The only fly in the ointment was Karl-Heinz, who—in spite of the Expert Medal he’d been wearing when Geoff met him—had turned out to be a lousy shot, comparatively speaking. He had blown his first M-14 course and had only twelve rounds left when he successfully finished it on the second try. Thus he would be expected tomorrow on payday to contribute $39.60 to the pool for the M-14 part of it alone. He had made the grenade launcher the first time, but with only five rounds of fifty shells left (which meant that he would have to pay eighteen dollars into the pool). Geoff suspected that Karl-Heinz was not going to do much better with the M-60 machine gun than he had with the M-14, which meant that instead of having an extra fifty bucks jump pay on payday, his first jump pay would not even cover his contribution to the pool.
As he prepared to start the machine-gun course, Geoff psyched himself up for it. If he worried about Ursula and Karl-Heinz being so pathetically poor, he was not going to be able to take the machine-gun course. If he took the machine-gun course, he was going to walk away from the pool with close to five hundred bucks. Even after contributing half of it to the beer bust, he would then have $250 or so left over in “explainable” money. Which he could then tactfully press on Karl-Heinz to tide him over until they had graduated from John Wayne High School and they got their sergeant’s stripes—and the pay that went with it.
He was very much afraid that if Karl-Heinz learned that money was something he didn’t have to worry about, Karl-Heinz would break off their friendship. He was a proud sonofabitch, and Geoff had recently come to the unpleasant conclusion that he should have told them right off. Now, when it came out, Karl-Heinz was going to resent the deception.
But there was no solution to that that he could see. The only thing he could do was keep playing it by ear and hope for the best. The prospect of being denied Ursula was more than he could bear to think about. The only thing he’d actually gotten from her was a couple of sisterly kisses, no more than two or three on the mouth, but he could never get her out of his mind.
“If you think you can stagger through this thing, Candy-Ass,” the instructor said, “without shooting yourself in the foot, I’m ready any time you are.”
“Ready, Sergeant,” Geoff said.
“Ready on the right, ready on the left, the flag is up, the flag is waving, the flag is down, commence firing.”
The first target was a machine-gun nest, two torso silhouettes in a sandbag emplacement. It was one hundred yards from the starting point and was considered one of the easier targets. One simply assumed the prone position, supported the M-60 on its barrel bipod, and fired short, aimed, riflelike bursts at the torsos.
Geoff put the machine gun to his shoulder and fired two very short bursts. Both of the steel silhouettes fell down.
“Wise-ass!” the sergeant said, but he was smiling with approval.
Geoff ran onto the course, the M-60 at something like port arms, with Karl-Heinz carrying a can of ammo in each hand and the sergeant instructor trotting along behind him.
It was one of his good days. When he finished the course, Karl-Heinz hadn’t even had to open the second can of ammo.
I think I have just won that fucking pool.
When they got back to the firing line, after setting up all the steel silhouettes Geoff had knocked down, there was a second jeep parked beside the jeep they had driven to the range. The driver was a young sergeant.
“Which one of you guys is Wagner?” he asked.
It was not required in the American army, and he tried not to do it, but habit was strong, and Karl-Heinz almost came to attention because he was being addressed by a superior.
“I am Private Wagner, Sergeant,” he said.
“Get in: Colonel Mac wants to see you,” the sergeant said.
“He’s firing,” the sergeant instructor said. “Won’t it wait thirty minutes?”
“Colonel Mac said get him right away, I’m getting him right now.”
“Shit,” the instructor sergeant said. “Go ahead, Wagner.”
When the jeep drove off, Geoff asked, “What was that all about? Who’s Colonel Mac?”
“I don’t know,” the sergeant said. “Colonel Mac is the guy with the medal; he does all of the general’s dirty jobs.”
“What medal?”
“Jesus! The one with the little white stars—the Congressional.”
“Oh.”
Geoff decided to take a chance.
“Can I say something to you in confidence?” he asked.
“Go ahead.”
“He can’t afford this goddamned pool. He’s supporting his sister on a private’s pay.”
“I heard,” the sergeant said. “So what?”
“So look the other way and let me run this course for him.”
The sergeant looked at him for a long moment.
“Fuck you, Candy-Ass,” he said finally. And then he walked to the firing line, picked up the M-60, and felt the belt to it.
“You vill march behindt me vid your moudt shud,” he said, in a credible German accent. “You vill speak only ven spoken to. You vill den call me Herr Feldwebel. If one liddle vord of dis gets oudt, I will feed you your balls. You understandt all dat, Shiess-for-Brains?”
“Jawohl, Herr Feldwebel,” Geoff said.
“Vorwarts, marsch!” the sergeant said, and then, just to keep Candy-Ass Craig in his place, he fired a six-round burst from the M-60, holding it against his hip, and knocked down the two torso silhouettes in the machine-gun nest.
(Six)
Office of the Deputy Commandant for Special Projects
U.S. Special Warfare Center and School
Fort Bragg, North Carolina
1425 Hours, 30 January 1962
“But my uniform, Sergeant Major,” Private Karl-Heinz Wagner said to Taylor. “And my appearance.”
He was in mussed and soiled fatigues and field jacket, and badly shaven.
“They know where you’ve been,” Taylor said. “Don’t worry about it. Just knock at the door and go in when you’re told to.”
Karl-Heinz marched to within three feet of Lieutenant Colonel Rudolph G. MacMillan’s desk and saluted, staring six inches over MacMillan’s head.
“PFC Wagner, Karl-Heinz, reporting as ordered, sir.”
Mac returned the salute.
“At ease, Wagner,” he said with a smile. “Were you doing something interesting, or were you-glad to be hauled off from McCall?”
“I was about to fire the M-60 machine-gun course, sir,” Wagner said.
“Well, I expect you’ve fired machine guns before,” Mac said. “This is Colonel Felter and Mr. Winston. They want to talk to you.”
Felter went to Wagner with his hands extended and spoke in German.
“You’re a very interesting man, Wagner,” he said. “I’m happy to meet you.”
He has a Berlin accent, Karl-Heinz thought. And he thought that the little colonel was an interesting man too. He was unquestionably an infantry officer of considerable experience and personal courage. He wore, among other decorations, the second highest American award for valor.
“It is my honor, Herr Oberst,” Wagner said.
“And this is Mr. Winston,” Felter said.
Winston smiled but did not offer his hand.
“Do it in English, Sandy, please,” Mac said.
“As often as the colonel has been in Germany,” Felter said, “his German is limited to ‘Another beer, Herr Ober,’ and ‘Where is the men’s room?’”
“That, Herr Oberst,” MacMillan said, in not at all bad German, “I understood.”
“We are about to have coffee,” Felter said in English. “Will you have some, Wagner? It must have been cold in the jeep.”
Why not? Wagner thought. They are buttering me up for something, but there is no reason I shouldn’t take the butter.
“Thank you, sir,” Wagner said.
“There is a CIA officer in Berlin,” Felter said abruptly, “who believes that you may possess c
ertain information concerning the wall, areas near the wall, and presumably East German Pioneer equipment, which would be useful to him. Mr. Winston is here to ask you if you are willing to go to Berlin and provide such information. Are you?”
Wagner was spared the necessity of an immediate reply by the appearance of Sergeant Major Taylor and a clerk carrying a stainless-steel pitcher of coffee, cups, and doughnuts.
“Sit down, Taylor,” Felter said. “I want you in on this.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I just asked Wagner if he will go to Berlin and make himself useful,” Felter said. “I’m waiting for his reply.”
“Do I have a choice in the matter, Colonel?” Wagner asked.
“Yes, of course,” Felter said.
“Then, with respect, no, sir.”
“Okay,” Felter said. “That’s it.”
“Colonel!” the civilian protested.
Felter looked at him.
“You have something to say, Mr. Winston?” he asked coldly.
“May I ask Wagner why not, sir?”
“You may ask him,” Felter said, “but he is under no obligation to answer. Do you understand what I said, Wagner?”
“It is a matter of honor, sir,” Wagner said.
“Didn’t you make that decision when you came over the wall?” Winston said.
“That was a decision to leave,” Felter said. “Which is a different matter. Wagner is, I believe, thinking about the oath he swore to the DDR when he was commissioned. Is that correct, Wagner?”
“Yes, sir.”
“May I speak, Colonel?” Taylor asked.
“I hoped you would,” Felter said.
“There’s a conflict of oaths,” Taylor said. “The one he swore when he was commissioned, and the one he swore when he enlisted.”
“When I enlisted, Sergeant Major,” Wagner said, “it was with the understanding that I would not be sent to Germany.”
“And you won’t be,” Felter said, “not involuntarily.”
“We are not asking him to take up arms,” Winston said. “All we want him to do is help us with the wall. And he knows from personal experience what a moral abomination that is!”
“I will ask you for your next contribution to this discussion, Mr. Winston,” Felter said. “Is that clear?”
“Taylor’s right,” MacMillan said. “If he doesn’t think he broke once and for all his East German oath, then the one he swore when he enlisted can’t count.”
“He swore to defend the Constitution and to obey the orders of officers and noncommissioned officers appointed over him, that’s all,” Felter said. “And it was with the understanding that he would not be sent to Germany.”
“Bullshit, Sandy,” MacMillan said. “He also swore that he had ‘no mental reservations whatsoever.’ Now, he either did or he didn’t.”
“I grudgingly grant the point,” Felter said. “But someone made him the deal—no Germany—and I won’t see him ordered there.”
“Colonel MacMillan, with your permission, may I ask what you would do in my circumstances?” Wagner asked.
“I’m not a West Pointer. You want to ask about the fine points of officers’ honor, ask Colonel Felter. He’s a West Pointer.”
“What’s that got to do with it?” Felter said impatiently.
“What would you do as a man?” Wagner blurted.
“What would I do? I’d ask what was in it for me,” MacMillan said.
“With respect, I don’t understand,” Wagner said.
“You’re a lousy PFC,” MacMillan said, “without a pot to piss in. You used to be an officer, so you’re obviously smart enough to figure that out for yourself. You should also be smart enough to know when a couple of light colonels and somebody from the CIA call you in and ask you to do something that they think what you have to offer is valuable. If I were you, I’d ask what the deal was.”
Wagner saw that Felter and the sergeant major were embarrassed by MacMillan’s speech and that it angered the civilian.
“I am not interested in a deal, Colonel,” Wagner said.
“You’re not an officer now,” MacMillan said. “Don’t get on an officer’s high horse with me. You’re in no position to reject a deal until you hear what it is.”
“I repeat, sir, it is a matter of honor.”
“Bullshit!” MacMillan said angrily. “You brought your sister with you. You’re responsible for her. You’re living on baked beans and bologna. You make me more than a little sick.”
“You’re offering me money?”
“I’m offering you early graduation from the course. That would make you a sergeant. I’ll sweeten that by making it staff sergeant. I’ll have Taylor exercise his considerable influence with post housing to get your sister into an on-post apartment. And all I’m asking of you is that you go over there and help the spooks figure out a way to get other people through the wall. If that offends your sense of ‘officer’s honor,’ so far as I’m concerned, you can go fuck yourself, Herr ex-Oberleutnant Wagner.”
“Take it easy, Mac,” Felter said.
“Bullshit. He pisses me off!”
MacMillan’s anger, Wagner saw, was genuine. The man held him in contempt, and that wasn’t fair. By what right?
He looked at him, and then his eyes dropped to the rows of ribbons on MacMillan’s tunic. Even as a young enlisted man, when first called to service, he had had an interest in the enemy’s decorations and insignia. He had later prided himself on being able to identify them and to know what their equivalents were.
The ruddy-faced lieutenant colonel glowering at him was an American Fallschirmjäger of some distinction. His parachutist’s wings were studded with five stars, each signifying a jump into combat. There was a wreathed star on his Combat Infantry Badge, which meant he had been awarded the American equivalent of the Close Combat Badge twice. He had the ribbon of the French Croix de Geurre (Iron Cross). He had a leaf-studden Purple Ribbon, the equivalent of the War Wound. And up on top, the first Karl-Heinz Wagner had seen one anywhere except on a decorations-and-awards poster, was a blue ribbon with a number of small white stars on it. That was the American Medal of Honor, the equivalent of the Knight’s Cross, with swords and diamonds, of the Iron Cross.
The conclusion Karl-Heinz Wagner reached was that he could not afford to offend such an officer. He was, as Colonel MacMillan had pointed out, a PFC literally living on beans and bologna, whose only chance to improve his position was by graduation from the Special Forces school and getting the promotion that would bring him to sergeant. It was possible that if he continued to defy this officer, he would be dropped from the Special Forces school and from Special Forces. They would then probably assign him to the Eighty-second Airborne Division, with some comment on his service record that he had been found “unsuitable” for Special Forces. It would, under those circumstances, be a long time—if ever—before he could win a promotion to corporal, much less sergeant.
He really had no choice. He thought that it really had been naive of him to think that he would not be asked to do whatever the army wanted of him, and that what they would want of him would involve his former comrades in arms in the army of the German Democratic Republic.
“When will I go to Germany?” he asked.
“I repeat, Wagner,” the small Jewish lieutenant colonel said, “that if you don’t want to go, you will not be ordered to go.”
“Yes, sir,” Wagner said. “I understand that, sir. I am willing to go, sir.”
“Don’t do us any goddamned favors, Herr Oberleutnant,” Colonel MacMillan said.
“That’s enough, Mac,” Felter said. Wagner was surprised at both the icy tone—“I will be obeyed”—in his voice, and at the reaction to it by Colonel MacMillan. It required great effort on his part to keep his mouth shut, but he managed it.
“When would you like to have Wagner, Mr. Winston?” Colonel Felter asked.
“As soon as possible, Colonel. Today preferably.”
&nbs
p; “That’s out of the question,” Felter replied immediately. “He has his personal affairs to put in order. We’ll leave when he leaves up to Sergeant Major Taylor.”
Winston nodded. There was no longer any question in Wagner’s mind that the little man was in charge.
“If we put him on TDY ‘to Washington, D.C., and such other destinations as directed,’” Felter asked, “can we pay him per diem?”
“Instead of to the Seventh Group?” Sergeant Major Taylor asked as his brain searched his encyclopedic knowledge of regulations. “Yes, sir. ‘Exigencies of the service.’ The General will have to okay it.”
“What about civilian clothing, Mr. Winston?” Felter asked.
“I hadn’t really considered that, Colonel,” Winston said after a pause.
“Perhaps you should have,” Felter said dryly. “Taylor, get him the civilian clothes allowance.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Winston, I think that’s all we need you for,” Felter said. “Wagner will be sent to Washington as soon as his affairs are in order. Unless you have something else?”
(Seven)
PFC Karl-Heinz Wagner stood beside Sergeant Major Taylor in front of the personnel sergeant’s desk as Taylor ticked off from memory, and the personnel sergeant wrote down, what was required bureaucratically.
By the authority of the commanding general, having considered previous experience, PFC Wagner was determined to have completed the requirements for graduation from the basic course of the Special Warfare School. In consideration of his performance while a student, and of his demonstrated qualities of leadership, he was to be immediately promoted to staff sergeant. He was awarded a primary Military Occupational Specialty of Special Forces operations sergeant, and a secondary MOS of engineer demolitions specialist (Special Forces). Staff Sergeant Wagner was to be placed on Temporary Duty with the Defense Intelligence Agency, Washington, D.C., for a ninety-day period. Travel by personal automobile and/or by military and civilian motor, rail, ship, and air transportation was authorized.
Inasmuch as the exigencies of the service made it impossible to determine the exact nature of his duties or their location, he was authorized the appropriate Zone of the Interior or Foreign Service per Diem allowance in lieu of rations and quarters, thirty days per diem to be paid in advance. Inasmuch as the nature of his duties would require the wearing of civilian clothing, payment of a three hundred dollars’ civilian clothing allowance was authorized. Finally it had been determined by the commanding general that the peculiar nature of Staff Sergeant Wagner’s duties were such that quartering of his dependent in on-post government housing was necessary for both security and compassionate reasons, and the post housing officer, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, was to be requested to inform the commanding general if there was any reason why Staff Sergeant Wagner’s dependent could not be assigned the next noncommissioned-officer’s-dependent housing to become vacant.
The Berets Page 38
