A YOUNG SUCCUBUS NAMED DELICIA by Michel Poulin - HTML preview

CHAPTER 13 – REACTIONS

11:02 (Paris Time)

Tuesday, October 28, 1941

Gross Paris Kommandatur, Hotel Meurice

Rue de Rivoli, 1st Arrondissement Paris, Occupied France

SS Brigadeführer40 Paul Hausser, the new Commandant for the Paris area, was listening with growing frustration to the briefing he was being given about the events of the past weeks. He had just arrived from an interrupted period of medical

convalescence in Germany, after the Führer himself had asked him to go replace General Von Stulpnagel, which Hitler had sacked. His wound to his right eye, which he had lost in combat on the Russian Front and which was now covered by a black patch, was still quite sensitive, something not helping his mood. However, what he had heard up to now was stretching his sense of belief to the breaking point. He finally interrupted his briefer, the operations officer of the SS Corps occupying Paris.

‘’Excuse me for interrupting you, Obersturmbannführer, but how am I to believe that we lost nearly 7,000 SS soldiers in just over one month, while those British commandos apparently didn’t lose a single man? British soldiers are well trained, but they are no supermen!’’

The operations officer became even more tense and nervous at that barely disguised criticism of his men’s combat performance and did his best to find acceptable excuses for Hausser, who had a high reputation as a top tactician and valorous combat officer.

‘’Uh, I didn’t say that the British suffered no losses, Herr Brigadeführer, just that we didn’t find any dead or wounded British soldiers. My guess is that those British commandos follow a strict policy of not leaving any of their own behind, be they alive or dead, possibly to pay mind tricks with us. In fact, their pattern of operations points to a strategy that plays heavily on psychological warfare.’’

‘’Explain!’’

40 Brigadeführer: SS rank equivalent to Major General.

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‘’Well, there is first the fact that those commandos have limited their attacks strictly to SS troops since the arrival of our army corps in Paris. There was even one instance when our SS men manning a road checkpoint were attacked and killed, while members of the Luftwaffe who were passing through that checkpoint at that time were allowed to go through unmolested. We think that the British are trying to build a rift between us SS men and with the members of the Heer, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine in Paris. Unfortunately, their tactic is apparently starting to work: while our SS men are confined to their barracks and fortified positions due to the security situation, members of the Luftwaffe and of the Kriegsmarine have now started to come back again to Paris for their leave periods. Our men are deeply resenting that and frictions are now quite high between our SS troopers and the men of the other services.’’ Hausser frowned on hearing that. He had seen plenty of instances of inter-service frictions on the Russian Front, where SS units were often at loggerhead with regular army units, and such frictions could only hurt the overall operational efficiency. On the other hand, those British commandos seemed to have understood how hurtful this could be for the German cause. In that, Hausser had to reluctantly give them their due.

‘’What else?’’

‘’Second, these British use the element of surprise and obscurity to the maximum. They nearly always attack at night and from unexpected venues. In particular, their most recent tactic is to infiltrate via tunnels and underground caves the basements of our barracks, then blow them up with tons of high explosives while our men are asleep.’’

‘’And where could they find such huge quantities of explosives?’’ asked Hausser in a harsh tone. ‘’Don’t tell me that they got them via parachute drops!’’

‘’Uh, no, Herr Brigadeführer! They apparently stole huge quantities of explosives from the reserves of Army Group ‘B’ which were stored in the Fort de l’Est. Obersturmbannführer Schellenberg, of the SD, discovered that fact just before the fort blew up, probably because the British had booby-trapped one of the explosives magazines to hide their thefts. Herr Schellenberg left just before the explosion and reported that the security at the fort was extremely lax, while the commandant of the fort was found to be an incompetent drunk. That commandant is now in Berlin, awaiting a court martial for gross negligence and dereliction of duty.’’ Hausser nodded his head at that, satisfied: such charges during a time of war usually drew the death penalty.

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‘’So, do we have an idea of how much explosives those British could still possess?’’

‘’Unfortunately, the Fort de l’Est blew up before a full inventory count could be made, but the British are estimated to have still over a dozen tons of hexogen high explosives, plus a least a few tons of TNT. There is however more, Herr Brigadeführer.’’

‘’More? This already sounded bad enough, Obersturmbannführer!’’

‘’I realize that, Herr Brigadeführer, but I believe that it is about an important point. Basically, we have been digging for two weeks now through the rubble of our barracks which were blown up from under, in order to rescue possible survivors and retrieve our dead. We however found at the same time that some of the weapons of our dead troopers, basically the ones locked in the overnight weapons racks situated in each wing and floor levels, were missing. We unfortunately have only one plausible explanation for this: that the British commandos somehow managed to steal those weapons before they blew the barracks up. If that is the case, then they probably went away as well with the ready reserves of ammunition stored in steel lockers situated near the weapons racks.’’ Hausser, feeling the proverbial mustard coming up his nose, nearly barked his next question.

‘’HOW MANY WEAPONS ARE WE TALKING ABOUT?’’

‘’Uh, since our digging is still ongoing, I can’t give you more than a very approximate number, Herr Brigadeführer, but my best guess would be close to a thousand weapons, mostly Mauser 98K rifles.’’

‘’A THOUSAND WEAPONS, STOLEN FROM US?!! DO YOU REALIZE WHAT KIND OF INTERNAL SECURITY NIGHTMARE THIS COULD REPRESENT FOR US?’’ The briefer, now truly in his small shoes, then had to give more bad news.

‘’Yes, Herr Brigadeführer, but I actually believe that either the British commandos or members of the French Résistance have even more weapons than that. Since August of last year, there has been a number of incidences of our supply trains, either going to Germany with foodstuff, coal and other goods, or arriving from Germany with weapons, ammunition and field equipment, having been looted by persons unknown. Part of the things looted were various light weapons, land mines, grenades and small arms ammunition. We now believe that the same British commandos who are attacking our men stole from these supply trains, both to sustain themselves and to build up their arsenal. As things stands, I would say that these commandos stole enough weapons and equipment to arm well the equivalent of an infantry regiment.’’

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Hausser took a few seconds to digest all that, wondering if he should have refused that sudden posting to Paris on medical grounds after all.

‘’And where could they have hidden such a quantity of weapons, in your opinion?’’

‘’Underground, Herr Brigadeführer! There is a very complex and extensive network of old tunnels, caves, quarries and crypts, some of them dating back to the Middle Ages, under Paris. That network in turn connects with the subway system, the gas, telephone and electricity distribution networks and the sewer system, making it nearly impossible to control movement underground, unless we would be ready to either sweep that network or block all of its access points to the surface. Unfortunately, that last option would take months to implement and would cost us a tremendous amount of resources we don’t have right now. As for sweeping the tunnels, we tried that two weeks ago and it turned into a disaster. Basically, those British commandos seem to know in depth that underground network, possibly thanks to the few French who are experts in the subject, and they use that advantage to the maximum. The last example of such use of the underground was two days ago, when the guards’ barracks at the Fresnes Prison were blown up from under, with British commandos then killing our troops who were about to start executing hostages in retaliation for the blowing up of our SS barracks. The British and possibly some French Résistance members assisting them then emptied the whole prison of its prisoners. Searching for these escaped prisoners is presently keeping our men very busy, but we had little luck so far.’’ Hausser finally had enough of all this.

‘’WHAT WE NEED IS NOT LUCK: IT IS GOOD PLANNING AND COMPETENT EXECUTION! UP TO NOW, I HAVE SEEN LITTLE OF BOTH! I WANT A SUMMARY OF THE MAIN EVENTS WHICH HAPPENED IN PARIS SINCE JUNE OF LAST YEAR, ALONG WITH THE PERTINENT INTELLIGENCE REPORTS ON ATTACKS AGAINST OUR PERSONNEL, AND THIS BY THE END OF THE DAY!’’

‘’Yes, Herr Brigadeführer!’’ could only say the operations officer before gathering his notes and leaving the briefing room after saluting Hausser.

The latter barely had time to calm down somewhat before Obersturmbannführer Walter Schellenberg, of the SD security services, showed up, knocking on the open door of the briefing room. Hausser, looking up from his notes, then saw that the SD man had two men dressed in civilian suits behind him.

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‘’Yes, Obersturmbannführer Schellenberg! What may I do for you?’’ Schellenberg walked up to the conference table, stopping at attention and then giving a Nazi salute to Hausser, who saluted back.

‘’Herr Brigadeführer, I have with me Mister Jean Strauss, the Swiss Consul in Paris, and Mister Raoul Clément, the Paris representative for the International Committee of the Red Cross. They came to me to file official protests about our policies concerning the execution of French hostages. Those protests come with threats of diplomatic and economic retaliations against Germany if we continue executing hostages, so I thought that you would want to be informed of them.’’

‘’You did well to come advise me, Herr Schellenberg.’’ said Hausser before looking coldly at the two civilians standing to the left of the SD man. Hausser found all this business about the laws of war and the Geneva Conventions to be quite hypocritical and tiresome. However, it generally involved only words, contrary to today.

‘’Very well, gentlemen, please make your case.’’

The smaller man, Raoul Clément, spoke up first.

‘’Thank you, Brigadeführer Hausser. As the local representative of the ICRC, I am here to inform you officially of a protest that my organization is presently registering in Berlin with your government. The ICRC is already on record about protesting the taking of innocent civilians as hostages and their execution when Frenchmen engage in acts of active, violent resistance. That, by itself, is already considered by the ICRC as a war crime, being nothing short of collective punishment. However, your government has gone one step further a month ago, by ordering the execution of civilian hostages in retaliation for attacks on your troops committed around Paris by uniformed British soldiers. Those British soldiers fought your soldiers while wearing openly British military uniforms, insignias and ranks, thus were obeying the customs of war. To equate their actions to terrorist attacks and then execute hostages in response contradicts all the laws of war and international conventions and would constitute clear war crimes on the part of Germany. Furthermore, the scope of your planned executions, which have been announced publicly by your government to account for a total of no less than 70,000 hostages just for the British attacks during this month, constitute no less than mass murder. That is not only the view of my organization, but also that of the Swiss government, which is supporting our protest. Know that, if your government persists in this criminal policy of hostage executions, especially in response to legitimate military

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operations by an enemy fighting openly and in uniform, then there will be serious consequences for Germany.’’

Hausser nearly laughed on hearing that: in his experience, both the ICRC and the Swiss government were all bark and no bite.

‘’And what ‘serious consequences’ are the ICRC and the Swiss government threatening against Germany, gentlemen?’’

In response, Jean Strauss took out of his leather attaché case a sealed envelope and handed it to Hausser while speaking in a calm but firm voice.

‘’This is an official diplomatic note from my government, detailing the actions Switzerland will take if such mass murders of innocent civilians continue. Up to now, my government did not act in response to your execution of hostages following so-called ‘terrorist attacks’ by members of the French Résistance, but Germany has now gone too far, way too far. As a result, and if the execution of hostages continues, the Swiss government will freeze all the bank accounts in Switzerland which belong to either German individuals or to German companies or government agencies. Switzerland will also stop all gold and currencies exchanges with Germany, including those effected via other foreign-held accounts. My government has contacted the United States

government concerning this matter and has received the full support of the American government, which will also freeze all German assets in the United States if the executions continue. Be also advised that the British government has informed us and the ICRC that further execution of hostages as revenge for legitimate military actions by British soldiers against German forces will result in retaliatory actions against the German military personnel held in British hands, as well as the German SS Corps being declared and then treated as a criminal organization whose members will not benefit from the protection of the Geneva Conventions. A copy of this diplomatic note is being served to your foreign minister in Berlin today.’’

As Hausser took the envelope while glaring at Strauss with his one intact eye, Walter Schellenberg was left totally dismayed. He knew how vital to the Reich’s war effort the hard currencies obtained from Switzerland in exchange for gold were, as those hard currencies then allowed Germany to buy iron ore and other vital minerals from Sweden, another European country that was neutral in this war. If the Swiss instituted the financial freeze they were now threatening, then Germany’s war industries would quickly grind to a halt due to lack of basic materials. Clearly, this diplomatic ultimatum had to be taken very seriously. Also clearly, the response to it was going to be decided in Berlin,

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at a level much higher than the Paris Kommandatur. Hopefully, Hausser, who over ranked him by three levels, would understand the seriousness of the threat and would not dismiss it out of hand. Schellenberg then held his breath as Hausser read the Swiss diplomatic note. After about a minute of reading, Hausser finally looked up from the note, staring hard at Strauss and Clément.

‘’Gentlemen, I am taking note of this diplomatic letter, but the decision about it will be taken at a much higher level than me. I will thus contact Berlin to obtain further guidance on this subject. However, until I can get such guidance from above, I am ready to suspend all executions of French civilians. Will this be satisfactory to you, gentlemen?’’

‘’It will, Brigadeführer Hausser!’’ replied Jean Strauss, who secretly relaxed after expecting Hausser to lose his temper. ‘’Please understand that, if your government decides to ignore the warning from my government, then those sanctions will be applied at once.’’

‘’I do fully understand that, but also understand that I will apply diligently the policies and directives coming from my superiors in Berlin…whatever they may be. If Switzerland then decides to adopt policies hostile to Germany, we could in turn decide to become less civil with Switzerland.’’

‘Why the hell did he have to say that?!’ thought to himself Schellenberg,

watching both Strauss and Clément stiffen up with indignation on hearing Hausser’s thinly veiled threat. Strauss, apparently a man of character despite his thin,

unimpressive frame, stared back at Hausser.

‘’My government will take good note of the threat you just uttered against it, Brigadeführer Hausser. Good day!’’

The two diplomats then turned around and left the briefing room, leaving Hausser alone with Schellenberg.

‘’We should have simply invaded Switzerland and be done with it!’’ spat out Hausser, throwing the diplomatic note on the big conference table. Schellenberg gave him a grim look then: he already realized that the odds were not in favor of Germany in this war. To invade a neutral country as reputable as Switzerland could in turn sour relations with other important neutral countries, like Sweden, Spain and Turkey. That would be like nailing your own coffin in the long run.

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‘’We still must consider very seriously their threat of a financial embargo, Herr Brigadeführer. It could hurt Germany a lot, especially now that we are fighting on two fronts.’’

Despite his fanatical belief in the Nazi cause, Hausser was no imbecile and could see the wisdom in Schellenberg’s words. He thus nodded his head once and picked up the diplomatic note from the table, then got up from his chair.

‘’Very well! I will give at once the order to suspend all the executions of hostages until further notice and will also stop the picking up of hostages, then will contact Berlin for further guidance. However, those British commando bastards better not test my patience in the meantime.’’

16:06 (London Time)

Thursday, October 30, 1941

Prime Minister’s official residence, 10, Downing Street London, England

Winston Churchill looked awestruck after finishing to read the intercepted German ‘ENIGMA’ messages, decoded thanks to the efforts of the crypto-analysts and wizards at Bletchley Park who worked as part of the top secret ‘ULTRA’ Program. Raising his nose from the last message he had just read, which had been sent from Berlin to Paris as an official response to Brigadeführer Hausser’s query about the hostages’ policy and the Swiss threat, he gave a frustrated look at his military secretary, Major General Hasting Ismay.

‘’These heroes definitely deserve our highest medals! BUT WHO THE HELL IS THE FIRST SPECIAL COMMANDO UNIT?’’