Panzer Soldier

by Barry Sadler

  Germany was almost at the end of its tether. The winter offensive against the Americans in the Ardennes had failed. The weather and stubborn resistance had slowed the German forces down until they had literally run out of fuel.

  The Russians had, by the end of January, pushed the Germans back to the west side of the Oder and stood on the doorstep of the Reich itself. The next step would be the invasion of Germany, once supply lines and logistical support had caught up with the advance. Right now there would be another pause until the Russians could resupply and prepare for the final act.

  Zeitsler was always courteous and well-mannered if a little cynical. Langer wondered at a man of his intelligence being part of the mad order of the Brotherhood.

  The general merely smiled and answered with a trace of humor. "Haven't you ever heard, Langer, if I may still use your German name – it's easier for me than Longinus – haven't you heard that there is no way to reason with religion or politics? It is enough that I believe in the mission of the Brotherhood as did my family for over three hundred years. Not quite as long as you have been around, to be sure, but still a long history of devotion and service that I quite agree with. A man, after all, has to live or die for something, doesn't he?"

  He caught himself and laughed again.

  He saw Himmler again the following day in the same office. The steady thumping crunch of artillery rounds landing was a constant reminder that war had come to Berlin. Dust fell from the ceilings in a steady thin mist covering everything with a powdery film. Only thirty thousand garrison troops were available for the defense of the capital, but the Russians knew the street fighting would be fierce, so they stood back and pounded.

  The city was a gutted shell of its former glory, but all this meant little to the gentle-mannered man behind the desk. He had more important things on his mind.

  Smiling, he looked up from some papers. "Well, now it's time to have a little chat. The reason I have brought you here is you are to be my birthday present to the Fuhrer tomorrow. I know that you would not wish to miss such an important occasion, and he has requested that you be present. You understand, one man of destiny to another, that sort of thing. And it is still to my benefit to oblige him in these small matters.

  "From your files, I see that you have given the Russians almost as much trouble as you did our people. Why?"

  Langer explained his reasons the same as he had told Deborah in the hut.

  Himmler bobbed his head in agreement. "I thought it would be something like that. Your character is somewhat predictable, you know. Where in all these centuries did you develop a sense of morality?"

  Langer thought over the question for a few moments. "I don't really know. I do know that nothing I will ever do makes any real difference. But still if I must go on at least I can have the satisfaction of not degenerating into a child-killing animal like you."

  Himmler wiped his glasses. "Insults will serve no purpose, since I really have no concern about your attitudes toward us. But understanding you as I do, I have given orders that you are to be released from your house arrest and issued weapons." Langer sat stunned. "Why?"

  Himmler smiled a secret smirk. "It's simple. Give me your word that you will not use the weapons against me personally and I will set you free to do what you have always done best, fight.

  "Surely now, at this place and time the best thing you could do would be to kill Russians. Everyone you eliminate saves a helpless person some misery. There are no Jews in Berlin for you to rescue. Hitler will die by his own hand shortly, and I will be gone before you're permitted to have any weapons. So it amuses me to give you your freedom. But don't worry, we will be watching and will most certainly keep track of your movements in the future. Now, if you will excuse me, I have some matters to take care of."

  The following morning, Casca was issued a new uniform, complete with his rank badges and decorations for service to the Reich. Casca attended the party in the company of SS Reichsführer Himmler. The reception was being held at the Chancellery Ehrenhof, the traditional spot for the occasion. Casca thought about the word Ehrenhof, place of honor. Bullshit.

  He received a number of strange looks from the assorted guests, but Himmler made no introductions and did not allow him to converse with anyone. Inside for the first time were the orchestrators of the war and their own disaster. The ministers who gave Hitler legal authority over the fate of millions.

  Hermann Goring sailed through the guests, an overweight ship bemedaled and dressed in one of his elaborate parade uniforms, smiling and wishing everyone well on this auspicious occasion. The official affair lasted about an hour and there was no liquor served. The Fuhrer was a teetotaler and a nonsmoker.

  Langer watched the master of Germany move around greeting first one then another of his ministers, his face, drawn and haggard, looking more like that of a tired old man who should have been in a rest home rather than the leader of the victorious German legions.

  Himmler checked his watch. "Time for me to go." Casca looked at him questioningly. "One moment, please." Himmler signaled to a Lieutenant of Fuhrerbegleitkommando, Hitler's personal bodyguard from the SS.

  Clicking his heels, the junior officer stood at rigid attention.

  Himmler made the introductions.

  "Stabsfeldwebel Langer, may I present Obersturmfuhrer Joachim Wolff, a member of my personal staff now assigned to the FBK during these trying times. He will a little later present you to the Fuhrer and afterwards see to your being given weapons and whatever gear you may desire.

  "I will now go and present my felicitations to the Fuhrer and take my leave of his happy celebration. Herr Wolff knows only that he is to do as I have said. He knows nothing of you or of your history. Please do not try to enlighten him in any way, it would do no good. After you have met the Fuhrer you may be off and about your business as I will mine." Himmler gave a short smile, clicked his heels in a half bow and left to join Hitler.

  The SS lieutenant addressed himself to the sergeant. "You will please stay close to me until after the presentation." Langer grunted his assent. The whole feeling of this was weird, the atmosphere of forced cheer. Most of the ministers had already packed and would be on their way out of Berlin before nightfall. Politicians always covered themselves, and transport was standing in wait for them.

  Their loyalty as such to their leader was that they would leave him to face the future alone. Several already had their escape routes out of Germany prepared along with documents giving them citizenship in different countries, though neutral Switzerland was the favorite.

  Langer and his escort followed the Fuhrer outside. There Adolf Hitler disappeared for a while inside the entrance to his bunker. Langer and the officer smoked a cigarette during his absence.

  There was no conversation. The officer had evidently been ordered to refrain from any familiarity, though he did give his companion a number of questioning looks. Why would the Fuhrer wish to see a common enlisted man from the army at this time? Steeling his mind he mentally disciplined himself for the unspoken infraction of his orders.

  An hour passed and Wolff led Langer to the barren garden just outside the bunker, checked his watch, straightened his tunic and stood ready. He butted out his smoke and adjusted the visored cap with the Deathshead and Reich adler insignia.

  Hitler made his appearance just as twenty members of the Hitler youth were led into the garden and placed into a single rank. They had come from the fighting in Berlin. The oldest was sixteen, the youngest was thirteen. All of them were children that the state had taken control of when their parents had died or been killed from either the bombings or the Russians. They were from Dresden and Breslau. Hitler wore an ordinary gray coat which looked too large for his stoop-shouldered frame. He moved from one to the other passing out the Order of the Iron Cross. He stopped at one youth and patted the child's cheek with a grandfatherly gesture, sighed deeply and moved on to the next. These were the last of his Thousand Year Reich. Children called in to fig
ht in the great battle, children who still believed the myth of their leader.

  Two of the boys had knocked out Russian tanks with bazookas the day before in the street fighting. Others had manned the barricades and fought the Asiatics of Russia with the ferocity that only those who believe in fairy tales could muster. Killer children died on the streets of Berlin. If they died fast, they did so with the thought that they had served their leader well and died as did the heroes of the Nordic myth. If it took a little longer for them to expire, and the pain was great, they called for their mothers.

  Finishing the awards, for the first time, Hitler looked at Langer. For a moment the dullness left his eyes. He motioned for them to follow and re-entered the subterranean bunker that served him as his personal haven.

  Wolff and Langer followed. The children were led off to return to the battle. All but two would die in the next three days. Eyes watched them as they followed. One of those pairs belonged to Hitler's personal aide, who looked with mistrust at anyone too near his god.

  Langer counted the steps down – forty-four. Inside, he could smell the mustiness that all concrete seems to keep forever wet, damp. Passing gray or moldy orange-colored walls, they followed. The fetid mixed smells of urine from backed-up toilets and sweaty uniforms and boots went with them. The hum of a diesel generator droned constantly, stopping only for a second when it was switched over, coughed and restarted.

  Normally to go into the bunker one would have to go through an elaborate system of security checks, but Himmler's presence and the assignment to Wolff evidently served as all the authorization Langer needed.

  They followed Hitler down the corridors and corners of his labyrinth. They stopped at a small conference room two doors down from Hitler's rooms and obeyed his beckoning finger to enter.

  Hitler sat at the far end, his back to the wall. He didn't like people to be behind him.

  Hitler had removed his greatcoat and sat in the familiar gray plain coat with the Iron Cross he had won in the First World War on it. He was a definite contrast to the peacock dress of his general staff, in particular, Hermann Goring. By his plainness he understood that he stood out in a crowd of brilliant uniforms and be-medaled chests. He was, as always, a master showman.

  But now the play was ending and he was a tired old man. He thanked Wolff and told him to wait down the hall in the guard and switchboard room until he was sent for.

  Obersturmfuhrer Wolff clicked his heels and gave the Hitler salute. "Zum befehl, mein Fuhrer," he said, as he obeyed, leaving the two men alone in the small room.

  Hitler indicated for Langer to sit at the far end of the conference table.

  His eyes foggy, he looked at the man opposite him for some time. His vision had been failing and he had to strain to keep things in focus, particularly in the dim light of the conference room.

  "So you are the one we have waited for so long.

  "Casca Rufio Longinus, soldier of Imperial Rome, gladiator and mercenary. It's somewhat ironic that you have ended up fighting for the Brotherhood. That's why we lost you for so long. It never occurred to us that you might be on our side in this war." Hitler laughed and coughed, his left hand holding his right to control the trembling in the arm.

  “You know, I never really believed the story of you. But here you are. You really exist." Wonder touched the edge of his voice.

  "I have naturally read all the reports of your physical description – the, scars on your face and wrist. Show me your hands." The thin, ragged, circular scar encircling his left wrist brought a spark to dulled eyes. "It's really true." Hitler glanced at the clock on the wall. "I don't have much time. Tell me what really happened at Golgotha when Jesus died."

  Langer spoke, trying to keep himself from strangling the madman. "What do you care about Jesus? I don't understand. He was a Jew, yet you kill Jews as inferior beings. Why should you have any interest?" He deliberately omitted the obligatory title of "Mein Fuhrer" or even sir.

  Hitler responded, "You really don't know? It's quite simple. We have definite proof that Jesus was not Jewish. He was of an ancient Aryan stock, the same as the pure blood of the German tribes. Jesus was not a Jew."

  Langer laughed. "Then he could have fooled me. He was as Jewish-looking as I ever saw. Not like the paintings of him with light-brown hair and blue eyes. He was a small man with a large Semitic hook nose and bad skin. He was a Jew, but he died well. Will you be able to claim the same" – sarcasm touched at his words – "Mein Fuhrer?"

  Hitler refused to rise to the argument. "That you will see for yourself, Herr Longinus. That you will most certainly see for yourself.

  "You know, you could do something about all those scars. They have learned some remarkable things about plastic surgery lately. You could have most of them erased." His mind wandered; then with a visible effort he drew himself back. Now he ordered him to tell him about the crucifixion. "I have to know."

  Langer hesitated a moment, then decided, why not?

  He turned on his mind, letting the past sweep over him, rushing, not conscious of his words as he let the past take over and let Hitler go with him to the Mount of Golgotha. To experience the storm of that hot afternoon, the sweat running down his legs. The priests of the Sanhedrin who came to mock the man on the cross. The moment when the storm was reaching its peak and he struck with his spear into the side of the man they called Messiah. Hitler felt in his words the feel of the Roman uniform, the rubbing of the leather against sore spots, the grating of sand in the sandals, the caligula.

  He experienced, in Langer’s words, the final moment when Jesus looked on the man who killed him and spoke, the storm around them breaking, the wind screaming. "As you are so you shall remain until I come again."

  Hitler wept.

  Langer finished, breathed deeply. He didn't like this reliving of his past, it drained him. Hitler wiped his eyes with a linen handkerchief. "It's true, it's all true, you were there." Taking a gulp of air, Hitler composed himself.

  Breathing deeply from the emotional exhaustion that had overcome him he spoke, his voice a little stronger than before. "Now I know all our work and sacrifices will not have been in vain. I will not have lived in vain. Everything is clear to me now. Thank you, Herr Longinus, or Langer, whichever you prefer. This moment has given me the will to do what must be done. You are free to go. But return to this place on the thirtieth of April. There will be something happening that you would not want to miss. My death."

  Langer rose, facing the maniac. "You bet your ass I will be here. That is one thing you can be certain that I want to be present for."

  He did an about-face unconsciously and left the room.

  Hitler picked up the phone and gave instructions to Wolff, who intercepted Langer in the hallway. "Come with me." He led Langer out of the bunker and back to the chancellery. There he took him to an arms room filled with weapons and equipment.

  "Take what you want." He handed him a card. "This will permit your entry into this place and the Fuhrer bunker at any time. You are on your own." He clicked his heels, hailed Hitler and left. Langer looked over the stockpile. The crunch of a Russian heavy shell shook the building.

  He picked out one of the new Stg-44 assault rifles. If they only had weapons like this early enough, they could have given Ivan hell. The rifle fired both semi and fully automatic. The rifle fired a short 7.92. It had a thirty-round magazine, a muzzle velocity of 2,132 feet per second and fired on fully automatic five hundred rounds per minute. A damned fine weapon, better than anything made anywhere else in the world and like most of the things that had come out of German science, too late to do the soldiers in the field any good. Well, he could put it to good use now. Himmler was right about one thing. For once, they had a common enemy, the Russians in the city. Maybe he could do some good there. Taking out as many as he could before the end. But he knew that he would, at any cost, be back at the bunker on the thirtieth. That left him only two days.

  Langer picked out a field pack and stuffed
it with loose rounds for the Stg-44, sat down on a crate and filled up ten magazines. These went into two bread bags, one slung from each shoulder. Another sack he filled with egg grenades. They took up less room than the potato masher type. Two canteens and iron rations. Last was a Kar-98 bayonet and a short close combat knife to fit in his boot top. From a pile of unissued uniforms he picked out one of the canvas material splinter camouflage jackets. It wouldn't help too much in daylight on the streets, but at night the patterns would blend perfectly with dark shadows.

  He left the confines of the chancellery and entered the streets of Berlin. Stopping, he listened. It would make no difference which way he went; the enemy was all around them. Refugees were kept out of this area by the SS and police, but in the city itself, he knew they would be huddling in basements and corners seeking shelter in attics. In the subways would be thousands of women, men and children. He checked his weapon, moved across Unter den Linden passing the Brandenburg Gate. From there, he worked his way through the rubble and smoke to Invaliden Strasse. He had passed small groups of men being herded up to the lines. The SS were rounding up deserters and stragglers. Hitler youth and men from the SA and Arbeit Corps. Anyone who could carry a weapon was forced into the line.

  From a lamp post where Muller Chaussee intersected the Invaliden, the body of a Gauleiter in full uniform swung slowly back and forth. The homemade sign around his once well-fed neck read,

  "I hang here because I lost faith in the Fuhrer. So die all defeatists. Heil Hitler."

  The crackling of small arms fire told him that he was close to the lines.

  When the encirclement was completed there were two million civilians in the confines of the city. On the twenty-sixth, Zhukov came from the north and Koniev from the south, driving their armies on through the defense of the city. Tanks grinding the defenders under after the artillery and rockets first softened up the positions. In two days of hellish fighting the Russian forces under Zhukov had advanced to the Spree. And Koniev had nearly reached the Tiergarten. The two armies were separated by only about two kilometers; the city was nearly cut in half. Between lay the last outpost of Nazi Germany: the Fuhrer bunker.