Eastern Inferno: The Journals of a German Panzerjäger on the Eastern Front, 1941-43 (4 page)

Ratas [Soviet fighter planes] appear and attack us. Thank God, no casualties. We reach the middle of the village around noon. Resistance from the Reds has been broken—an entire Red division has been destroyed. Clusters of dead and wounded soldiers are blocking the street. The number of our own casualties is also high. We are so exhausted we could pass out. Despite this, we reassemble and continue to advance without any noteworthy resistance, to the village of Lokacze. The welcome there is not very pleasant, as wild gunfire was awaiting us. Damn snipers! House after house must be cleansed with hand grenades. Fanatics fire at us until the roofs collapse over their heads and they are buried under the rubble. Others escape their houses at the last minute as human torches. They either collapse dead on the street or are beaten to death. Within the hour the entire village has transformed into an ocean of flames.

A thought comes to mind about our infantry during the slaughtering: how many innocent men have been sent to kingdom come? It is a bizarre thought. Our lancers go out and get drunk.

As soon as the first house goes up in flames, dead bodies can be found lying on the street. Soldiers destroy and shoot about mercilessly until plumes of smoke cover the horizon. I believe that this raiding by the infantry brings balance to the extreme exertion of marching and fighting. At the single shot of a sniper the exhausted men return to life. With their nerves pulverized, they have forgotten the barbarian heat, forgotten all that damn traipsing about. An infantry soldier recently said to me, “You see, I was terribly tired, now I am fresh again. It went back to being a good party!” Yes, yes, this “party” makes me sick to my stomach.

25 June:
What I would give to be able to sleep in! After only two hours of sleep we are back at it. We have received orders to rush and break through enemy lines to the south of Lutsk. Will we be successful at crossing the River Styr?

Our rapid advance in narrow wedge formation has created a terrible situation for us: only the banks along the road are able to be cleansed of enemy troops. There is no time to comb the neighboring forests, which is precisely, however, where the enemy combatants are reassembling. Time and time again there are small battles to the rear of the front line.

Supply convoys are being attacked and obliterated by the enemy far behind our own line. Red aircraft are hanging over us today like flies. It is a miracle that their relentless attacks have caused only a few casualties.

We reach the Styr around noon. The Reds have broken the river. The flooded territory is kilometers wide, rendering a crossing of the river for our panzers impossible. Attempts to use floating bridges are futile. The enemy fires unremittingly at our bridgehead.

A sad day for me! Four dear comrades have fallen: Walter Wolff, Horas, Muegge the always good humored, and Schielke. Many have been badly wounded. I myself am spiritually and physically totally exhausted! If my dear Rosel could see me like this—dirty, jaded, thirsty… I think she would cry out of pity for me. Our beloved homeland [
Heimat
] will never fully comprehend what we have accomplished during this campaign. They do not have the slightest idea of the difficult terrain we have experienced, nor the types of battles.

We have just had another attack from a Red
Tiefflieger
[low-flying bomber]. Gruber was killed. He had just married his bride eight days ago by proxy. The night is restless. Hell must be loose to the rear of the line. The sky is blood red; relentless rumbling and thunder are indicative of the heavy battle occurring all around us.

Our panzers roll in to provide reinforcement. At present, we receive news that the battle for Lutsk has commenced. At dawn, we notice dark, smoky clouds hanging over the riverbanks close to the village.

26 June:
Latest observations in the morning bring no changes to the situation. It is still impossible to get the vehicles across the river. We receive orders from division HQ and are commanded to cross the Styr near Lutsk, despite the chance of meeting strong Russian tank forces there. Very well; we take off toward our destination—all by ourselves, without the support of heavy artillery and infantry, which will cross the river by way of the floating bridges.

The constant attacks from the enemy are sickening. Enemy aircraft, mostly bombers, suddenly attack, as if they were coming from right behind the hedges. All of the drama is over within seconds: first, the incredible thunder of detonations; next, the hammering of on-board cannons from the bombers; and finally, the smell of dark and foul smoke along with the hissing and singing of shrapnel over our heads. In the end, the wounded are shrieking, and the show is over. That is how it went five times until we arrived in Lutsk.

The number of casualties is considerable. Slowly, we enter the village, all while keeping our left and right flanks secure. We are able to take a short break in the town center. The time is used to collect the injured and take a swig from our canteen.

The beating that the town has taken from the Stukas and heavy artillery is extensive. The local prison is a gruesome sight. Prior to their retreat, the Bolshevik mob staged a terrible bloodbath. More than a hundred men, women, and children were slaughtered like cattle. Never will I forget such appalling images. These are the dead of our enemies, for those bloodhounds and murderers would prey on English priests!

Meanwhile, a few comrades have pulled the remaining
Rotarmisten
[Red Army soldiers] and Jews from their hiding places. A solo gun performance echoed across the square and with that, the mob ascended to the heavens of “the English High Church.”

We move on. Together with our panzers, we advance slowly to the east side of the village, where Russian tanks suddenly appear. PaKs [anti-tank cannons] have never before been brought into position so quickly. Our panzers are deployed; we lie atop them, packed with hand grenades in order to eliminate the approaching infantry. After an hour of battle, the attacking behemoths and their accompanying fighters are either destroyed or have fled. Unfortunately, we too have suffered the loss of some of our panzers. I was on top of one of them, but was incredibly lucky that it did not catch fire. Such an episode is typical for the entire damn Eastern campaign. The panzers that have been able to make a quick advance are already in Lutsk, approximately 40 kilometers from here.

Lutsk was captured by our troops this morning, and the area around the town has been cleansed of enemy troops. So where did the enemy tanks and infantry suddenly come from? This Asian mob is sly and cunning; every hour brings an evil surprise—a large pile of
scheisse
[shit]. We are no longer safe anywhere. There is not a single hour of peace and quiet. It is true that I am not a coward. Fear is a term unknown to me. It is rather eerie, however, to ride alone on a messenger motorcycle through large stretches of forest that have yet to be cleansed.

Over the past few days the Reds have shot many messengers on their motorcycles, dragging them off their bikes in order to torture them terribly and then to kill them. The rashness of the Russian strategy can be seen in the following example:

This afternoon, when Russian tanks appeared, the crew of one of our panzers climbed out to position its cannon. When we returned, we found it all in flames. A civilian who was in hiding had set it on fire. He was captured and also set on fire.

There is strong ground and aircraft activity from the Russians during the evening. We hear rumors that we have been encircled by enemy tanks.
Scheisse
,
scheisse!
Stay calm and wait and see!

27 June:
Russian anti-tank guns (7.5–22 cm) hammered our positions the entire night. Once again, a night without any peace and sleep. By dawn, the Ratas are present in large numbers; however, none of their firing succeeds at making it into our holes. Like drunken men, they move in, veering to the right, then sharply to the left. We fire like crazy. We know very well what these maneuvers mean—they’re sniffing about our positions. Soon they will either take us under well targeted fire, or the heavy flounders [
flundern
] will dive down and dribble a dozen or so bombs into our holes. We are therefore ordered to immediately change positions, which is not that easy, since we are under machine gun fire.

As expected, a jolly group of heavy bombers appear a few minutes later. Again, everything happens in a matter of seconds. Chunks of earth are propelled into the air just 40 to 50 meters from us. Dirt, mud, roots, and entire sections of ground swirl about in the air. Glowing hot pieces of shrapnel land right at our feet. Jagged bolts of lightning slam into the ground with a loud roar. Though as quickly as it started, it was over. The ghostly silence that follows eats on our nerves. Wounded soldiers are moaning.

What will come next? A third and fourth wave, which uncover our exact positions and blow the living lights out of us? Minutes of anxious waiting follow, but nothing happens. Enemy fire has even started to subside. A single SMG [
schweres maschingewehr
—heavy machine gun] chugs on for a while, and then there is silence. What is going on? Why don’t the Reds attack this ridiculous bunch of ours? Shortly after, we are given an answer: Our infantry had hobbled in a forced march to our aid. (Hobbled, because it is impossible to talk about walking when mentioning these poor fellows, who have no shoes to cover their blistered feet.) As courteous as the Russians are, they left the area to our soldiers. Now though, the leaf is about to turn!

28 June:
The rest of our motorized groups and most importantly our artillery arrive in the morning. Even more important, though, is the food. The
B-Wagen
have also arrived. We would have suffered terribly had the Russians attacked us with only a few drops of gas left in our tanks.

No enemy contact as we advance. Red fighter planes try to disrupt our convoy every now and then, but these brothers do not dare a true attack today, for we have our comrades from the MGK with us today. It is glorious how they pierce the blue skies with their twin-barrel machine guns. Our
Heeres-Fla
[anti-aircraft forces] stutter as if they are possessed. The gentlemen of the Ratas soon tuck in their tails and disappear while growling ferociously. The farewell they bid with their onboard cannons unfortunately costs us two wounded soldiers.

29 June:
The morning delivers an explanation as to why the Russians disappeared so quickly. We have taken a few Ukrainian POWs who had been hiding out in the bushes. They had lost the will to continue fighting, and are better informed about the situation than we are, and what they have to say, as their meaningful grins demonstrate, makes us happy. The Russians are encircled, and since the encirclement is weak around Dubno, they have begun to concentrate their forces there in order to try and break through.

Town center of Dubno, present day Rivne Oblast, Ukraine, summer 1941. (Photograph courtesy of Håkan Henriksson)

Summer 1941. Ruins from the relentless bombing in Dubno, present day Rivne Oblast, Ukraine. (Photo courtesy of Håkan Henriksson)

We reach Dubno in the evening following a rapid march. The town is free of enemy troops. Earlier in the afternoon, the Russians were forced to surrender the town after putting up a desperate fight. They didn’t leave before vandalizing the town like a bunch of
schweine
[pigs]. Everything has been crushed to pieces. We find a large pile of mutilated dead bodies in the town prison.

A so-called “check of the road” on our sidecar motorcycle almost costs us by a hair’s breadth our lives. The Reds need to schedule some extra shooting lessons for their recruits. One should be able to hit a motorcycle with three people from a distance of 150 meters—Yes, yes, when one has joyfully survived, one can make fun of the situation! I think that if our helmets had not been on top of our heads, our hair would have stood straight up—the odds were 100 to 3!