Red Inferno: 1945 (14 page)

Elisabeth smiled. Logan thought he saw the hint of a tear in her eye. “Thank you for the toy. I almost forget when he last had a chance to be a little boy.”

Logan shrugged and grinned. It hadn’t been all that easy rummaging through the abandoned and looted buildings until he found something he thought a child Pauli’s age would like. Now he thought the effort had been well worth it. If Elisabeth was happy then he was ecstatic.

“Yeah, he does seem to be having fun.”

“And it’s the first time he’s let me go without jumping all over me when I return. That is a very good sign that someday he too can live a normal life when we get out of this.”

If, Jack thought, not when.
If
we ever get out of this stinking mess. All signs indicated that the American army was being pushed farther and farther to the west and away from them. So far there had been no effort on the part of the Russians to overrun Potsdam. Apparently taking the city was something they felt they could do at any time they wished. It was one thing to be an optimist, but he preferred realism, and realism said their stay in Potsdam could be tragically, violently short. It was a thought that nagged him, but what could he do about it?

He checked his watch. “I’ve got to go. Captain Dimitri wants to meet with his officers in a little while. Would it be all right if I stopped by again? I might not be able to find any more toys, though.”

Elisabeth laughed. For a big, bright officer, he could be so dense. “Well then, you will have to be his toy. But yes, you may come back and visit. I would like that. When Pauli goes to bed, perhaps you and I can simply sit and talk.”

“Now would you take some food if I brought it?”

He had brought some “extra” rations for Pauli and the boy had gobbled them down. Despite her protestations that she was receiving enough, he had seen her eyes widen at the sight of what he and his men thought of as tasteless and undesirable C rations, which included meat, instant coffee, lemonade powder, a chocolate bar, hard candy, toilet paper, chewing gum, crackers or canned bread, and cigarettes. Pauli, of course, did not get any cigarettes or coffee. K rations, which were intended to be eaten without being cooked, were even worse, but the boy had no qualms about eating them either.

“I will think about it,” she said softly, then brightened. “Perhaps we can have dinner together.”

CHAPTER 12

M
ajor General Mikhail Bazarian was livid with rage, his lean and handsome face contorted and tears of anger being squeezed out of his eyes. In impotent fury he watched as the American artillery shells chewed up the column of Soviet armored vehicles that had strayed too close to a portion of his lines confronting the Americans in Potsdam. He had warned their fool of a commanding officer that the Americans could see them, and now they were paying the price.

The Soviet tanks had marched down the autobahn as if on parade. They had given no thought to the Yanks who were in Potsdam, only a few miles away. Just because the Americans had been quiet for so long did not mean they would remain dormant forever. The sight of the column of Soviet tanks had been too much of a temptation, and the American shelling had started almost as soon as the Russian vehicles were within range.

“Damnit!” he snarled, and a handful of officers nearby moved farther away from the tall and elegantly uniformed general. Another T34 was hit and tumbled off the roadway. A half mile away, at least a score of vehicles were burning and the remainder of the column was scattered in every direction in an attempt to find safety from the scourging artillery.

“I warned that stupid fucker,” he raged, “but would he listen to me? No! He was a fucking Russian and all I am is a stupid fucking Armenian. I hope the fucking Russian asshole has been blown to hell!”

A gasp from behind him reminded him that such criticisms were frowned upon, could even be fatal.

Bazarian pounded the table in his spartan office. It wasn’t fair. He was a good general, but what help had the Soviet high command given him? None. He had three divisions of second-rate infantry and one brigade of armor to contain the Americans. Worse, his tanks were not first-line. Most of them were light, old, and obsolete.

It would be enough to contain the Americans, he had been told. Bazarian’s orders were to prevent the Yanks from breaking out and rejoining their main army. Now, as the front lines moved farther west, it was less and less likely that any breakout would even be attempted.

Bazarian was in a backwater and the war was moving away from him. He was only a major general when he deserved to be a lieutenant general. If he were Russian and not Armenian he would have had the higher rank. He would also be commanding better-quality troops and would be in the front lines against the Yanks, instead of this military sewer.

Only rarely did a non-Russian achieve any real status in the new people’s government. It sometimes discouraged him that such prejudices still existed, but he presumed that it would take time for them to disappear. The Russians of Moscow and Leningrad neither liked nor trusted people whose skin was swarthier or whose hair was darker, or who thought and spoke differently because they were from different cultures.

He seethed. It wasn’t fair. He had always supported the people’s revolution and had devoted his life to the success of communism. He had even turned in relatives for practicing Christianity in secret. Religion was the opiate of the people and the enemy of the state, particularly the forms of Christianity and Islam that were practiced in the southern republics of the USSR. These religions were not docile, not like the tame Orthodox faith that had failed the tsars. Instead, the religions in and around his homeland of Armenia fomented rebellion and had to be stopped.

Another barrage landed, chewing up the ground around the destroyed column, hurling more metal and bodies into the air. There would be hell to pay for this defeat, and he knew who would be blamed. He would. His guns were returning fire and shelling the Potsdam perimeter, but he knew their effect was minimal. For one thing, he really didn’t know just where in the perimeter the American guns were situated. For another, he could logically presume they were well dug in and impervious to anything but a direct hit.

Nor could he continue firing for very long. He simply didn’t have the ammunition. Stavka, the military headquarters in Moscow, apparently didn’t think he needed much ammunition to hold the Americans at Potsdam. Nor were many of his weapons very good. A familiar shriek told him that his Katyushas were firing their multiple rockets at Potsdam, and that would have been good but for the fact that they were small 3.2-inch rockets mounted on an old Studebaker chassis. They might as well have been firecrackers. Stavka wouldn’t give him some of the 11.8-inch rockets that could really do some damage. Nor did he have any of the marvelous T34 tanks that were now burning in front of him. Instead, he had the older models that were now almost relics.

Chuikov would rip his ass and possibly relieve him of command. It wouldn’t matter that he had warned that drunken asshole Russian colonel in charge of the tanks that he was straying too close to the Americans. No, it would only matter that he, an Armenian, had let a Russian armored column be destroyed.

Bazarian had to do something and do it quickly in order to save his career, and possibly his life. He turned to an orderly and told him to get his division commanders and his armored brigade commander to his headquarters for a council of war. The Americans had lived in solitude and luxury for long enough. He would attack them and make them pay. No more pinpricks like a Katyusha rocket barrage, or a few artillery shells. No, he would launch an attack. It would take a few days to move and gather and position his men, particularly the brigade he had on the other side of the Havel, but it could be done. Then the Americans would pay.

A
FEW MILES
away, the American general Chris Miller absently sucked on his empty pipe. He was out of tobacco. He continued to receive reports of the damage his howitzers were inflicting on the Russian column. He hadn’t wanted to open fire on the Russian tanks, but quickly decided he had no choice. A radio message had told him that the air force was up to its ass in alligators and could not attack the column. He could not let it go by unscathed and cause American deaths in the future. It was also good for morale to strike back and cause such heavy damage.

“Cease firing,” he ordered.

The major of artillery was puzzled. “But, sir, the Reds are still firing back at us.”

“I know, but they’re not hitting anything. Besides, we don’t exactly have a lifetime supply of ammunition in here, now do we?”

Chagrined, the major agreed and relayed the order. The airdrops had been continuing, but now on an irregular, almost sporadic basis.

Miller sighed and wished someone had thought to air drop some tobacco. He hated poking among the enlisted men who smoked pipes and borrowing it, but he would and they would cheerfully lend it. He had a lot to think about and he needed the peace of mind the smoke from a pipe gave him.

“Leland.”

“Yes, sir,” the captain answered.

“Tell that kraut, von Schumann, that I want to talk with him.”

W
OLFGANG VON
S
CHUMANN
saw Elisabeth and the little boy strolling in the sunshine. She had told him of her concerns that Pauli would never be able to get over his fear of the noise the guns made. Who could? he had answered. She said she wondered if he would quiver and shake every time a thunderstorm rumbled. She had said, harshly, would there ever be a time when they could marvel at the sound of nature and not of the guns of man?

Von Schumann was limping by in the company of an American officer when he saw her. “What are you thinking of, little girl, a hot meal or your American officer?”

Elisabeth smiled and stuck out her tongue at him, making von Schumann laugh. He knew that the girl—he had a hard time thinking of her as a young woman—would have been incapable of such an impudent act in response to his teasing only a short while earlier. As to the American officer, he had been by only moments before to see whether she was safe from the Soviet barrage, and then literally ran back to his unit. Von Schumann had caught the look on both their faces on learning they were all right. He had seen them together several other times and sometimes envied them their youth, their innocence, and, God willing, their future.

“Amazing. All that shelling and they accomplished so little?” said von Schumann.

Leland agreed. “In most cases, all they did was rearrange some earlier ruins and knock down some empty buildings. Casualties were extremely light.”

Unless you happened to be one of those casualties, von Schumann always thought on hearing the phrase.

On arrival at headquarters, he was ushered immediately into Miller’s office. As in prior instances, there were no other American officers present. This helped Miller continue the fiction that he was not receiving any official help from a German.

Miller gestured von Schumann to a seat. “Using your artificial leg today, I see.”

Von Schumann grinned. “The crutch was a shameless cry for sympathy. It didn’t work.”

“I’m not surprised. No one considers you helpless. You don’t know where there’s any pipe tobacco, do you?” As leader of the civilian population, von Schumann had made a number of interesting contacts and had turned up some surprising creature-comfort articles.

“Not offhand, but I’ll look into it.”

“Good. Now what do you think of what just happened? What was this Bazarian creature trying to prove?”

Leland had informed von Schumann of the destruction of the Russian tank column. The former German colonel paused before responding. “I think you have made a mortal enemy of the man who commands the Russians. Not that you had a choice, of course. You had to bombard those tanks. To have done otherwise would have been a betrayal of your oath as an officer.”

“So what will he do? Attack us?”

Von Schumann nodded. “He doesn’t have a choice. You have disgraced him, and the punishment for disgrace in the Soviet Union is loss of command at best, and he could be shot.” Von Schumann stretched out his artificial leg. He still had difficulty sitting comfortably. “But you do have some advantages.”

Miller smiled. That was why he had invited the German. It was common knowledge that some of his people were skillful at questioning new arrivals. They had also ferreted out a couple of attempts by the Russian commander to infiltrate his own people into the Potsdam area. The Russians had been imprisoned, while the German turncoats had quietly disappeared, likely facedown into the Havel and now floating downstream.

“Herr Oberst,” Miller said, using von Schumann’s rank in the Wehrmacht. It was equivalent to colonel. “Please tell me of those advantages.”

The German responded, speaking in a slow voice. “You know you are confronted by at least three rifle divisions. These are very ordinary units, perhaps even less so. At full strength they would each have just under ten thousand men. I think we can assume that the war has worn them down and that they are not quite at full strength. More important, they are not Russians. They are a mixed lot from the southern part of the Soviet Union and are commanded by an Armenian, Bazarian. This means they are neither as well trained nor as well equipped as an equivalent Russian unit would be. You should also know that they are likely the shit soldiers who have been plundering and defiling Germany. The Russians are tough men, but many of those from non-Russian areas of the Soviet empire are barbarians and animals. Sometimes the Russians refer to those types of soldiers as ‘black-asses.’ It is equivalent to your referring to a Negro as a nigger.”

Miller didn’t quite agree with that comparison but said nothing. He toyed with his pipe. “What about their tanks, their artillery?”

Von Schumann chuckled. “They have more tanks than you, but many of theirs are the older, lighter models, and not the T34s or larger Stalins we have learned to fear. As to artillery, they have a number of 122-millimeter guns and you have 105s and a handful of 155s; it’s almost a trade-off. They have larger-caliber mortars, but the overall advantage belongs to you since you are on the defensive—at least until they bring in reinforcements and assuming you don’t throw away your advantages. They may be shit soldiers, but they can kill very nicely if you let them. If led properly, they may just fight like the animals they are. Like I said, this Russian force surrounding you is second echelon. Their general may or may not be.”

Miller digested the information. He had the remnants of one armored division in Potsdam, not even a third of its strength. Far too many had been destroyed or were missing after the initial onslaught.

Von Schumann continued. “You’ve had a major problem sending out patrols, since few of your men speak Russian or, for that matter, German. With your permission, I will send out some of my men to find out the exact locations of their artillery and their tanks. To date I have been only passively acquiring information from refugees.”

Miller was not displeased at the thought of Germans actively spying for the Americans. “Who will you send? Most of your people are either women or old men.”

Von Schumann’s answer was tinged with bitterness. He knew what had happened to so many of the women in his flock. “We certainly won’t send the women. Those pigs would fuck them and then cut their throats, regardless of their age or condition. No, I’ll send old and crippled men like myself. One can hope they will not be considered a threat by the Russians.”

Miller cleared his throat. His own attempts at longer-range patrolling had gotten nowhere and had cost him needless casualties. If von Schumann could provide the information he needed, then he could be well situated to resist the Russian attack.

“I appreciate this.”

“Thank you, General, but I am not doing it out of any sense of devotion to the American cause. I see cooperating with you as the lesser of two evils. Indeed, there is no comparison.”

“Even so, you could have stood aside. Many of your people have done just that.”

“Then they are fools, General Miller. Besides, I have my reasons. Do you wish to know them?”

Miller thought he knew the answer. “Go ahead.”

“I believe there is a good chance that you will ultimately win. In any case, for me it is the only chance I would have to continue my life. Should that victory occur, I wish your government to know that I assisted you so that I will not be impeded in my efforts to find my wife and daughter.”