Not a Panzer To Be Seen

Fallschirmjaeger May 1940

Karl hugged the rubble in front of him as bullets ricocheted from dark red chunks of clay brick and lime mortar. His boots sucking in the soggy polder that created a cloying mud. The volume of fire around Ypenburg airfield had intensified. The artillery never stopped. There was not a fucking Panzer to be seen. Nearly every building, house or office was a smoking ruin. Karl pushed his helmet just a little tighter down on his head, making himself small as possible.

Three days ago, the mused, he had been joking with Hans and Stephan, as they checked and rechecked harnesses for the drop gear. A dozen of them, smiling and preparing to jump from a perfectly good plane, they all laughed, it was only the one hundredth time it had been said. The Ju-52 had never once failed to put them where they needed, it was as reliable as clockwork.

Weapons loaded, extra ammo and rations for three days. The cavernous hold of the Ju-52 plane was something they had all grown to be comfortable in. The jumping was not quiet second nature however. Karl no longer wanted to shit himself before he leapt out, his knees did not betray him any more. Plus he didn’t piss himself like Hans. Poor bastard. He was after all a qualified Fallschirmjäger. He had respect of the regulars, the admiration of teh fraus. He and the Luftlandsoldat, are one of a kind, he fondled the hawk and swastika badge, elite indeed. Glancing out the sixth window of the fuselage, he knew this was really happening, as more planes taxied into place. They would fly over Holland drop near Den Haag, take the Dutch out of the war rapidly, Holland would be a push over. The airfield was lightly defended, they had said.

The cacophany of zings, pings, and the enoumouse booms of Dutch arty brought him back to the present. He stared at Hans’s lifeless eyes. He had not died well in the last attack these mad Dutchmen had done. Pinned down there was nothing Karl could do for him, except hold his hand, and protect him as best he could. Looking out to the airfield he saw the wreckage of a string Ju-52’s some still aflame. Two more inbound. Yes the AA had been a bit rough for the troopers that para-dropped here, but we had silenced that. He watche dteh first one descend, would it fair better than the others? In it came, the ground grabs the wheels, wrenching, the aircraft slews, cartwheels, breaking up, its engine explodes, no one exits.
The second plane can’t stop.
Broken struts, wheels axle deep, bent propellers. Supplies cooking off. The area laden with the dead and dying. The ground was too soft for the heavy payloads, the drizzling rain incessant.

“Where are the tanks, Hans my friend where?” Karl glanced over to where Stephan was also hunkered down. ‘Wo sind die Panzer? Stephan!’ Stephan shrugged his shoulders, chanced a glance over the rubble. Then replied ‘Nicht mehr lange, Nicht mehr lange!!’ He laughed. Karl smiled, not long indeed. However he was down to one magazine for his MP, and had long ago run out of grenades. Their Zug was a shell now. Barely two squads left out of the platoon. Their two MG 34 were saving ammo for the next counter attack. Karl had scavenged Han’s rifle grenades.

Someone called out. “Here they come.” The arty lifted, and through the rubble of buildings, came another company sized element of Dutch fighters, as equally battered as we were. Hard men, solid men. Grim, determined, they had this war thrust upon them. We asked for it, and got more in the bargain. They had not yet folded.

The MG chattered, forcing them to scatter for cover. Others fired back at that problem, Stephan called out ‘reloading’, Karl saw the arcing blob of awell thrown grenade, descending upon him. Diving to one side the blast projected him through the air. Stunned, Karl fumbled for the grenade launcher, determined to ward off the attack and allow Stephan time to finish his reload.

Fire burned his left side.
Pain lanced his body.
The recoil of his last rifle grenade forced a gasp from him. Looking down, several dark patches were slowly spreading across his uniform.

Darkness.

He awoke to the agonizing jostling of his body upon a stretcher. Stephan had a bandaged face, but was grinning down at him as they bounced along. ‘You slept through our war Karl.’ He said, ‘and now we carry you off to be prisoners of war!’ On the stretcher a sound reaches him he can’t place at first — low, grinding, from the south. Tracks. He turns his head. Stephan follows his eyes. “Nicht für uns,” he says. Not for us.
Confused Karl tried to sit up, but was stopped by pain.

‘Relax, my friend. For us the war is over unless those tanks arrive! We surrendered. ‘

Karl looked up at the sky. The sun was now out, but the sky was empty.

Not a Junkers in sight.