Himmler's War

CHAPTER 12

Bill Stover had gotten his promotion to first lieutenant, received a Distinguished Flying Cross for his part in killing Hitler, and, best of all, now had his own B17 and was now flying in formation with a hundred other bombers over Germany.

At first he’d been annoyed that mousy little Phips had gotten all the glory and the publicity while he, his copilot, the man who’d actually urged him to drop the bombs, was basically forgotten. When the crew went on a bond tour, it was Phips who got the cheers while the rest got polite applause. When women threw themselves at the scrawny pilot, his faithful copilot got the leftovers, which, he’d laughingly decided, wasn’t all that bad a fate. That life, however, quickly bored him.

Bill Stover, age 24, basically was not a jealous man and, when logic took over, he sincerely wished Phips good luck. All Stover wanted to do was get back in a B17. He’d volunteered for the air force so he could fly and fight, not hustle war bonds from civilians. He’d pestered his superiors and finally gotten his wish. He was back with the Eighth Air Force and flying a B17, the sweetest bomber in the world.

This was his third mission over Germany and he’d laughingly told his new buddies that it was two and a half more than he’d had in the Mother’s Milk ’s historic one and only bombing run.

The morning’s briefing had raised a concern. Intelligence had apparently picked up indications that the krauts were going to try something new. As a result, the number of P51 fighter escorts had been increased. Stover felt quite comfortable with that idea, and, regardless what happened, he’d vowed that he would never break formation like the incredibly lucky Phips had. Germany was below him and bombers were arrayed on all sides of his plane.

He stiffened. Something was happening. He focused his concentration on the increasingly strident radio chatter from the escorting fighters indicating that a small number of German fighters was headed for them. “Holy shit, look at them,” a voice said in a not very military manner.

“Jets,” another voice said and Stover’s blood ran cold. He’d heard that jets existed and that they could fly at incredible speeds. His own plane’s machine guns started chattering at something he couldn’t see. And then he could, and then it was gone in a shrieking second. At the same time, his plane shuddered. It’d been hit. His outer left engine had been shredded, pieces were flying off as it and his left wing were disintegrating.

Slowly and with apparent dignity, the wing collapsed and the plane began a slow death spiral. Stover ordered everybody to jump, but it was almost impossible as centrifugal force pinned them to the hull. Finally, Stover clawed his way to a hatch and pushed two of his men out into the wind. He couldn’t see the rest of his crew. He hoped they’d gone. He couldn’t wait. The ground was coming up far too fast.

Stover jumped and felt the blast of cold air grab him and spin him. He missed the bomber’s tail by a few feet. Seconds later, he opened his parachute and watched as his bomber sped downwards and corkscrewed itself into the ground. The bombs exploded with a mighty blast. He looked around as he descended. The rest of his formation was disappearing and the German jets, if that’s what they were, had also vanished.

He landed awkwardly and he felt his right leg snap. He screamed and was dragged by his chute until he managed to overcome the agony from his leg and free himself. He lay there for a few minutes fighting off the waves of nauseating pain and trying to compose himself.

Stover heard voices and, a few moments later, several German civilians were gathered over him. “ Bitte, ” he said. He thought it meant please. “ Kamerad, ” he tried again.

The civilians glared at him with undisguised hatred. Here was one of the American murderers who was savaging their cities and massacring innocent family members.

One of the German men leaned over and spat in his face, and a woman kicked him in his obviously injured leg. Stover screamed and they laughed. A man with a pitchfork stuck it into his other thigh and twisted. Stover writhed and tried to evade further jabs. It was futile and the pain from repeated stabs nearly made him unconscious. He screamed some more and the German civilians cheered. “Now you suffer like we do,” one of them said in English.

An authoritative voice stopped them. A man in a uniform, probably a cop, Stover thought, looked down on him with contempt. He barked some orders and the men picked him up without care for his injured legs and he screamed again. He continued to scream when they threw him in the back of a truck, and finally he passed out when they drove down the rutted road.

Miles away and thousands of feet in the sky, Lieutenant General Adolf Galland, “Dolfo” to his friends, flew alongside Major Walter Nowotny who commanded the ME262 squadron. It had been a most worthwhile test run. Of course, some would say that generals should not fly in combat, but Galland was sick and tired of desk duty and he’d flown the ME262 on test runs before.

This fine day, he’d bagged a P51 fighter and a B17 bomber without any damage to his plane and Nowotny had killed two fighters and damaged a bomber. The jet could go more than twice the speed of the Flying Fortress and a hundred miles an hour faster than the fighter escorts.

Sadly, it would be a while before the ME262 appeared over Germany in any great numbers. Aircraft manufacture of any kind had been slowed by the damned Allied bombers. The plane was designed to destroy the bombers and obviously could slaughter them in great numbers. There was a shortage of jet fuel, too, although there were more than enough qualified pilots to fly the few jets the Luftwaffe possessed.

Still, many of the best and brightest Luftwaffe pilots had been killed in the war and replacement pilots from service in other planes were scantily trained, little more than cannon fodder for the Americans who shot them down as fast as they went up.

Perhaps, Galland thought with a smile, the situation would require him to spend more time in a cockpit.

Beetle Smith was in his normal lousy mood. “Granville, please tell me you know what the hell is going on because nobody else around here does.”

Colonel Tom Granville took a seat and adjusted the folders he’d brought. He knew everything in them, but their physical presence reassured him. Smith was a harsh and demanding leader on a good day, and this wasn’t a good day.

“Regarding the jets, it’s easy, General. The ME262 is something we’ve known about for a long time. It was inevitable that the krauts would introduce it, and they have a number of other new planes being developed, including a rocket plane that’s a real pilot killer, the ME163 Comet, and another jet, the Heinkel 162, which they refer to as the Salamander. Of the group, the 262-it’s called the Swallow, by the way-is by far the most formidable if only because they are beginning to make them in numbers that are large for German war production, although quite small in comparison with ours. We picked up a message that Galland himself flew one of the planes involved in that attack on our bombers, and that he referred to the jet as an ‘angel.’ He also said it was worth five ME109’s. We should thank our lucky stars, or our air force pilots who have been bombing their factories, that the Germans are unable to produce them in any real quantity.”

“Shit. Tell me again what we’ve got in the way of jets to counter the ME.”

Granville sighed. “Not much. The British are introducing something called the Meteor, but it’s nowhere near as fast as the 262, and we’ve got the P80 but it’s a long ways away from entering the field. Apparently it’s killing more of our pilots than anyone likes.”

“Fantastic. So what is the air force going to do now?”

“They are going to saturate the skies with fighter escorts, mainly P51’s. The air force believes we will win a battle of attrition if only because we outnumber them so vastly.”

“And that will be a great comfort to the widows and other family members of those killed.”

“General, the air force does have other tactical plans. The German jets guzzle fuel, so they have to land and gas up fairly frequently. The idea is to follow them and either shoot them down when they slow down to land, or hit them on the ground, or bomb the crap out of the airfields so they can’t take off or land.”

“I guess it’s better than our boys lining up to be shot at,” Smith said, again grumpily. “Now, what the hell is going on with the French and what the hell are the Russians up to? All I’m getting is word that the French commies are rioting and that the Soviet advance is slowing and we don’t need either to happen, not for one damn minute.”

“General, we’re trying to pin things down, but nothing looks very good. In fact, it could wind up being real, real bad.”

Jack flew the Piper in lazy circles around the barn a thousand feet below while Snyder called out information that was largely superfluous. The American tanks were pounding the building. For reasons known only to them, a handful of German soldiers had opened fire on the head of the 74th’s column. A Jeep and a half-track had been damaged and two men lightly wounded, but now the barn, yet another old stone structure, was surrounded and being blasted to pieces by a platoon of tanks. Although he could not tell the difference from the sky, he knew that the American tanks were Jeb’s and now had the higher velocity 76mm guns that could knock out most German tanks. Unfortunately, they still had inadequate armor and were vulnerable to both German tanks and antitank guns.

“Can’t have everything,” Jeb Carter had said. “And by the way, keep yourself out of my cousin’s pants.”

They’d had the conversation that morning. “Got nowhere near her pants, or any other part of her clothing or anatomy,” Jack had responded in mock anger. “Even though she’s related to you, she’s got more class than to allow that.”

Jack was well aware that the relationship was by marriage not blood. “I’ve seen her naked,” Jeb volunteered, shocking both Jack and Levin. “Of course she was two and I was about four. Still, she said she was impressed with the state of my manhood even at that young age. Sadly, I thought she was a little flatchested.” He declined to add that he’d seen her half naked just a few years ago when she was much older.

Jack flew lower to see the damage being done to the barn. As he did, Snyder caught motion and suggested they reverse course and fly higher. “Good catch, Snyder,” he said and keyed his radio to the ground. “Jeb, you’ve got a handful of German tanks coming right at you.”

Carter chortled. “How many in a handful? Some of my cracker relatives got eight webbed fingers on a hand.”

“Four tanks and one scout vehicle and, oh shit, I think they’re Panthers.” He flew low, almost at ground level and picked up the distinct slope to the hull and turret. “Confirmed, Jeb, they’re Panthers.”

Carter swallowed, or tried to. His mouth was suddenly dry. The five man Panther weighed nearly forty-five tons, but, more importantly carried a high velocity 75mm gun as its main weapon, and its sloping front was heavily armored and virtually impervious to many American weapons. Now it was time to find out what the Sherman’s new 76mm gun could do. Many other U.S. units had fought the Panther with mixed results. In most cases, the German tanks had inflicted serious damage and withdrawn.

The Germans were in sight and Morgan again confirmed that they were the dreaded Panthers. Now they were just within range. “Open fire,” Carter ordered.

All four of his tanks shot, but, at long range, only one hit, and that shell bounced off the glacis, or sloping frontal hull. We’re in trouble, Carter thought. He’d also fired way too soon and cursed himself for the mistake.

The Panthers fired and one of Carter’s tanks was hit. The shell penetrated the tank’s armor and it began to burn almost immediately. Jeb heard the explosions but was too focused on his immediate front to care about the other tank and its crew. Carter’s tank fired and again the shell bounced off the glacis.

“Damn it to hell,” Carter swore. Even with improved guns, the Panther’s front armor was impervious to the Sherman. The reports were right, only a hit on the side or a damned good shot on the turret would stop a Panther.

A second Sherman was hit and damaged. Carter called for reinforcements and the remainder of his twelve-tank company responded rapidly. The Germans saw them and decided they’d had enough. They began to back away. Carter’s tank fired again; this time the gunner’s aim was true, hitting a Panther’s turret. Smoke and fire billowed from it. Carter was about to cheer when his own tank was rocked by a hit, hurling him against the turret’s wall. Smoke filled the compartment.

“Abandon ship,” he yelled, coughing violently from the smoke. The order was probably unnecessary. Everyone knew to get the hell out once fire started. He tried to open the turret hatch but it was stuck. Jesus, he thought as he fought off panic, I am going to burn to death.

Carter slid down through the smoke to the belly of his tank. The bottom hatch was open and one of his crew was already escaping that way. Carter called out and heard no one else. He hoped they were all gone. If not, their life expectancy was now in seconds. He slid down and crawled out behind his immobile tank, hoping that he wasn’t going to be machine-gunned. When he was far enough away and thought he might be safe, he stood up and watched the remainder of his force moving carefully in the direction of the Germans who could no longer be seen.

“Anybody call for air support?” he yelled. His voice was hoarse from inhaling smoke.

“They’re coming,” was the answer.

“Yeah,” he said. “Once again a day late and a dollar short.” Worse, they’d just had their first real taste of fighting the best tank the Germans had and it had just clobbered the best tank the U.S. had, the up-gunned Sherman.

“This is going to be a long fucking war,” he said to no one in particular.

Colonel Otto Skorzeny stood at attention. Both Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler and Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt waved him to a seat. Skorzeny smiled inwardly at the fact. Which of them, he wondered, was truly in charge? And who would still be standing when this damned war was over, Himmler the snake or Rundstedt the warrior? Never bet against the snake, he decided.

Himmler smiled. “Colonel, we have several important and discrete tasks for you. I’ve been told you speak both English and French, true?”

“Yes, but not as fluently as a native.”

Himmler smiled. “No, we would not think of passing you off as one. Do you also speak Russian?”

“A very little,” he admitted, “but I am certain I could improve on my skills.”

“An excellent idea,” said Rundstedt. “In the meantime, we wish you to develop separate detachments of men who can speak English, Russian, or French, or, perhaps, all of them. And in these cases, the men must be fluent enough to fool the natives, so to speak.”

Skorzeny paused for a moment, thinking. “Finding large numbers of men who can, as you say, fool the natives, will be very difficult, if not impossible. Many of my men who have those language skills from living in other countries have now lived in the Reich so long that they’ve picked up accents or forgotten old idiom, or are unaware of current ones. The Americans, for instance, ask questions about current baseball standings if they are suspicious of someone, and most of my English speakers don’t even know the rules of the game, or they learned their English in England where they know even less about it.”

“As do I,” Rundstedt said dryly, and even Himmler smiled.

“Although, there are times when an English accent is often a good excuse for not knowing about American trivia,” Skorzeny said. “In fact, Americans are almost childishly impressed with an intelligent sounding British accent.” His mind was racing with possibilities. What on earth did they want him to do?

“What would be feasible,” Skorzeny continued, “is to establish certain levels of language skills, such as Class A for the handful of those who could pass as natives, Class B for those larger numbers who are fluent but have accents and lack knowledge of minutiae, and Class C for that largest group who are fluent enough to understand and be understood, and read newspapers, bulletins, menus, etc.”

“Excellent,” said Himmler.

“Since it is obvious that these people would be intended to operate behind enemy lines, the Class A types would be the ones who would actually come into contact with the enemy, while the others would avoid it as much as possible. It goes without saying that they would need appropriate clothing, uniforms, identification, and equipment.”

Himmler beamed while von Rundstedt nodded. “Colonel,” said Himmler, “all that will be done. In the near future, we will have several assignments for you. First you are to deliver a package, human, to the Soviets. Second, you are to disrupt matters in France as much as possible, and last, think about how you would deliver an extremely large bomb or two into the heart of the enemy.”

Skorzeny thought quickly. Disrupting the French would be no problem. They were in a state of near anarchy already. “I assume you want the French communists blamed for those disruptions, which would result in a heavy-handed response by de Gaulle and the fools around him.”

“Indeed,” said Himmler, again pleased by Skorzeny’s intelligence.

“As to delivering a human package to the Reds, would the package have to be still living, or even intact? For instance, would just a head be satisfactory?”

The field marshal turned away in disgust while Himmler beamed. “We will check on that, now what about the bombs?”

“How large, Reichsfuhrer?”

“Assume five tons each.”

Skorzeny whistled. What on earth could weigh that much? “When and where?”

“Several months, and let’s assume Moscow and New York,” Himmler said. Von Rundstedt looked surprised.

“It can be done,” Skorzeny said. Nothing surprised him anymore. He was confident about delivering a bomb to Moscow, but New York? Despite what he’d just said, he would have to think about it.

“Then go and work on it,” Himmler said and dismissed the scarred colonel, who saluted and left them.

“I wasn’t aware that Heisenberg was that far along with his work,” Rundstedt said when they were alone. He was thinking of Varner’s last report on the matter.

“He isn’t, but he will be. He is too much of a scientist with his checking and rechecking until everything is perfect. He will be informed that he must race to completion and if that means taking shortcuts, even dangerous ones, then so be it. If he loses some of his precious physicists in the process, then they will be casualties in our war. Heisenberg can no longer think of himself as working in a lab. He must begin to realize that he is a soldier in the trenches and the enemy is coming at him. He must stop them now, and not a year or two from now when everything is perfect and he can say ‘eureka’ and astound the scientific world, perhaps winning a second Nobel Prize. He will also understand that he and his family will be forced to pay the price of his failures should he not succeed.”

Rundstedt nodded silently. He wondered if Heinrich Himmler had any idea just what the hell he was talking about.

Jessica heard the groans while she was still out in the hallway. She paused and was tempted to go somewhere else while Monique and Master Sergeant Charley Boyle completed their usual noisy mating ritual. Nuts, she thought. She was tired and, besides, her money was paying for the apartment.

She quietly entered the apartment and tiptoed past Monique’s bedroom. The door was open and she stopped. Boyle was on top of Monique. He was a stocky man with reddish hair on his back. She wondered if Jack had a hairy back. Monique’s legs were wrapped around her lover’s waist. He was thrusting inside her while his hands grabbed her breasts. Monique’s hands were on Boyle’s buttocks, pushing him ever deeper inside her while they both groaned and sighed.

Jessica tore her eyes from the scene and quickly went to her room, quietly closing the door behind her. She took off her dress, and cleaned her face, arms, and shoulders from a bowl of water. She thought about what she’d just seen. Vive la France, she thought. Jessica had never before seen people making love, if that’s what it really was. A few years back, she’d had the chance to see a smutty movie that cousin Jeb had gotten from his friends, but had passed on it. He’d later admitted it involved some foreign people and the film quality was really bad.

“And the people were ugly, too,” he’d added.

My education is sadly lacking, Jessica concluded. She wondered about Jack’s and thought she knew about Jeb’s. He’d bedded several of her friends who had told her what a wonderful experience it was. These comments had led her to let Jeb take a few liberties with her until they’d both called a halt to it.

Monique knocked and walked in. “My beloved sergeant is gone, if you haven’t noticed. Did you enjoy the view?”

Jessica was not abashed. If Monique had wanted privacy, she should have closed the door. “It was intriguing.”

Monique laughed. “Intriguing? Now you sound like an Englishwoman. It would have been truly intriguing if you’d brought your Jack Morgan up here and romped on your bed, with the both of you squealing with pleasure like Charley and I did. You should have, you know. Life is too short and sometimes people make it too damned complicated. There’s a war going on and we’d all better enjoy it while we can.”

Jessica and Monique had had this conversation before and Jessica had explained that, first, she wasn’t ready to have sex with Jack or anyone else for that matter, and, second, American women didn’t usually jump into the sack with someone they’d just met. Monique had said that was a shame because they were missing so much time and pleasure. She’d then gotten Jessica to admit she’d never gone all the way, and that some reasonably heavy petting had been about it. Monique again thought that was a terrible waste.

“You’re lovely and you have a wonderful figure, why don’t you use it?” she’d said. “Someday you’ll be old and wrinkled and no one will want you. Use it now, while you can still enjoy it.”

Why not indeed, Jessica had thought, although she figured she had more than a few years to go before she’d be old and withered. But Monique had a point. Jack could be dead at any time, and bombs were falling around Paris although, so far, its status as an open city had been sustained and kept it from damage even though the Allies now occupied it.

It was time to change the subject. “What do you mean about complications?” Jessica asked.

“I told my sergeant to go away and not come back,” she said sadly. “That was a farewell lay.”

“Good grief, Monique, why?”

“Because he is a thief and a crook and is going to get arrested. And that means anyone close to him might be arrested as well.”

“Ah.”

“Ah, indeed. Recall all the food and other things he got me, much of which I sold and sent back home to help with my son? Well, all of it was stolen. I thought as much, but I closed my eyes to it. My sergeant and a bunch of others are stealing from the U.S. Army and now the MP’s are investigating it. He is debating turning in others in return for a light sentence and came to me to tell me to get rid of what I might still have and be ready to answer some questions. He will doubtless lose his stripes and probably have to go to jail. He may be dishonorably discharged, but he may also be sent to a combat unit as a private. Either way, he is dead to me. I will miss him. He was a competent lover and a great purveyor of luxury items.”

Jessica had heard rumors from her uncle that some GI’s in the supply units were pilfering large quantities of supplies and selling them on the black market. A little thievery was common enough when temptation presented itself and, as Tom had said, who counts paper clips and pencils? Still, stealing to provide one’s self with creature comforts was one thing, but this level of thievery was much more ambitious. Jessica was glad that the apartment was in her name and that she could prove where the money came from.

“Monique, I’m sorry.”

“So am I,” she said with a mocking pout. “Now it will take me weeks to find a replacement for him.”

Jim Byrnes’ career in the United States government had been varied, even spectacular, although he’d been denied his nation’s highest honor, the presidency. And, at age 65, he knew it would never happen. He’d been a congressman from his native state of South Carolina and then a justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. He had stepped down as a Justice in order to head the War Mobilization Board for his good friend, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He’d also been born a Catholic, which offended many Protestants, and then converted to Episcopalian, which offended Catholics, thus making him unelectable to national office.

Still, the President trusted him and liked to use him for unofficial duties like the one he was pursuing today. Andrei Gromyko, the gloomy looking Soviet ambassador to the United States awaited him in a conference room in the uninspiring red stone castle that was the Smithsonian Institute. Gromyko was much younger than Byrnes and was considered a rising star, a Red Star, Byrnes thought whimsically.

Typically, Gromyko came right to the point. “Why do you wish to speak to me, Mr. Byrnes?”

And a bright good morning to you too, James F. Byrnes thought. “We would like to know what is happening to your army. It seems to have disappeared,” he said dryly.

“I don’t understand,” Gromyko said, either ignoring or not understanding the sarcasm. “We are fighting bravely and enduring casualties on your behalf.” Gromyko was known to be a stubborn negotiator.

“Ambassador, your vaunted Red Army does not appear to be moving. What has happened to your great advances and even greater victories?”

“The Red Army continues to fight. As you are aware, the Germans are now fighting far more intelligently than in the past. I believe your own forces are discovering this unpleasant fact in France. The Red Army’s senior commander, Marshal Zhukov, has informed our high command, the Stavka, that the army is exhausted. It requires far more in the way of supplies and manpower; thus, a period of relative rest is required. However, do not fear, the pace will increase once the situation improves.”

Byrnes continued in his soft Southern drawl. “In the meantime, the American army bears the brunt of fighting the Nazis. We are seeing German units in France that had been in Russia until recently.”

Ultra was providing disheartening information that numerous other German units were moving from the Soviet front to France. Aerial reconnaissance, along with captured enemy soldiers was confirming this.

Gromyko laughed unpleasantly. “Now you know what it is like to fight alone, even temporarily. From 1939 until now, Russia stood alone while your country dithered. My people bled. Our soldiers were killed and maimed, our cities ruined, our women raped, and all the while you Americans slept snug in your beds.”

Byrnes bristled. The accusation, however truthful, was unfair. The American people weren’t going to go to war against anybody until the Japanese had conveniently attacked Pearl Harbor and Germany subsequently and foolishly declared war on the United States. FDR had correctly identified Germany as the greater evil and had ordered the military focus to be against Hitler, even though there had been fierce opposition to that decision by those who felt that Japan should be defeated first. They both knew that an American focus on Japan would have meant defeat for Russia, and perhaps even Great Britain.

“It takes time to prepare an army,” Byrnes said, “and we were separated from the war in Europe by an ocean, whereas you had the Nazis by the throat. In Teheran, less than a year ago, we promised a cross channel invasion this spring and we have done it. We expected to be marching in lock step with you, and not have you giving the Germans a respite.”

Gromyko nearly sneered. “I concede that, however late, your army has arrived. But it is nowhere near the size of ours or that of the Germans confronting us. Your invasion of France is, for all intents and purposes, a sideshow.”

Byrnes nearly gasped at the insult. “Our army is large, getting larger, and will continue to grow, as will the amount of aid we are giving you. Our concern is that the Red Army isn’t fighting.”

Gromyko was clearly unimpressed. “I will relay your concerns. However, I will also remind you that General Winter was a Russian ally when the Hitlerites invaded, but is now a friend of the Germans. Winter in Poland might not be as severe as it is in Russia, but waging war in ice and snow and mud is still an extremely difficult enterprise.”

Byrnes reluctantly but silently concurred. “Then please add this. We are working hard and our people are in great danger in order to send supply convoys to the Soviet Union. Those supplies could just as well be used by our own soldiers as yours.”

Gromyko stood. His expression was one of controlled anger. “As I said, I will convey your concerns.”