Арнольд Цвейг - Outside Verdun

Raucous laughter. ‘Oh boy,’ cried Kroysing, ‘spare us!’ And Süßmann, giggling like a little imp, gasped: ‘Where was Douaumont, and where was the Kaiser?’

‘Gentlemen,’ said Bertin, not at all offended, ‘that’s what it said in the report. We read it out to each other from the bulletin board at brigade headquarters in Vranje, a small mountain town north of Kumanovo in Macedonia – a crowd of field greys in the spring sunshine – and I can still hear a young hussar lieutenant next to me shouting: “Brilliant, now there’ll be an end to this shit.” How am I supposed to know what really happened?’

‘Oh boy,’ cried Kroysing again and his eyes shone in the light from his third glass of cognac, ‘haven’t you worked out yet that it’s all a lie? Lies to the rear and at the front, lies on our side and over there. We’re bluffing, and they’re bluffing. The only ones who aren’t bluffing are the dead – the only decent ones in the whole show…’

‘Nothing is true,’ said Sergeant Süßmann, ‘and everything’s permitted. Are you familiar with that expression? The Assassins’ motto.’ Bertin confirmed that he was indeed educated and knew about the Assassins – an oriental murder sect from the Middle Ages, whose sheikh was called ‘The Old Man of the Mountain’.

‘You’re educated,’ said Kroysing, calming down. ‘Thank God. Now we just need to understand how a world works where young men such as yourself are knocking about like Parsifal in squaddy’s boots. That motto rules here, my dear boy. Nothing that’s printed is true, including the Bible. Everything men want to do is permitted, and that includes you and me if we have the guts. I don’t want to hold up the youngster here, because he’ll paint you a picture of how things really are here, but if you believe what the reports say, that we captured Fort Vaux in May and then magnanimously left “the ruins of the armoured fortress” to the French the next day, you deserve the Iron Cross. We laughed ourselves silly, my boy. But the infantry were furious because they were still under fire from that concrete monstrosity, which the French were defending like mad, but now they were also being pelted with questions and threats, and being dressed down by telephone, just because some idiot from headquarters had probably looked through his periscopic binoculars, from God knows how many kilometres to the rear, and had mistaken the backs of German prisoners being led into the fort by the French for those of our heroic conquerors taking their prize. Fort Vaux fell in June, and that’s all there is to it, and the way it held out amazed the world. War only runs smoothly on paper. A plague on all writing jackals.’ And he tipped out his fourth cognac, smaller this time, and drank. ‘And now it’s your turn, young Süßmann, and I’ll become a Trappist monk.’

‘We’ll believe it when we see it,’ joked Sergeant Süßmann. ‘At least we had Douaumont and we stayed there, but the French advance positions weren’t far below. Now the show really began: counter attack! At the end of April, the French were actually tramping about above our heads. They’d retaken the upper works as far as the northwest corner, but the machine guns in the embrasures and the flanking positions stopped them coming down. Then our reinforcements arrived, and they had to leave with their tails between their legs. That’s when we learnt from the French prisoners that our success in February had been due to a bit of standard military confusion. Two fresh divisions had taken over the sector, one to the left and and one to the right of Douaumont. Each one was convinced that the other had occupied the fort, and the relieved division had withdrawn so bloody quickly to Belleville ridge that no one knew how things stood. If we’d had fresh reserves back then, our victor’s luck might have taken us forward to Fleury and Souville, and who knows if Verdun would still be in French hands today. It would still have been tough, but it would have bucked us up and the reports would have been glorious. But the miserable French weren’t giving us anything for free. We had to attack Thiaumont and Fleury, and that’s what we were doing when the great explosion happened that gave me a glimpse of the Hereafter. Prost to that!’

He drained his glass and Kroysing refilled it. Staring intently into a corner of the small room, Süßmann continued with his story in his even, boyish voice. At that time, the beginning of May, Douaumont had been the strongest support point on the front. It was packed with soldiers, supplies, ammunition and sapper equipment, and it had a large dressing station. It was like a huge communications tunnel leading to the front and back. The Bavarians storming Fleury slept there before attacking or collapsed exhausted on the paving stones afterwards. The great attack of 5 May failed after a massive bombardment, but down below the fort still teemed with life.

‘Back then, our depot was over where the ASC men sleep now underneath the armoured turret, which the French had used as an ammunition store. A few dozen shells were still left over. Our mines and flamethrower oil reserve tanks were stored there. More harmless stuff, such as flares, was lined up against the corridor wall, with crates of hand grenades on the other side. On the right of the corridor were steps leading down to the hospital rooms, where the doctors were busy day and night. Orderlies dashed back and forth, hauling in the serious cases, while those with minor injuries or who were just shell-shocked or had been buried crouched by the walls, sleeping or dozing, until they got soup, which they spooned down as if it were heaven-sent. But as we know, heaven is right beside hell, and there must have been a couple of nut cases among them, because, using the boxes of flares as cover, two or three of those Bavarian morons went over to heat up their chow with a hand grenade – it was too cold for them, do you see? In order to make it taste better, they invited the devil in.

‘Now, anyone can unscrew an infantry hand grenade and use the head, which contains the charge of powder, to warm up his food if he has a couple of stones to stand a pot on and everything nearby is harmless. But as bad luck would have it, my Bavarians picked up a hand grenade that had already been filed off or was defective, and it blew up in their faces. That might have just been their private misfortune. Screams. Three or four more dead. A few wounded. That didn’t count for much in the battle for Fleury. But Satan decreed that the splinters should fly through the open door into the ammunition dump and stick into one of our harmless flame throwers, which are filled with a blend of heavy and light oils. The stuff flowed out, evaporated, and contact with air turned it into an explosive. I saw it with my own eyes; naturally, I don’t know where the bit of burning wood came from that set it alight – a smouldering cigarette would’ve done it. “Fire!” screamed those around the hand grenade cooks. At the same time, heavy fragments were hurled against the roof and the burning oil tipped on to the rocket crates made of nice, dry pinewood.

‘In that moment, we were already running. We ran forwards, the clever ones in silence, some screaming with terror. You know the long tunnel where I met the captain just now? It’s 80m long, I believe. Men ran into it from all the side passages. We were fighting for our lives with our friends and comrades. Woe betide anyone who stumbled or turned round. We men from the depot were pretty much the furthest back. In front of us were the minor casualties and the Bavarians who’d just been relieved. The ASC men were in the side passages and the infantrymen were up front – a seething knot of anxious grey backs, necks, heads and fists. Then a crash came from behind. There was thick smoke and heat, a dreadful stench as the signal rockets exploded like some colossal fireworks. The flames were bound to reach the shells and they did, but first they reached our hand grenades. There was a rumble from behind, and a jolt with the force of an earthquake flung us all against the walls, me included. I was 40m into the tunnel when I fell over. Actually, I didn’t fall over; I passed out. I lost consciousness propped against the curved wall and hung for I don’t know how long wedged in the throng. I assume I gradually sank to the floor with them. That must have been when the explosion came that wiped out all life in the tunnel, the side corridors, the casemates, the hospital – everywhere. I choked on the poisonous gases. I was actually dead, subjectively speaking. If you can feel fear, it’s terrible, because your lungs struggle for fresh air and inhale ever more poison and muck, your throat burns, your ears roar – but for me expiry was a relief. Let’s drink to that.’