Soldaten: On Fighting, Killing, and Dying by Harald Welzer, Sönke Neitzel Read Free Book Online

more than a few days.
    Let us take the example of a conversation betweenLieutenant Meyer, * a Luftwaffe pilot, and Lieutenant Pohl, a Luftwaffe observer, from April 30, 1940:
    P OHL : On the second day of thePolish war I had to drop bombs on a station atP OSEN . Eight of the 16 bombs fell on the town, among the houses, I did not like that. On the third day I did not care a hoot, and on the fourth day I was enjoying it. It was our before-breakfast amusement to chase single soldiers over the fields with M.G. [machine gun] fire and to leave them lying there with a few bullets in the back.
    M EYER : But always against soldiers?
    P OHL : People (civilians) too. We attacked the columns in the streets. I was in the “Kette” (flight of 3 aircraft). The leader bombed the street, the two supporting machines the ditches, because there are always ditches there. The machines rock, one behind the other, and now we swerved to the left with all machine guns firing like mad. You should have seen thehorses stampede!
    M EYER : Disgusting, that with the horses …
    P OHL : I was sorry for the horses, but not at all for the people. But I was sorry for the horses up to the last day. 85
    In Pohl’s own account it only took him three days to get used to the violence he began exercising as part of the German campaign inPoland.Already on day four of his mission, feelings of desire predominated, as he illustrates with the phrase “before-breakfast amusement.” His conversation partner, apparently somewhat taken aback, articulates the hope that those killed were enemy soldiers exclusively, but this hope is quickly dashed. Pohl says he shot at “people,” i.e., civilians: in retrospect, the only thing he can’t accept is that horses were hit as well. Meyer seems to sympathize with that.
    Pohl then continues his narrative by telling how he bombarded an entire city:
    P OHL : I was so annoyed when we were shotdown; just before the second engine got hot, I suddenly had a Polish town beneath me. I dropped the bombs on to it. I wanted to drop all the 32 bombs on the town. It was no longer possible; but 4 bombs dropped in the town. Down there everything was shot to pieces. On that occasion I was in such a rage … one must imagine what it means to drop 32 bombs into an open town. On that occasion I would not have cared a damn. With 32 bombs I would certainly have had 100 human lives on my conscience.
    M EYER : Was there plenty of traffic down there?
    P OHL : Chockablock. I wanted to drop a batch, because the whole place was full of people. I wouldn’t have cared. I wanted to drop them at intervals of 20 metres. I wanted to cover 600 metres. It would have been great fun if it had come off.
    Pohl seems most concerned about inflicting maximum damage before his plane crashed and indeed, as he himself stresses, taking as many lives as possible. He takes aim where the town is “chockablock,” and he’s unmistakably irritated at not having achieved the desired results.
    Meyer’s next question is one of professional curiosity:
    M EYER : How do people react when they are fired at from a plane?
    P OHL : They go mad. Most of them lay down with their hands up, making the German sign. (Imitating rattle of M.G.): That laid them out. It was really bestial.
    On to their faces—they all got the bullets in the back and ran zigzag in all directions like mad. Three rounds of incendiary bullets, when they had that in their backs, hands up—bang—then they lay on their faces. Then I went on firing.
    M EYER : What happens if one lies down at once?
    P OHL : You get hit all the same. We attacked from 10 metres, and when the idiots ran I had a good target. I had only just to hold mymachine-gun. I am sure some of them got a full 22 bullets in them. And then suddenly I scared 50 soldiers and said: “Fire, boys, fire!” and then we just sprinkled them with the M.G.’s. In spite of that I felt the urge, before we were shot down, to shoot a man with my own