The Kindly Ones

Yet the Russians still weren’t moving. In the West, our forces were still struggling to break through (the Americans were clinging to Bastogne), and we also had gone over to the offensive in Budapest, which gave us a little hope again. But the famous V-2 rockets had turned out, if you knew how to read between the lines, to be ineffective, our secondary offensive in Northern Alsace had immediately been contained, and it was obvious that it was just a question of time now. At the beginning of January, I gave Piontek a day off so he could evacuate his family from Tarnowitz, at least as far as Breslau; I didn’t want him worrying himself sick about them when the time came. Snow fell steadily, and when the sky did clear, the heavy, dirty smoke from the foundries dominated the Silesian landscape, bearing witness to a production of tanks, cannons, and munitions that would continue till the last minute. A dozen days went by like this in anxious tranquility, punctuated by bureaucratic quarrels. I finally managed to persuade Bär to prepare special rations, to be distributed to the inmates at the time of departure; as for warm clothing, he told me they would take them from the Kanada

, whose warehouses, for lack of transport, were still full. A good piece of news briefly came to lighten this tension. One night, at the Haus, Drescher presented himself at my table with two glasses of Cognac, smiling into his goatee: “Congratulations, Obersturmbannführer,” he declared, handing me a glass and raising the other.—“That’s fine with me, but why?”—“I spoke to Sturmbannführer Morgen today. He asked me to tell you that your affair is closed.” That Drescher knew about it scarcely bothered me, I was so relieved by the news. Drescher went on: “In the absence of any material evidence, Judge von Rabingen decided to dismiss the case against you. Von Rabingen told the Sturmbannführer that he’d never seen such a shoddy case with so little to back it up, and that the Kripo had done an abominable job. He was close to thinking it all stemmed from some plot against you.” I breathed in: “That’s what I always said. Fortunately, the Reichsführer kept his confidence in me. If what you say is true, then my honor is cleared.”—“That’s right,” said Drescher, nodding. “Sturmbannführer Morgen even told me that Judge von Rabingen was thinking of taking disciplinary measures against the inspectors who were working against you.”—“I’d be delighted.” The news was confirmed to me three days later by a letter from Brandt, which included a copy of a letter to the Reichsführer in which von Rabingen stated he was fully convinced of my innocence

. Neither of the two letters mentioned Clemens or Weser, but that was enough for me.

Finally, after this brief respite, the Soviets launched the long-dreaded offensive from their bridgeheads over the Vistula. Our meager covering forces were swept aside. The Russians, during their pause, had accumulated incredible firepower; their T-34s rushed in columns across the Polish plains, smashing our divisions, imitating our 1941 tactics with brio; in many places, our troops were surprised by enemy tanks when they thought the lines were a hundred kilometers away. On January 17, Generalgouverneur Frank and his administration evacuated Cracow, and our last units withdrew from the ruins of Warsaw. The first Soviet tanks were already penetrating Silesia when Schmauser launched Fall-A

. For my part, I had done everything I thought possible: stored cans of gasoline, sandwiches, and rum in our two vehicles, and destroyed all the copies of my reports. On the night of the seventeenth, I was summoned by Bär along with all the other officers; he announced that according to Schmauser’s instructions, all fit inmates would be evacuated, by foot, starting the following morning: the roll call under way that night would be the last one. The evacuations would take place according to the plan. Each column commander was to make sure no inmate escaped or stayed behind on the road; any attempt would be pitilessly punished; Bär urged them, though, to avoid shooting inmates as they passed through villages, so as not to shock the populace. One of the column commanders, an Obersturmführer, spoke: “Sturmbannführer, isn’t that order too severe? If a Häftling tries to escape, it’s normal to shoot him. But what if he’s simply too weak to walk?”—“All the Häftlinge who are leaving are classified as fit for work and must be able to do fifty kilometers without any problems,” Bär retorted. “The sick and the unfit will remain in the camps. If there are sick prisoners in the columns, they must be eliminated. These orders must be applied.”