Sacrifice (The Red Gambit Series. Book 5)

by Colin Gee

  “Runner!”

  A rifleman stepped forward as Von Scharf scribbled on his order pad, repeating his written word to the shocked young grenadier.

  “Find Oberleutnant Rieke, Leutnant Grüber, Hauptfeldwebel Riedler...whoever is in charge over there... tell them we’ll be moving around the flank now... attacking left to right across their front. Form up what they can and stand ready to come to our support. Secure the right flank. Von Scharf”

  He ripped the page off the pad.

  “Now... be careful of mines and trip wires. Go!”

  The boy scuttled away as fast as his legs could carry him, his eyes glued to the ground on which he stepped.

  “Move them out now, Keller.”

  Seventh Company moved to the left.

  It was Iska’s company that first engaged the new attack.

  A pair of machine guns opened up from the ridge, causing the engineers to dive for cover, distracting them as Von Scharf slid around the flank with the bulk of the Seventh.

  However, Iska had a blocking force on the end of his line, just in case the enemy tried such a manoeuvre, and it was this group that spotted the men slinking through the trees.

  A DP-28 opened up, bowling over a handful of green clad soldiers.

  Keller yelled at his men and they dropped into cover in an instant. Using hand signals, he communicated his plan to the NCOs around him, and the three men prepared their smoke grenades, ready to throw on order.

  “Now!”

  The four grenades landed, spewing their chemical smoke instantly.

  Keller cut the air with his left hand, sending the leading group even wider, a wise precaution, as the defenders commenced putting bullets into the smoke.

  Two grenades exploded, the defenders expecting to reap benefits amongst the attacking troops.

  No screams greeted the explosions, and Iska immediately understood.

  “Right… Tartasky! Your section to cover right… now!”

  His hand shot down the path that he wanted Corporal Tartasky’s section to cover, only to see dark shapes emerging from the edge of the smoke cloud.

  In an instant, Iska snatched out a grenade and primed it, running down the line towards the end of Tartasky’s line.

  He flung the charge and it exploded in mid-air, some three feet from the face of a German soldier.

  Pieces flew from the man, and two more soldiers running nearby, all three dropping to the earth as if poleaxed.

  Bringing up his SKS, Iska hastily discharged his magazine as he rushed to the support.

  As he leant down to speak to Tartasky, the man’s face was obliterated by a pair of bullets, throwing blood and human matter over Iska.

  The horrible mess gave Iska a demonic look, and more than one of Tartasky’s men shuddered at the sight as he called them to hold the line.

  Slipping a ten round charging clip into the carbine, Iska engaged the looming shapes, suddenly realising that the smoke was drifting towards them.

  He looked behind him.

  “Back… behind that tree trunk, Now! Move!”

  He almost threw a couple of reluctant soldiers in the direction of the fallen trunk, grabbing a third by his straps and dragging him along.

  As he flopped behind the trunk, the defensive position that the eight men had occupied a moment before exploded as stick grenades arrived.

  “Now, Comrades! Kill the fascist bastards!”

  The German infantry swept confidently over the position, expecting to have to finish off some wounded, only to be hit by accurate fire from the displaced defenders.

  Six went down swiftly, but the others dropped to the floor and started to fight back, scoring hits amongst the defending engineers immediately.

  Keller swapped his magazine and let rip for a second time, seeing another defender disappear in a red mist as a reward.

  “Now, menschen!”

  He rose up and charged the ten metres to the tree trunk, not bothering to see if the rest of his group were with him.

  They were.

  A man with one of the new weapons shot at him, sending his helmet flying as a round clipped the metal. Another round hit his MP-40, knocking it from his grasp.

  Unarmed, he threw himself over the trunk and onto a soldier grappling with reloading a DP-28.

  Grabbing the engineer’s head, he propelled it into the trunk, driving a branch stub through the soldier’s right ear.

  Iska used a short arm jab to smash the jaw of a German soldier, driving the butt of his SKS hard into the man’s face a second time, just to silence the gurgling screams.

  Pausing to quickly unfold the attached bayonet, he suddenly found himself airborne, as a grenade exploded behind him.

  Propelled back over the trunk, Iska clattered into two German soldiers.

  Recovering the quickest, he snatched off his helmet and used a roundhouse motion to smack it into the head of one of his adversaries.

  The other lanced his bayonet across Iska’s thigh, causing him to bellow with pain.

  He swung the helmet again, missing, unbalancing himself and dropped to the earth.

  The German rifleman’s satisfaction turned to despair, as two bullets robbed his lungs of air.

  Dead before he hit the ground, the Kar98k dropped virtually right at Iska’s feet.

  Behind him, on the other side of the tree, Keller had snatched up a solid lump of wood and had already succeeded in braining one Russian soldier.

  More Germans arrived, the first running straight into a complete fighting lunatic.

  Iska worked the bolt, but the weapon jammed, so he drove the bayonet point towards his enemy.

  The combination of thrust and the speed of the attacker drove the screaming German soldier up to the muzzle of the rifle, the bayonet protruding from his back by at least four inches.

  A German officer pointed at Iska, and immediately he felt the impact of bullets.

  Robbed of his strength, he dropped to one knee.

  Meanwhile, Keller had taken up a dropped PPSh and used it to sweep the area that a handful of Russians had swarmed from a moment before.

  Greeted by wails and screams, he contented himself with emptying the magazine into the undergrowth that clearly contained hidden troops.

  A bullet struck his shoulder, sending him flying back against the tree.

  German soldiers surged over and round him, as Von Scharf pushed Seventh Company along the Soviet line.

  Two men dragged Keller around the tree and into safety, where the Sani started to work on his messy wound.

  “Fucking hell, Unterroffizier! You’ve already got the fucking cross. You after another one?”

  Keller’s reply was cut short as the medic probed the wound, causing lancing pain.

  “Reckon that’s your shoulder blade gone. Sit still now.”

  The medic quickly bandaged the wound and packed it to prevent more bleeding.

  He lit a cigarette and stuck it between Keller’s lips, then moved to another German soldier, face smashed in by a rifle butt. After a few cursory checks, he pulled open the soldier’s tunic and split the tag, taking half so that the man’s death could be properly recorded.

  “What about him, Sani?”

  Keller nodded towards the bleeding Russian officer.

  The medical orderly looked at the sitting man, and saw the look of defiance and hatred.

  “What about him, Unteroffizier?”

  “He’s wounded.”

  “So fucking what? The bastard did for a few of our boys. He can take his chances with the fucking fairies, far as I’m concerned.”

  Keller started to protest, but a coughing fit wracked his body. He yelped in pain as the grating bones caused mayhem inside.

  “For God’s sake, Unteroffizier, will you calm down and rest.”

  The medic pushed one of his few remaining morphine ampoules into Keller’s thigh.

  Keller started to feel drowsy, imagining whistles and shouts, gunfire and grenades, until merciful darkness e
nded his pain.

  0924 hrs, Sunday, 1st April 1946, the Teutobergerwald, Germany.

  Chekov and Balyan, blowing their whistles as hard as the climb would allow, led the small reserve force into the flank of Seventh Company, driving it back on itself with ease.

  Only the direct intervention of Von Scharf stopped the German flank from being turned.

  The two sides drew back from each other, almost as if by mutual consent, recovering their breath and regaining strength for what would come next.

  A runner dropped at Chekov’s feet, panting, red faced, the effort of his mission almost too much for the wounded engineer.

  “Comrade Polkov… nik… message… from Polkovnik… Nagan…”

  Chekov, keeping half an eye in the direction of the enemy, quickly read the order.

  “You’ve got to be fucking joking,” he said, to no one in particular.

  Showing the order to Balyan, he waited for the younger man’s reaction.

  “They’ve got to be fucking joking, really they have, Comrade Polkovnik!”

  Turning back to the exhausted man, Chekov gave him his orders.

  “Can you manage to get back to Polkovnik Nagan?”

  The man nodded wearily, especially as the alternative was to stay in this hellhole.

  “No time for writing, so tell Polkovnik Nagan, orders received and understood. Off with you, and good luck, Comrade.”

  The man beat a hasty retreat, much faster than his exhausted condition would have seemed to allow.

  The reply would never reach Colonel Nagan of the 1st Guards Mechanised Engineer Sapper Brigade. Not because the messenger failed in his duty, but because the Colonel was already dead by his own hand.

  “Right, Starshy Serzhant, get the men ready to move on my order.”

  “But…”

  “No buts, Comrade Balyan, no buts. Orders are orders.”

  0925 hrs, Sunday, 1st April 1946, the Teutobergerwald, Germany.

  Some metres away, Von Scharf listened to the repeated order.

  ‘You’ve got to be fucking joking!’

  “Received, Herr Oberstleutnant, but I think it’s a bad idea. Why don’t…”

  The other set went to transmit, crashing the system.

  Von Scharf stopped talking.

  “…bey your orders or you’ll be relieved. Implement by 0930. Ende.”

  Von Scharf focussed on the handset he held, his anger directed at the inanimate lump from which this most stupid of orders had come.

  Controlling himself, he passed it back to Schneider.

  ‘0930… less than an hour gone… My God.’

  Regaining his composure, Von Scharf pointed at the wounded men.

  “Sani! Get them away down the hill now. Take whoever you need to help. Get moving now!”

  The medic immediately started to organise the evacuation of the wounded.

  Scharf could see no officer or NCO of note in sight.

  He knew that Rieke and Gruber had both fallen, and Keller was amongst those broken bodies being taken back down the slope.

  He checked the magazine in his Gewehr.

  Hauptfeldwebel Riedler stumbled into view, his ripped trouser leg exposing blood and dirt on his left calf.

  “Are you well, Hauptfeldwebel?”

  “Just a few wood splinters in the leg, Herr Hauptmann.”

  Indicating that they should crouch, Von Scharf listened to Riedler’s report.

  It was awful listening.

  The two companies that had been attacked by the Ilyushin now consisted of eighty-three shattered men, survivors of the two hundred and seventeen soldiers who had led the second wave. In Riedler’s opinion, the stunned men were incapable of doing much for the foreseeable future.

  “Right, well, we’ll combine them into one unit under your command, Hauptfeldwebel.”

  Riedler nodded and waited for his orders.

  “With respect, this is a joke, yes?”

  “No, Oskar, I’m afraid it’s not. You’ll lead,” he checked his watch, “And we’re late already. Get back to your men and get them moving now. Good luck, and make sure they look out for more mines and trip wires.”

  Riedler rose and moved off to get the two shattered companies roused and moving.

  Two separate orders, born miles apart, but with one shared purpose.

  Colonel Gennadi Chekov’s orders were to withdraw immediately, and fall back to the new defensive line being established in the farmland to his rear.

  Having sacrificed so many of his men, quitting the Teutobergerwald Hills was a hard thing to do, despite the joy of seeing Iska carried off the slopes, wounded, but not so wounded that he couldn’t use every swear word in the Russian language.

  Chekov was the last man to walk off the hill, pausing for a moment to look back over the dead of both sides, some still obscured by smoke from smouldering items of all shapes and composition.

  On the other side of the Teutobergerwald Hills, First Battalion, 899th Grenadier Regiment, had already moved back under orders, forming a defensive line almost back on the start line.

  Third Battalion moved back towards them, with Seventh Company providing the rear-guard.

  The final casualty fell to an unexploded butterfly bomb, a simple stumble sending the senior NCO on top of the waiting device.

  More than one tear was shed as the destroyed body of Hauptfeldwebel Riedler was wrapped in a zeltbahn and taken off the slopes.

  On the other side of the valley, the Tönsberg had not fallen either, the situation that resulted becoming a mirror image of the fate of First and Third battalion’s, except that the Fusilier battalion escaped heavy casualties.

  The unexpected success of another attempt west of Detmold, combined with American successes by the 84th US Infantry Division to the north meant that the Oerlinghausen attack was overtaken by events.

  The decision to halt the fighting was made to prevent unnecessary casualties, casualties that had already been suffered long before the order came.

  1st Guards Engineers, worn down by days of heavy fighting, could muster less than two short battalions in the field. 14th Guards, under Chekov, was disbanded and merged into the 1st Brigade to bolster the numbers.

  It seemed only right that Chekov would step into the shoes left by Nagan’s death.

  899th Grenadier Regiment started the day with nine companies, and ended it with the equivalent of three and a half.

  Hundreds of men from both sides had died in a pointless exchange, disputing a piece of ground that neither occupied at the end of the day.

  Such is the way of war.

  1703 hrs, Sunday, 1st April 1946, 899th Grenadiere Regiment Headquarters, Gaststatte Dalbker Krug, Lipperreihe, Germany.

  Prinz stood beside Johansen, the old Oberwachtmeister, surveying the aftermath of the battle as best he could.

  His adjutant arrived with the news.

  “Go on, Sauber.”

  Keeping the binoculars to his eyes, Prinz blanched as the butcher’s bill was laid bare.

  “Thank you, Hauptmann.”

  “There is also a message from division, Sir.”

  Tensing, Prinz merely nodded.

  “You are to report to Generalleutnant Spang as soon as possible, Sir.”

  “Thank you, Sauber.”

  Still glued to his binoculars, Prinz’s eyes were moist as he probed the smoke, hoping to see something there to assuage his pain.

  Of course, there was nothing but smoke, trees, and the dead.

  The Oberwachmeister understood the Officer’s grief.

  Prinz turned away, preparing himself to go and ‘face the music’, as he expected to be blamed for the destruction of his regiment.

  He stopped momentarily, a smile crossing his face.

  Looking back at the old artilleryman, he spoke softly.

  “Quintili Vare…”

  “… Legiones redde,” the Oberwachmeister completed the quote, throwing up an immaculate salute.

  The modern day ‘Var
us’ returned the salute and descended the ladder.

  1st April to 17th April 1946, Area of operations for the 1st German Republican Army Group, Germany.

  The 266th Infantry Division played no further part in the offensive, being withdrawn to Beckum, where it was rested and reinforced, as well as performed security duties at the Soviet POW camp that had been established there.

  German III and X Corps drove hard into the Red Army and achieved a signal victory east of the Teutobergerwald, destroying a number of Soviet infantry and artillery formations, and opening a gap in the defensive line that carried III Corps to the outskirts of Springe, southwest of Hanover.

  Marshal Malinovsky responded, allocating everything he had to hand, driving a counter attack into the southern flank of III Corps on 14th April, virtually destroying the 5th Infantry Division, and badly damaging the adjacent X Corps unit from 12th Infantry Division.

  German 63rd Army fought its way to the Weser at Beverungen, where it was only halted by destroyed bridges.

  An ill-advised amphibious crossing floundered in the face of heavy resistance, and a tragic friendly fire attack by DRL medium bombers, killed or wounded many of the assault pioneers and lead infantry units forming for a second attempt.

  On 17th April, CI Corps, with 3rd Fallschirmjager and the 116th Panzer Divisions leading, blundered into a trap outside of Trendleburg, including a massed mission by ground attack aircraft of the Red Air Force, resulting in the loss of 40% of the ‘Windhund’ Division’s precious tanks in three hours of fierce fighting, and over two thousand casualties amongst the paratrooper infantry.

  After twenty-five days of constant combat, the DRH was exhausted, and, reluctantly, FeldMarschal Guderian advised Eisenhower of his need to revert to a defensive role until his troops were rested.

  C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre. C'est de la folie.

  Translation – It is magnificent, but it is not war. It is madness.