Initiative (The Red Gambit Series Book 6)

by Colin Gee

  Both battalion commanders were down and on their way to the rear, broken men, in spirit as well as body.

  Losses amongst the remaining officers and senior NCOs were huge, as they struggled to push their men forward, exposing themselves to the greatest dangers and, too often, paying the price.

  But the valiant men of Pioniere-Bataillon-266 had finally gained a foothold and had started to remove the barbed wire and obstacles that posed a risk to the follow-up forces, backed up the soldiers of 3rd Korps’ own assault pioneer unit, the 903rd.

  The bridging engineers waited patiently, in no hurry to expose themselves to the maelstrom of shot and shell that transformed the waters of the soft flowing Saale into a blend of the finest liquids Germany had to offer; the water of her mountains and the blood of her sons.

  More tanks were brought up, their massive guns providing direct fire support as the Soviet commanders counter-attacked, desperate to throw back the Germans and destroy their tenuous hold on the east bank.

  The men of the Red Army died in their scores.

  German artillery, combined with air support, hammered front and rear line positions incessantly.

  The men of the Red Army died in their hundreds.

  The bridging engineers were sent forward, ordered to construct their bridges even though still under fire.

  Men were killed and men were wounded, but the structure quickly took shape.

  More pioneers made the short journey across the Saale, and reinforced the bridgehead.

  Infantry followed, as the lead companies of the 897th Grenadiere Regiment made their way over, clinging to the developing structures or using the flotation devices they had been given or made from materials to hand.

  Another hasty Soviet counter-attack drove into the men clinging to the bank, and floundered in close quarter fighting. The clearly weakened and less fit Red Army infantrymen failed to gain an upper hand, despite their superior numbers, and fell back in disarray, pursued by fire from the German soldiers, whose numbers grew steadily as more men crossed the bloody waters.

  Soviet mortar fire increased in tempo, but was less accurate than usual, although men still died as hot metal penetrated their flesh.

  To the southwest, more men of the 897th were pushing against the defenders of Salzhemmendorf. Pushing none too hard, as per orders, hoping to pin the defenders in place, rather than push them out, as the plan was to pinch off the small salient before pushing further into Germany.

  The lower half of the pincers was still silent.

  Half a kilometre north of Ockensen, the two watercourses, the Saale and Thüster Beeke, were less of an obstacle, being of considerably less width at that point than at Hemmendorf. It was here that 3rd Battalion, 899th Grenadiere Regiment, temporarily assigned to the 897th, waited for the order to attack.

  “Get them ready, Hermann. It won’t be long.”

  “Will do. Still no sign of anything to my front. I hope the recon photos are right.”

  Hermann Keller left that hanging.

  The phone buzzed softly as Von Scharf, some metres away in his battalion command post, wished for the same thing.

  “I suspect there’ll be something up there, and we’ve catered for it, Hermann. But whatever it might be, it won’t be a lot. Just keep that rogue Schneider and his radio close, and we’ll deal with whatever challenges us today.”

  Keller smiled, seeking out the sleeping figure of his radio operator.

  “Never doubted it, Herr Hauptmann.”

  “Hals-und beinbruch, Hermann.”

  “Hals-und beinbruch, Herr Hauptmann.”

  Two minutes later, the phone rang again.

  “Attack immediately, as per plan.”

  1029 hrs, Saturday, 20th July 1946, the Saale, Ockensen, Germany.

  “Vörwarts!”

  The men of Seventh Company rose up as one and pelted forward to the edge of the small watercourse, immediately welcoming the cooling liquid as it rose up their legs to waist level.

  Newly fledged Stabsfeldwebel Keller, popular NCO and the sole Ritterkreuzträger in the regiment, pushed his men hard, wishing them out of the exposed area and into the uneven ground beyond.

  Fig # 199 - Allied Order of Battle - Height 462, Marienhagen, Germany.

  The trouble with the assault was obvious to every man who had sat waiting to advance. The whole of their initial movement was overseen and dominated by a huge hill, Height 462, from which they expected fire to descend at any moment.

  “Quickly! Push on quickly!”

  Keller’s cry was taken up by all the NCOs of Seventh Company, although the now veteran soldiers of the 899th needed no encouragement. The men had all developed the crouching run that marked veterans from new soldiers, their jinking low advances intended to throw off the aim of any defenders ahead.

  Mortar shells started to arrive, a few at first, and then more, and the first grenadiers fell.

  Keller’s company pushed forward hard, and escaped most of the shrapnel, the occasional man dropping as a light defence was offered by the handful of Soviet infantry occupying Height 462.

  Those grenadiers following the lead company fared worse, as the majority of the mortar shells landed amongst them.

  They went to ground, isolating Keller’s men, who kept plunging forward, intent on getting as close to the hill top as they could.

  Height 462 had once been covered with lush green trees, but three separate heavy battles over two years had converted it to a barren landscape, the occasional ruined stump belying its former beauty.

  Keller forced his men on, and they started up the gentle foot slopes, moving from shell hole to shell hole, inexorably closing on the defenders.

  Von Scharf saw the danger and shouted orders down the radio, encouraging the other companies to rise up and follow Keller.

  They did not, the maelstrom of shrapnel made worse by more mortars being targeted on their positions.

  “Koenig-five-three, Koenig-five-three, Koenig-one, over.”

  Through the steady crumps of mortar shells, von Scharf recognised Keller’s voice.

  The radio operator acknowledged.

  “Koenig-five-three, keep on going. I’m bringing the rest of the kompagnies up behind you. Push hard and don’t stop, over.”

  “Received, Koenig-one. Do it quickly, enemy fire is increasing the closer we get to the top, over.”

  ‘Scheisse!’

  “We’re coming. Koenig-one, out.”

  Gathering his battalion headquarters troops around him, he rushed forward, determined to shake the companies loose of their hidey-holes, and get support to Keller.

  Back with his weapon of choice, an MP-40, von Scharf led his battalion troops, sweeping up stragglers from the lead companies as he went, accepting losses from the lessening mortar fire, in order to get as close to Keller as possible, and as quickly as possible.

  Some men hugged the bottom of shell holes, feigning injury or working on a real one; some lay in ready-made graves, ready for the clearing parties to come after the battle.

  But, in the main, von Scharf swept up the reluctant grenadiers and drove them up the hill towards the crest, where it was obvious that Keller had closed with the enemy.

  1107 hrs, Saturday, 20th July 1946, Height 462, near Marienhagen, Germany.

  It was all over by the time that von Scharf and his cohorts arrived on the peak, the only work being done by Keller’s men being that of first aid to wounded, or repairing damaged positions.

  The dead of both sides lay where they had fallen, not presently a priority.

  The battalion commander dropped into the command position and slapped his friend on the shoulder.

  “I’m surprised you aren’t on the way to Berlin by now.”

  Keller turned to face him.

  Von Scharf recoiled in mock horror, even though the injury did look nasty.

  “Ouch! How did you get that?”

  Keller’s eye was turning purple and black, and getting worse by the second.<
br />
  The Stabsfeldwebel pointed at his ST-44, leant against a rickety table, almost placed in the corner like a boy being disciplined in the classroom.

  “Self-inflicted, Herr Hauptmann. Can’t even bolster my wound tally. Caught that fucking thing on the wooden support there, fell over… got the butt straight in the optic.”

  Von Scharf failed to keep a straight face.

  “Sorry, Hermann… I mean…”

  He took the flask that Keller offered, a Russian one, which meant he prepared his throat for some fiery content; it was greeted solely with water.

  “How many did you lose?”

  “Doing the numbers now, but my belief is seventeen dead or still lying back there wounded.”

  Von Scharf nodded, surprised that the butcher’s bill wasn’t much higher, something that Keller understood.

  “Me too, Herr Hauptmann. You?”

  “More than that, for sure. I don’t know yet. Anyway, what have you done to get organised here?”

  The officer moved out of the bunker in order to study the position with his senior NCO.

  Keller reached for the offending ST-44 and, with studied care and a look of hatred for the vertical wooden post in question, moved out through the narrow entrance after his commander.

  The two walked the position as best they could, stopping in suitable cover to make observations of the surrounding hills and the valley below.

  The frontage of the hill was nearly four kilometres, so the tour took some time, but the general defence plan had been decided beforehand, and needed little alteration, so the landsers of the 899th got themselves setup quickly.

  Von Scharf and his officers had requisitioned, as well as obtained by various other less straight-forward means, extra machine-guns for their platoons, and Von Scharf himself had ‘borrowed’ an ad-hoc machine-gun platoon for his headquarters.

  Even though their task was complete, and all they had to do was hold the hill and pin the enemy in place whilst other forces, north and south of the diversions moved around and bit off the salient, Von Scharf and his men were intent on taking no chances.

  Parties were organised to scour the slopes for casualties, and to recover weapons and ammunition.

  Abandoned Soviet equipment was policed up and stockpiled.

  The German mortar platoons were called forward and, once they had toiled up the hill with their weapons, would be directed to positions that had been, until recently, occupied by their Russian counterparts.

  Von Scharf settled into his bunker and accepted the scalding coffee offered to him, reading through the message pad to pick up a sense of the battlefields around him.

  It made surprisingly poor reading.

  Even though everything in sight was a diversion, there had been an expectation of some advances, but there were next to none worthy of the name.

  ‘Except us… and the pioniere boys…’

  “Koenig-one, Koenig-one, Koenig-five-five, over!”

  Fig # 200 - Position of 3rd Bataillon, 899th Grenadiere Regiment, on Height 462, Marienhagen, Germany.

  The tension in the voice was not masked by the gentle static that troubled the radio waves.

  The radio operator responded.

  “Koenig-one, enemy counter-attack forces spotted moving south from Hoyershausen. A force has detached and is heading towards our position, over.”

  Koenig-five-five, Oberleutnant Hubert Aschmann, the 9th Company commander, was a relatively unknown quantity and was clearly rattled.

  “Tell him to continue to monitor and report.”

  Whilst the radio operator sent the message, Von Scharf gestured to a nearby Feldwebel.

  “Hanson… take two men and get over to Nine Kompagnie.”

  He took the older NCO by the arm, leading him to the entrance of the bunker.

  “Keep an eye on things for me. Aschmann sounds rather… err… worried.”

  Hanson understood perfectly and was soon jogging away with two men in tow.

  “Koenig-five, Koenig-five, Koenig-five-three, large enemy force to our north. Tanks and infantry… counter-attacking against the bridgehead. Large enemy infantry force heading our way, looks like just under a full battalion, over.”

  ‘That can’t be right… surely… but it’s Keller…’

  He grabbed his submachine-gun.

  “Kasper, look after things here. I’m going to Keller’s front to see for myself.”

  The Leutnant saluted casually and returned to logging the contact information on the battalion tactical map.

  Kasper Janjowski was a former POW, once of the 340th Volks-Grenadiere Division, captured by the Americans during the Battle of the Bulge.

  Whilst he bore solely the Iron Cross Second class, he exuded a confidence and calmness that had ensured he was quickly trusted by those around him.

  He was also the smallest officer any of them had ever seen, being only a cigarette paper over one and a half metres.

  In Von Scharf’s absence, he forwarded the new contact reports to Regimental Headquarters, where the news was greeted with a mixture of alarm and scepticism.

  A report from 8th Company added to the growing feeling that something worrying was about to happen.

  1204 hrs, Saturday, 20th July 1946, Height 462, near Marienhagen, Germany.

  “Where’s the fire, Hermann?”

  Keller said nothing, but hastily ducked into a small trench that led from his command position, gesturing for Von Scharf to follow.

  Keeping low, the two moved quickly along the earthwork and into a covered observation post, from where two further trenches led off, one to a position occupied by a machine-gun crew who were clearly alert and ready for action.

  Gently pulling aside part of the foliage that camouflaged the position, Keller invited his commander to take a look. Although the sounds of battle had been growing the closer he had moved to the edge of the hill, he was still surprised by what greeted his eyes.

  “Verdammt!”

  “Like I said, Herr Hauptmann, they’re hitting the bridgehead units… and winning as I see it. Look to the right and you’ll see the bastards who have us in mind.”

  “Hurensohn!”

  As they were alone, Keller felt duty bound to indulge in some humour.

  “I love you too, Herr Hauptmann, but now is not the time.”

  Von Scharf stayed focussed on the large movement of infantry.

  “The mortars’ll be ready soon, but I suggest we don’t provoke them for the moment…”

  He looked at his friend, “Just in case it’s not us they’re after.”

  In truth, there was little chance that they intended to go around the 3rd Battalion, and both men knew it.

  “Well, at least we’ll discharge our mission, Herr Hauptmann. Consider the enemy suitably distracted by our presence. High Command never mentioned that there were thousands of the bastards, and that they were full of fight though, did they?”

  Von Scharf coughed politely.

  “Cigarette?”

  He took the offered smoke, checking that the bunker would disperse the smoke without drawing attention to their position. It was a Soviet bunker, so he didn’t expect a problem. The Russian knew how to build a bunker fit for purpose.

  He returned to view the goings-on on the Saale.

  “Mein Gott, the bridges are down, they’re cut off!”

  Two kilometres away, the situation had changed dramatically.

  “The bastards have organised a counter-attack damned quickly…”

  He left the though hanging there as his mind came up with another possibility.

  Keller’s eyes narrowed as the evidence of his eyes also suggested something extremely unpalatable.

  “Mein Gott… it’s not a counter-attack, Hermann. We’ve only walked into a fucking Soviet assault force.”

  The two took to their heels and headed back to Keller’s command position, Von Scharf issuing orders on the way.

  Pausing to shake hands, the two went their separate
ways; Keller to get to his radio and send out the warning, Von Scharf to get back to his headquarters and get ready to organise the defence of Height 462 against a mixed armoured and infantry force much larger than had been anticipated.

  Fig # 201 - Rough layout of the area of around Height 462, Marienhagen, Germany.

  1204 hrs, Saturday, 20th July 1946, the Stadtpark, Gronau, Germany.

  That enemy force was better known as the 11th Guards Tank Corps, a veteran formation that had suffered less than most from the privations of winter and poor supply.

  The Corps had also been no more than lightly engaged since the early months of the war, and was at nearly 80% strength, considerably more than most major frontline formations in the Red Army.

  Von Scharf and Keller were right.

  From their position, they had the benefit of seeing the real Soviet strength, something that was denied to the units dying on the Saale or fighting in Salzhemmendorf.

  The intended distraction attacks had blundered into the waiting 11th Guards, whose own attack was scheduled to start that evening, once the sun had disappeared.

  A reconnaissance mission by USAAF aircraft photographed nothing unexpected in the area, a testament to the well-known Soviet skill at camouflage, often referred to as ‘the ability to hide an elephant under a postage stamp.’

  Von Scharf called in artillery as best he could, but a dedicated team was needed, and he asked for one to be sent forward immediately. German efficiency was such that a suitable observation section was quickly dispatched to join 3rd Battalion on the top of Height 462.

  In the German rear, controlled panic ruled, as some staff officers redirected units to bolster the centre, whilst yet others pushed the pincer formations harder, sensing an opportunity.

  Seven kilometres from where von Scharf had his headquarters, another bunker, secreted within Gronau Park, contained the commanders of 11th Guards Tank Corps, gathered together to review the attack plan, and now employed in responding to the unexpected German incursion.