Battle of Kursk

by Tom Zola

  Bern, Switzerland, May 16th, 1943

  Thomas had suffered from a profound sense of emptiness and a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach after Luise’s rejection last Friday. Because she had taken off in her car without him, he had had to wait for the next train and spent the whole night at the Basel main train station, where he had enough time to ponder the situation and become consumed with his thoughts. He had been too fast, too forceful! He had had her where he wanted her but then he had put his foot in his mouth!

  Why the hell do I always have to grab the woman by the tits? Taylor could have kicked himself in the ass. Of course he could write off this job now; he had to notify his supervisor. But he could still do that tomorrow. Then he would return to the cottage near Remigen, and probably not get a new assignment but would have to somehow sneak into the Reich on his own. What was worse than the failed mission, though – at least for the moment – was what Luise’s rejection had done to him. Thomas was sure that his lovesickness – as silly young ladies called his condition – would pass, but until then he would just have to put up with it. The night from Friday to Saturday that he had spent at the train station had been unpleasant, and even though he had been dead tired, he hadn’t really been able to sleep on the train and in the apartment. In his mind, he kept replaying the situation in Birsfelden, watching his own stupidity, over and over again. He had acted like a real jerk. Oh man!

  Saturday night, after several hours of tossing and turning in bed, he had tried to distract himself with the help of alcohol and Swiss hookers – after all, Military Intelligence provided the means. Yet the whores had only managed to satisfy him for a short period of time. At least the alcohol had helped him through the night to Sunday morning; though of course he didn’t drink enough to lose control of himself – that would be too dangerous in this hostile territory. Even though he was drunk enough to get into a fight with some Swiss guy – an adolescent – he was still sober enough to be able to escape the guy’s friends. At least the alcohol made him sleep through the second night.

  Now it was Sunday afternoon, and Thomas already felt considerably better. He no longer thought about Luise, and seemed to be ready for a new mission.

  Maybe Russia again for a change? Taylor reflected while he stuffed several personal items into his bag, where he also hid his pistol beneath a false bottom he had crafted himself.

  Later he sat on his bed, a cigarette between his lips, and examined the two abrasions on the back of his right hand. Last night’s fight had left its marks. Shaking his head, Taylor had to laugh.

  How could that stupid bitch put me in her pocket like that? he wondered. It bothered him, that someone, anyone, could confuse him and throw him off the track like this, despite how he had always perceived himself as a mentally stable young soldier. His conduct had been highly unprofessional. Therefore he was glad that he had obviously gotten over her so fast.

  It wouldn’t have worked out anyway, he told himself. When emotions were involved, he might have had a problem focusing on what mattered. It’s better this way! He kept thinking.

  Someone knocked on his door. At first Thomas was startled and looked for his bag. But then he figured that the police or enemy spies would hardly sneak into the building just to knock on his apartment door. So he opened it. It was Luise. Her lips were a luscious red, and today she wore her hair down, which was unusual for Luise. Thomas’s heart beat all the way up to his throat but she didn’t give him any time to think about it. She walked up to him so that their lips were almost touching.

  “Éxgüsee last Friday,” she whispered, looking at him wide-eyed. Then she took the cigarette out of his mouth and put her tongue inside. Kissing and touching him, she shut the door with one of her high heels and pulled him into the center of the room.

  Kursk, Soviet Union, May 18th, 1943

  After the Russians’ attempted breakout, the remaining forces of the 253rd Infantry Division were removed from the pocket front line and transferred to the center of Kursk as a reserve formation. Since the division had suffered sixty-four percent casualties - killed in action, wounded, or sick - it was no longer capable of participating in any significant combat action.

  While other units looked still okay, the 253rd had paid in lives and limbs the highest price of Citadel. Currently the remaining officers were busy with the total reorganization of the division. They would probably gather all remaining soldiers into two reinforced regiments until the division could be replenished with fresh forces from the reserve troops.

  Meanwhile the Landsers, NCO's, and officers enjoyed the time in rear echelon waiting for the marching orders that would take them out of the mud zone for the time being so they could regain their strength and reorganize themselves. In the meantime, fresh units were brought in to stabilize the new front lines.

  Pappendorf, who due to the lack of officers had been promoted to commissarial company commander and was responsible for thirty-six men, had set up his office in the backroom of a hardware store. He was not only a slave driver, he also didn’t care about the local people; he deliberately just ignored the regulation that pillaging of civilian property was strictly prohibited, and even helped to cover up such offenses within his company.

  “They’re just Slavs,” was his shady motto. So the men of his company had plenty of food these days while the civilians became more and more reserved towards the Wehrmacht soldiers.

  Pappendorf sat behind a narrow desk in a room decorated with wood paneling, and brooded over documents prepared by the Quartermaster’s office that had to be signed. It was raining outside; black clouds passed over the city, though in the darkness of the night one couldn’t see them with the naked eye. It had cooled down considerably, and Pappendorf had lit a fire in the clay oven that heated up the room to a pleasant temperature. He had also decorated the space with some of his “personal items”; next to his desk, a portrait of Adolf Hitler hung on the wall, and next to that, his confirmation of acceptance in the NSDAP as Member No. 6.547. These days it wasn’t always smart to show off one’s Nazi membership but it depended on one’s superior. When it came to this subject, the Wehrmacht was still torn apart.

  Of course a lot of soldiers clung to that ideology, but there were just as many who were happy about last year’s change in the government.

  There was a knock on the door but Pappendorf didn’t move at first. He stoically finished reading the document in his hands, jotted down something on a piece of paper, and finally said – after more than a minute – in a loud voice, “Herein!“

  He had no idea that the person who had knocked on his door had already been standing in front of his office for three minutes because it had taken him that long to gather all his courage. The door opened and Sergeant Berning walked in.

  He immediately stood at attention, saluting. “Herr Unterfeldwebel – Unteroffizier Berning reporting on a personal matter,” he said.

  “At ease!”

  Berning immediately stood at ease.

  “I’m listening.”

  Pappendorf’s attitude indicated that he didn’t want to invest a lot of time in this conversation. Stuttering a little, Berning came out with his request. “I heard that you’ll be in a meeting with the division commander tomorrow morning, Herr Unterfeldwebel?”

  Pappendorf nodded curtly.

  “I want to ask you for a favor, Herr Unterfeldwebel?” Berning obviously had to muster all his courage to come to his new company chief with such a request. The latter narrowed his eyes and leaned forward.

  “Would you ask the commander about the results of today’s soccer game between Bochum and Bielefeld, Herr Unterfeldwebel? I am sure he has ways to find out.”

  “And why do you think the commander would waste his time on such civilian nonentities, Herr Unteroffizier?” Pappendorf responded in a sharp voice.

  Berning pressed his lips together; he suddenly felt hot. Had he gotten himself in trouble again without meaning to?

  “Well, I just thought,” he stammer
ed, “I thought – because Staff Sergeant Claassen always managed to find out the results, too.”

  Pappendorf bent forward even farther and focused on the sergeant like a hawk who was watching its prey. He considered the request for a few seconds. Then he nodded.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” he said. “And now get out! Dismissed!”

  “Jawohl, Herr Unterfeldwebel.”

  Berning couldn’t suppress a smile. He turned around, reached for the door knob – but before he could leave, Pappendorf added, “Oh, Herr Unteroffizier?”

  “Sir?” When Berning turned around again, he was startled. There they were again, these merciless eyes of a hawk.

  Pappendorf got up but this time his voice was calm, which made his words even more menacing. “If you think that it’ll wash away your guilt if you follow the soccer results for that good lance corporal who was killed in action, then you’re barking up the wrong tree.”

  Berning started to sweat all over. What was Pappendorf saying?

  “Don’t think for a minute that I didn’t see what happened!” Pappendorf’s voice was getting sharper with every syllable. “Don’t think I didn’t see that you just stood there and did nothing while that Slav killed the lance corporal! You just stood there! You didn’t do anything about it! You even watched! Even though it was not only your duty to interfere but it would also have been so damned easy. All you had to do was raise your gun and blow the enemy away! You let your Kamerad die!”

  Berning shook his head apathetically but Pappendorf repeated his last sentence even more insistently: “You let him die.”

  Berning stared at Pappendorf. His face was frozen while his eyes twitched and his mouth gaped. Everything collapsed inside of him again.

  Now Pappendorf came from behind his desk and slowly went up to the sergeant while he continued to speak. “Don’t you dare consider yourself a big war hero just because you finally figured out how to fire your gun!” He now stood directly in front of Berning.

  Berning’s heart raced.

  “I should have reported you, and then you would’ve been shot for that. They call it cowardice in the face of the enemy. My sealed lips are my gift to you, though you don’t deserve one. But if you don’t start to dig in your heels and act like a German NCO, I’ll light a fire under your ass, you military rag-doll, you. Dismissed!”

  Berning left the room with a stomach-ache.

  East of Lgov, Soviet Union, May 19th, 1943

  Kursk Front “In the pocket“ – 65 kilometers west of Kursk

  The biplane of the Red Army the fascists called “sewing machine” because of the sound of its engine, glided gently across the territory that was still in the hands of the Soviets. Yet Sidorenko was aware of the fact that the fate of the 720 000 comrades locked in the pocket west of Kursk was sealed. The attempt to break out had failed; the supply situation in the pocket was desperate.

  “Sogeodnya nam ne povislo,“ Sidorenko thought aloud, but due to the hum of the engine and the airflow around the plane his female pilot couldn’t hear him. Today we didn’t have any luck!

  The Germans had sealed the encirclement completely; a Soviet relief attack attempt across the front line of Bryansk had been beaten back yesterday, and the supply from the air wasn’t working because of the enormous loss of airplanes during the battle of Kursk.

  So the Red Army had to write off hundreds of thousands of good soldiers once again. After all, they had enough replacements!

  Sidorenko was boiling with rage. Not only had he been forced to fight a hopeless battle because of what the Stavka had failed to do, but now they would even blame him for the defeat!

  “Oni menya sa eto strogo nakashyut,” he mumbled to himself. They’ll tear my head off! He would have to listen to a lot of crap in Moscow, but if this old klunker actually stayed in the air until he was past the German lines, he would at least stay alive and not be taken a POW, as was the fate of his divisions in the pocket. That meant that he could continue the war against the fascists from another place – and yes, he would continue this war as long as he had to! Now Sidorenko had to grin despite his situation. He wouldn’t be put on ice by the Stavka, because he still had an open account with the Nazis, and they had to pay!

  “Ostoroshjno tovaritsch, mi salitayem w nemtzkii protivo vossdushnii obstrel,“ the pilot informed him in a loud voice; then things became bumpy. German anti-aircraft guns ahead! Black detonations powdered the sky, but the plane got through safely.

  South of Kursk, Soviet Union, May 26th, 1943

  Lieutenant Engelmann had been promoted to commissarial company commander of the 9th, but under the circumstances he would have gladly done without this career boost. He still had a total of twenty-nine subordinates who, however, had to share the only four tanks that were more or less in working condition. Together with the remains of the regiments, they had been relocated to almost the same sector they had moved to shortly after having taken the city of Kursk. Again he looked at the Seym River, on the bank of which a group of elderly women were sitting together, chatting and washing their laundry. Engelmann still had to be careful. The Russians hadn’t forgotten the conduct of the Germans during their first occupation of the city, and showed great willingness to hurt their occupying forces wherever they could. Yet right now everything seemed quiet. Leaning against a tree and enjoying the shade – the sun was burning down relentlessly – Engelmann stared at a blood-smeared book. By now the blood had dried; some of the pages stuck together and would have to be separated carefully with a knife. But he could still make out the black letters on the red background.

  All in all the lieutenant recalled Operation Citadel with mixed feelings. Though they had managed to take Kursk, he didn’t want to overrate that victory.

  What’s a salient of a hundred and fifty kilometers width on a front line of 2 500 kilometers? His pessimism clung to his mind like a leech. It troubled him deeply that since yesterday the Russians had been pressing against Oryol and Kharkov with incredible masses of human and material resources. Well, at least the eastern front line was holding up – still. And everything was quiet around Kursk, which they had accomplished by dealing the Russians a violent blow. At the same time, Panzer Regiment 2 was too battered to engage in any combat, which was why Engelmann guessed that they would soon be transferred to the far rear echelon in order to recover. And he felt uneasy when he thought about the fact that Field Marshal von Kluge and his generals had been really sly foxes to lure the Russians in: There had been reconnaissance just in time, which had shown that a large concentration of enemy troops had gathered in the ”pocket-to-come” in order to penetrate the supposedly weak German lines near Kursk; their intent was to subsequently cut off the German attack driving towards Voronezh, and then encircle it themselves. Intercepted radio messages had revealed that Soviet intent to attack. They actually owed the idea for this battle to Paulus – and it had worked: Simulate an attack directed at the Voronezh area in order to let the Russian forces run up against alleged weak German formations that had been left behind for securing the pocket’s front line; yet in truth, it had been possible to fight off the attack with the aid of the armored forces the Russians thought were on their way to the East. The whole ploy had been backed by enormous planning and deception. Formations had had to be moved; needle-like attacks with massive forces in the Voronezh area had served to convince the enemy of the pending danger of a German attack. Von Kluge had pulled out all the stops: Imaginary radio messages had been sent, orders for attack had been “leaked to the enemy”, and an armada of trucks had driven behind the lines so as to provide the Russians with aerial photos of huge troop movements. Even the German defense forces in and around Kursk had been left in the dark until the end, so that no real information would leak through to the enemy. These tactics were as risky as they were brilliant, but in the end the Germans had had to pay a price for them – as they always did. That became obvious when Engelmann compared the current number of divisions, with those from the time th
ey had still been in their area of deployment.

  A figure holding something in one hand approached the lieutenant. Since Engelmann was facing the late afternoon sun, he couldn’t immediately recognize Staff Sergeant Nitz, who was holding a small package.

  “Evening, Herr Leutnant,” he said to his company commander.

  “Herr Feldwebel.” Engelmann nodded at Nitz warmly.

  “Field post,” the latter informed him curtly, handing him the package.

  “Danke.” Engelmann reached for the small box. He was delighted when he saw the name of the sender: Else Engelmann.

  “And – how’s your back?” the lieutenant inquired politely, though he could hardly wait to open the package.

  “Bearable, Herr Leutnant, bearable.” They both nodded. Then the staff sergeant walked away again.

  Engelmann immediately tore the package open. At first he was overwhelmed by piles of red cans of chocolate.

  Wonderful! Elly had also sent him a new shaving kit, a current photo of her and Gudrun – man, how much my little girl has grown! – as well as candy and hard tacks. Thank you, Elly, thank you, thank you, the lieutenant thought happily. This package is really something!

  Then he discovered her letter – scented stationery with her beautiful handwriting in ink that Else’s bad spelling made even more endearing to him. Josef unfolded the sheet and started to read. Then he nearly started to cry.

  Lieutenant Josef Engelmann, May 16th, 1943

  F.P. 34444