“Congratulations Field Marshal.”
The newly promoted Guderian flipped his cap onto a hook and snorted. “It’ll look marvelous on my tombstone, don’t you think?”
Koenig didn’t know quite what to say, so remained tactfully silent. Rumors that the general would be promoted had been rampant, but it had just become official. Heinz Guderian finally had his field marshal’s baton.
Guderian continued, “So now I am joining such as von Runstedt, Rommel, and von Manstein.”
“They are all great generals, sir.”
“Indeed, although I have my doubts about Rommel. Also on the list of marshals is that drunken drug-addict Hermann Goering; Keitel, the ass-kissing toady; and von Paulus, the clerk who managed to win at Stalingrad because the Soviets collapsed. I will not say it is an empty honor because it is something I always wanted and felt that I deserved. However, the quality of marshal’s in the Reich has been diluted greatly.”
Koenig was stunned to hear Guderian talk like that. Now that he worked directly for the general as a personal aide and occasional driver, he and Guderian had gotten close, or at least as close as a high ranking general and a captain ever could be. Guderian had started using Koenig as a means of sounding off about his problems, but there had been nothing like this.
“Of course you never heard me say anything of the sort, did you, captain?”
“I heard nothing, sir, and I know even less.”
“Excellent, now what are the latest reports on the war with the Soviets?”
“According to Berlin, our troops are advancing steadily against determined last ditch efforts by remnants of Red Army forces.”
Guderian rubbed his eyes and sighed, “Which means that von Paulus is getting the shit kicked out of him. Soon, von Paulus will request permission to make a tactical withdrawal in order to reorganize his forces. The Fuhrer will deny it and the heavily augmented Sixth Army will be surrounded and then be overrun by the Red Army, which will be a catastrophe of the first order for the Reich. Indeed, it might even threaten the existence of the Reich. When threatened with the extinction of his army, Von Paulus will ask permission to surrender, which will also be denied. It will then be strongly implied that von Paulus should kill himself because German field marshals don’t surrender. And that, young captain, is why I said my new rank will look good on my tombstone.”
Koenig was shocked. “You would kill yourself, sir?”
“When I joined the army, I fully understood the risks and dangers involved. Death is part of our profession, although it is far better to inflict it than to endure it. While suicide might be preferable to spending a lifetime in the mines of Siberia, or even being hanged as a war criminal, killing myself is not on my agenda. Being killed in battle is acceptable but regrettable.”
He laughed. “That too would look good on my tombstone. Now, how is von Arnim?”
“I visited him this morning and there does seem to be some improvement. He may be conscious and he may be trying to speak. The doctors aren’t certain.”
“Which means he will not resume command in a hundred lifetimes. A shame. He is, or was, a decent general. And what of the air war? Is it safe to step outside?”
Koenig laughed. “Perfectly safe, at least for the moment. American planes have made several visits, but have caused no serious damage.”
“Good. Remind me to again pay my compliments to those in charge for the excellent job they did hiding our army. When Patton moves eastward again, as he must, we will be more than ready for him. We bloodied his nose the last time, even though we were forced back a few miles. This next time will be different, very different.”
Chapter Seventeen
Major General Lucian Truscott looked over Tom’s shoulder at the photographs he was analyzing. The eight-by-ten black and white glossies had been taken by specially equipped P47s and showed the ground below in exquisite detail. Tom had been attempting to enhance that detail by using high a powered magnifying glass.
“Anything exciting, colonel?”
Tom couldn’t stifle a grin. His promotion to lieutenant colonel had just come through. He and Alicia had celebrated the night before and, along with truly marvelous sex, they’d shared a couple of bottles of wine and Tom was now nursing the last of a headache.
“Nothing really, sir. The Germans are damned good at hiding things. That and the fact that they move around almost entirely at night makes it difficult to locate their tanks and ammo. I wish we had some of that infra-red technology that enables people to see in the dark.”
Downing moved to Truscott’s side. “If the army wanted you to see in the dark, they would have issued you bat’s eyes.”
It was common knowledge that the military was working on devices that would indeed enable the users to see in the dark. Not as well as bright sunshine, but enough, perhaps, to locate an enemy tank. Right now, however, all they had were the eyes they’d been issued at birth, along with high-powered magnifying glasses. The other magic devices were for the future.
Tom put down the glass and rubbed his eyes. The strain of looking for things that weren’t there was giving his headache a new lease on life.
“We’ve been able to ascertain that we still haven’t done much to degrade German capabilities,” he said. “Worse, it looks like they were able to upgrade many of their weapons before they attacked and we cut off their supply. What tanks we’ve been able to spot appear to have the new long barreled guns and those can play hell with our Shermans.”
Truscott nodded grimly. He’d been in high level meetings with Eisenhower, Fredendall, and Marshall. As a result he’d been out of touch with recent intelligence discoveries and the fact that the German armor had been improved was not good news.
“Please don’t tell me you’ve found that they have Panthers?” Truscott inquired.
“Can’t lie, sir. It does look like they have a number of them and that’s bad news. If they are as good as advertised, we don’t have a thing to stand up to them. It looks like the krauts did a tremendous job of improving their weapons just before they attacked us. Of course, they would have known that date and we were unable to do anything about their shipping before then. The krauts are really much stronger than we realized, even in our worst case scenarios.”
“Then we can only hope that our planes and artillery can kill them before our boys get slaughtered.”
The Sherman was America’s best tank, but the Panther weighted in at forty-five tons and had a high velocity 75mm cannon. It had a lower silhouette than the Sherman which made it harder to find and its armor was sloped so that shells might ricochet off. The Sherman also had a 75mm gun, but it was considered medium velocity and inferior to what the German tanks possessed. With all its faults, however, the Sherman was a vast improvement over its predecessors and was being churned out in large quantities. If nothing else, the Germans might be overwhelmed by the sheer weight of American numbers. Every American tank destroyed would be replaced, while every German tank killed could not.
The same grim math applied to manpower as well. It now appeared that Patton significantly outnumbered the Germans confronting him and that his constant nibbling at German positions was beginning to bear fruit. Patton was building up for a massive strike against the Germans. The only question was when.
Truscott glanced about and saw Westover at his desk. “Glad to see you make it back to us, commander, and don’t try to stand. How are you doing?”
Westover clutched his chest dramatically and winced. “It still hurts when I exert myself, sir, but it’s getting better every day.”
Truscott shook his head. “You belong back in the hospital, commander.”
“I spent enough time in a hospital. I was going crazy as the officer in charge of distributing bedpans. You are aware, I hope, that we think we got the U-boat that was operating in Lake Erie.”