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- Herausgeber: tredition
- Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
- Sprache: Englisch
The post-war period brought peace and prosperity. The Wild East is no longer wild, only occasionally do scattered Soviet units behind the Urals still attack the Wehrmacht administration and German settlers. Sturmbannführer Reuter is a detective at heart and entered the SS reluctantly. He finds himself transferred far from home to the East as a district leader and sits behind a desk all day, pushing paper rather than hunting criminals. One day he comes across a cold case that appears to have a number of loose ends, despite Berlin's emphatic claim that it is all over. As he looks further into the case, he stumbles across an unbelievable crime. Could it be the reason why Nazi Germany won World War II? Is it the foundation for the Third Reich in 1980? There are some influential people in the party who aren't keen on the case being brought back to light… In this alternative reality, in which the Russians have been defeated and the other Allies agree terms with Germany, the Third Reich is now everyday life. However, even 40 years later, it is still no bed of roses as the zealous detective discovers when he unexpectedly finds himself being hunted and his superiors in the SS and GeStaPo resort to tried and tested means... A remarkable and exuberant detective story full of twists and turns that begins where Robert Harris's "Fatherland" leaves off.
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Seitenzahl: 451
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
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The Ostland Protocol
An alternate history thriller
by
Lutz von Peter
edited and translated into English by
Laura Massey
© 2024 Lutz von Peter
Translator: Laura Massey
Cover design: [email protected]
Softcover
978-3-384-36511-8
E-Book
978-3-384-36513-2
Printing and distribution on behalf of the author:
tredition GmbH, Heinz-Beusen-Stieg 5, 22926 Ahrensburg, Germany
The work, including its parts, is protected by copyright. The author is responsible for the content. Any use is not permitted without his consent. The publication and distribution are carried out on behalf of the author and can be reached at: tredition GmbH, “Imprint Service” department, Heinz-Beusen-Stieg 5, 22926 Ahrensburg, Germany.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Prologue
Un
Deux
One
Two
Three
Four
Trois
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Quatre
Glossary
The Ostland Protocol
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Prologue
Glossary
The Ostland Protocol
Cover
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
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Prologue
11 January 1941
It was bitterly cold. He stamped his feet hard on the uneven ground at regular intervals as he walked down the long side of the factory hall. The pain shot up his legs, but it was better than numb feet. Anything but frostbite. He looked down the passageway that led to the front of the building. Rough, unfinished concrete. The walls had probably once been white, but almost everywhere the paint was peeling off. Through the misty glass he looked out over the snow-covered field and the little birch grove beyond. It was quiet outside. Very quiet. A relief really after the non-stop aircraft overhead and the massive artillery fire of the previous week. Up to two or three days ago, you could still hear occasional thundering. At the start there had still been gunfire and artillery, but since then it had fallen quiet. The whole front seemed somehow frozen under the snowfall from two days ago and it had not moved since. He looked at his watch – two and a half hours until he went off duty. Then he would trudge five hundred metres through the snow and warm up in the troop quarters. The others would give him funny looks because he had not been with them outside and he would try to get some sleep. Then four hours later he'd be back here, guarding this shitty, crumbling, draughty, freezing factory hall. He would guard the hall and the two solitary corpses lying on camp beds in a corner. Because there was no doubt that those were corpses under those sheets. He gazed absently at the swirling clouds of his breath. Was it colder outside than in here? Of course it was, though it was hard to imagine. When he finished his watch and went back into the open air, the cold would pounce on him like a wild animal, although right now he thought he would never feel warm again as long as he lived.
He wondered how they’d died. Why hadn’t they been laid out in the room next to the field hospital like the others, but instead been left lying here alone since yesterday? And why had they declared a four hundred-metre exclusion zone around the building?
They had been kept in this building for four days. Thank God he had only had to stand guard in the hall since yesterday, when nothing had been moving any more. Only the two camp beds covered with white sheets, under which you could see the outline of two bodies. But his comrades who had stood guard during the two previous days had looked terrible when they returned to the troop quarters. And even from a considerable distance away, you could hear the roaring and screaming of the dying pair. The guards had disappeared before anyone could ask them questions. Moved to other units, recalled, maybe given leave. All very strange. In the lonely hours of his guard duty, he could have walked across the hall and pulled back the sheets. But not knowing how the pair had met their miserable end, it wasn’t hard to curb his curiosity. Curiosity killed the cat! Somewhere, in some other life before the war, it seemed an age away now, he had come across this English saying and always wondered which cat it was talking about.
Voices and footsteps at the dark end of the passageway. Imperceptibly he tensed and waited to see who would step into the dim light of the factory hall. Two silhouettes appeared in the passage opening. He immediately recognised the man on the left as Dr. Köhler, the regimental doctor, and relaxed a little. The other had to be top brass. He wore the peaked officer's cap and even wrapped from boots to cheekbones in a thick sheepskin coat, he radiated authority. They walked nearer and he could make out the face of the unknown man. No one from the regiment. From a different regiment? Maybe division HQ?
He gave a stiff salute. “Private Weidlich on death watch duty, nothing to report!”
The two men nodded and entered the large hall, walking past him without paying him further attention. Their footsteps echoed through the high-ceilinged space illuminated by the reflection of the sun on the snow. Weidlich remained standing where he had been all the time.
“How many did you have in your regiment?” asked the officer.
His voice was pleasant, but firm and somewhat strained, as if he didn’t really want to hear the answer.
“These two,” replied the regimental doctor.
The other man raised an eyebrow and then nodded appreciatively, “Only two? That’s excellent. Really excellent. Have the men got wind of what’s going on?”
“Yes, although we isolated them here as quickly as we could.”
“Then how could they have found out?”
“Are you joking? First that order about the water. And then suddenly two comrades fall down, writhing in convulsions and screaming like they've been stuck on a spit? I can rattle on about epilepsy as long as I like, but with the two of them not being taken to a normal field hospital but isolated here instead, and then a four hundred-metre exclusion zone declared around the isolation unit…”
“Four hundred? The order was for two hundred.”
“You obviously haven’t had any cases near HQ. You should have heard those chaps bellowing, four hundred wasn’t even enough. If it had been two hundred, there’d have been no point setting up an exclusion zone. At night they could still be heard screaming from the troop barracks, on the first night anyway. After that their strength gave out.”
“I want to see them,” said the officer evenly.
The doctor looked at him uncertainly. “Are you sure? It's a ghastly sight, even for a doctor.”
“Do it.”
The doctor bent down, grasped the edge of a sheet and raised it. Weidlich could see nothing from where he was standing, the position of the two men blocked what was revealed under the sheet. The officer turned away abruptly and fought for composure.
“Those bastards,” he swore, as the doctor replaced the sheet, “those filthy pigs. And they talk about Untermenschen…” He turned on his heel and stormed past the guard. Weidlich saw a glint in the officer's eyes. Tears? Dr. Köhler followed him out more slowly, but he also seemed ill at ease.
12 January 1941
Leaning over the map table, Colonel von Zielinski traced a line with his finger and then stood upright again. “It can't be,” he muttered. He bent forward again. His finger traced the same slightly irregular semicircle as before. “Möglingen, read out the names one more time.”
The man he addressed, a few years younger than himself, answered “Yes, Colonel,” and began slowly to read out a series of place names. With each name, the commander's outstretched index finger advanced a few centimetres until, as before, it completed the crooked semicircle.
“Müller, I want to talk to division.” Müller picked up the handset and spoke to the switchboard operator then hung up.
While the connection was being put through the various switchboards, Zielinski wondered aloud: “Why are they removing us from here and sending us to the other side of the pocket? And on such a tight and precise schedule?”
He looked questioningly at the lieutenant colonel. He shrugged. “Have you verified the order?”
“Yes, Colonel.”
“So there can be no mistake, no interference from the Russians?”
“No, Colonel. I called division HQ. They confirmed it.”
“And nothing about a replacement unit to occupy our position?”
“No, Colonel.”
The telephone rang and Müller held up the receiver: “Division HQ, Colonel.”
Zielinski went and stood by the telephone table, lifted the heavy Bakelite earpiece and held it to his ear. “Zielinski here.”
From the receiver came a shrill reply.
“Yes, I know Möglingen has already called. Is it at least clear who'll be plugging the hole we're tearing in the pocket?”
More shrill chatter at the other end.
“No, it is not enough. Not by a long shot. Put the chief on the line.” A brief reply. “I don't care. I want to talk to him, now.” A few beats of silence followed. “Excuse me, Lieutenant-general. I just wanted to… yes, Möglingen told me… The whole division?” Zielinski opened his eyes wide. Amazement and disbelief showed on his face. “Could you repeat that? … Yes… The pocket will be… With your permission, Lieutenant-general, there are over half a million heavily armed Russians in the pocket… Yes… Yes of course… Yes, I understand.”
He stared straight ahead and very slowly put the receiver back onto its cradle. He gazed blankly through the window until Möglingen cleared his throat: “Colonel?”
As if emerging from a deep sleep, the regimental commander murmured: “All units securing the pocket to go to a new deployment line further east … the pocket is being dissolved … more than half a million enemies to our rear. Just keep marching as if they weren't there…” His gaze went to Möglingen. “Have the orders issued and calculate within the given timeframe as generously as possible.”
“Colonel, the time frame is very tight. I don't know…”
“Do your best. Over the next few days, 800,000 men around Moscow will be moving eastwards. Expect the odd traffic jam,” he smiled grimly, “and see that our schedule looks good, at least on paper. God only knows if we’ll be able to stick to it.”
Möglingen stared open-mouthed at his superior.
UN
Marseille, Vieux Port, 1993.
It was definitely the best seat in the café. From early in the morning the sun shone over the wide expanse of the Vieux Port, the neighbouring streets and square. On this white limestone terrace, the metal bistro tables and chairs were bathed in a flattering honey-coloured light. Anyone finding it too warm, despite the lateness of the season, could sit at one of the tables under the arcades, in the semi-shade provided by the light reflecting off the pale-coloured ground.
The waiter spotted the man once again sitting in the first row of tables next to the street, at his usual place, punctually arriving as soon as the daylight turned from yellow to orange. Not every day, sometimes he didn’t come for a week or two, but always at the same time of day.
Unprompted, he served him an espresso and a glass of cognac.
“Bonsoir, monsieur, vous allez bien?” he asked, his standard greeting.
“Très bien, merçi.” Barely an accent, where is he from? The man reluctantly tore his eyes away from the glowing orange façades on the opposite side of the harbour, looked up and gave him a slight smile. Then his glance moved quickly along the rows of tables, through the arcades and across the street, following the edge of the harbour basin, coming to rest on the houses of the Rive Neuve.
The waiter knew this all-encompassing glance only too well. Marseille was Marseille after all. There were plenty of people in the Zone with good reason to be cautious. But it was an unusual gesture here, the café was too much like a goldfish bowl.
“Get some matches for me, please.” The man had put a packet of Rothändle on the table and was looking up again.
“Right away, sir.” Rothändle. German maybe? But no trace of an accent. His dark hair and complexion more like someone from round here, and his sharp features, dark, almost black eyes and wiry medium-sized physique. But his attitude, the firmness of his gestures, the authority he exuded suggested otherwise. Somehow the man was in command. It was not in his stature, rather in how he spoke, his look, how he moved. Yes, definitely used to being in command. He called the stranger Capitaine – the captain. No, he was not from the Midi, probably not French either. He just couldn’t make the man out.
With the casual enjoyment typical of a long-time smoker, Capitaine breathed the pungent cigarette smoke deep into his lungs, waited a moment and then released a whitish cloud into the orange light. His whole world seemed to be reduced to this act of smoking, an occasional sip of cognac or coffee and the play of colours on the harbour and the houses. His face turned towards the water, he leaned back comfortably in his chair, while somehow remaining straight, seemingly engrossed and still. Only his eyes, seeking out a new object from time to time, and the cigarette, as he occasionally extinguished one and lit a new one without looking down, showed that he was not a mannequin.
The darkness fell slowly, orange giving way to ever darker shades of blue. The first streetlights came on, and Capitaine appeared to wake up as if from a long, deep sleep; he looked around, noted the comings and goings of people at neighbouring tables and on the street just in front of him. The afternoon pastis and coffee drinkers and families had made way for the evening clientele stopping by for an aperitif before dinner. All the tables now seemed to be occupied, and he was surprised he hadn’t picked up on the conversations going on around him.
“Excuse me.”
He turned in the direction of the voice with a slight Maghreb accent. A middle-aged businessman, small paunch, high hairline…
“I see you smoke Rothändle.” Capitaine nodded. “I haven't smoked one for a long time. May I…”
Wordlessly, Capitaine took his pack from the table, knocked out a few cigarettes and proffered the pack to the man. The brand was not widely available in France and the Zone, but you could get hold of it. Capitaine wondered what the stranger wanted.
He took one, lit it and inhaled the smoke. “Hmmm, not bad, not bad at all.” He examined the burning cigarette and laughed. “And they say that the Germans can't grow tobacco. May I give you one of mine…?” He held out a slightly crumpled pack with an Arabic inscription. “Please…”
Capitaine looked at the cigarettes, smiled briefly again and then politely declined. Shortly after, he placed a two-mark note on the table, rose and walked along the quay towards the Canebière, where he disappeared among the evening crowds.
Capitaine closely observed the figure heading for the café along the quay. How did he know that man? Where had he seen him before? Was he being tailed? Had they started looking for him again? It was possible. Had they never stopped looking for him and only found him now, after all these years? They had said they would leave him alone, but would they have kept their word? They weren’t afraid of anything, they wouldn't think twice about reneging on their promise if the agreement had become inconvenient for them. Still, it was hardly likely, not after ten years. But you never knew… Capitaine subtly shifted his position until he could see the passageway between the cafe and the neighbouring house. If he stood up, the flowerpots with the bougainvilleas would shield him from view until he was under the vault of the arcades, from there a jump and he would be in the narrow passageway between the houses. He knew from a previous exploration undertaken a long time ago that the passageway led to a tiny square which opened onto four or five streets, all of which branched off shortly afterwards and got lost somewhere in the maze of the old harbour district. It was the perfect escape route for all occasions. He had chosen this table ages ago because of the beautiful view of the Rive Neuve and the escape route. The passageway between the houses was unobstructed and so was the path by the flowerpots that led there.
He turned back to the new arrival.
He knew the guy, but the memory felt unthreatening. The alarm bells were still ringing in his head, they rang every time he recognised someone, but could not immediately place them. But that had been his habit for years. He’d have to plan until his dying day, caution was just ingrained in him. But somehow Capitaine was sure that if the arrival had really been a threat, his instincts would have sent him a much clearer warning.
The man made a beeline for the next table, sat down and gave him a friendly greeting. Capitaine had no choice but to incline his head in reply. Only when the other laid a crumpled pack of cigarettes on the table in front of him did the penny drop: the man who asked for cigarettes! He relaxed imperceptibly. Neither the SS nor the secret service would be so clumsy. He unbent a little and allowed himself a smile in the direction of the cigarette-man.
This encouraged the man to say, “This is one of the most beautiful places in the Zone to enjoy the autumn light.”
Capitaine murmured his agreement.
“We saw each other a week or so ago, didn't we? You offered me a cigarette.”
You asked me for one, thought Capitaine, giving him a brief nod.
“Do you know Marseille well?” Capitaine now felt obliged to contribute at least a little to the conversation.
“I come here regularly but know it…” he left the end of the sentence hanging in the air “…you never really know this city.”
Silence fell again.
“You speak excellent French.” The questioner seemed uncomfortable with the silence.
“Thank you, I get by.”
The questioner looked at him, clearly hoping for something more; but even those of a garrulous nature notice if their interlocutor is reluctant to talk. The silence between them carried the day.
DEUX
The weather had turned cooler, rainy and grey. High summer was over and most of the tourists had gone. Every so often there were days when it would have been just warm enough to sit on the terrace and the waiter toyed with the idea of bringing out the chairs and tables again, but it wasn’t warm enough for people to want to linger outside. Only the determined coffee drinkers would choose to go out there now.
Most of the guests came because of the terrace. The chintzy interior attracted far fewer people and the winter season was therefore rather quiet. The only person who came with unwavering regularity was Capitaine, and increasingly also his new friend, the Moroccan. Through late summer and autumn, they had often chanced to sit near each other, beginning to greet each other more and having the odd conversation. Capitaine had even tried the Moroccan’s cigarettes, but only once. Towards the middle of November, there had been a period of maybe two or three weeks when the Moroccan preferred to sit inside because of the weather while Capitaine stayed outside under the arcades – it had felt like a separation. Since then, both men usually sat inside, naturally on different tables. But the waiter sensed that they waited for each other and they grew twitchy when one of them did not come to the café for a couple of days.
The conversations had started harmlessly enough, cigarettes had been the first subject. The weather too, obviously. The rumours in the Marseille Free Trade Zone and what was going on beyond its confines in France. They were pleased to discover a shared interest in recent history and talked at length about the unrest in the Middle East, and the political instability in the Republic of Grand Maghreb. The Moroccan perked up and animatedly told Capitaine about his youth in a village in the Atlas mountains. He spoke about legendary bands of brigands and his dark eyes flashed as he recounted legends and stories full of heroes and wonders.
He could not hide his bitterness when he spoke about the powerful people in his country that had always spoken French. Those traitors that had sold out the country’s interests when France was still one of the Great Powers. Those traitors that had granted asylum to the last dreamers and warmongers who still thought of France as la Grande Nation. Traitors that had ruined their country in a foolish attempt to create a counterbalance to the Greater German Welfare Sphere by creating that idiotic Republic of Grand Maghreb. And traitors that, after forty years of struggle, could neither pacify their new empire, lessen its inner turmoil nor create even moderate levels of wealth with its economy.
“Aren’t you going a bit far there?” Capitaine interjected. “I don’t think it was the intention of the Grand Maghreb government to invite all those marauders, France libre units and whatever else to–”
“Not their intention?!” the Moroccan retorted. “Not their intention?! In what way was it ‘not their intention’?”
Capitaine had evidently not expected such a heated reaction. “Well, the creation of Grand Maghreb–”
“The creation of Grand Maghreb was a crime!” shouted the Moroccan and pounded the table with his fist. He jumped up, fists on the table, chin thrust forward, breathing heavily and glared at Capitaine.
The waiter, who had always stayed in the background, approached with a worried expression. The Moroccan dropped back heavily into his chair. Capitaine addressed him very calmly: “Why don’t you tell me?”
The Moroccan rubbed his forehead and closed his eyes, then replied: “Please accept my apologies. So many lies are told these days. It just makes me see red.”
Capitaine repeated: “Why don’t you tell me?”
“I told you that I grew up in a village in the Atlas.” Capitaine nodded. “It was more like a town really. We were responsible for the administration and tax collection in our town and a handful of villages. For generations, members of my family were the mayors. It was not an official position, more a sort of a hereditary role, my family simply made decisions about things. People came to us when they needed advice, to resolve a quarrel between neighbours or when they needed money. We were accountable to the governor in the nearest big city for collecting taxes and keeping our district peaceful. And for that reason we were in charge of our town and the surrounding villages. We obviously spoke French at home, we were a good family after all. But we also spoke Berbère and Arab.” He fell silent. “I do not think that our people would have elected somebody else to lead them if they had had the choice. We were their leaders,” he stated and added with a hint of defiance: “that was how things were back then.” He fell silent again. “Do not get me wrong: my brothers and I went to a boarding school in Tangier. We knew the French culture from childhood and even appreciated it, which the people in our town did not. But it was not our culture. We were Moroccans, we had our own culture. We knew many pieds noirs.” He saw Capitaine’s puzzled look. “French people born and living in Northern Africa. We rubbed shoulders with them, but they were French, we were Moroccans. We appreciated their culture, but they were not our people. They were foreigners and some families had lived with us for several generations.”
He was quiet for several moments until Capitaine asked: “And Grand Maghreb?”
The Moroccan lifted his head, fire in his eyes, his voice trembling with barely suppressed fury: “Grand Maghreb? Do you really think any Moroccan, Tunisian or Egyptian would have come up with such an idea?”
Capitaine shrugged his shoulders. “No? Who did then?”
The Moroccan snorted. “After the French capitulation in 1940, many French people went to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia. Most did not come because they wanted to live with us or because they loved Morocco. They did not want to live in their own country because it was occupied by the Germans and there were already many pieds noirs that had settled comfortably in our lands. That madman De Gaulle’s broadcast gave them hope–”
“Charles De Gaulle? The French rabble-rouser? The June 1940 broadcast from London?” Capitaine asked.
The Moroccan nodded. “Yes, his appeal to fight on from the colonies. Those crackpots thought they could continue their struggle against the Germans and they chose our country as their base of operations. That De Gaulle was killed that same year by his own people took the wind out the sails of that first wave of immigrants. But after the French Reunification–”
“1956?” Capitaine interjected.
The other man nodded. “When the two French states appeared to be developing fairly well, starting to grow fat in the Greater German Welfare Sphere, and then decided to reunify in free elections, a second, much larger wave of immigrants flooded our country. And these people did not come to set up a base of operations. They came to stay.”
He seemed to lose himself in his own thoughts for a moment. “They were everywhere and it caused friction. Here and there, in small towns and in the countryside, there were riots. Who had done what to whom, the fault was often difficult to decide. Both sides quickly drew arms. Those who had come in the hope of reconquering France opened up their secret weapon stashes. Those who had hoped for a new home defended what they saw as their right to stay. The troubles grew worse and worse. And then the France libre militias, who had been inactive since their arrival in North Africa, offered to help the government re-establish peace. Without a second thought, the government accepted their offer and from one day to the next acquired battle-hardened, well equipped, albeit somewhat rusty, rapid deployment forces. It was the hidden part of the agreement that the government probably had not understood and that spelled the end of Morocco.”
Capitaine raised an eyebrow inquiringly.
“The rapid deployment forces were not liked by the people they were used against, they created bitterness and resentment. Very quickly, word went around that the French and pieds noirs had nothing to fear from them. The rioting grew worse and worse, repression by the France libre troops became more and more drastic. This drove a wedge between the Moroccan population and the French-speaking upper class.”
“Like your family?”
“Like my family… even though… No, not really. My family broke apart because not everybody chose to side with the French.” It was evident from his expression on which side he had stood. He continued: “The government increasingly allowed their power to be propped up by the immigrants, partly borne of sheer necessity, but also because they felt superior to the ignorant rabble, parlez français, c’est plus chic, as they said back then, speak French, it’s more classy. At some point, the well-equipped and well-trained French had become an essential support for the state, and it was then that the concept of Grand Maghreb arose: unify all of North Africa and begin a counter concept to the Greater German Welfare Sphere. That was the official version, the one that was disseminated. But the armed militias and their contacts in the administration and the army saw this anti-German stance as a call to action.”
“And the other countries?”
“The situation developed in parallel in Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria at approximately the same time. The French agreed among themselves, they had the same goals. So they created Grand Maghreb. Libya and Egypt joined later. But I know of no maghrébin, no real maghrébin, that had any love for the new state.”
Capitaine nodded thoughtfully. “And the France libre bands that occasionally appear in Europe…?”
“…are nothing more than part of the army, police or volunteers that are mustered in Grand Maghreb. The government blocks its ears and simply requests that the fighters don’t get caught wearing their official uniforms.”
Capitaine listened intently to the Moroccan’s explanations. He appeared to be well informed about certain aspects, particularly those to do with the military, and also about the incursions of the insurgents into Europe, but he contributed relatively little to that discussion or any other on North Africa.
When they got on to the subject of the war in Europe in 1939-40, he became more animated; not exactly talkative, but one felt that he had a clear opinion and that his arguments were somewhat pro-German. The campaign in the West particularly engaged his interest.
He was notably attentive when the Moroccan mentioned Dunkirk one day. Capitaine asked what was so special about Dunkirk. The Moroccan shook his head: “Nothing really. That was the final nail in the coffin for the French and the British. But I keep on wondering…” he fell silent.
After a pause and a sip of coffee, Capitaine asked: “You keep on wondering…what?”
The Moroccan hesitated, then grinned a little bashfully: “Imagine what would have happened if the Germans hadn’t marched directly on Dunkirk.”
Capitaine didn’t understand. “What do you mean, ‘hadn’t marched directly on Dunkirk’?”
“Imagine if they’d stopped their advance. Just like that.”
Capitaine shrugged his shoulders: “But they DID advance directly on Dunkirk without stopping and took down the Tommies and all!”
“Yes, yes,” the Moroccan replied quickly, “but imagine if they hadn’t overrun the pocket. If they’d waited a week or two before overrunning it.”
Capitaine made a dismissive gesture. “Why would they have done that? Why let a nearly beaten enemy escape when you have the upper hand?”
The Moroccan replied: “Just for argument’s sake, for the pleasure of thinking it through.”
“Nobody would have been that idiotic back then. Nobody would ever have stopped the push on Dunkirk. Not even the Führer would have ordered that, and God knows he made a few cockeyed decisions.”
Both men chuckled appreciatively. Even if the Führer had redrawn Europe and managed the impossible, it was very well known that the GröFaz (the ‘greatest commander-in-chief of all time’, as he was occasionally called) had several times snatched victories from his generals’ grasp simply because ‘he knew best’. Propaganda had worked hard to depict the Führer as infallible, but over the years it was easy enough for anyone to find out that the Führer’s oeuvre contained, besides obvious strokes of genius, catastrophic errors of judgement and decisions that suggested incipient madness.
“Okay then, why not?” Capitaine conciliated. “Let’s assume that the British Expeditionary Force and the French hadn’t been taken prisoner in Dunkirk. What would have happened then?”
The Moroccan thought for a minute. “With their army back home, the British might have given it a second go, continued the war, had maybe attempted an invasion into the Netherlands or France.”
“Impossible!” Capitaine scoffed. “After Narvik? After the disaster in France and an ignominious retreat to their island? Never! Even if the British had got away in Dunkirk, they would not have taken up arms again to carry on the war.”
The Moroccan was dubious. “They could have tried an invasion into the Netherlands or allied themselves to France libre in North Africa.”
Capitaine gave an ironic laugh. “Yes, sure, and what then? Next, you’ll be claiming that the Americans would have come over to help the poor British and the oppressed peoples of the continent; the Russians would have reneged on their agreement with the Germans and joined the others in battling the evil Germans. You’ve got to agree that it sounds crazy.”
The Moroccan grinned sheepishly. “Yes, yes, I know, it's all just fantasy.”
They both carried on sipping their coffee.
Several weeks later they spoke about the German East. The Moroccan repeated the truisms everybody had heard. Only the 1940 peace treaty with France and England had allowed the Germans to advance in 1941 so quickly in the East that the Russians were unable to mount a defence before the Ural mountains. And once again the Moroccan laughed and wanted to discuss what would have happened if… If the Bolshevists had withstood the onslaught of the German armies, if they had held, or at least re-taken, Moscow. Or if at least they had managed to rebuild their communist empire behind the Urals in Siberia. What if they had not disappeared in a puff of smoke, if they had not united against each other in constant new alliances under constant new khans. What if they had held the Urals?
Capitaine was silent for a long time. The Moroccan looked at him expectantly, challenging him. He was waiting for a response along the lines that it was nonsense so he could then explain his theories. But Capitaine looked up and said: “We shouldn’t talk about that.”
The Moroccan was surprised. “Allez, Capitaine! It is a game, nothing more. Come on now!” Capitaine shook his head. “No, it’s not. I don’t want to. I… Let’s drop the subject.”
“Ah, come on now, don’t be like that,” the Moroccan replied eagerly, reaching across and laying his hand on Capitaine’s forearm. “There’s nothing wrong with–”
Capitaine jumped up and cried out: “Je m’en fous de vos théories à cinq balles!! I don’t give a rat’s arse about your cheap theories.” He stood breathing heavily, glaring angrily at his companion.
The Moroccan stared at him, wide-eyed at the unexpected explosion. “D’accord, d’accord,” he murmured, soothingly. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
Still agitated, but becoming calmer, Capitaine sat down again, fixed his gaze on the rattled man and said icily: “So you want to talk about the German East, tell stories about what never happened.” The Moroccan made a dismissive gesture, no, no, that was not what he had had in mind, but Capitaine stared at him. “If you want to hear a story that never happened, I’ve got one for you. Just spare me your old wives’ tales.” And as the Moroccan shifted uneasily on his chair, Capitaine began to tell his story:
“It happened in Hartmannstadt an der Medritz in the summer of 1982…”
ONE
Hartmannstadt, 1982
Reuter stretched luxuriously then groped his way half-asleep to the kitchen. He clicked the kettle on. He was still in the middle of the dream he’d been having when the kettle switched itself off with a snap. Two spoons of coffee powder. Water on top. Open fridge, pour milk. The fridge smells again, should clean it. Blearily, he shuffled to the living room, opened the ceiling-high shutters and stepped out onto the terrace into the early morning light. He enjoyed the warmth on his body and decided that this would be a good day. Opening his eyes to drink in the endless vastness of the ripe cornfields, the glorious sight of the limitless East, Reuter saw a combine harvester barely thirty metres away on the field, together with a tractor and trailer, and a settler staring at him slackjawed from the combine. Around the trailer stood a group of harvest hands, young men and women from the Arbeitsdienst. The girls huddled together giggling hysterically, one pointed a finger at him, the men grinned broadly.
“Good morning Sturmbannführer!” shouted one of them, Kunz, the son of an SS-farmer and the local youth leader.
Reuter considered for a second how he was going to avoid embarrassment, decided that he could not and shouted back: “Stop gawking, Kunz, and get to work.” He waved at them, mustered the last bit of dignity he had left, and turned not too swiftly, knowing full well that the group was now being treated to a view of his backside. In two brisk steps, he reached the safety of the terrace door, went through and leaned against the wall inside. He had stretched naked in the sun in front of everybody, how mortifying! He grinned. At least it had given the girls something to laugh about.
His thoughts wandered idly to the past when he had been a harvest hand himself. How everything had changed in the last thirty years. Nothing was the same, not him and not the Ostland which only half-jokingly had been called the Wild East back then. He remembered only too well that feeling of embarking on a great adventure when they left the confines of school and university for the summer. Freight wagons had transported them east, uncomfortable and draughty, but their spirits were high. They all had their own reasons for joining in each year and for preferring the harvest to other services. A late summer with no cares and no cramming, an alternative to the Wehrmacht summer courses or the endless army cadet courses and a good way to shirk the army reserve operations at the Eastern Front. Earning some money or credits towards an extension of a university scholarship. The prospect of spending lots of time with friends in the open air, and, if the opportunity arose, a fling with an Arbeitsdienst girl in the rustic charm of the tented camps. Reuter whistled happily, deep in his own thoughts: “…there is Lore and Dore and Trude and Sophie, and then Lene, Irene and Annemarie…” You couldn’t forget the old songs. Nor your first love in the Arbeitsdienst in the Ostland either. Her name had been Carine, a French girl from Bordeaux studying to become a doctor in Leipzig. With a long blue-black mane of hair, tanned skin and nearly black eyes. Carine with her drop-dead gorgeous French accent that she had not lost even after years of living in Germany. Yes, there had certainly been as many reasons to be a harvest hand as there had been harvest hands.
Each year around mid-July, the tented camps sprouted everywhere like mushrooms after rain. The recently settled farmers in the East were able to till the fields, but during Reuter’s time, it had not yet been possible to provide fixed housing for the hundreds of thousands of harvest hands. Each landed farmer or each cooperative had to provide accommodation in tents for ‘their’ hands. In the beginning, some cooperatives had tried save money and effort on the facilities they provided. As the hands were under fixed dispatch and could not choose where they worked, there were several protests in which the SS-farmers often drew the short straw. When these riots would erupt again every year in the same places, the administration of the Arbeitsdienst felt obliged to make some rules and define minimum standards. By now some cooperatives understood that it was cheaper in the medium term to erect semi-open barns that served as accommodation in summer and as tool sheds in winter. When shortly after, the fixed dispatch was abandoned and the harvest hands could choose where they wanted to be sent, a real competition started among the cooperatives. They built more comfortable accommodation and only the fact that they were single storey buildings distinguished them from youth hostels or barracks.
Reuter had been in the tent camps, long rows of light-grey tents each housing twenty people with endless camp alleys and field kitchens. Between them were huge tarps strung out to create openair dining halls and recreation rooms with foldable benches and tables. Despite the hard work, there was endless freedom to enjoy singalongs with friends in the evenings, sit around a fire or meet your sweetheart away from prying eyes, far far away from your parents’ and the Party’s stuffy ideas of morality, just the two of you under the infinite sky. And that life outside, the community at work, the camaraderie with strangers that became friends, the feeling of freedom after escaping the big cities and being together in the evenings, singing, talking, drinking. The memory of all that had led him to decide years later to accept the promotion and posting to Hartmannstadt instead of leaving the civil service and the police force entirely.
He shook off these final, less pleasant thoughts, crossed the cool hallway and went into the bathroom before the cleaning lady caught him naked as well. His week-long holiday in southern Germany had done him a world of good. But now he was back in the Ostland and his desk was creaking under the weight of the work that awaited him as the head of the Hartmannstadt district. Ah well, Fräulein Müdert would certainly have sorted it all into some kind of order. She was excellent at that.
The young people had stopped sniggering in the meantime.
“Reuter’s one of the good guys!” said Kunz and grinned at an Arbeitsdienst hand. “He should just put on a uniform before leaving the house.” Everybody smiled again. “But cool as a cucumber.”
“The Sturmbannführer’s all right, leave him alone,” shouted the settler from the combine harvester. “Can we get on with it?” The machine roared to life, cut, threshed, separated wheat from chaff and spewed the golden harvest into the trailer crawling alongside.
A short time later, Reuter walked along the linoleum-lined corridors of the administration building. He could never understand why everywhere in the Reich the corridors of government buildings had to be the same boring shade of grey. And the off-white walls were an acquired taste as well.
It was still very early in the morning, and like every morning, he looked forward to the day stretching out ahead of him and seeing how it would unfold. He rarely encountered colleagues so early in the morning, and if he did, he tried to avoid them to preserve this special time for himself.
He stared into the blackish brown liquid in his cup. He pulled the cup out of the machine carefully in order not to spill any coffee and leaned against the wall. As he did every morning, he looked at the big poster on the opposite wall. “Why are YOU with the SS?” In flaming red letters, below them a fat index finger that pointed at the reader. As obvious as the answer probably must have been for the designer, it was not that simple for Reuter and his colleagues. Obviously, he had been spoon-fed the basic ideas about the SS in countless meetings, seminars and training sessions. People of particularly sound character, people of the new national-socialist race, living in the racially challenged East as soldiers, policemen and Party members. People who, as an example and shield for the settlers, protected the new German Reich while also being its moral fibre and defence. So much for the theory.
Reuter knew full well that he was not a prime example of this theory. The same was true of all but a small minority of the SS-people that populated the Ostland. He was a police officer, criminal investigations were his lifeblood. He was a Party member by conviction as he couldn’t imagine defending a state without being a part of its strongest driving force. Considerations for his career definitely played a role in his Party membership.
Nevertheless, while he was with the judicial branch in Stuttgart he never dreamed of requesting a transfer to the SS. He liked his administrative and criminal work too much to volunteer for the sometimes rather narrow-minded projects the SS worked on. The excessive hectoring to toe the Party line stopped him from investigating the sizeable advantages of an SS membership and the more interesting parts of their work.
When he was ‘volunteered’ to the East, however, he had not had a choice. It was either general police and judicial branch, which in the East meant being with the SS, or a general administrative function at the bottom of the ladder without any authority. As all police, judicial branch and military jobs in the East were in the hands of the SS, this had been an easy decision for him. Reuter was lured by the complex police work that needed to be done in the district of Hartmannstadt an der Medritz, and slightly closer proximity to the Party line could do no harm after his involuntary transfer from southern Germany. And it would do wonders for his personnel file. Add to that the higher salary, the tall boots that came in very handy in the ever-present winter mud in the Ostland, the Ribbon of the Order of the SS that – worn on the lapel – greatly resembled the Great Cross of the Order of Merit and the Golden Medal for Combatants and the whole package was not to be sniffed at. All in all, these were sound and creditable reasons but as a whole they were lightyears away from what had inspired the first SS units sixty years before. Yes, the movement had developed, it had grown in age like its founders, had become more easygoing, more bourgeois and more indulgent. Obviously, this could not be said about the Führer who had remained true to himself until his death. But already under Hess, who out of respect for his predecessor only assumed the title Chancellor of the Reich and had never called himself “Führer”, change had started. Many of the fighters from the first generation had retired from the scene in the 1950s and 1960s. The younger people that had taken their place only knew from their history books about the oft invoked ‘flaming wrath’ of the first generation towards the consequences of the Great War of 1914-1918. These younger ones were National Socialists as well, but the implacable, pugnacious, impudent movement had evolved into an arrogant political class that defended its acquired privileges. It still uttered the old slogans but was becoming more bourgeois by the day. Courageous in battle if need be, but certainly not relishing the fight anymore.
While these thoughts wound their way slowly through his brain, he sipped his coffee and was dismayed to see he had once again let a drop spill onto his uniform jacket. Just as well that he drank his coffee black so the stain was nearly invisible. He thought about a third cup of coffee, decided against it and put the empty cup in the sink. He walked down the whole length of the corridor, opened the door to his office and stared at the pile of files on his desk. The sight never failed to amaze him: love, hope and failure, the small transgressions and the great conspiracies and crimes, the lives of people reduced to off-white paper in light blue and dark pink binders. Each activity captured, filed, decorated with dozens of stamps and sent on its proper way. Reuter understood why some people thought his to be the most boring work in the world. What did they know about the butterflies in his stomach when he found a file in the middle of the pile that was apparently indistinguishable from the rest. For Reuter this was a clear sign that here was a file that required his particular attention. Diligence, experience and industriousness he possessed in abundance; but what distinguished him from an average civil servant was exactly that instinct, an intuition, a feeling that bordered on a physical sensibility for files that were special, that had to be taken care of and that stood out from the pile. And it was even more difficult to explain to others how his hunting fever took over when he sniffed out one of these files. His workload might sometimes hinder him from dissecting the file there and then, so he would put it aside. But at the next possible opportunity, he dug into the file to discover the reason why he had those butterflies in his stomach.
Lovingly, he looked at the current file on the windowsill, around 100 pages thick, pink folder, so far so ordinary. But it refused to divulge its secrets. For Reuter, this was a delight and a torture at the same time. He turned to the next file on his desk.
“The Ostland awakes!”
He stared furiously at the newspaper clipping. He should have known it. Yes, he might have guessed that Geinitz would seize the opportunity. Could have, should have, would have…! He had once more relied on someone’s decency and been disappointed. Those Party lackeys had no decency. Not animals like Geinitz. He could have kicked himself. And he could not undo his deputy’s blunder. He stared at the file with the clippings that contained among other things excerpts from yesterday’s Beobachter. The article had been on page three, nearly half a page long: “The Ostland awakes!” The letters jumped out at him, and then further down a picture of Geinitz in uniform with his assessment of the situation in the East. Reuter was not sure what disgusted him more: the breach of trust by the deputy head of district who had used his boss’s week-long absence to approach the press, styling himself as ‘acting head of district’, or the fact that his views were factually wrong and stemmed exclusively from his desire to bring about the assimilation of the Reichskommissariat into the normal civil administration.
“The Reichskommissariat Wolgaland is ready to be assimilated into the civil administration as Reichsgau Wolgaland” read the final sentence of the article. But there was no way he could sanction Geinitz. If he escalated the matter either Geinitz’s high-up friends in the Party would stop the process in its tracks and nothing would be gained, or it might inadvertently help Geinitz as he would be removed from the SS and find another position in the civil administration thanks to his contacts. Better not touch it.
Reuter attacked the pile of files in front of him and reduced it systematically. Signatures, comments in the files, forward to the relevant colleagues, the usual work of a district head. Another thin pink file caught his attention, he browsed through it several times. Confused, he pushed it away, rubbed his eyes and then pulled it
