Forgotten soldier. Reviews of the book "The Last Soldier of the Third Reich" Guy Sayer. 37 - Book: Guy Sayer

Guy Sayer... Who are you really?

I’ll make a reservation right away, sometimes I call myself by name, as if someone else is talking to me, whose words have more power over me.

Who am i? The question seems to be simple, although how to say ...

In general, my parents are simple people, ordinary workers, endowed by nature with tact and intelligence. The provincial town of Wissembourg, where we have a modest house with a small estate, is located in the north-east of France, literally a stone's throw from the border with Germany.

When the mother and father met, none of them could have imagined that they, young and in love with each other, their fatherland promises a very thorny life path.

And not only to them, but also to me - their firstborn - too!

In fact, if you have not one, but two fatherlands, then, of course, there are twice as many problems, despite the fact that there is only one life. When you think about the future - what to do? how to proceed? - I really want everything that I dream about to come true. Is not it?

With age, of course, comes the understanding that the past years, in fact, are a complete discord between dreams and reality. But this is me, by the way ...

I had a wonderful childhood, but my youth did not work out. At the best time of life, when everything is so significant and important, when you live in the expectation of your first love, the war arrived in time, and at my incomplete seventeen I was forced to be engaged to her. Of course, not out of love and, of course, not out of calculation! What is the calculation here if, leaving for the army, he was going to serve under one flag, but had a chance to serve under another, if, relatively speaking, he had to defend the “Siegfried Line”, but not the “Maginot Line”.

And yet, when I was drafted into the army, I experienced the incomparable pride of the defender of the fatherland. My father told me more than once that protection from the enemies of the hearth, in which the fire has been maintained by a woman from time immemorial, is the sacred duty of a real man.

Everything is correct! But the war ruined me, although I escaped the shells.

I am not like those who did not fight. I am a soldier, and, therefore, another because I have been in pitch hell and now I know the terrible truth of front-line everyday life.

I became callous, ruthless, rude, and vindictive. Perhaps this is good, because these are the qualities I lacked. If I didn’t have this hardening, I would most likely go crazy in the war.

Arrived in Chemnitz. The city barracks fascinated me. When you look at the oval-shaped huge building white color, just dumbfounded. I tried to enlist me in the 26th detachment of the flying squadron under the command of Rudel. To my great chagrin, experimental flights on the Junkers-87 dive bomber demonstrated my complete unsuitability for service in the air fleet. It's a pity of course! My father believes that, although training and combat education are at a high level in all branches of the Wehrmacht troops, it is still in tank troops and aviation in particular.

Chemnitz is a cozy city. Its red peaked roofs are surrounded by greenery. The weather is fine, mild and not hot. In the park, which is next to the barracks, century-old lindens and oaks have grown widely and luxuriantly, while beeches, on the other hand, grow upwards and, despite their old age, remain straight and slender.

Time flies at breakneck speed. This has never happened before. Every day something new. I have a brand new, brand new uniform. Sits on me like a glove. I am a real soldier. I'm so bursting with pride. The boots are worn but in good condition. I wonder who stomped in them before me?

At the penultimate tactical exercises, they practiced the "offensive of a rifle platoon on a long-term enemy firing point." Our infantry training is still reminiscent of a sport. Near the park, on the lawn, we lay down in a chain, dashes, attacks. In a hollow near the forest we lie down in tall grass, wallow, laughing ...

Recently, it rained all day, and we were driven with full equipment and with a rifle in hand through a wet wasteland. Commands "Get down!", "Run march!" Until we became like garden scarecrows and did not collapse from exhaustion.

But more often than not, split into squads, under the direction of non-commissioned officers, we march on the lawn. We walk, stop on command, move from step to run, from run to step, we approach the sergeant major with a fictitious report, move away from him in accordance with all the rules of military science. The words of commands are heard here and there, the simultaneous clatter of feet shakes the valley.

To trump, to stand at attention, to take guard, to turn “to the right” and “to the left”, click your heels, endure thousands of nit-picking - is this preparation for feats?

It turns out that drill training is now gaining special meaning, because, as our sergeant said, appearance army in war time plays a special role. In general, he gave us a whole lecture on the fact that in modern times courage is a good thing, but a secondary one. The main thing now is the ability to learn everything that a soldier needs to know.

We already know by heart all the existing infantry weapons of the enemy, because underestimating the enemy, as our sergeant major said, is a big stupidity.

I am in a state that can be defined by the words: "Restrainedly happy." I feel great. True, tactical exercises and drill training are exhausting to the limit. At dinner, I literally nod. By the way, the food is tolerable, but from time to time I remember our family meals at home. Tablecloth in red and white checkered ... For breakfast, coffee, honey, croissants and hot milk.

I learned a couple of marching songs and now I sing them along with everyone, but only with a monstrous French accent. Everyone laughs, of course. Well, let! We are now one family. We are now friends. Military partnership, where all for one and one for all. This pleased me. I endure the burdens of barracks drill easily and even willingly.

We are going to Dresden.

For nine weeks we went through military training, and during this time they managed to re-educate me more thoroughly than in all school years. I have already learned that a polished button is more important than many school tricks, and one cannot do without a shoe brush.

That drill - useful thing, I understood immediately and came to the conclusion that, in the end, the main thing is to be conscientious. How simple it is in general and how difficult it is in conditions when an order is almost a law.

“Fulfill the order” - how familiar this phrase has become, how convincing its meaning is, eliminating the need to make your own plans.

Well, goodbye, Chemnitz! We left early in the morning on a fast march. A light grayish fog melted every minute, and soon the sky cleared and turned blue. On the sides of the road along which we walked, among the bushes of hawthorn and elderberry, dark green fir trees were visible. It was quiet. A huge sun was rising behind him. Ahead of each soldier moved his long shadow.

We marched in three squares, platoon-by-platoon, in accordance with all the rules of the charter. After passing fifty kilometers, they plunged into a military train in Dresden and drove east.

We stood in Warsaw for several hours. Many expressed a desire to get acquainted with the sights of the Polish capital. We examined the ghetto, or rather, what was left of it. And when it was time to return, they broke up in threes or fours. The Poles smiled at us. Especially the girls. Soldiers older and bolder than me have already got girlfriends and talked in a nice company.

Finally, our train leaves, and after some time we arrive in Bialystok. After a couple of hours, minting a step, we are already walking along the highway. We have to walk twenty kilometers to the barracks for formation before being sent to the front.

Through the foliage of the trees that rise along the sides of the highway, break through Sun rays and fall in a thick net on the whitish pavement of the road and the green helmets of the soldiers.

Autumn is already in full swing in this region. Beautiful and quiet everywhere! A wide, hilly plain basks in the rays of the warm autumn sun.

Sergeant Major Laus gives the command to switch to an accelerated march, and literally ten minutes later, squat towers of a medieval knight's castle appear high on a hill, one of those that once guarded principalities, and possibly duchies, from robber raids and peasant uprisings. Gray and gloomy in any weather, even now - on a sunny day - it has a formidable appearance, resembling a scenery against which the actions of an opera by Richard Wagner are usually played out.

The castle, which from a distance seemed empty and uninhabited, turned out to be our barracks. In rooms with walls of extraordinary thickness, located in the fortress wall, the soldiers lodged.

sing along! - the sergeant barks when we approach the bridge thrown over the moat.

She sang from the second platoon, looking quite a little slut, a thin and undersized soldier, with an unexpectedly high and strong voice, brings out the first stanza: “Deutschland, Deutschland über alley ...”

French artist and writer.
Grew up in Alsace. Mumin's mother was a German by the name of Zayer (German: Sajer), which allowed Mumin in 1942 to enlist in the German army under his mother's surname.
Guy Zayer fought on the Eastern Front. First, in the 19th company of an unknown unit in the logistics troops. Then as part of the division "Grossdeutschland". Member of the Third Battle for Kharkov, the Belgorod-Kharkov operation, the Battle of the Dnieper, the Defense of Bobruisk and the battles in East Prussia. Two and a half years of service, which ended for him with surrender to the Americans in 1945, were described by Guy Mumin in the book The Forgotten Soldier (French: Le Soldat oublié; 1967), published under the signature of Guy Zayer. This book has been reprinted many times, translated into different languages, including Russian, and is considered a vivid evidence of the everyday life of the German army, the life and customs of German soldiers. The translation of the book into Russian contains many errors and inaccuracies.
In France, however, Guy Moumin more known as an artist, author of numerous comics published since the early 1960s. in leading comics magazines: "Cœurs Vaillants", "Fripounet", "Charlie Mensuel" and others. As an artist, Muminu usually signs with the pseudonym Dmitry (French Dimitri). The Russian theme occupies a large place in Mumin's work: in particular, he owns the comic strip Rasputitsa (French Raspoutitsa; 1989) about the fate of a German soldier captured near Stalingrad, a series of 16 issues Gulag (French Le Goulag; with 1978), depicting the USSR and Russia in a satirical manner, and other works.

) () ()

December 16, 2005

23:37 - Book: Guy Sayer - Forgotten Soldier.

In the Russian edition it is called " The last soldier of the Third Reich". Publishers can be understood - being published in the ex-USSR under the original name, she risked incurring suspicions in another shedding of tears over some local conflicts or in loser sighs about former power Soviet army. And the "Third Reich" is understandable: the heroic Wehrmacht, nickel-plated merciless terminators with Schmeissers, the brilliance and glory of the best army in Europe.

And the book is not about that at all. Rather, it is really about a Wehrmacht soldier. But this soldier is not German. He is French. And the book was written in French. Guy Sayer- Le Soldier Oublie. Sayer, an Alsatian, was drafted into the Wehrmacht in 1942 as the greenest young man, not even knowing how to speak German properly (!) And came from Europe directly to the snowy fields of the winter of 1942/1943 on the Eastern Front. And suffered this brutal war in full. At first he served in supply units, and in the summer of 1943 hit volunteered for the division "Grossdeutschland", where he fought to the very end.

And yet he is a German soldier. Why? Because he fought with the Germans for Germany. And he thought he was doing his duty.

However, Sayer is least of all inclined to talk about debts to the Motherland. Without getting out of the battles, gradually he has one duty left - to relatives and friends. The book is oversaturated with emotions, this is not Manstein's memoirs. No strategy, no Ostrogradsky equations. Where Manstein has an organized withdrawal of troops across the Dnieper, Sayer has a crowd of ragged soldiers at the crossing, under fire and bombs trying to have time to climb onto another loose raft on the Dnieper. And right into this crowd at the crossing, Soviet "thirty-fours" burst in, simply crushing the Germans with caterpillars. Where Manstein has a successful operation to withdraw troops from the boiler at Sayer - a crazy battle in which his platoon is mixed with the ground with artillery fire. Fighting on the Dnieper, fighting near Vinnitsa, fighting near Lvov, fighting near Memel, a terrible retreat into East Prussia. And surrender to the British.

He was released very quickly - as a Frenchman. He returned home to someone else's, even enemy French soil. He hid his war. He even enlisted in the French army. And maybe even occupied Germany later.

In general - do not envy.

The book is very good, maybe even the best I've read in a long time. I recommend.

PS. While reading, I constantly remembered another, also screaming book of forgotten soldiers

The book was first published in France in 1967, in 1969 in Germany, in 1971 it was translated into English, from which a Russian translation was made in 2002. Everywhere she was very highly appreciated by critics and readers, confident in her authenticity. The military and historians have often cited it as a brilliant example of describing battles through the eyes of an infantry soldier. According to the American historian D. Nash, the book was used for a long time in the training of American soldiers who studied how war affects a person physically, psychologically and intellectually.
Later it turned out that the author of the book is the French artist and writer Guy Mouminoux (1927-). He took the surname of his German mother, Seyer, to enlist in the German army. In France, M. has been known since the early 60s. as an artist, author of numerous comics (under the pseudonym Dmitry). The Russian theme occupies a large place in M.'s work: for example, he has a comic book Rasputitsa (Raspoutitsa; 1989) about the fate of a German soldier taken prisoner near Stalingrad.
The hero of the book is a native of Alsace. His mother is German, his father is French. In the summer of 1942, 16-year-old Guy volunteered for the Wehrmacht. After a detailed preparation, he ended up as a driver on the Eastern Front. In the spring of 43, S. enters as an infantryman in one of the most famous divisions of the SS "Grossdeutschland", in whose ranks he stayed until the end of the war. His story about the trials that fell to him, which were many even for experienced soldiers, constitutes the main and most famous part of the book (a little over 250 pages). The work of S. was revolutionary for its time - the life of a simple soldier at the front has never been described so frankly and in detail. In the spring of 45, he surrendered to the Americans, who quickly decided that he was a German soldier who was being sent home en masse, and not a French collaborator worthy of the gallows. Guy was allowed to go home, where he joined the French army.
I have two complaints about this book. The first is to the author. The second is for the translator. Let's start with the title. Firstly, the original title of Guy Sajer's book is Le soldat oublié or The Forgotten Soldier (he became a forgotten soldier for his homeland - France, because he served in the German army during the war). Secondly, he was a private for a very short time, rising to the rank of (at least) corporal. True, S. himself admitted to his lack of leadership qualities. Probably, this can be called not fundamental - the name was changed, the corporal is the same private, but questions about inaccuracies, alas, are not limited to this.
S. announced that he saw as his goal a description of the suffering and experiences of a soldier in the war. However, conversations, sensations, actions of 10-20 years ago, no matter how bright and significant they are, it is IMPOSSIBLE to reproduce with complete accuracy. And this book is full of Sayer. It is clear that a lot was thought out / rethought, i.e. was subject to alteration. So already in this respect, Sayer's book is an example of hoodlit, not memoirs.
Questions about the authenticity of these memoirs were first raised only in the 1990s, and since then there has been a debate whether these are real memories of the war with some factual errors, or skillfully written fiction. Historians have expressed doubts about the authenticity of S.'s book, pointing to inaccuracies in the names of military units and the names of officers, and plot inconsistencies. From this point of view, S.'s book should be considered a historical novel (like Remarque's story "All Quiet on the Western Front"). According to others, these inaccuracies are unprincipled (S. forgot or mixed up something, and he knew German poorly), and in some cases they do not take place at all (something was generated by a mismatch between German, French and English military terminology). However, there are points that raise questions. There is not a single photograph of the author of those years, there are no photos before or after the war. Has everything died? Hardly. In the German archives, there are no documents on the passage of S. military service, which is also strange. There are factual errors: what he writes about the battles near Belgorod is completely wrong - the Germans recaptured the city in March 43, and not in the summer, and it was taken by another SS division.
The confusion was exacerbated by the translation. A. Danilin is an excellent translator, but he does not know military terminology at all. Here are examples of his mistakes: the Germans had not engineers, but sappers (p. 32); the Mauser rifle is capitalized (p. 32, etc.); "panzer division" (p. 46) is a tank division; soldiers receive not bullets for rifles, but cartridges (p. 67); there was a Walloon division, not a "Waloon" division (!) (p. 113); Gen.-Regiment. Guderian in 1943 did not command a division (p. 121), but from 1942 he was chief inspector of armored forces in Berlin; in Berlin there is a Spree, not Spree (p. 152). The Germans had 88 mm anti-aircraft guns, not 80 mm (p. 333). Stripes with the name of the division (p. 130) were called sleeve cuffs. Military ranks are not explained (Hauptmann and others). There were no sergeants in the Wehrmacht, there were sergeants and non-commissioned officers (p. 60 and others). In the Wehrmacht, the English tanks Mark-2, -3 and -4 (p. 111-12, etc.) were not in service, there were P-1, -2, etc. until 6. They are also referred to as T-1, etc. There were no T-37 and KV-85 tanks (p. 309) in the Red Army, there were no grenade launchers (p. 241), there were mortars. We didn’t have a 50-mm cannon, we had a 45-mm one (and a 50-mm mortar). Planes drop "four hundred and five hundred thousand bombs" (p. 144) - what is it? Funnels 20 m wide (p. 261) - maybe feet? - from the fall of an ordinary aircraft are not formed. Machine guns are called heavy, not powerful (p. 268). They are grabbed by the barrel, not by the muzzle (p. 323). Teams "On your feet!" (p. 146) no, there is “Stand up!”. Machine guns are quadruple, not "four-barreled" (p. 357). My favorite pearl: “Complete order reigned. The wounded were buried” (p. 365). Anti-air guns (p. 432) are called anti-aircraft guns. For some reason, the translator left yards, miles and feet throughout the text (p. 32, etc.), although there are meters and kilometers.
When reading memoirs, it is important to believe in the author, that his text is not a fantasy, but a true story. Sayer is hard to believe. This book, for all its artistic merit, is a controversial example of MEMOIR literature about the Second World War.