Schwerpunkt: From D-Day to the Fall of the Third Reich (31 page)

The order was received by the Polish Commander at 2:00 in the morning and the Poles complied. Maybe they were seeing this as their opportunity to kick the shit out of the Germans who had literally kicked the shit out of Poland. They were ready. Maybe too ready. The first report came in saying they were leaving before they even got their fuel and ammunition resupplied. The first reports we received were that the Poles had been led to the wrong location and that they found themselves sufficiently behind enemy lines so as to be intermingled with the escaping Germans. Though I don’t think anyone knew it at the time, it was later discovered that these escaping Germans were the 2
^nd
Panzer Division which was none other than the German division who had fought and decimated many Polish towns five years earlier. Divine Intervention for Divine Retribution? I’d have to say yes, given what we eventually learned had happened.

We kept waiting to see how much progress the Canadians and Poles on the northern jaw of this pincer were making. We continually received reports that the Canadians were running into heavy resistance which slowed them down. We kept receiving reports that the Poles were running into heavy resistance which slowed them down. But with Patton just sitting there waiting for Monty’s troops who weren’t setting any world records getting to their objective, I don’t know why Monty didn’t allow the southern jaw to move towards the northern one since the northern one was sure not moving towards the southern one. I’m not saying the Canadians and Poles didn’t meet up with heavy enemy fire, I’m just saying that since they were otherwise engaged, why didn’t he let the southern jaw close the gap? Patton could have completed the encirclement himself, but he was ordered to halt at Argentan. The powers commanding the show said it was because of a fear of friendly fire disasters but isn’t that why God created radios?

We had been bombing the town of Falaise in preparation for further action for a while now. Falaise was a railway center and had been a town filled with Krauts and much of their communication equipment. These communication and railroad targets were critical to us because the way we figured it, if the goddamn Krauts were able to rattle the bushes and bring more reinforcements to bear just by picking up their phones and then sending them to the hot spots by trains, we were dead ducks. We had to knock these things out as quickly as we could. The only thing is, reports had come in that over 100 civilians have been killed in Falaise. The same thing but worse happened in St. Lo where over 300 civilians were killed by our bombs, just on DDay. Even more perished as the fighting went on. And on. And on.

We dropped pamphlets whenever we could, notifying the townspeople to leave their homes. But too many people didn’t pay close enough attention or there were SNAFUs. I heard that in one town, the pamphlets were dropped something like 12 miles away. Even so, I guess that if I saw that kind of a warning dropped from an airplane, I’d think twice about leaving the entirety of my worldly goods and just chucking it all away too. It’s gut wrenching though, to think about what we just call “collateral damage.” I know everyone is sick about it because it’s not just here that this kind of tragedy happens. Caen had thousands of innocents killed as did the towns all along the beaches. We signed up for this; these townspeople did not. I hope they see from heaven that we had to do it to keep those goddamn Krauts from ruling the world, the sons of bitches. I hope there’s a special corner in hell for every one of those goddamn Nazis. Am I bitter? Nah, not too much. And then when I think about the hundreds of Londoners the Krauts have killed with their bombs, I have to say I don’t have too big a conflict about our bombers bombing the ever-living shit out of Germany. It gives them a taste of their own medicine plus it keeps some of the Kraut soldiers busy defending their goddamn “Fatherland.” Still, it stinks. An innocent is an innocent.

Back around Falaise, about 100,000 German soldiers found themselves in what was normally a valley of almost indescribable beauty. Between August 17
^th
and August 20
^th
though, as we unleashed as much stopping power as we could on the Jerries, this beautiful Dives Valley was a place of almost indescribable carnage and death. The escaping Germans were trying to bring as much of their men and materiel out through the only road available to them in the small opening in the gap between Monty’s and Patton’s troops and they were getting pounded while they tried. At the one crossroad, it was reported that the Jerries were bringing everything from armored trucks, to horses, to bicycles, to men through. With all this congestion and apparently very aware that they were very soon to be virtually surrounded by British, French, American, Canadian and Polish armies, they were hustling to get as much out as they could while the going was good. But when the Krauts got between Coudehard and Mont Ormel by the town of Falaise, they were facing the Polish 1
^st
Armored Division who quite simply annihilated their withdrawing column in what was reported to be a matter of minutes. Not only that, but we knew that the columns of these “would be escapers” were being riddled by British aircraft as well. There was nothing for these bastards to do but escape or die trying.

The firepower we brought to bear effectively closed the last escape route they had but didn’t those sons of bitches try a counter-attack in order to reopen the gap?! Once that exercise in futility was extinguished, the gap was completely and finally closed. So what happened was, even though we caused a whole lot of death and destruction to the Hun, we didn’t “Stalingrad” them...we didn’t get them into a pocket they couldn’t get out of. By August 20
^th
, the Canucks and Poles finally met up with the Americans right outside Chambois and the pocket was sealed. But by then, thousands of Krauts had already escaped although just as many were killed or taken prisoner.

The Battle at Falaise involved so many tanks shooting at so many other tanks and troops that eventually it was determined that over the two weeks of fighting, the road out of the gap was strewn with dead soldiers, dead horses, disabled vehicles and destroyed tanks. Hundreds of them. Our later analyses showed that it cost the Germans 10,000 killed and 40,000 taken prisoner. 50,000 were able to escape. Still, that’s about another 50,000 enemy we won’t have to worry about anymore and only God knows if those figures are even correct. Ike wants to go see this indescribably gruesome battle sight but we are trying to talk him out of it. Knowing Ike, though, he’ll be there within days.

Whatever the number actually killed or captured, we found that we were taking prisoners from 13 German divisions. I heard that we completely destroyed something like 25 divisions of the Jerry Army. I wonder how many more we got to wipe out before they see the handwriting on the wall. I’d love to be home for the Holidays.

As bad as the Krauts had it, we learned that the Poles really had it worse. They started with over 1,550 men and returned from the battle at Falaise and Mont Ormel with only 114 able bodied men still fit enough to fight another day. We’ve rarely seen more heroic fighters than the Poles. They’ve got a lot an awful lot of hate in them right now since their country is virtually in flames.

Mail came in today and there were a couple of interesting letters. By mistake, one letter was forwarded here but it is not in English. I asked Walter who is Polish, if he recognized the language and he said it was written by a son to his mother back in Poland. He translated the letter for me.

Dear Mama:

I am in heaven and I am in hell. My position is on a high hill. This is heaven. I am ordered to kill every German soldier I see from my position on this hill. This is hell. It is not hell to kill the enemy who has taken our country and who kills everyone so easily, it is hell because there are so many of them and I keep pulling the trigger to kill more. It is easy to kill them for me now because if I don’t kill them, they will kill me and I want to come home to see you again. You will need a strong son to take care of you. I hope you are safe and I hope to see your kind face again.

Your loving son,

Gregor

In this same batch was a letter from a French girl.

Dear General Eisenhower,

My name is Emilie Therese and I am now 14 years old. My family and I used to live in St. Laurent, France. Our town is right on the beach where we used to swim and play. I just wanted to tell you thank you for saving our country and for saving our lives because one day we found the papers dropped from your airplanes but my papa did not want to leave our home on our farm. He said that there was no bomb that had the name of our house on it and he refused to leave. My mama said he should think of his family before his farm but he still refused. Then, on what I now know was the day before the great day of liberation, I heard bombs dropping near my house and far away from my house. I saw the bombs dropping everywhere. We quickly knew something was happening but we didn’t know exactly what so we turned on our crystal radio set which I was told never to tell anyone about. We took out the pamphlets we collected from the airplanes and we read them again. We huddled around our tinny radio. We could barely make out what was being said but we heard the BBC telling all of us still living in our homes along the beaches to leave our houses immediately. Now we knew something different was really happening! The radio told us to gather our friends and neighbors and get out of our houses. They said not to go on the main roads and they said not to make ourselves a big target by traveling in large groups. I didn’t understand what this meant but my mama explained that in large groups, we might look like soldiers from the airplanes. Once we heard the planes and the bombs and once we saw the boats and all the soldiers, it became a bit easier for papa to be persuaded to leave. My mama and grandpere finally talked him into leaving. We walked for several days and finally reached my aunt’s house. We have been staying with her for two months but then because she had no more food for us and because my papa wanted to go back to protect our house and farm, we went back but we went back to nothing. As sad as we are that our house is no longer standing, we are happy still because the Germans have left. I was told that you and Monsieur Churchill were the men who saved us. I wanted to write to tell you Merci for all the soldiers you sent and ask that you tell each one of them that we are very happy we no longer have to live with any more German soldiers. I hope that all of the other towns in France can also be happy that there are no more Germans living with them too.

Your Friend,

Emilie Therese

I guess that unless the Germans finally decide they don’t need to conquer every last square inch of Europe, I won’t be home by Christmas.

The Germans fought under three Field Commanders in Normandy: General Rommel, General von Kluge and General Model. Erwin Rommel was implicated in the plot to kill Hitler and, afraid of turning him into a heroic martyr, Hitler gave him the choice of taking poison quietly, leaving his wife and son with their good name and pension or defending himself in a German Court where he would almost certainly be found guilty of attempted murder and treason. He took the poison and died in October, 1944. General von Kluge, also afraid he was discovered as a co-conspirator, was summoned to Hitler’s “Wolf’s Lair” at the Führer’s Rastenburg headquarters. General von Kluge committed suicide instead of going. He died in August, 1944.

After surviving the attempt on his life, Hitler’s distrust of his generals intensified and he angrily rejected even more of his generals’ arguments and counsel. Against the advice of all German generals save for the most sycophantic, Hitler ordered the Cotentin Peninsula to be retaken in a gamble to trap the Americans left in Brittany and around Avranches. Hitler’s “Mortain Offensive” backfired and the retreating Germans were encircled and decimated by the Allieds in what was called the Falaise Gap, the last major battle of the Normandy campaign and one of the bloodiest. 100,000 German troops found themselves encircled by Allied troops around Falaise. The Germans tried to retreat from Mortain but suffered a huge loss when their only means of escape was through a small opening which was closing tighter and tighter as the British, Canadian and Polish troops joined up with the Americans and the northern and southern jaws closed around them.

The German Battle to retain Normandy lasted approximately two and a half months and effectively ended on August 20, 1944 at Falaise. Five days later, Paris was liberated. Besides losing almost half of their fighting forces, they lost about one third of their dwindling supply of tanks and approximately 3,500 pieces of artillery by the end of the Battle in Normandy.

We have been fighting in northern France for two months now and it’s becoming obvious that der Führer is going to need even more significant flashes of genius to keep up the defense of Normandy in particular and France in general, especially as our front has been ripped apart. The enemy has cleared out of the bocage terrain that so favored us and they are now moving towards the open country where I’m sure our commanders are concerned that we will be sitting ducks. If the enemy tanks don’t get us first, their bombing and strafing airplanes will get us later. Several divisions of their tanks are out of the hedgerow territory and it is now only a matter of time before they are all on the open French roads. Everyone around here sees that it is going to be far more difficult to stop them, now that they are no longer hemmed in by those barriers.