“Is he well enough to attend this meeting?” Chancellor Goerdeler asked. “I understand he was unconscious for several hours today.”
Sanger hung back as the chancellor and the defense minister chatted so he could eavesdrop more effectively. Although everyone knew he was fully bilingual, his American uniform served to make Germans sometimes less guarded when they spoke in their native tongue. Most of the big shots had their own translators anyway, relieving him of that duty for tonight’s meeting.
Hans Spiedel, the defense minister, replied, “I’ve never seen medical opinion stop Generalfeldmarschall Rommel from doing anything. If he can stand, he will be here. But that’s not enough. He is a man of his own mind, and does not easily put aside his opinion to accept that of someone else. It won’t be enough to get him to obey. He has to want to do this or it will not work.”
“Should we consider replacing him?”
“Goodness, no! Besides his undeniable military genius, he serves as a magnet, pulling soldiers from the other side. And his fame helps win over the citizenry.”
The reference to Rommel’s fame obviously didn’t sit well with the chancellor. The officials of the provisional German government weren’t united on much, but they all agreed that Rommel’s fame and reputation was eclipsing their own, and none of them liked it. The Desert Fox was, after all, a recent convert to the cause, not one who had truly paid his dues. Spiedel, who seemed born to the political arts, was kept busy nearly full-time just smoothing over ruffled diplomatic feathers. It seemed odd to Sanger that people who didn’t even yet have their country pacified would be spending their time jockeying for relative position, but that was altogether too common a behavior in people of any nationality. Politics seemed to him a fundamental characteristic of what human beings were all about.
As Eisenhower approached, Spiedel slipped directly into heavily accented English. “Good evening, General,” he said, reaching out his hand. “Forgive me. I haven’t been a civilian in a long time, and my hand wants to go into an automatic salute.”
Eisenhower laughed. “It’s hard to make the adjustment, I know.”
The room was filling up with the big brass: Eisenhower and Bradley,
Goerdeler and Spiedel, Patton, and a smattering of colonels—Sanger himself, Müller, and von Reinhardt. The civilians wore suits, the American officers wore their pinks-and-greens, and the German officers still wore Wehrmacht dress uniforms, omitting only decorations and insignia containing the swastika. They hadn’t had time to make new uniforms; the only evidence of their new affiliations were armbands with the letters DDR, for Deutsche Demokratische Republik, the provisional name of the new government.
Von Reinhardt was sitting while the rest of them stood; his face was stretched and pale and he was obviously in some discomfort. The cigarette smoke was already thick, and it was irritating the wounded man’s injured lungs. Müller had arranged coffee and a small assortment of cakes, but was the only one who had helped himself to something to eat. The others drank only coffee or did without.
Only the guest of honor—Rommel himself—was missing. As Sanger maneuvered himself into a good position to watch the proceedings, he tried to figure out what was going on. Goerdeler wouldn’t object if Rommel took himself out of the picture altogether, as long as he got to appoint his successor. Spiedel was weaving a spiderweb of control, manipulating everyone, including Rommel himself.
Eisenhower was full of bonhomie, but his babyish face and open manner masked a subtle and powerful intelligence. Patton was telling an off-color story to Bradley and laughing uproariously at his own punch lines. He had the edginess of someone who expected the current process to be a waste of his time. Bradley’s body language was reserved. Sanger wondered if Patton knew how much he put others into a defensive mode and how much that tended to cost him—if Patton did understand, it was clear he didn’t care. Müller, the supply officer, looked awkward and out of place. He had filled his cup of coffee too close to the brim and some had fallen on his tunic. There were other food spots there, too.
Aside from the pain clearly evident on von Reinhardt’s face, the intelligence-officer-turned-diplomat seemed pulled into himself, watching. Sanger had the feeling that von Reinhardt had a few cards to play, and was waiting for an opportunity.
“Good evening, gentlemen. Are you waiting for me?”
The voice at the door was sharp and penetrating, although not particularly loud. It was a “general’s voice,” the tone of command that all leaders need but not all leaders have. It drew everyone’s attention to the door.
The Desert Fox stood framed in the opening, his face solemn, left eye covered with a fresh bandage, the marks of battle scars and wounds clear. His uniform was unadorned, without medals or rank insignia; it was dirty from manual labor.
Chancellor Goerdeler, as the technically highest-ranking member of the
group, tried to open. “How are you doing, Generalfeldmarschall? We’re all quite concerned …”
Rommel moved forward abruptly. “You’re all concerned that I seem to be fighting the wrong war in the wrong way. Correct? You find my working here, trying to save these prisoners who have been savaged by our own fatherland, to be wasteful when I could be out adding to the death toll of this war.” He gathered in the room with his remaining good eye. “I have just learned from my American doctor that I have become blind in one eye from the wounds I sustained last summer, exacerbated by infections and dirt from our current surroundings. My scholarly friend von Reinhardt reminded me that an eye is the traditional price one pays for wisdom, for that is what the god Odin paid for his.”
Von Reinhardt nodded solemly at this. He was a strange bird, thought Sanger—an intelligence officer who thought that his business was actually intelligence. Not many military officers would think to give their commanders lectures on Norse mythology.
“I don’t know whether I have gained wisdom, but I do know that I see what has happened here in a new light. I’m sure many of my countrymen will want to say that this was not us, but rather the doing of our Nazi masters. That is not sufficient. We are Germans and patriots, and therefore this belongs to us. This camp, and the others we have not yet found, is German property, not merely Nazi property, for the difference is one fit only for lawyers. There is no cause, no work in Germany today more important than this, because our honor is the only true value a people can have. Ours is here, in the dirt, and must be reclaimed from the dirt.”
It was Patton—indeed, it had to be Patton, Sanger thought—who interrupted Rommel’s speech. Patton was the only major Allied officer who had come to the camp but who had not done some KP duty. “Hold on just a goddamned minute, Rommel. I agree with you that this is a pretty fucking awful mess, and that you Germans have responsibility for cleaning this up. But you can’t just forget the lines of Soviet bastards rolling westward. If you just swap Nazis for Commies, you haven’t made things better. And if you think your buddies mistreat prisoners, just wait until that son of a bitch Stalin starts in. He’ll give Buchenwald a run for its money in the competition to be Hell on earth.”
“Now, just a minute, Georgie,” interjected Bradley. “I think we ought to hear Rommel out before we …”
“Brad, we’re here to lay it out in black-and-white for Rommel, and I don’t think he’s the sort of man who likes people to pussyfoot around. What do you say, Rommel? Do you want it straight, or do you want it political?” The unstoppable force paused for a minute. Sanger noticed that Rommel was having trouble controlling a smile.
“General Patton,” Rommel said in his most formal voice, which sounded
odd in contrast to his dirty clothing, “I always prefer straight talk from men I respect. I am just as aware as you of the threat the Soviet Union poses. In fact, I have more intimate knowledge of them because so many of my colleagues in the armed forces of the Reich have been doing battle in the East for years. And I am mindful of what you are saying. But what we have here is unprecedented. War, as we all know, is often terrible, and the suffering of innocents is not unusual. That is why we have laws and customs of war, to lessen its savagery. What we see around us is not only horrific and inhumane, but also criminal. That crime must be expiated.”
Eisenhower stepped forward, as if to separate the two men. “Field Marshal Rommel, I completely agree with you about the ethical and legal issues here. This matter demands our deepest concern. But we are officers in a military organization trying to prosecute a just war and bring it to an honorable finish. We have doctors, investigators, social-service teams, and many other resources available to help with this situation. This assignment is important, but it isn’t a task calling for the full capabilities of the man who commanded Army Group Africa. We can find capable people for this work. If you’ll forgive me for saying so, we can find people more capable than you—or I. It is not your job.”
Rommel gave a short military bow, acknowledging Eisenhower’s speech. “In fact, most of the logistical work is already being ably handled by Colonel Müller.” The pudgy colonel reddened. “You’re right that much of the work can be done by others, and that others may be able to do it better. But there is one job that I’m afraid only I can do.”
The pause grew in length, until Eisenhower felt compelled to ask, “And what is that job, Field Marshal? Manual laborer?”
“Exactly, General Eisenhower.” He stood, waiting. The pause grew longer again.
“Manual fucking laborer!” Patton could no longer contain himself. “So you’ve decided to wallow in shit and claim you’re on a moral high horse, when your failure to command your troops is condemning your countrymen to Soviet slavery? God
damn
it, Rommel! If you want to tear your shirt and wear sackcloth and ashes, then I suggest you get the fucking hell out of my way and I’ll go fight the Russians for you. Jeezus!” He threw up his arms in melodramatic disgust.
“Put a sock in it, George,” said Eisenhower with deceptive mildness. Bradley added the force of a restraining hand on Patton’s arm.
“Perhaps another German can best speak to this,” interjected Goerdeler. “You see, Herr Generalfeldmarschall, those of us in the resistance are as horrified by the evil we see all around us as you are, but we are less surprised, because we have known about this for years. You were in North Africa, carrying on warfare in a manner consistent with German honor, and because you
are an honorable man, you tend to assume that honor is a common characteristic. I’m afraid that isn’t true. You yourself finally reached the point where your soldier’s oath to the führer had to be set aside because of your deeper loyalty to the German people and to humanity.
“Our good name as Germans has been befouled with mass murder, and the worst crimes have not yet been exposed to the light of day. The extermination of Jews and others continues even as we speak, and military action is needed—now. There will come time for acts of contrition. But this madness must be ended, and quickly. We need the Desert Fox to return to his station at the head of the free German military, to liberate this nation from Nazi domination, and to stop this madness.”
Rommel bowed in acknowledgment. “Herr Chancellor, when I took on these new responsibilities for the provisional government, it was my deepest hope and prayer that I would be able to get Germans to lay down their arms, to switch sides, to bring an end to the Third Reich with as few additional casualties as possible. Now you are asking me to wage the cruelest sort of war on my own people, for the leaders of the Reich well understand that there is no longer any surrender to be had now that this crime has been revealed. How can I do this? Hans,” he said, turning to Spiedel, “what do you think I should do?”
Spiedel looked down at the floor. “Erwin,” he said quietly, “you are my field marshal, and I will be with you whatever you choose. If it is war against our own, I will stand with you, or if you want me to go back into the camp and continue to perform manual labor at your side, I will stand with you there as well.”
“Of all the pansy-ass bullshit I’ve ever heard, this takes the cake!” Patton could no longer contain himself. “Do you think for one minute that any of the sadistic bastards who built these camps shed one tear or had one minute of conscience over what they did? So instead of tracking these bastards down and putting a personal bullet through their miserable fucking heads, you’re going to stick your heads in the sand and be oh-so-noble? You’re a soldier, goddamn it, not a fucking pussy! So as one soldier to another, it’s time to suck it up and get back on the fucking goddamned horse! Jesus Christ!” Patton looked heavenward, as if he was looking for immediate confirmation from above.
“Dammit, George, I said to put a sock in it,” growled Eisenhower. “Field Marshal, I appreciate your dilemma, but I must tell you that General Patton has an important point, even when put in somewhat less than diplomatic language. We can certainly prosecute the end of this war without you and your army group, but for a variety of reasons I’m sure you understand, it would be far better to continue with the plan that’s got us this far.”
The Desert Fox surveyed the group in front of him. His one good eye was
sharp and clear, and Sanger noticed that he did not seem fazed by the opposition in front of him. “All of you, I think, view the events here and at the other camps as quite serious, but something less than world-shaking. I, on the other hand, believe we have entered an entirely new world with evil on a scale not heretofore seen. Because this is unprecedented, the appropriateness of normal behavior is subject to rethinking. I am not convinced that what seems obvious is necessarily correct. Sanger, you have worked with me these past few days. What is your opinion?”