The Second Objective (2 page)

“Yes, sir,” said Bernie, trying not to look surprised.

“Your parents emigrated there in the early 1920s, after the last war. Why?”

“As I understand, there was little or no work in Germany then,” said Bernie. “Economic hardship.”

“Your father is an industrial chemist. He worked for Pfizer, on Long Island.”

“That’s right.”

“And you were raised and educated in New York.”

“Brooklyn. Yes I was, sir.”

“When did your family return to Germany?”

“In 1938. I was fourteen.”

“Why?”

Bernie hesitated. “For the same reason we left in the first place. My father lost his job in the Depression. He had no way to support his family. As a scientist and a German citizen, he got an offer from the new government to go home and work here.”

The captain betrayed no reactions. Judging from the man’s shrewd manner, he knew the answer to every question he was asking. His steady, unblinking gaze sent waves of fear through Bernie. When the SS took an interest in someone, he had a way of disappearing, even if he had nothing to hide. Bernie felt sweat dripping down under his arms.

“Your father works for IG Farben, in Frankfurt,” said the captain.

“Yes, sir.”

“Has he ever discussed his work with you?”

Is that what this is about? My father? Not what happened in Berlin?

“No, sir. I believe it is classified.”

“You began military service sixteen months ago,” said the captain. “When you turned eighteen. You made no attempt to enlist prior to that.”

“I was still in school, sir—”

“Nor were you ever a member of the
Hitlerjugend
.”

The captain’s eyes bored into him. Bernie felt rattled to his core, certain the man could read the thoughts he tried to keep from his mind. Did he know that within months of returning to Nazi Germany, his father had been warned by his bosses at IG Farben that if he ever tried to leave, his family would be killed? Or that Bernie’s own hatred of the Nazis had only grown greater after he was drafted? He’d come to Germany against his will, with an American teenager’s skepticism intact, immune to the Nazis’ nationalist fantasia. With their fixation on pomp and ritual, he’d thought them coarse and buffoonish. Then he and his family had watched in horror as they brought Europe to its knees.

Bernie’s mind raced to the one question that mattered: Did this man know that when they learned about his language skills and moved him to the radio room, Bernie had twice altered his translation of intercepted American intelligence reports about troop movements, trying to mislead his superiors about their intent? Fighting his own private resistance, probably ineffectual, certainly reckless. He’d waited a month before trying again, sure they were watching him. His second attempt had come just a week ago.

Had they only been waiting for him to stick his neck out again? Why else would they have brought him here?

“I was older than the compulsory age when we returned from America,” said Bernie. “My father wanted me to finish my education.”

The captain stood up and walked around the table. “Why has your father never joined the National Socialist Party?”

“I’m afraid you’d have to ask him, sir—”

“Is he a patriotic man?”

“He’s always thought of himself as a German first. That’s why he came home when he had the chance—”

The captain pulled his pistol and held it firmly to Bernie’s forehead.

“And how do you think of yourself, Private?”

Bernie swallowed before answering. “As my father’s son.”

“You are an American citizen.”

“I have dual citizenship, German and American.”

“And if you had to choose?”

“I’ve never been given a choice—”

“I’m giving you one now.”

Bernie never took his eyes away from the captain’s, convinced that the slightest slip would make him pull the trigger. “Speak with my commanding officers if you think my allegiance is in question.”

The captain kept staring at him. Bernie remained at attention, eyes forward, trembling.

“We have spoken with them. Isn’t there anything else you wish to tell me?”

Bernie looked right at him. “No, sir.”

Another moment, then the captain lowered the pistol and holstered it. Bernie had passed the test. His knees nearly buckled.

“You’ve volunteered to become part of a new brigade. English is a requirement. Yours is excellent, for obvious reasons. Is it safe to say you also have knowledge of American culture? Movie stars. Baseball. Current events.”

“I’ve been away for six years, sir.”

“You read newspapers, don’t you? America is still of interest to you. You can answer the question honestly, son; it’s only natural. It was your home for fourteen years.”

Bernie saw the trap beneath the question, and asked neutrally, “Why, sir?”

“Your experience can be of value during our training. We may call upon your expertise in this area.”

“I’ll help any way I can, sir.”

“I am Captain Stielau. You will report directly to me. You look relieved.”

“Do I? I suppose I am, sir.”

Stielau seemed amused by Bernie’s reaction, then turned to his lieutenant: “Category One.”

The lieutenant wrote Bernie’s name on a roster with four columns. Bernie saw that his was the first name in the first column.

“May I ask the purpose of our new brigade, sir?”

“Yes,” said Stielau.

Bernie hesitated. “What is the purpose of our new brigade, sir?”

“I said you could ask. I didn’t say I would tell you. You’re dismissed, Private Oster.”

2

Grafenwöhr

NOVEMBER 1944

B
ernie tried to bury his fear by losing himself in the camp’s routine. Over two thousand men from every corner of the Reich arrived during the following week. Bernie helped conduct their initial interviews, asking questions to determine their level of competence in English, both speaking and comprehension. They were then classified into four categories. One: fluency in English and working knowledge of American slang. Two: fluency without knowledge of specific American idioms. Three: general comprehension and the ability to conduct limited conversations. Four: restricted comprehension, men who had studied English in school without real-world application.

Bernie quickly realized that most of the “volunteers” had vastly overstated their abilities. By the end of the week, as the last men arrived, he had picked fewer than twenty to join him in Category One. Fifty went into Category Two. The third category had about one hundred men in it, and the fourth another two hundred. As for the rest, over two-thirds of the men who had been summoned to
Grafenwöhr
, their English was limited to single-word responses. Bernie barracked with the rest of the Ones and Twos; Threes and Fours occupied separate quarters across the yard, and the rest stayed on the far side of the compound.

The men were issued neutral olive-green uniforms without insignia. All previous ranks were erased, and officers received no preferential treatment. They dined together in the same large mess hall, eating meals that far surpassed normal army fare. Contact with friends or family was forbidden. Every man signed an oath of silence, and letters home had to pass a censor’s strict review. Medicine and prescription drugs were dispensed freely to prevent illness, since no one was allowed out of camp to see a doctor. This taut atmosphere fueled rumors and speculation about their brigade’s reason for being, which flew through the camp, mutating on a daily basis. Their true purpose remained a mystery.

They heard their first explanation when Bernie and the rest of the brigade were called one day at dawn to a general assembly in the compound. Captain Stielau addressed them. They were now part of the 150th Panzer Brigade, he said, operating under the command of Colonel Otto Skorzeny. The mention of his name sent a ripple through the yard; he was without rival the most notorious figure in the German armed forces. Stielau told them their mission was called “Operation
Greif
,” and they were being trained to defend Cologne when the Allies attacked across the Rhine. It sounded plausible, but Bernie found it impossible to reconcile with what they were being taught.

Their training began each morning with English lessons, focusing on American slang, and tutoring to eliminate native accents. Bernie helped craft a crash course on American culture, using newspapers, magazines, sports sections, and comic strips. Tests were given each day to drill this information into long-term memory. The men were ordered to use only English; anyone heard speaking German was disciplined with solitary confinement.

Each afternoon they were put through Skorzeny’s commando training: demolition, communications, reconnaissance, special weapons, light artillery, night fighting in both urban and forest environments, hand-to-hand combat. They were schooled in map reading, the basics of movement under combat conditions, camouflage techniques, and communications. They were taught how to drive and service captured American jeeps, scout cars, half-tracks, and tanks. Each man in Categories One and Two was issued an M1 rifle. Ammunition was too scarce for target practice, but they learned to carry, field strip, and maintain their rifles as rigorously as any GI.

After dinner they gathered in the mess hall to listen to U.S. Armed Forces Radio. Beer was served and they were encouraged to sing along with the popular songs of American recording artists. On some nights they watched American films, in English, with orders to observe and mimic the actors’ mannerisms. Seeing these familiar faces again, the first Hollywood stars he’d seen in years, made Bernie desperately homesick. His dread about what Skorzeny was really preparing them for grew with each passing day; only exhaustion kept it from overwhelming his mind.

At the end of the second week, the fluent English speakers, about eighty men, were placed directly under the command of Captain Stielau. Except for meals, they now spent their days apart from the others, and their language training intensified. Whenever shipments of new Allied material arrived—uniforms, boots, weapons—Stielau’s men received it first. Bernie believed that the future objectives of the two groups, whatever they might be, had begun to diverge.

Bernie met one other American-born man in Category One, a U.S. Army deserter named William Sharper. He had served in the American Army until after the invasion of Normandy. Sharper took a lead role during training, teaching the men specific GI behaviors; the way they slouched, chewed gum, how to rip open a pack of cigarettes with a thumbnail, and the fine art of swearing. Bernie stayed clear of him, disturbed by the violence he saw in the man’s eyes. A handful of others were former members of the German diplomatic corps who had learned English serving in foreign embassies. The rest came from the merchant marine, itinerant seamen who at some point had worked on American or English ships. One was a former porter on the
Queen Mary
. Their isolation, intense physical training, and the airtight atmosphere of secrecy brought them quickly and closely together as a unit.

At the start of the third week, each man in Bernie’s unit was assigned an American name. American dog tags were issued bearing these names, along with a new rank, and they were ordered to refer to one another only by these new names and ranks. They were told to create and memorize a fictional American history: place of birth, family members, education, hometown history, favorite pets, girlfriends left behind, baseball teams, local geography. Bernie decided the only way to create a life story he could remember under pressure was to keep it as close as possible to his own. A New Yorker from Brooklyn, the son of immigrant parents, he became Private James Tenella.

That Tuesday Bernie was summoned to the interview cabin. A new arrival sat joking with Stielau’s lieutenant, waiting to go through the evaluation process. Unlike the hundreds who’d preceded him, he still wore his German uniform: the crisp black tunic of a
Waffen
-SS lieutenant. He was in his mid to late twenties, wiry, compact, with close-cropped blond hair and a ready, dazzling smile.

Stielau’s lieutenant waved Bernie into the room: “Private Tenella, meet our latest arrival, SS
Unterstürmführer
Erich Von Leinsdorf.”

Von Leinsdorf stood up to shake his hand, and looked him in the eye. “A pleasure. They tell me you may be able to iron the starch out of my plummy Mid-Atlantic tones.”

Von Leinsdorf spoke perfect English, with a crisp upper-class British accent.

“Whatever it takes, sir,” said Bernie.

Stielau’s lieutenant handed Bernie the clipboard and left the room. Von Leinsdorf perched on the edge of the table and opened a sterling silver cigarette case engraved with his initials.

“I suppose I’ll have to start smoking Lucky Strikes,” he said. “No more English Players for me.”

Von Leinsdorf torched his cigarette with a matching silver lighter and smiled again. He smoked like a movie star, or someone who had studied movie stars smoking. Despite his easygoing charm, Bernie felt a visceral wariness of the man. He seemed to take up more space than he physically occupied. The superior airs seemed characteristic for someone from his class, but Bernie was reacting to something starker than the aristocratic “Von” in his name. He pulled back the chair Von Leinsdorf had been using and sat down facing him.