Lennart Svensson - Burning Magnesium

“3 rdPlatoon! This is your new Platoon Leader, Sergeant Greif. He’s a Swede but he knows the language well. He’s half-German by birth. Sergeant!”

Arno placed himself before the line. He said:

“Thank you, Captain. I’m Sergeant Greif. I have received orders to lead this Platoon. And this I will do. I have previously fought at Stalingrad, in Kharkov and at Kursk.”

Pause. The two ranks, a total of 25 men, looked at him steadily. Scarred faces in grey-green garbs and with forage caps and field caps alternately. They were currently in quarters behind the front, it was relatively quiet, but generally the German Army by this time, November 1943, was in retreat.

What would Arno say? He chose to speak freely, from the heart:

“What about my experience, then, to lead this Platoon? Let me say this: when I came to Stalingrad in 1942 I gave up the hope of returning alive. I had no illusions. I was a soldier who would do his duty, natürlich , but I realised that this was the Valley of the Shadow of Death. And this gave me peace of mind, giving me strength to cope with the challenges.”

Arno felt the inspiration to elaborate on this, speaking about Death and Night and Blood. Then he thought better of it and decided to tone down the excesses, merely saying:

“I guess you all have had your fair share of life in the combat zone. We all know that death is stalking us. Well, hopefully you know it. My philosophy is, in any case, not to live on hope, not frivolously hoping that you can come out of this alive. Now, I’m not trying to be some death-worshipping fire-eater. But a healthy respect for death you must have.”

The eyes of the men stayed firmly on him. Finally Arno said:

“I have told you a few things. This is my philosophy. I can do more than talk. I can lead. But in any case, now you know something about me. And generally I can say: if you, as soldiers and individuals need help with something, need advice in any matter, I’ll help you as best I can. And as the head of the Platoon I will of course listen to my Squad Leaders. So we’ll talk after this. Captain?”

The Captain said: “Sergeant Greif takes command of 3 rdPlatoon!”

“Yes, sir,” Arno said. “I hereby take command of 3 rdPlatoon.”

The Captain saluted and left the yard. Arno dismissed the Platoon and gathered the Squad Leaders around him. They went to a room in the house with chairs and a table. They sat down. Arno took off his cap and glanced at the other three. The giant Bauer was a sunny, smiling type, Karnow was short and slender, and Deschner was a moustachioed, tight Prussian, vaguely reminiscent of Hans von Seeckt, Army Chief in the Reichswehr era.

Arno told the three:

“ Na ja . Here we are. I am Platoon Leader. You are my Squad Leaders. I just want to say: I trust you. And you can trust me. We’re fighting in the German Army, we’re fighting for our lives, and I’m dedicated to this task. I live for this. I expect the same dedication from you.”

“This you can count on,” Bauer said. “Total dedication! No rest for the wicked. Well, then, but you understand… Durchaus .”

“That’s the spirit,” Arno said. The rest of the meeting was a review of the men of the Platoon, their strengths and weaknesses. Arno got the impression of a well-run platoon with good rank and file. This he noticed even when he led them operationally, in battle. It didn’t take long, because they continued the retreat next week. Kampfgruppe G and Battalion Wolf fought with “active defense” tactics, being inserted here and there in the overall falling back.

In other words, the retreat through Ukraine continued. For the remainder of 1943 Arno’s unit, Battalion Wolf, fought defensive battles on a succession of bloodstained sites. The retreat through Ukraine added to Arno’s experience. Here’s a sample of what happened, scattered impressions of the infantryman’s everyday, with examples from Ukraine in the autumn and winter of 1943.

They took the village, they were driven out, they halted and then retook it the same day. Finally, when thrown out of the village for the second time, the Battalion Commander decided to seek support from the Tactical Air Arm. This was arranged for the next day, Stukas would arrive to bomb the village and then the infantry would attack again. On the day in question, Arno’s platoon deployed on a forest edge as the vanguard. Arno checked his wristwatch. He looked towards the village and told his orderly: “Soon the bombers will arrive, then Ivan will be in hot water. Just hope the pilots know where the B-line goes, it’ll be plus in the flight path, not minus.”

The room was illuminated by the soft glow of a Hindenburg light, a cross between a torch and a tea light, a puck of tallow with a cardboard frame and a wick. There were double-decker bunks of wood, a beaten floor with straw, a stove around which woollen socks hung drying. It was in the evening, in a neighborhood somewhere in Ukraine. Men slept. Arno had a lower bunk in the corner. And now he turned to the wall, pulled the blanket over himself and fell asleep. Even he.

It was a metal harsh reality, a bronze shimmer on a statue, the deep sapphire blue of the sky and a twilight lustre over everything. It was a pathos-filled existence, neither “good” nor “evil”. Arno had long since left dualism behind. He wasn’t a saint but he was a man who strove towards liberation from indignation, indulgence and bitterness. Patrol with an SPW and a rifle squad, scout over A to B, get to grips with the enemy, observe and report… this was Arno’s reality and he affirmed it fully.

One word summed it up: elegy. And “elegy” for its part isn’t equal to “lament,” not exclusively. It’s a mixed feeling of euphoria, longing, passion and something undefined thereto, possibly the “ apateia ” of stoics. Arno said to himself these days: “It’s hard now. Hart wie Kruppstahl .” And in this there was a silent cheer. With this maxim he expressed an elegiac-ironic condition that he rather enjoyed.

As intimated earlier: Arno had found his home. He felt quite at ease as an NCO in the field, even though the operations generally went backward, not forward. They retreated through Ukraine. Strategically it went backwards but operationally you must and can sometimes fight back. They applied the concept of “Shield and Sword,” coined by Walter Model: retreat was acceptable only if a riposte was delivered, retreat followed by a counterattack reasonably restoring the situation.

Lines move back and forth: a forest that is lost and recovered, a height that is taken and lost again; a village that is taken, a river being crossed, a landscape that is taken and lost; a battle swaying to and fro like a torn flag in the wind. The waves of the battle that rolls back and forth, seemingly forever and ever, sweeping to and fro, creating breakers, meeting and cancelling each other out so the sea becomes calm again.

Steel grey, grey-green and dim green, khaki, maroon red and pitch black, off-white and blue-grey… titanium, aluminum, wool, canvas, cloth and concrete… burlap and cotton sheeting, copper-clad, unsheathed…

They broke into the hall with weapons on automatic. The Bolsheviks, all seven of them, sitting at the radio table and standing at the orders table, were surprised. They were all shot down and died, bought a farm in the sky, were killed in action.

Arno called to Bauer to see if his squad had kept up. Bauer shouted an affirmation that echoed in the woods. It came from the left. Then a burst of automatic fire was heard from the right flank. What was this, then, was it problems for Karnow or was it Karnow fighting back…? It was hard to know. The vegetation was dense and the light dim.