Lunch with Mussolini

by Derek Hansen

  The First Battle of El Alamein in July ended all hopes of a German victory. The men of the Afrika Korps were exhausted and heavily out-numbered. First the British repulsed their attacks, then subjected them to counter-attack. All the while the British forces grew stronger as more men and tanks—including the fearsome American Sherman tank—came to their aid. On October 23, with Rommel absent in Austria convalescing, Montgomery ordered the attack which signalled the beginning of the Second Battle of El Alamein. The Axis troops crumbled before the superior force and began their headlong retreat back across the desert.

  Rommel was ordered back to Africa but it was too late. Panzer units became isolated by the speed of the attack and were destroyed. Mines laid by both sides failed to distinguish between friend and foe, and the horrible death envisaged by Friedrich became commonplace, as violent, fiery eruptions ripped through the underbellies of Panzer and Sherman alike.

  Still Friedrich survived. His experience and ability to read a battle enabled him to extricate his unit in the nick of time, and support Rommel in his retreat. But they hadn’t counted on an increasingly unstable Führer.

  The General called his senior officers together and grimly read them the latest despatch from Hitler. ‘There can be no other consideration,’ he read, ‘save that of holding fast, of not retreating one step, of throwing every gun and every man into the battle. You can show your troops no other way than that which leads to victory or death.’ If Friedrich had suspected the Führer was out of control, he now had the evidence. Hitler was ordering the annihilation of their entire forces, themselves included. Reluctantly Rommel ordered a halt to the retreat. But two days later, at risk of court-martial, he reversed his decision. Even so the delay was costly. They turned west once more with the remnants of their armoured and motorised units, gathering up what foot-soldiers they could. Hundreds of thousands of men, mainly Italian soldiers, were left behind to surrender.

  Friedrich allowed his tank to become festooned with soldiers, as many as could find a place to sit and hold on. Among the soldiers he rescued this way was an Italian tank crew, whose own vehicle had succumbed to the infiltrating sand and lack of spares.

  On November 8, the Allies, under the command of General Dwight Eisenhower, landed on the beaches of Morocco and Algeria and began their advance on Tunisia. Hitler immediately despatched a quarter of a million German and Italian troops to hold Tunis and, along with them, new Panzer IVs and the mighty Tiger tanks. If he’d sent a fraction of this force a few months earlier, in time for the First Battle of El Alamein, Rommel’s victory would have been assured. Instead, under the command of Colonel General Jurgen von Arnim, they began a desperate defence of Tunis against the Americans attacking from the west, and Montgomery’s forces from the south-east.

  When Friedrich heard of the arrival of the Tiger tanks and reinforcements, he was absolutely incredulous. Why not before when they had victory in their grasp? Why now, when they faced certain defeat? It was clear to him then that Hitler the magician had not just lost his touch, but his mind as well. They should be evacuating North Africa for Sicily, not adding to the weight of their defeat. He raced around to see his commander.

  ‘Friedrich! Come in.’ A ghost of a smile flitted briefly across Rommel’s face. His attempt at good cheer failed dismally. Friedrich was dismayed. Sickness had taken its toll on the General but that alone did not account for his appearance. What Friedrich saw etched into the lines of his face was the bitterness and disappointment of defeat; of a man defeated not by his enemy but by his own High Command. Friedrich could see that Rommel had nothing left to give.

  ‘General.’

  ‘Sit down, Friedrich, I know why you are here. The wheel has turned the full circle. Where once we prospered from the mistakes of our enemies, they now prosper by ours. I have proposed a plan to combine all our resources and drive westward to Tebessa. That way we can cut the Americans’ communication and supply lines to their bases in Algeria. If we have learned nothing else in our campaigns here we have learned this. Armies cannot function without supplies. That also is the fundamental principle of blitzkrieg. We need to strike now, yesterday! But von Arnim isn’t sure and he will let the opportunity pass. You see, my friend, we have learned nothing. We ignore all the tactics and principles that made us successful in the first place. We are now driven more by hope than intelligence, fuelled by memories of invincibility. Instead of striking a mortal blow we will probably be sent northward to Thala where the Americans are expecting us.’

  ‘General, it is not too late for a staged withdrawal to the coast and evacuation. That is the only way we can save our forces.’

  ‘Yes, that has been discussed. But the Führer is adamant that we should hold out here until our final victory.’

  ‘Final victory?’ Friedrich made no attempt to conceal his feelings.

  ‘Major, I told you once before that your tongue will get you into trouble. By all means think these things but, oblige me, do not say them out loud. Our final victory is not in question.’

  ‘Of course, Herr General.’

  ‘Do you know that Ziegler destroyed more than one hundred Sherman tanks at Fa’id? Dear God in heaven, Friedrich, think what we could have done with just fifty Tigers. Not even your blasted Matildas could have withstood their 88 millimetre guns.’ The General seemed to lapse into a reverie that Friedrich was reluctant to interrupt. Slowly he pulled back from his thoughts and looked up into Friedrich’s eyes. ‘One thing, Major. I was fortunate in one respect. I could not have asked for better officers and men.’

  Friedrich rose from his chair and snapped to attention. ‘Herr General, it has been a privilege to serve under you. All of us feel honoured.’

  ‘Thank you, Major. Now let us hope that my brilliance and your willingness will enable us to overcome a vastly superior number of Sherman tanks.’ He smiled thinly. ‘But Friedrich, I wouldn’t count on it.’

  The attack on Thala, though initially successful, was finally repulsed by fresh reserves. It was a familiar story. Superior German tactics overwhelmed by superior forces. For General Rommel, the attack on Thala was his penultimate engagement with the enemy in North Africa, following which he relinquished his command. For Friedrich, the Thala offensive was the last action he saw in Africa.

  His Panzer took a disabling hit at the beginning of the engagement. As he was helping his crew from the turret, fuel leaking into the hull ignited. The blast knocked him backwards. He regained his balance only to see his gunner’s agonised face above the turret and hear his screams of pain. He raced over and grabbed the man beneath his armpits. Flames licked up around his own arms and ate into his flesh as he dragged him clear. The gunner’s clothes were alight from his chest to his feet. Friedrich beat desperately at the flames, his arms windmilling frantically. As quickly as he extinguished them they seemed to reignite, but gradually his flailing arms won out and he collapsed exhausted. He’d saved his gunner’s life but had badly burned his own arms in the process. He stared up at the sky, so distant and blue, and waited for the peace to descend upon him as it had at the Battle of Arras. Instead he felt a sharp, stinging sensation, first in his hands and then his arms. It grew and intensified and doubled and redoubled until he thought his mind would snap. But it didn’t. This time there was no merciful unconsciousness.

  Friedrich was evacuated by air to Palermo in a Junkers crammed with wounded. He’d foregone the offer of morphine in favour of others more severely wounded than himself, and regretted his decision the instant the plane had begun to taxi. He tried to lift his arms high so that they didn’t rub against those next to him. But the jostling and jolting caused them to flail around like straws in the wind, colliding with everything. He wasn’t the only one suffering. Despite the deafening noise of the engines he could stiill hear men cry out and moan. He was close to adding his voice to theirs when two arms reached from behind him and steadied his. He tilted his head back as far as it would go to see who his benefactor was and to thank him. He saw anot
her patient in the uniform of an Italian tank crew, whose head was encased in bandages from above his eyes to the back of his neck.

  ‘Come sta, compagno?’

  ‘Va bene, grazie a lei.’

  ‘You don’t know me but I know you. You are Major Friedrich Eigenwill and I am Guido Mila. You gave me a lift on your tank all the way back to Benghazi.’

  Friedrich looked again at the Italian. Yes, even upside down and partially obscured by bandages, the man was vaguely familiar. ‘I am in your debt.’

  ‘And I in yours.’ The Italian laughed throatily. ‘A lot of good it will do us. Still, maybe we are lucky. Maybe we are now out of this stupid war. Maybe now I can go home to Ravello.’

  ‘Where is Ravello? Tell me about it.’ Despite Guido’s kind assistance, the pain in his arms was becoming unbearable and he was desperate for distraction. Guido sensed his need and began a long, glowing monologue which embraced the district, the people, the food and the wine, and lasted till touchdown.

  As the medics helped him to his feet, Friedrich turned to Guido in gratitude. ‘Thank you, compagno, grazie.’

  ‘No thanks are necessary. My head feels like it was run over by a Sherman tank not just grazed by a bullet. The distraction served me equally.’

  ‘Perhaps we will meet again.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  The two men parted friends, bonded by trial and hardship, little realising that the next time they met they would be mortal enemies.

  Friedrich stayed in hospital in Palermo for eight weeks, while skin from his buttocks was grafted on to his hands and lower arms. Each night he added his nightmares to the chorus as men’s minds struggled to come to terms with the horrors they’d witnessed. Now Friedrich had no choice but to surrender to the flames and each night he met a painful, fiery death, his arms held helplessly away from his body in restraints. He craved the drugs that brought him peace but they were all too few.

  With Gottfried’s help, as soon as he was fit enough to travel, he scrounged a flight to Rome and then to Berlin. He knew only two certainties. He wanted to get home to Christiane and his son, and he never wanted to set foot in a tank again. When Gottfried met him at the airport, he wasted no time in pleading his cause for a transfer. Friedrich’s preoccupation with escaping from the Panzers made him insensitive, and he was slow to pick up on the fact that Gottfried wasn’t responding as he would have expected. He paused mid-sentence. The look on his friend’s face was enough.

  ‘My God, Gottfried! What has happened? Has something happened to Christiane? Or Helmuth?’

  ‘It’s Ernst. He was killed in the retreat to the Dnepr. The news came through last night.’

  ‘Dear God …’

  ‘Dear God is right. He was just a boy. Our armies are made up of boys. God forgive us.’

  ‘Do Carl and Clara know?’

  ‘They told me. I would like to come with you to Dresden but it is impossible. Are your travel documents in order?’

  ‘Yes, thank you. And Gottfried …?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  The old General bowed his head. ‘Look after them, Friedrich. You are the soldier. They will need your strength. I will see what I can do about a transfer. It shouldn’t be difficult. You have no unit to return to. All the forces we sent to Tunisia and the remnants of your Afrika Korps are lost, thanks to the genius of our Austrian corporal. Your father was right. We cannot defeat every country at once. We never could. Take care of my family. And look after young Jutta especially. She was very close to her brother.’

  For a while they sat in silence, each alone with his thoughts, but Friedrich had been deprived of news for too long. In the end he couldn’t resist questioning Gottfried. ‘How bad are things in the east?’

  Gottfried’s shoulders heaved and he turned slowly to face Friedrich. ‘How bad? As bad as they could possibly be. Stalingrad is just the beginning. When we attacked Russia we estimated that they had around two hundred divisions. Within a couple of months we had identified three hundred and sixty. As fast as we destroyed them others replaced them.’ He looked sharply at Friedrich. ‘What do you know about the T–34?’

  ‘I’ve heard it is formidable.’

  ‘Formidable is a good word for it. Again, when we attacked Russia we knew nothing about them. Can you imagine how our commanders felt when they encountered the T–34 for the first time? We believed our tanks were the finest in the world. Now we had to learn differently. They are faster, more manoeuvrable, better armed and better armoured. Our 50 millimetre shells bounced off them. We may as well have fired peas at them. In the beginning the only way we could destroy them in numbers was to somehow get in close and have our Panzergrenadiers place Teller mines on the rear of their turrets and blow them off. What bravery! Our new Panthers and Tigers are putting up a better show, and our 88 millimetre anti-tank guns are highly effective. But Friedrich, we are only staving off the inevitable. They will overrun us unless we can negotiate a ceasefire. No. Call a spade a spade. Unless we negotiate a surrender. Do you want to be the man who suggests to our Führer that the time has come to surrender?’

  Friedrich didn’t bother answering, the question was obviously rhetorical. He sank back into the seat, allowing the collar of his greatcoat to creep up to his jawline. But it wasn’t the cold that had him shivering. Gottfried had the ear of the OKH, the Army High Command, and there was no reason to question his analysis. It wasn’t just the hard, clinical facts that depressed Friedrich but the lifeless manner in which they had been relayed. It reminded him of his last conversation with Rommel. They kept their respective silence until they reached the station.

  Friedrich stood and watched until Gottfried’s car had disappeared into the evening gloom. Ernst, he thought, poor Ernst. But why not Ernst? Why not any of them? Who in Germany was safe now?

  Chapter Twenty-two

  War does not impact upon everybody equally. In her home in Prager Strasse, Christiane believed she was safe, at least as safe as anyone in Germany. Dresden had been spared the terror and destruction of Allied bombing because it was at the very limit of the effective range of most bombers. Even with the introduction of the Lancaster and Flying Fortress it was spared because of its lack of military targets. Apart from the Sachsenwerk plant which manufactured parts for radar, the Siemens glass factory and the Zeiss-Ikon optical factory which produced, among other things, bomb sights, the Saxon capital had little to interest the planners of Bomber Command. The Ilse Bergbau Synthetic Oil Refinery in nearby Ruhrland was another story though, and attempts to bomb it occasionally caused Dresden’s Fliegeralarms to be sounded. But no bombs fell on Dresden.

  Other cities in the west had not been so lucky, and already Dresden’s population had begun to swell with an influx of bombed out families. Most of the refugees were rehoused near the industrial plants so that their contribution to the German war effort could continue with as little interruption as possible.

  Even so, Christiane’s decision to remain at Prager Strasse—however reluctantly made—increasingly proved to be the correct one. Particularly in the west, where the housing shortage was more acute, the Housing Ministry was forcing families to open up their homes to others. With two families already sharing Prager Strasse, Christiane had succeeded in buying time.

  There were food shortages but, again, nowhere near as severe as in other parts of Germany. Fresh vegetables and fruit were no longer in abundance for bottling and pickling, even in season. But for the arrival of Helmuth, there would have been no milk. But they made do with no real hardship. Besides, they could always hop on a barge down to Pillnitz and for a few days enjoy life with few restrictions. There was always someone who had eggs and butter for them, or rabbits, or smoked trout, and milk in unlimited quantities. But, best of all, there was usually meat, fresh pork to roast or fry in fillets, and serve the traditional way with hot fat instead of thickened gravy. They scavenged in the fields for mushrooms—the Pfifferling, Steinpilz, Speisemorchel, Walderge
rling—and edible toadstools, the Hallimaschen, which they’d once enjoyed only for their novelty value.

  Unfortunately, apart from a few mushrooms, they couldn’t bring any of their bounty back to Prager Strasse for risk of being searched and branded black marketeers, an offence which could result in execution. Nevertheless, Christiane and her family fared far better than most. She tried to keep this in mind as she waited for Friedrich on the station platform. Despite the fact that the clock was just ticking over to three am, more refugees had just arrived, distinguishable by their few meagre possessions and dark-ringed, haunted eyes. They moved like sheep, unthinking, blindly following instructions.

  Christiane had been as devastated by the news of Ernst’s death as her parents. It had been bad enough when Friedrich was wounded but at least they’d felt some relief that he wasn’t killed. There was no such relief with Ernst. For all their insulation and good fortune, the war had found them and wounded them as surely as if the projectile that killed their son and brother had also torn through their own flesh.

  Nevertheless Christiane tried to put Ernst out of her mind and look on the bright side. She still had a husband and she didn’t want him coming home to tears and more suffering. They had to look after the living and she was under no illusion as to the job that lay ahead of them. Friedrich’s letters, all written in strange hands, gave no indication of how the injuries had occurred, but she could guess. How many times had she held down his flailing arms? Although he’d given a brief description of his burns and made light of them, eight weeks in hospital told a different story. Still, she’d know soon enough. She stamped her feet and rubbed her gloved hands together, but it seemed nothing could keep out the cold night air. Where was he? She longed to throw her arms about him, to give comfort and receive it in return. She fought back her tears. Poor Ernst! Poor Friedrich! She looked up as an old, tired train slowly drew up to her platform, sighing and wheezing and sadly discharging billowing clouds of steam. She willed her face to smile.