Armageddon (83 page)

He was deposited a few blocks from the Press Club, and immediately called Sean, who was in the room at Reinickendorf. “You better get me to see General Hansen,” he said excitedly.

In the middle of the morning the Western governors, the Berlin commandants, and the German political leaders floundered without course. Popov and the Russians had trapped them. There was no choice but to wait and see.

General Trepovitch was selected to read the proclamation on People’s Radio the next day.

“There is no blockade of Berlin! The Soviet Union can no longer stand by idly and watch the Airlift aggression bring further suffering to the workers of Berlin. Your Soviet brothers hold out their open arms.

“Beginning Monday the people in the so-called American borough of Neukölln may cross to their brothers at the borough town hall of Treptow in the Soviet Sector and turn in your illegal ration cards and B marks. You will be issued a new ration book guaranteed by the Soviet Union giving you five hundred more calories of food a day. Your illegal B marks will be exchanged for regular marks at the rate of one to one.”

An awesome moment of decision had come! Every man and woman had to search deeply and alone to find his own answer. Face starvation in the winter; if you survive the winter ... what then? Continue to live in fear of another Russian onslaught of another kind? Perhaps direct invasion ... like the last one.

Would it not be better then to simply submit to survive and accept the Russian offer as the only way out of an impossible trap. The revenge would be horrible if the Russians were rejected.

The procedure was simple. On given days, citizens of a Western borough were to go to a neighboring Russian borough and exchange ration books and currency. There were over two million people in the Western Sector. The Soviets figured if only half of them crossed over initially the shaky city administration would collapse and the West would be hopelessly deluged by Russian marks.

In the Russian boroughs of Treptow, Freidrichshain, Pankow, Mitte, and Prenzlauer Berg they staffed for the onslaught!

The week of great decision came and went with no change in the life of Berlin. Two per cent of the people in Western Sectors changed to Russian rations.

Chapter Twenty-five

C
LINT
L
OVELESS STUDIED THE
list for repair or replacement of equipment. The top priority read: starters, landing lights, harnesses, inverters, indicator master gyro fluxgate compasses, ammeters, indicator gyro horizons, and on down to windshield wipers, transmitter oil pressure, propellers.

The general had had him at Erding to break the spare-parts repair bottleneck.

There was a knock on his door.

“Come in.”

Scott Davidson entered. “Hello, Scott.”

“I had to come to Headquarters on some other business and wondered if I could see you for a few minutes.”

“Sure.”

He pushed his paperwork aside and rubbed his eyes. Scott studied his office curiously. It was a wonderland of charts and maps.

MAJOR PROBLEM AREAS

PRIORITY PROJECTS

CAUSES OF PILOT FATIGUE

Scott had always seen the colonel as a guy on the general’s coattails, always looking green when he left the plane in Berlin. This first sight of his office gave him a sudden new respect.

“Sir,” Scott said, “I’ve just finished this report and wanted you to have a look at it.”

Clint took the folio. The cover read:
THUNDERSTORM FLYING
by Captain Scott Davidson, Chief Pilot, Airlift Wing, Provisional.

Clint made a sour face. “This is out of my line. All I know about it is that I hate it.”

“That’s just the point, Colonel. Before I submit it to the chief pilot here, I’d kind of like a layman’s opinion.”

Clint shrugged, put the folio on a stack of papers, and said he’d read it.

“Colonel, long as I happen to be here, I just happened to remember something else. You are in a hell of a position to do me a favor.”

“So?”

“Shall I get to the point?”

“By all means,” Clint said, handing him back the report on thunderstorm flying.

Scott smiled. “Sir ... I’d like an introduction to your housekeeper.”

“No.”

“But ...”

“I don’t want any of you crushed-hat bastards knocking her up. She’s too good a maid.”

“Colonel, I don’t have that in mind at all.”

“Then you must be queer.”

“The truth is that I met her once and well ... I was pretty damned crude. I’d like to make amends.”

Clinton Loveless had grave doubts about the sincerity of Scott Davidson. But what the hell ... trying to keep men away from Hilde was as ridiculous as ... trying to keep men away from Hilde. Furthermore, Clint flew with Scott and placed his life in the man’s hands too often to be uppity.

“Colonel, could I just happen to drop around your house, like for dinner ... or something?”

“Like maybe you’ve thought this over?”

“Well, sir, as a matter of fact, with me flying two runs a day to Berlin and all my paperwork, I’ve got limited time off.”

“Like when do you have in mind?”

“Like tonight ... Colonel?”

Clint was amused by Scott’s gall. “Cocktails are at six-thirty. I assume you’ve already cased my house and know how to find it.”

“Goddamn, Colonel, you’re a good troop.”

Judy thought Scott Davidson was adorable and just loved being part of the scheme. When Hilde served drinks in the living room she was introduced to the captain and matter-of-factly said she had met him. If she was uncomfortable about his sudden appearance, she did not show it.

“Won’t you join us for dinner, Captain?”

“Oh no, that would be putting you to too much trouble.”

“Nonsense.”

“Well ...”

“We insist, don’t we Clint.”

“We insist.”

“Hilde, set a place for Captain Davidson.” She nodded, went to the kitchen for her own dinner and to feed the children.

Scott waited until a reasonable time had passed in order to give proper attention to the hostess, then found a pretense to get into the kitchen.

Hilde was at the kitchen table joking with Tony and Lynn. Scott poured himself a glass of water, edged his way into the group, and quickly endeared himself to the children in the continuation of his outflanking her by having the family go crazy about him.

Tony and Lynn were sent off to put on their pajamas and study. Hilde flitted about the kitchen putting the final touches on the dinner as Judy and Clint discreetly remained in the living room with the martini mixer.

“Sure is a pleasant coincidence,” Scott said.

“I think not,” she answered.

“Look, I wanted to find you to tell you I’m sorry about the other night. We were tired and I just had too much to drink.”

“I don’t think you’re sorry.”

“I went to a lot of trouble to find you so I could show just how sorry I am.”

“What you are sorry about is that your ridiculous pride has been damaged. This trouble you are going to now is an attempt to redeem it.”

Hilde was neither amused, charmed, or swept up by him. The resistance was failing to melt on schedule for Scott Davidson.

“Can’t I have a clean slate?” he persisted.

Hilde set the bread knife down, wiped her hands on her apron. “This town is filled with easy girls who should be able to fill your appetite. You’re only going to damage your pride further if you attempt to see me.”

“You’re being too rough. I’m a lot of fun, Hilde.”

“Strange, Captain. I find you dull, spoiled, and immature.”

Nick Papas snapped his fingers together eagerly. It was the first bet he had ever collected from Scott. “Poop, Captain, poop.”

Scott peeled off five bills of ten-dollar military script.

“Fifty bucks.” Nick kissed the money with mock ecstasy. “Most beautiful bet I ever collected. Five O!”

“What’s up?” Stan Kitchek asked in amazement.

“I asked the captain to donate to buy candy bars for you to parachute to the kids in Berlin. Look what he did. He gave me fifty bucks.”

“Gee, Scott,” Stan Kitchek said with a catch in his throat, “that’s awful nice.”

Chapter Twenty-six

T
HE
B
ERLINERS’ REJECTION OF
Russian rations forced Marshal Popov to advance the timetable for the take-over of the city. They clamped down on the blockade runners, sending a half dozen of them to the firing squad. Harassment of Berliners at the checkpoints against the B marks reached a new high. And then an assault on the city government just short of all-out war!

Action Squads trained with military precision assembled in Marx/Engels Platz under the control of Russian officers in civilian disguise. They poured in, over five thousand strong, many in American lend-lease trucks.

They converged on the City Hall and the Magistrat buildings armed with clubs, knives, stones, carrying banners and slogans.

This was the tactic that crumbled freedom in Czechoslovakia. This was the replay of the Prague riots. The Action Squads broke into the buildings, smashed up offices, and left the main chambers in a shambles. American, British, and French liaison officers were beaten up and the phone lines to the Western Sectors were cut.

The riot grew! Neither the Russian Sector police or the Red Army were anywhere to be seen, allowing the Action Squads free hand. At the end of the day Oberburgermeister Hanna Kirchner was able to see General Trepovitch to demand protection.

The Russian shrugged. “I cannot keep the workers from staging a democratic demonstration. They hate the imperialist Airlift aggression. It is the free right of the workers to protest.”

The angry little lady came to her feet. “I never believed,” she spat, “there could ever again be anything as loathsome as the Nazis. The Soviet Union has won that honor.”

Trepovitch sprung to his feet.

“Go on, hit me,” she dared.

He dared not She spat on his desk and walked out.

The next day the “riots” continued.

Hanna Kirchner defiantly drove to her office, but the doors were now blocked by Red Army guards and she was not allowed to enter.

People’s Radio announced more Red Army guards were coming, explaining that the anger of the workers compelled the Soviet Union to protect the citizens of Berlin from their corrupt officials.

Andrew Jackson Hansen returned to his old posture as Eric the Red. He spewed a stream of oaths in frustration against the outrage. When Neal Hazzard and Sean were able to calm him down they entered a conference with the British and French to reach a mutual decision.

The third day of riots at the City Hall and Magistrat was allowed to continue. The Western commanders then contacted Hanna Kirchner and told her that the Berlin Assembly and Magistrat could continue operation in the Western Sectors of the city.

On the fourth day of riots, Oberburgermeister Hanna Kirchner called for the Assembly to come into session in the British Sector at the Student’s Haus on Seeinplatz.

People’s Radio retorted that night, “The workers of Berlin have been abandoned by flunkies carrying out the dirty work of the imperialists.”

Armed now with the “fact” that the Democrats, Christians, and Conservatives had “abandoned” their offices, the Soviets swept all non-Communists from borough offices in their sector, including three mayors. The Russians padlocked vital files at the Magistrat.

A massive shift of population and offices followed as members of the free parties fled to the new sanctuary of the West. Each day a new department of the government splintered off and opened new offices there. The climax was an assembly of sixteen hundred Communists at the Admiral Palast.

“The people of Berlin have been left to the mercy of the revenge seekers,” Rudi Wöhlman cried to his audience. “Look at the Magistrat and Assembly. They have been abandoned! This is the time to elect representation for the workers!”

This rump meeting of Communists by hand proclamation declared Heinz Eck as Oberburgermeister of “Free” Berlin. A new Magistrat now to be known as the Berlin Soviet was proclaimed without debate, protest, or formal vote.

In the beginning of September 1949, the Soviet Union had evaded an open election and split the city into two parts.

“My God!” Nelson Goodfellow Bradbury said, “my God!”

From his vantage point high in the shell of the gutted Reichstag he looked down on the Platz der Republik. The people had gathered to protest Russian atrocity.

A mass of humanity jammed the square; they were packed solid in the destroyed Tiergarten. The great Charlottenburger Chaussee was a solid bulk of people backed all the way to the Victory Column restored by the British. Berliners spilled over the area against the Brandenburg Gate where it touched the Russian Sector. There had never been a gathering like this. A half-million Berliners rose in anger.

Usually an orderly people, they became enraged when the Russians saw fit to change the guard at a monument which sat just inside the British Sector. The Berliners called it “Tomb of the Unknown Raper.” A student climbed the flag pole on the Brandenburg Gate and ripped the hammer and sickle from its mast. Only courageous action of the British guards prevented a full-scale uprising.

It rained and they were drenched, but it did not seem to matter. One by one the leaders came to the rostrum and defied the Soviet Union.

The great figure of Ulrich Falkenstein, hatless and refusing the protection of an umbrella, faced this unprecedented sea of human wrath. He had kept his sacred word to General Hansen. The people had held.

“Berliners!” his voice echoed through them in the midst of their ruin. “I have said that you were never Nazis. And I say now: Berliners will never be Communists!”

Chapter Twenty-seven

S
COTT
D
AVIDSON HAD FALLEN
upon hard times. First he ran into a new boss like Hiram Stonebraker. Now a rebuff by a German maid! ... No broad had ever called him dull!

Scott had accumulated four days’ leave. He and Nick went on an historic binge from Rüdesheim to Wiesbaden to Frankfurt to Mainz, which ended with Nick’s car sinking slowly in the Rhine River. And he had plenty of Schatzies ... six girls in four days.