Red Inferno

CHAPTER 28

Logan crawled on his belly behind Crawford. “Lieutenant, why the hell are we doing this? Didn’t anybody believe me?”

“If nobody believed you, we wouldn’t be out here crawling on our bellies like snakes. Your info was passed up all the way to General Miller himself and all he wants is confirmation.”

“So why do I have to go?” Crawford asked as he slithered forward under the barbed wire.

“Because, Corporal Dummkopf, you’re the one who found it and you’re the only one who knows where it is.”

They moved forward in the shallow ditch Crawford and others had dug weeks before. It enabled them to slide under their own wire and snoop around Russian areas. Their faces were darkened with mud and dirt, and dark cloth bands secured their clothing and kept their equipment from rattling. Logan thought they moved like ghosts but Crawford told him to stop making so much noise.

Finally, they were through the wire. They crouched low and moved slowly. Sudden motion in the night attracted attention. They reached a dirt road and Crawford signaled a halt.

“Now we crawl across?” Logan asked.

“Hell no, Lieutenant. Right now there are people awake and looking around but not for us. You try to sneak and you’ll stick out like a big red pimple on a fat girl’s ass. No, you and me we stand up and walk across like we lived here and had a right to.”

Logan swallowed and did as directed. His estimate of Crawford was rising. The little man from the piney woods knew exactly what he was doing. It was also a reason why von Schumann’s spies were ineffective in this case. German civilians in a built-up military area would be easily spotted and summarily executed.

“If we see anybody, we just walk casually in the other direction.”

Logan thought that was fair enough and started walking. “How much farther?”

“Little bit.”

Half an hour later, Crawford halted in a wooded area. “It begins here. They’re kind of spread out and there are men either in tents or sleeping on the ground, so we’re gonna go around the area and not through.”

Logan tried to make out the shapes in the night. Crawford was right. He’d found Russian tanks, lots of tanks. They moved around the tank park’s perimeter and made a rough estimate of close to a hundred tanks, many of them behemoths that could only be of the Stalin variety. The remainder were T34s. To date, they had confronted neither kind, only the older, smaller, and less-well-armored models. The Stalins and T34s spelled major-league trouble.

Crawford grabbed Logan’s shoulder and pointed. “See the roads, Lieutenant? They have to use the roads to get to us because the ground is so boggy. Big-ass tanks like those will get stuck otherwise. There’s lots of wooded areas down here, and I’ll bet if we chopped down a big bunch of trees near Potsdam we could slow them down a lot, maybe even get them to go where we want them to.”

Logan’s estimate of Crawford went up yet another notch. If the bombers couldn’t take out the tanks before they moved up, then artillery from Potsdam could straddle the roads as they got close. Regardless, it was imperative that General Miller get confirmation of Crawford’s discovery. They could notify the air force and begin zeroing in on the roads that led to Potsdam.

“Maybe we could mine the roads,” Logan said, and Crawford chuckled.

A woman’s scream pierced the night. She screamed again, groaned in agony, and whimpered. The raucous sound of men laughing followed.

“What the hell is that?” Logan asked.

“Some fucking Russian general. I think his name is Rednuts. He gets German women and that’s what happens. Heard it before. Kind of wonder what’s going on, but maybe I really don’t want to know.”

Jack agreed. It was time to get back inside the wire and report.

• • •

Harry Truman stared at the microphone on his desk and took a deep breath. He envied the late FDR’s calming voice and mellow tones. He knew he sounded tinny and had a tendency to speak too quickly and clip his words. Comedians and mimics were already having a field day with him. So be it. Sometimes their efforts were actually funny, although on some occasions it was merely spiteful. He thought it would be nice to punch one of the sons of bitches in the snoot.

The hell with them. He was president and they weren’t. The sound engineer signaled. He was on.

“Fellow Americans. I am taking these few moments to speak to you about the way the war with the Soviet Union is progressing. As you are aware, our boys are fighting bravely and well as they withdraw to more defensible positions. Despite the fact that we continue to withdraw, we are gradually winning this conflict and will continue fighting until final victory is ours.

“However, that is not the purpose of this address. Some of America’s enemies are planting the lie that we have signed a separate peace with Nazi Germany. This is absolutely false. There has been no treaty or understanding with the Nazis.

“Let me tell you what has actually happened. Before the savage and unprovoked attack on our boys by the Soviet Union, Germany was already fighting Russia and that has not changed. Germany continues to fight Russia, so, to that extent, she is on our side. Please recall the old saying that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Well, Germany’s enemy is now our enemy as well.

“During the past couple of months, we have taken possession of many excellent pieces of German equipment, including planes, tanks, and antitank weapons. We are using and will continue to use those captured weapons against the Russians. It just makes good sense and will save American lives. It also makes good sense to use captured German personnel to train American soldiers in their use. And, if that means German military personnel sometimes wind up fighting alongside Americans in a highly fluid military environment, then so be it. Our job and my duty is to end this war quickly and decisively. It would be sheer lunacy to be choosy when American lives are at stake.

“Please be assured that no SS, Gestapo, or suspected war criminals will be allowed to work with American soldiers and airmen.

“Does this mean that our policy of unconditional surrender regarding Germany is being reevaluated? Yes, it does. Following Russia’s brutal attack on us, any agreements previously made went down the drain. When the war is over, we will base treaties with Germany and other countries on current realities rather than the Soviet Union’s lies.

“Let everyone be assured that this does not mean that war criminals will go unpunished. They will be tried by an international court and the guilty will receive justice, which is not what is being meted out to the German people by the Soviets. The Russian armies are committing unspeakable acts of barbarity on the German civilians. They say that they are doing so because this is the way the SS acted in Russia. Yes, the German SS did behave brutally, raping and murdering innocent people, but what the Russians are doing is revenge, not justice. By torturing and killing innocent civilians, they are behaving like Mongol hordes, not a twentieth-century civilization. Justice will be meted out after a fair trial and not indiscriminately against innocent civilians.

“Finally, we will use every weapon at our disposal to bring this war to a successful conclusion, and I do mean every weapon.”

Truman took a sip of water as the radio people disconnected him. “Well,” he said to General Marshall, “do you think Uncle Joe understood me?”

Marshall smiled tightly. “We’ll find out, won’t we?”