Free Red Inferno: 1945 by Robert Conroy Page A

hospital tent. If there were any hospitals, he thought.
    Having done what he could, Logan checked the rest of his men and found only one other slightly wounded. Fearful of leaving his comrades, that soldier refused to go to the rear. Logan didn’t have time to argue and left him with his buddies.
    The road was littered with damaged and burning vehicles of all types, and many were surrounded by the fragmentary and smoking remains of their crews.
    Logan was vomiting on the ground when Captain Dimitri found him. Dimitri’s face was one of controlled fury. “Where the hell is Singer?”
    “Badly wounded, Captain. I think he’s gonna lose his arm.”
    “Goddamnit.”
    “Captain, how bad off are we?”
    Dimitri shook his head. He was having difficulty comprehending the magnitude of what had just occurred. “Looks like a half dozen killed in the company and maybe twice that many wounded. It’s bad, but it could have been a lot worse. Do you hear the big guns?”
    Logan hadn’t. Concentrating entirely on his own problems, he had been unaware of the crash and rumble of artillery fire that was coming from the west of their position back toward the Elbe.
    “Those poor bastards down there,” Dimitri said, “are really getting clobbered. Battalion says they are being hit by waves of armor. At least we’ve been spared that.” Dimitri smiled wryly. “Thank God for small favors.”
    Captain Dimitri told Logan where he could find some help for Singer and departed to continue checking on the rest of his company. What the hell is going on? Logan thought. Just a little while ago we were all planning on going home. Now the Russians have attacked. Do we have a whole new war? Against Russia? He had heard of the size and ferocity of the Russian military and had no urge to test the truth of the stories.
    Logan and the rest of his platoon stayed in their positions for a couple of hours until they saw the familiar form of Captain Dimitri again approaching. He could tell from the look on the captain’s face that they would be moving and there would be new holes to dig.
    “Logan,” Dimitri snapped. “You’re in charge, at least for the time being. Take a couple of men and a jeep down the road and see what’s happened to our armor and if the Russians are coming.”
    “I sure as hell hope they aren’t, Captain,” he said, and Dimitri grunted.
    Twenty minutes later, Logan’s slowly moving jeep found what appeared to be the point of the column. Ruined and burning tanks and half-tracks littered the field along with a number of bodies. There was no sign of the Russians. A small blessing, Logan thought. They were out there, and he wondered if Red Army scouts were watching him and his jeep and wondering if they should kill him. Now I know how someone who’s paranoid feels, he thought.
    They got out and walked around, checking to make sure that no American was still alive. None were. There were too many dead to take back in the jeep. Jack hated to leave them, but had no choice.
    “Sarge, I think we should go,” said Crawford.
    Logan concurred. They were well ahead of their column and the only people to their front would be Russians. They’d stayed long enough and were pushing their luck. A burst of machine-gun fire chewed up the ground near them, punctuating their thoughts.
    “Agreed. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
    There was no more firing from the unseen Russian gun. Maybe the Reds were taunting them. What the hell was happening? Goddamnit, Logan snarled silently. They were supposed to be going home soon.
    •    •    •
    W OLFGANG VON S CHUMANN watched incredulously as the attack on the Americans took place about a mile away from where he and his flock huddled along the riverbank. It was incredible, like watching a pageant unfolding. The Russians and the Americans were fighting each other. He recalled an officer in an SS unit a long time ago saying that Hitler believed the Anglo-American-Russian alliance against