by Gee, Colin
‘Molyneux.’
Reports from Plummer had suggested that the man was actually acquiring some competence. A private conversation with De Walle had revealed the contents of yet another such exchange, when Lavalle had expressed his surprise at the contribution Molyneux had made in the planning of Spectrum Black.
‘Perhaps we are all wrong about him?’
De Lattre snorted openly.
‘Perhaps not!’
The man had been virtually on the verge of tears as he presented the bad news.
The notes De Lattre had made were for his use only. The results of Spectrum Black would already have been translated onto the situation map downstairs.
Picking up the phone again, he directed the operator to place his secure call.
The whole art of war consists of guessing at what is on the other side of the hill.
Arthur Wellesley, subsequently The Duke of Wellington.
Chapter 113 - THE DECISIONS
1606 hrs, Thursday, 5th December 1945, Headquarters of SHAEF, Trianon Place Hotel, Versailles, France.
“A good evening to you, General.”
Eisenhower was in the planning room, poring over maps with most of the command group for Spectrum; Smith, Tedder, Bradley, Patton, Dönitz, Guderian, Somerville, and McCreery.
Von Vietinghoff was absent on a visit to Alexander in Italy. Devers was busy with his own problems, and he had easily accepted De Lattre’s request to speak directly to Eisenhower.
Also present were two men from the darker professions, remaining aloof and silent until their time to contribute came.
None of the officers present had yet benefitted from the latest reports from French First Army, so focussed had they been on their own part of the plan.
Ike covered the mouthpiece and mouthed the name of the caller. Everyone stopped for the moment, waiting for the Supreme Commander to get the good news.
The look on Eisenhower’s face sent out warnings long before he started to repeat what he was hearing.
“Spectrum Black has been stopped.”
Guderian and Patton exchanged looks, wondering if all the planning was about to go out of the window. The two had established a professional working relationship, based on mutual admiration for the qualities of the other, stirred with the obvious personality differences, and tempered with the distrust that clearly remained from their time as adversaries.
“I’m sorry to hear that, General, really I am. Can you hold what you have?”
Eisenhower scribbled as De Lattre spoke.
‘Legion Corps decimated. Spectrum Black advances approximately half of intended distance.’
Eisenhower nodded at the telephone, at a man who was so many miles away.
“Yes indeed. That was noted by our reconnaissance. At least six corps equivalents. That represents two of their army formations at the very least, General.”
Part of Spectrum Black had been aimed at moving some of the Soviet units southwards, and it had achieved that aim rather too well for the Legion Corps.
Clearly, De Lattre was concerned over the ratio of forces.
Again, Eisenhower nodded out of habit.
“I will authorise that immediately, General. Give me an hour and I’ll send you something else too.”
Ike grimaced, feeling the man’s pain.
“Please thank your unit commanders, General. They’ve done all they could.”
The Commander gripped the phone demonstrably tighter, his voice adopting the reluctant tone that was always present when Eisenhower asked men to do the impossible.
“Can you continue to bring them down on you, General? Agitate? Local attacks? Keep their moving units on the march south?”
Ike closed his eyes, initially to pray for the right answer, and then in thanks that the man immediately supplied it.
“Thank you, General.”
De Lattre came to the end of his call.
“Yes. Thank you, General. We will not waste the opportunity your brave men have granted us. Good night to you, General.”
Replacing the telephone in its cradle, Eisenhower remained staring at the inert object.
“Sir?”
It was Bedell-Smith who had spoken first.
Eisenhower recovered his poise.
“Sorry. Gentlemen, the French have been stopped.”
His hand shot up immediately he saw that Patton’s body started to twitch.
“No! Not now, not the hell now, George. They did what we asked of ‘em, and they brought down a world of hurt upon themselves so that your boys can have an easier ride... so not now... not ever.”
Eisenhower’s voice climbed steadily as he spoke, his final five words almost spat directly at Patton.
The men in the room almost recoiled, for such passionate displays were extremely unusual for their leader.
George’s pathological disregard for his French allies and their capacity for fighting was not well known, except to the men in the room.
His disdain for the ex-SS units had not been hidden from the moment they came into being.
Eisenhower, clearly affected by the conversation with de Lattre, had fallen on him heavily.
Out of the others in the room, only Bedell-Smith did not show the slightest traces of a smile at the cowing of the buoyant commander of Spectrum’s main assault phase.
George Patton was heavily disliked by Bradley, as the two had history that went way back. The Germans, grudging admirers of the man’s record driving through France, felt the American’s brashness hid away limitations that would surface if things did not go to plan. The British, at least those present, tolerated him, but did not enjoy his presence, which was as much as a result of his ability to get under people’s skin as his blind faith in his own invincibility.
Eisenhower brought them back to him as he lit his cigarette.
“Gentlemen... Spectrum Black’s now effectively ended. De Lattre will try and make further distractions, but his units have been hammered, so no great progress is now possible.”
Letting them digest that for a few seconds, Ike cast a quick look at the map.
“They have been successful bringing down these units, away from where they can harm the main attack.”
Others joined him in his examination of the plethora of coloured arrows and markings that designated the plan for Spectrum.
“Before that call we were agreed that they’d already done enough. I’m sending some extra troops to bolster them... I’ll sort that with you shortly, Walter... so what we’ve to examine is any change caused by the losses to the French. Brad?”
Eisenhower deliberately called in his senior field commander to make the first contribution.
“Sir, we’ve very little time before we go in.”
Bradley paused between each point.
“The Commies’ve moved considerable assets out of our line of advance, and we were happy to go on that basis, before the call, that is.”
He looked at Patton and Guderian, the two men most burdened with direct responsibility for the main assault.
Neither spoke so the commander of the US Twelfth Army Group continued.
“We’d like more assets to move away, but I assume that’ll risk causing us trouble down in Alsace there?”
There were enough nods for him to understand he would get no argument on that point.
“Unless the Navy and Air Force can show me otherwise, I think we gotta go in the morning, as planned.”
It was not as originally planned, but delay had been forced upon the Allies by unforeseen circumstances.
“Good point, Brad. Admiral?”
Cunningham looked at Donitz, who gave a firm nod of the head.
“The naval aspects of Spectrum are ready to go on schedule, Sir. Unless Admiral Donitz can say otherwise, I would absolutely recommend that we go on Friday. We cannot risk ‘Red’ being discovered beforehand and, if we delay, I’ll have to keep my fleet circling out here,” he stabbed the North Sea, “And that will do nothing f
or those aboard the ships.”
Dönitz did not wait for an invitation.
Golding, ever-present to interpret, had not even started before the diminutive German Admiral had concluded.
“Sir, Admiral Dönitz states his belief that Spectrum Blue should go on Friday as planned, Sir.”
Eisenhower looked the German in the eye.
“Thank you, Admiral. Arthur?”
Tedder, Ike’s second in command and highest-ranking Air Force officer in SHAEF was similarly straightforward.
“Sir, we’ve the weather we need across the areas of concern, guaranteed as best can be until Monday. If we delay, I grant you, I’ll have my assets get stronger, but I may not be able to bring them to bear if the weather falls away. ‘Green’ is unaffected by the French’s problems. I say go.”
Eisenhower nodded to his deputy, sliding his matches to the RAF man who was clearly in search of ignition for his pipe.
His gaze turned to the two men responsible for the sharp end of the ground attack.
“So, gentlemen?”
Patton, still annoyed by Eisenhower’s relative harsh handling, remained unusually silent.
Guderian slowly turned away from the curtained window he had been looking at, his gaze trying to burn through the heavy hangings and into the night sky beyond.
Clearly, he did not trust his English for the statement, so Goldstein was called into action again.
“Sir, General Guderian states that much depends on the weather so, if it is as Herr Stagg says, then we must go as planned. Delay risks discovery of all parts of Spectrum.”
Eisenhower nodded his head and turned to Patton, looking him directly in the eye, not challenging the man, but firmly letting George know that the previous matter was closed.
Patton’s haughtiness returned in an instant and, with hands on his hips and chest thrust out, George S Patton, commander of the US Third Army, shared his thoughts.
“Just say the goddamned word, Ike, and we’ll march all the way to Moscow, starting ten o’clock Friday morning.”
No one had expected any different.
1607 hrs, Thursday, 5th December 1945, GRU Western Europe Headquarters, the Mühlberg, Germany.
“What?”
“The NKVD are convinced that this assault near Strasbourg is a feint; a maskirovka. They have reports that the Allies will move elsewhere, as a main attack, within the next seventy-two hours, possibly as soon as tomorrow, Comrade General.”
“Where? Do they know where?”
Nazarbayeva was normally softer in her dealings with her staff, especially Poboshkin, but the nature of the report had unsettled her.
“Not for certain, but there are German ground formations involved. That places it on or either side of the Ruhr area. The NKVD have discounted Italy, I’m assuming because of the source of their information.”
She took a drink from her glass, the cool water bringing the moment’s pause she needed to gather her thoughts.
“We'll deal with how we’ve missed this later. For now, re-examine every report we’ve had for the last two weeks... and reassess on the basis of what we now know, or what our comrades of the NKVD believe we now know. Find me something, Andrey. My flight’s at 1725 hrs, and I want everything we can put together to brief the General Secretary.”
Alone in her office, Nazarbayeva’s mind went through everything she could remember, occasionally picking up a piece of paper, or making a note of her own on a pad.
After nearly an hour, she was no closer to making any meaningful discovery.
The knock on the door both broke her concentration and intrigued her, for it carried with it a sense of urgency that, in present conditions, could only mean progress.
Her aide almost ran to the desk, the Captain that followed behind slower and more wary of the new commander.
“Comrade General. This is Kapitan Ivashutin. He has been monitoring information regarding our field agents, with my permission, of course.”
From that, Nazarbayeva clearly understood that Ivashutin had been freelancing something in his department, undoubtedly outside of his normal duties, but that Lieutenant Colonel Poboshkin intended to stand by the man, in spite of the serious indiscretion.
That told her much before another word was spoken.
“Kapitan.”
At Poboshkin’s invitation, the nervous man laid a handmade map on the desk.
The annotations were meaningless to the uncoached eye, which in this case was everyone but Ivashutin.
Clearing his throat, he repeated what he had told Poboshkin ten minutes beforehand.
“Comrade General, this is something that I was doing in my own time as a monitoring exercise. This map records matters between the 1st and 31st of October.”
He tapped the hand written legend, meaningless words and numbers that clearly meant something to him.
“Sir, you’ll note that I took security seriously and encrypted my results.”
“Comrade Kapitan, please. PodPolkovnik Poboshkin’s already vouched for you and further discussion on your... personal project will take place under his authority. Just give it to me straight and to hell with the ass covering!”
“As you command, Comrade General. Each of these marks is a message that originates from one of our field agents as best as can be interpreted on the basis of tasking and known operating base...”
Ivashutin’s voice trailed away and he coughed deeply. Nazarbayeva gestured towards the carafe and Poboshkin filled three glasses quickly, setting one on the desk for each of them.
“Thank you, Sir.”
Ivashutin’s glass emptied and his dry throat was refreshed.
“Excuse me, Comrade General.”
He produced a second map and laid it next to the first so that the two were easily compared. Tapping the legend, he continued.
“This covers the same group of agents from 1st to 30th November.
Nazarbayeva could not help but be shocked.
“Go on, Comrade Kapitan.”
As she spoke, she shared a look with Poboshkin who aired his thoughts.
“He’s sold me, Comrade General.”
Picking up in confidence, Ivashutin tallied off the reasons why normal procedures did not reveal the issue. He was stating the obvious, but Nazarbayeva let him have his moment.
“Agents in the field cannot always contact us on a given schedule, and we are used to them dropping out for weeks at a time without problems. Because of recent events, the volume of work has been maintained as some agents have become prolific in their reporting. Because of the way we assign control of our agents, the lack of central monitoring has counted against us this time, Comrade General.”
Normally, criticism of the system was not acceptable, but he had a point.
“So, Comrade Kapitan, translate this for me.”
“Comrade General, what you see here is an area, from Venlo down to Luxembourg, where agent reports have greatly reduced, compared to October.”
He sought eye contact with Poboshkin, and was rewarded with silent encouragement.
“Comrade General, in October we had thirteen agents, possibly as many as sixteen, at work within this area.”
Checking the pad in front of him, he dropped his bombshell.
“For certain, twelve, possibly fourteen of those have made no reports in November, whereas here...and here,” he indicated the military zones above and below the virginal white paper, “The reports are flowing thickly.”
Her eye examined the two maps, acknowledging the void created south of the Ruhr, through the Hürtgenwald, and into the Ardennes.
“And your opinion and interpretation, Comrade Kapitan?”
Ivashutin was momentarily confused. The number of times that a general officer had sought his view on anything could be counted on the fingers of a hand with no fingers.
Nazarbayeva decided to put him at his ease as best she could.
“Speak freely, Comrade Ivashutin.”
“Sir... Comr
ade General... I believe that this area has been created by the Allies counter-intelligence forces removing or displacing our agents as they have built up a large assault force. I have no proof, but PodPolkovnik Poboshkin has ordered a review of agent’s reports from November, which might help us understand better, especially if we look at them in the context of this suspicion... Comrade General....Sir...”
The quiet unnerved Ivashutin, both senior officers fixed upon and absorbed by his map work.
“What is your job, Comrade Kapitan?”
“Comrade General, I head the logging section. All reports come through us for logging and filing.”
“Not any more. You’ll be allocated four men and a second officer to create a new section specifically to officially undertake,” she spared a wry look for her aide, “The task that Comrade PodPolkovnik Poboshkin wisely asked you to commence... in October?”
Again, Ivashutin looked uncomfortable
“Err, September, Comrade General.”
“September?”
“Yes, Comrade General.”
The man had been wrong to do what he did but his efforts, ones that could easily earn him a place in a Gulag, had highlighted a problem long before it would have been found.
Her mind was made up.
“PodPolkovnik Poboshkin will sort out your new personnel and a suitable place of work. You will keep him informed at all times, understand?”
One nod was enough.
“Thank you for taking the risk and bringing this information to us, Comrade Ivashutin. You could easily have said nothing.”
Nazarbayeva picked up an official letterhead and wrote a formal note, which she passed, to her aide.
Sharing his smile, she concluded the session.
“Now, go with Comrade Poboshkin and report back to me once you have settled into your new office. 1900 hrs on Saturday should give us both sufficient time. Make sure he’s properly dressed please, Comrade Poboshkin. Dismissed.”
The two officers saluted formally, one knowing everything, the other knowing nothing, at least until he was shown Nazarbayeva’s written order promoting Ivashutin to Major, effective immediately.
