasn’t anything much special to report,’ he said, picking up his thread once more. ‘The Romanians were right to worry. The Russians have attacked like they feared they would. The Romanian cavalry in front of our position behaved impeccably, though they came under some pretty heavy shelling. But Christ only knows what went wrong in the section to their left. It was suspiciously quiet over there. Kallweit spent the whole of the afternoon patrolling around with his tanks in the surrounding area: no sign whatsoever of the German combat group that was supposed to be there, but instead some wide tank tracks running north–south! And what does the general have to say to that? “Don’t talk such rot!” So, ahead of us in the mist we spot a squadron of tanks, around thirty or forty of them. And they loose off a couple of rounds across our bows. “Russians!” I take the liberty of remarking. And what does the general have to say to that? “Don’t talk such rot!” In fact, it’s the only response he seems capable of uttering: “Such rot!” You should have heard how Unold ranted and raved once he’d cleared off. “I can’t work with lunatics!” he hollered in front of everyone.’