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Rockets and People
there was a blown-up bridge and a village that had been wiped off the face of the
earth.We would need to bypass both.What had happened there? We learned the
answer to that question there and then.
After a good dinner with Rhine wine, we heard about the episode in the village
from an elderly man who turned out to be a Russian “displaced person” who had
worked in SVA as a translator.To him, this characterized the American method of
combat and the basic tenet of American military operations: Above all, save the
lives of your own soldiers.
An American mechanized column was moving deep into Thuringia, meeting
virtually no resistance. After entering this unfortunate hamlet—I don’t remember
what it was called—the advance guard was suddenly fired on by automatic
weapons and hunting rifles. Later it was determined that a small detachment of
Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) had settled in that village. They had responded to
Goebbels’ appeals and decided to become “werewolf” guerrillas.Their fire did no
harm to the Americans.
If a Red Army unit had been here, these “werewolves” would have been annihilated
on the spot or taken prisoner. But the Americans didn’t want to risk the
life of a single one of their guys.Without firing a shot, the powerful mechanized
formation withdrew several kilometers. The “werewolves” decided that their
village had been saved from the occupying forces, but they were sorely mistaken.
The commander of the American unit reported the situation in such a way that a
bomber formation was sent to his aid. It turned the ill-fated village and all of its
inhabitants into formless heaps of smoking ruins. Only after this treatment from
the air did the Americans continue their “victorious” advance.
We made a small detour to get a look at this demolished “fortress” and discovered
an intense reconstruction project at the site of the former village.
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