Johann Krause held his arms over his chest, wrapping them tight over his uniform's tunic for warmth. The temperature in Stalingrad had plummeted, and 71st Infantry Division had not yet received their winter uniforms. Krause had never much minded the cold, and if he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine he was back in Berlin, sitting at the table of a sidewalk café, sipping schnapps.
He was not in Berlin, of course, and he was not at a sidewalk café. He was here, in Stalingrad, occupying the basement of the "Railwayman's House".
The Railwayman's House had been the living quarters of the Soviet administrator of Stalingrad's Central Rail Station. He and his family had, apparently, had the good sense to leave, either defying Stalin's orders or else receiving special dispensation for their high rank in the Communist Party. So, the apartment house, ruined like every other building in Stalingrad during the firebombing, stood abandoned.
Over a month ago, when 71st Infantry division had sent wave after wave of German soldiers to capture the train station, only to be thrown back again and again by Soviet reinforcements, Krause's officer in command, Hauptmann Polik, had come up with an idea. Rather than attack the rail station itself repeatedly, Polik argued, the Germans should attack and occupy the buildings that surrounded it. That way the Soviet defenders in the station would be cut off from resupply and reinforcement, allowing a final German assault to be decisive.
General Walther Von Seydlitz, commander of LI Army Corps, of which the 71st was a subordinate part, approved of Polik's plan, and this Railwayman's House was the first building Polik had led his company to attack. The assault had been horrible and difficult, and Krause shivered when he remembered his own part in it. He had been sensibly armed with a submachinegun instead of a rifle, which he sprayed indiscriminately through walls and doors ahead of his advance into each room. The tactic worked – often after kicking down a shattered door he was greeted only by the slumped bodies of bullet-ridden Soviet defenders. But one time the tactic had almost cost Krause his life. A Soviet defender had primed a grenade before he was killed, so that when the door swung open the live grenade was rolling on the floor seconds from exploding. Krause and his squad mates hit the deck just in time.
Krause hadn't had unlimited ammunition, so eventually he was forced to fight hand to hand. His brain played a funny trick on him, and he barely remembered wrestling with the last of the Russian defenders. He did remember, however, emerging from the building, victorious, but his hair and face crusty with blood. It was probably for the best that he couldn't recall how they had gotten that way.
The old Krause would never have fought like such a devil. The old Krause would have found some clever way to avoid the duty or hang back near the front of the building. The old Krause had no one to impress and was impressed by no one. But the new Krause was in love, and he would do whatever he needed to help the object of that love receive the credit and admiration he deserved. The new Krause wanted Polik's plan to succeed.
And it had succeeded. Polik's strategy hadn't only resulted in the eventual occupation of the Central Rail Station, but in clearing a way for all Central Stalingrad to be attacked. A few days later the 71st had driven all the way to Central Landing Stage on the Volga, and by September 27th the Germans had prevented the Soviets from ever again using that dock to evacuate wounded or ferry over fresh troops.
There were other landing stages, of course, in the north and south of the city, but the capture of Central Landing Stage was a major victory. Krause had received an Iron Cross for his bravery, and Polik had received a promotion from Hauptmann to Major. The Railwayman's House became both his headquarters and a symbol of Wehrmacht perseverance and tactical genius.
Throughout the subsequent bitter fighting of October, during which Russians seemed to be multiplying like rats, this basement ruin had become a welcome retreat for Krause and his beloved officer, where he could lie in the arms of his lover and commander and they both could forget, for a time, the bloodshed.
Right now, the cold and dim space was being used for a dinner party. Major Polik had invited important officers, including General Seydlitz himself, to hear Hitler's much-anticipated November 8th radio address. Krause had spent several days preparing for the event, gathering chairs and tables and scrounging for liquor and victuals worthy of a general's palette. He often had paused in the effort, reflecting with a self-deprecating smile that he was acting more like a housewife than a soldier – a housewife trying to impress her husband's boss.
Krause couldn't tell if Polik's boss was impressed or not. Krause had swept out the dust, rubble, and broken plaster. He'd covered the dismal walls with Wehrmacht unit banners and, despite his own distaste for them, Nazi swastikas. He'd covered the rough wooden tables and benches with an eclectic collection of cushions and cloths. He'd fashioned seats salvaged from wrecked half-tracks and kubelwagens into easy chairs. And he'd lit the dim space in a magical glow of candlelight. He was proud of the basement's transformed appearance.
He was less proud of the refreshments. The other officers surely had their own carefully horded supplies of delicacies. But supplies had slowed to a trickle in recent weeks so perhaps they genuinely appreciated the minor extravagance of vodka and sardines. They certainly hadn't complained. Krause suspected they were just being polite. He had no way to tell.
The radio address had begun, and all of the assembled officers and their aides were listening attentively. For the first time in Krause's memory Hitler was not ranting and raving in the spoiled-child tone of voice that had made him famous. The Fuhrer spoke with calm reserve; he even sounded halfway sane. "I wanted to come to the Volga," Hitler explained, as if he, personally, was leading 6th Army, "to a specific place and a specific city. It happened to have Stalin's name, but that's not why I went there. It could have had another name."
Hitler paused as his radio audience burst into laughter. He had been accused of being driven by his ego rather than military strategy, and of attacking Stalingrad for the very reason he now denied – because it was named after his communist arch-rival.
"But now," Hitler continued, "this is a very important point. Because from here comes 30 million tons of traffic, including about 9 million tons of oil shipments. From there the wheat pours from these enormous territories of the Ukraine and from the Kuban region then to be transported north. From here comes magnesium ore."
Krause unconsciously nodded to himself. This was the real reason for the attack on Stalingrad. Its importance as a port was a bit overstated, perhaps, but it was true that the Volga was a major artery to the vast Soviet empire and if the Wehrmacht took Stalingrad, they could cut that artery in two. The Soviet Union's armies in the north would be starved of everything an army required to fight.
Krause hated Hitler, and he hated that Hitler took personal credit for the strategies Germany's great Generals had devised for him. But since falling in love with Polik and joining Army Group South, Krause had begun to admire the army itself. He was proud of the Wehrmacht, proud that it was on the verge of achieving what even Napoleon had failed to do.
The trouble was, they hadn't yet taken Stalingrad, and they hadn't yet cut the Volga in two. That was proving far more difficult than the Generals had predicted. These Russians were resilient. It required more than superior tactics to root them out. It required lives and blood. It required German reinforcements.
"We have it now," Hitler continued. "Only a few small pockets of resistance are left." Krause caught his breath in surprise, and noticed he was not the only one. What the hell was Hitler talking about? They didn't have the city, not yet, and they'd only taken one of the river crossings.
"No ships are coming up the Volga!" Hitler announced triumphantly. "That is the important point!" And suddenly his voice was drowned out by the thundering applause of his radio audience.
Krause leaned back on his bench, stunned. It was true that no ships were coming up the Volga, but not because of the German attack. They weren't coming because the weather had turned, and the ice flows were too dangerous to navigate. But that wouldn't last long, maybe a month or a month and a half at most. Then winter would come in earnest and the Volga would freeze over completely. It would no longer be a river – it would be a road.
"Heil Hitler," someone mumbled, as if suddenly remembering.
"Heil Hitler," nodded Krause, and several other officers self-consciously echoed the words. But no one said it earnestly. They all seemed as stunned as Krause.
"What does he mean," Krause ventured cautiously, "when he says, 'we have it'."
General Seydlitz cleared his throat. "I think he means...or he believes...that we are in complete control of the river."
"Are we?" Krause asked, willing to play the role of a naïve NCO who wasn't privy to the full strategic picture.
"To my knowledge, no," replied the General with a frown.
That gave his subordinates the freedom to speak frankly. "What's this business about isolated pockets of resistance?" asked a colonel. "Is Mamayev Hill an isolated pocket? Is Red October? Is the Tractor Factory?"
Krause recognized each of those terrible battlefields, where thousands of Germans had already died, and perhaps tens of thousands of Russians. They were meat grinders of attrition, slaughterhouses in which the Germans killed a never-ending supply of Russian adversaries. And yet more Soviets always appeared, new Russian reinforcements, fresh meat for the abattoirs.
"He isn't here," Seydlitz said, apologizing on behalf of the Fuhrer. "He isn't fully assessed of the situation."
"Shouldn't Paulus be assessing him? Or Manstein?" asked the Colonel, referring to the leaders of 6th Army and 4th Panzer Army, respectively.
"They are doing their best," Seydlitz assured his subordinates. But his voice was less than convincing.
"So long as he sends reinforcements," growled another officer. "We need more men to reduce these 'isolated pockets of resistance'." That drew a cynical chuckle from the assembled soldiers.
"Perhaps he is reinforcing elsewhere," Polik suggested, speaking out for the first time.
All eyes turned to the newly promoted Major, and Krause's heart swelled with pride. His paramour was junior to every other officer present here, and yet they so respected his opinion that they hung on his words.
"Why do you think that?" Seydlitz pressed.
"How many Soviet Armies do you think we have pinned down here?" Polik explained. "More than the two we've committed," he said, answering his own question. "Perhaps Hitler has finally realized that we can't take the city. Perhaps he has decided to leave us here, tying down the bulk of the Soviet forces while Army Group Center storms Moscow, captures Stalin, and ends this war in a single stroke."
"You mean a sneak attack?" asked one of the Colonels.
Polik nodded. "The bulk of the Soviet Air Force is here, too. It shouldn't be too much trouble to assemble a force to the north without Russian planes spotting it."
General Seydlitz nodded and chewed his lip. "That would be crafty," he admitted. "And this radio address, then, is what? Just a feint?"
"Disinformation," suggested Polik.
Krause wanted to believe. He wanted to think Hitler had some great plan that would end the war by Christmas. He wanted to think that they'd stop throwing themselves at the Russian defenders and dig in, instead.
But, like everyone present in that basement, he had trouble believing, because there was a second, unspoken part of Seydlitz' comment. "That would be crafty," he had said, and everyone knew that Hitler was seldom crafty.
Three days later Krause had his answer. Hitler, trying to take advantage of the Soviets' inability to provide reinforcements across the Volga, ordered an all-out offensive throughout the city.
By the end of the week, more than half Krause's battalion was dead, 6th Army was no closer to controlling Stalingrad, and they still hadn't received reinforcements.