The Forgotten Soldier

Sajer reunites with his comrades, including Hals, and they begin the long journey back east. They finally arrive at the training camp for the Gross Deutschland Division, which promises to turn them “into the best fighting men in the world” (160). They go through grueling drills, simulating carrying a wounded man across treacherous terrain in hot weather, and crawling under live fire to practice staying as low as possible. Wracked with pain and exhaustion, some soldiers die in training. The survivors are admitted to the infantry, swearing loyalty to Germany and its Fuhrer (leader), Adolf Hitler.

Anticipating further Soviet offensives, the Germans make the city of Belgorod a major staging point for counteroffensives. After a period of monotonous chores, soldiers receive weapons and ammunition, meeting very young soldiers from the Hitler Youth. Sajer writes to his mother and Paula, and he learns that “we are going to be part of a full-scale attack” (174). They are ordered to make a silent nighttime attack to overwhelm the Soviet front line. They crawl over no-man’s-land (the space between the German and Soviet trenches), stumble into a small reconnaissance unit, and one of their number tosses a grenade amid the resulting exchange of fire. Before long, the Soviets line responds, and they lie still as grenades explode all around them. As quiet returns, they remain motionless, waiting for the German assault to relieve them. German artillery pounds the Russian position, followed by the onrush of tanks, and Sajer is overwhelmed with the sights, sounds, and smells of combat, the “tragic, unbelievable visions, which carry from one moment of nausea to another” (185). They have pushed the Russians back despite being massively outnumbered. Sajer witnesses the murder of several prisoners, and then himself tosses grenades at Russians waving a white flag, in the belief that “it was either them or us” (186).

Despite having won the battle, the group mainly mourns the loss of their fellows and struggles with traumatic memories of what they just endured. Hoping for relief, they instead endure a two-hour Soviet bombardment, followed by orders to push the Soviet position even further back. Passing several corpses of the Hitler Youth, they ride a tank to the front line, dig a trench, and endure a terrifying Soviet bombardment. A panicked soldier jumps into their trench, only to be destroyed by shrapnel, and over time the excessive bombing makes them feel like “madmen, gesturing and moving without thought or hope” (194). Exhaustion adds still more to their strain, and they watch with numbed indifference as others collect and identify the German dead. The Soviets seem ready for a counteroffensive, issuing terrifying war cries, and despite help from the Luftwaffe, Sajer and his fellows have no choice other than to die or retreat. Back at the main German line, they realize the need to stand and fight or else suffer a collapse of the front. The Russians soon resume their attacks, bringing their own tanks to the front, and panic sets in across the line. Hals is wounded, though not fatally, and they are finally able to escape to a quiet zone and rest, having lost all the ground they had gained in the latest offensives as well as nearly a third of their forces.