accuracy’s even worse. They have a devil of a time hitting a long, thin target like this. A large sprawling city like Berlin they can find and bomb, but not defensive works like these. After a number of terrible incidents in Normandy, the Allied bomber pilots are desperately afraid of dropping too soon and killing their own men. They are now doing a marvelous job of plowing various farmers’ fields for them.”
The bombs impacted. Explosions rippled and sent artificial winds over them. But Schurmer was right. The bombs fell harmlessly well to the east.
Schurmer took a happy puff on his cigar. “Oh, sometimes they get it right and we lose some men and we have to rebuild something, but the normal day’s bombing is of no consequence. Generally, they fly too high for precision bombing. They depend on their so-called secret Norden bomb sight, which is fine by me. Also, I don’t feel that their pilots have their hearts in the effort to bomb us.”
The all-clear sounded and the guards prodded the workers out of the shelters and back to work.
“As you can tell,” Schurmer said, continuing the tour, “our primary ground defenses consist of tank traps, large ditches, and bunkers made of sandbags and concrete. The whole area is or will be saturated with numerous antitank guns along with soldiers armed with machine guns and Panzerfausts. In front of the bunkers, we’ve sown tens of thousands of antipersonnel and antitank mines. When the Allies do break through, there are several hundred Panzer IV and about fifty of our precious and carefully rationed Panther tanks waiting to counterattack and nip the Allies in the bud while the bulk of our army withdraws to the next line.”
“So what should I tell von Rundstedt so he can tell Himmler?”
Schurmer chuckled. “I suggest you tell Rundstedt the truth and let him decide what to tell Himmler. In the meantime, I suggest we go to my quarters for some dinner and brandy. There is no reason for war to be altogether hell, now is there?”
“They’re fattening us up, you know,” Levin announced as he stood in his clean and creased new boxer shorts and undershirt. “From here it’s on to the Seine and God knows what else.”
Carter grinned. He was similarly attired along with the rest of the officers in the 74th. “You’re probably right, but, in the meantime, put a sock in it. Preferably a clean sock.”
Officially the 74th had been pulled back to get some rest and new equipment. Unofficially, the regiment had suffered badly and needed to get over the shock of their losses. Of the seventy tanks, twenty-one had either been destroyed or were so seriously damaged that they were not repairable by the regiment’s mechanics. Nor were other categories of equipment immune. Many Jeeps, trucks, and half-tracks had been damaged or destroyed.
Nor had they yet run into heavy German armor. While other units had fought the Panthers and the Tigers, the 74th had not.
Most significant was the human toll. Of the three thousand who’d landed in Normandy only a few weeks earlier, more than two hundred were dead and another three hundred wounded. Six men were reported missing and at least two of them had likely deserted. Nobody wanted to talk about desertion, but rumor said that thousands of GI’s were wandering around France looking for a safe place to wait out the war. Morgan wondered what they’d do when it did end, and concluded that many probably hadn’t thought that far ahead. They just wanted to get out of the horrors of the fighting no matter what the future price.
Thus, Jack and the others had the chance to have a long, hot shower and wear clean fresh clothing for the first time in more than a month. Even the mess hall food wasn’t as bad as remembered. After all, it was hot and had been prepared by actual human beings. The time off was a major morale builder even though the coming advance to the Seine and beyond was on everybody’s mind. The Germans were fortifying the east bank of the river and what once had been a romantic tourist destination now seemed like it would be a voyage to hell.
“I never thought I’d praise shit on a shingle,” said Carter after they made it to the mess hall in their new uniforms. Nobody ever called it chipped beef on toast and it was almost always universally despised.
“And here I thought everyone else smelled terrible or it was the stench from all the dead bodies around,” added Levin, “but now I realize it was me. How did you ever stand me?”
“We didn’t,” gibed Morgan. “We attributed it to gas from all the kosher food you eat and tried to be tolerant of your religion.”
“How thoughtful,” Levin said. “And by the way, Jeb, did you notice that all the equipment was distributed by colored soldiers? Any thoughts on that?”
Carter scowled. “Actually, I have many thoughts. I have no problem with Negroes in the army so long as they aren’t officers and so long as they aren’t in combat.”
“Why not?” asked Jack. “Wouldn’t putting them in the fighting actually save white guys’ lives?”
“Yeah, but it’s not that easy,” Jeb said. “Put a gun in colored boys’ hands and rank on their shoulders and they’ll begin to think they’re equal to white men and nothing good can ever come from that. Then they’ll come home and want to go to school with us, be our bosses, and then maybe marry my sister. Now my sister may be truly ugly and desperate to get laid, but I still don’t want her marrying a nigger.
“On the other hand,” Jeb continued, “I sure as hell don’t want them sitting on their asses at home while I run the risk of getting shot at. I admit it’s a dilemma.”
“Blacks served in the Union army way back in that misunderstanding we call the Civil War,” Jack said, “and in combat. And we’ve had colored units in wars since then.”
“That’s right,” Jeb said, “and did you know that several thousand free blacks volunteered to serve the Confederate army?”
They’d never heard of that. “Why?” Jack asked.
“Beats the hell out of me,” Jeb answered. “If any are still alive go ask them. But let’s quit talking serious stuff and get some of that bottled dog piss they call beer.”
Levin concurred. The beer was low-alcohol, but it was better than no alcohol and, besides, Levin’s contacts for booze had dried up, temporarily they all hoped. “Might as well enjoy ourselves before we get tossed to the Nazi wolves.”
When the Nazis first invaded the Soviet Union, rumors flew that Josef Stalin had collapsed from the unexpected shock of Hitler’s betrayal of their nonaggression pact and had suffered a nervous breakdown. If they were once true, and no one knew for certain, they no longer applied. Stalin was in complete command of the Soviet war effort. His military title was Supreme Commander in Chief, and in theory there was a military hierarchy under him called the Stavka, but in reality Stalin controlled it. He also headed the Communist Party and was the Soviet Union’s prime minister. In effect, the massive Soviet Union was a one person empire. Stalin ruled alone and with an iron fist. The blood of millions of his own people was on his hands. He didn’t care. He cared only for the worldwide expansion of communism, and the Soviet Union was the tool that would do it.
It galled him that converting the world’s oppressed working people to communism had to take a back seat to defeating the vile fascists who were now led by the odious Himmler. The Nazis had broken the treaty with the USSR, invaded, slaughtered, raped, and plundered. They had nearly brought communism and the Soviet Union to ruin.
Both Field Marshal Georgi Zhukov and Foreign Minister Vacheslav Molotov sat in scarcely disguised terror as Stalin’s cold eyes fixed on them. They were in a large and ornate office in the Kremlin, one that had once served the Czar Nicholas II and other Romanov nobility. If anyone thought their presence in the home of the czars was incongruous, they didn’t mention it. Zhukov and Molotov had begun to sweat. Stalin had murdered thousands of military officers and politicians. Two more wouldn’t matter.
Physically, Stalin was a small man with a peasant’s habit of smoking cheap cigarette tobacco in his pipe, resulting in a noxious cloud of smoke around him. He was crude and undereducated despite having spent time in a Russian Orthodox seminary.
“Comrade Molotov,” Stalin said flatly and coldly, “is it true that the Hitlerites have initiated contact with Sweden regarding the Swedes their functioning as a broker for peace?” He smiled without warmth. “Or should we now call the Germans Himmlerites?”
Molotov smiled wanly at Stalin’s small joke. “It is true, Comrade Stalin, although nothing appears to be
