One failure is nothing

Chapter 78 One failure is nothing

Berlin, July 1941.

The linden trees along Victory Street were shedding their blossoms, pale yellow petals carpeting the sidewalk, crushed into the cracks of the cobblestones by pedestrians, emitting a slightly sweet, decaying scent. The sunlight was bright, but not the languid golden light of southern France; rather, it was the sharp, glass-like white light of northern Germany, so intense it stung the eyes. Few pedestrians were on the street; occasionally, soldiers in grey uniforms would pass by, their boots clicking crisply on the cobblestones, the sound echoing for a long time in the empty street.

Rommel stood at the entrance of the Chancellery, waiting for the bronze doors to open before him.

He had been standing there for five minutes. The gatekeeper hadn't made him wait; he had stopped on his own. His legs were trembling, not from fear, but from exhaustion. From Agaira to Port Regga, from Port Regga to Sirte, from Sirte to Misrata, from Misrata to Tripoli—eight hundred kilometers—he had walked for twenty days. Not by car, but on foot. His tank was lost, his truck was lost, his fuel was lost; all he had left were his two legs, a compass, and the soldiers who had followed him into the desert and emerged with him.

They numbered 60,000 when they set out from Agairah, but only 40,000 remained by the time they reached Tripoli. The remaining 10,000-plus were left forever in the desert, buried beneath the dunes, facing the direction of Mecca. They were not Muslims, but in the desert, the dead do not need faith, only a relatively correct direction.

He changed into a clean military uniform. In Tripoli, he had borrowed one from an Italian, but it was too big; the epaulets were almost up to his elbows, and the trousers had to be rolled up three times to barely keep them from dragging on the ground. The collar was worn white, and the cuffs had indelible dust stains, as if they had grown out of the fabric fibers, impossible to remove no matter how much he rubbed. There was a bullet hole in the brim of his hat, pierced by a British machine gun, less than two centimeters from his temple. He didn't change his hat, not because he had no other options, but because he wanted to remember that bullet.

The bronze gate opened. A servant in a gray uniform stepped out and saluted expressionlessly.

"Marshal, the Führer is waiting for you."

Rommel nodded and stepped inside. His military boots clattered on the marble floor, echoing in the empty corridor. The corridor was long, lined with huge oil paintings of Frederick the Great, Bismarck, Hindenburg—those who had made Germany great—looking down at him from their gilded frames, their gazes either stern or indifferent, as if scrutinizing this defeated general who had crawled back from the desert. He knew what he looked like. Thin, dark-skinned, with sunken eyes, prominent cheekbones, and chapped lips. He didn't look like a marshal; he looked like a beggar just released from a prisoner-of-war camp.

The aide-de-camp led him through corridor after corridor, past office after office. Each office door was open; some were on the phone, some were typing, some were talking in hushed tones. As he passed, some glanced up at him, then looked down again; some showed no reaction; some deliberately turned their faces away. Rommel knew what they were thinking. They were thinking, this man has lost. This man, whom the newspapers called the "Desert Fox," has lost in North Africa to a French lieutenant. His tanks have been captured, his soldiers scattered, and his 60,000 men have marched across the desert like refugees driven from their homes. They wondered, what would Hitler do with him? Execute him? Dismiss him? Or imprison him?

Rommel was also thinking about this problem. He felt a chill run through his body, as if life itself had turned gray.

They walked to the end of the corridor and stopped in front of a huge oak door. The attendant knocked on the door.

"Come in." A voice came from inside, not loud, but very clear, as if it came from the bottom of a deep well.

The attendant pushed open the door and stepped aside. Rommel went in.

The room was enormous, more like an auditorium than an office. The ceiling was high, adorned with murals of Germanic mythology: Wotan, Freya, Thor—the gods looking down upon humanity from the clouds, spears and hammers in hand. Directly opposite the door was a massive, black desk, its surface gleaming. There were no documents, no telephone, no office supplies, only a lamp with a green shade, casting a dim light that illuminated only a small area of ​​the desk.

There was a person sitting behind the table.

Adolf Hitler wore a grey military uniform, the collar buttoned tightly, the Iron Cross pinned above his left breast pocket, gleaming a dull silver in the lamplight. His face was paler than when Rommel had last seen him, almost unreal, as if cast in wax. His eyes were deep-set, his cheekbones high, and his lips pressed into a thin line, devoid of any expression. His hands rested on the table, fingers interlaced, motionless, as if in prayer.

Rommel walked to the table, stood at attention, and saluted.

"My Führer."

Hitler didn't move. He sat there like a statue, his grey-blue eyes fixed on Rommel for a long time. So long that Rommel thought he wouldn't speak again. The air in the room seemed to freeze, making even breathing difficult.

"Field Marshal Rommel," Hitler finally spoke, his voice like a blunt knife, "you've returned from North Africa."

"Yes, my Führer."

How many people did you bring back?

Rommel paused for a second. "Forty-three thousand men."

How many people did you take with you?

"Sixty thousand people."

Hitler tapped his finger on the table. It was just a tap, very light, but in the enormous room, the sound was as clear and jarring as a pin dropping.

"Seventeen thousand men," Hitler said. "You've lost seventeen thousand men in the desert. And over a hundred tanks, hundreds of artillery pieces, thousands of trucks. You've lost my Afrika Korps."

Rommel remained silent. He stood there, back ramrod straight, eyes fixed on Hitler's face, neither flinching nor bowing. He knew he had lost. He needed no explanation, no begging. He was simply a soldier, defeated and returning to face his fate.

Hitler stood up. He was shorter than Rommel, but standing behind that enormous desk, his shadow, cast on the wall by the lamplight, was huge and distorted, like a bat with outstretched wings. He walked around the desk, stood before Rommel, and stopped. The two were less than a meter apart; Rommel could see the bloodshot in his eyes and smell the faint scent emanating from him.

"How many days did you besiege Argair?" Hitler asked.

"Three days."

"The British besieged you for three days, and you couldn't hold out?"

"My fuel is gone. My food is gone. My water is gone. My soldiers are starting to starve."

"Your soldiers are starting to starve." Hitler repeated the sentence, a cold smile playing on his lips. "Do you know what conditions our soldiers were fighting on the Eastern Front? Forty degrees below zero. No winter clothing, no insulated boots, no antifreeze. Tanks wouldn't start, machine guns wouldn't fire, soldiers' fingers were too frozen to pull the trigger. But they didn't retreat. They didn't surrender. They stood there, frozen solid, still standing there."

His voice began to rise, from a whisper to a statement, and from a statement to an interrogation.

"And you, in North Africa, in the desert where it's forty degrees Celsius, have Italians transporting food for you, Arabs guiding you, and British prisoners working for you. You have the sun, the wind, and the sand—the sand isn't cold, the sand won't freeze your fingers off. What excuse do you have?"

Rommel did not answer.

Hitler turned around, walked back to the table, and pressed the bell on it. The door opened, and the aide-de-camp entered.

"Let the generals in," Hitler said.

The attendant saluted and withdrew.

A few minutes later, the door opened. A group of men in military uniforms filed in—marshals, generals, lieutenant generals, their epaulets covered in stars that gleamed under the light. Keitel, Yodl, Brauchitsch, Halder, and others Rommel knew and didn't. They entered and stood in two rows on either side of the table. No one spoke, no one sat down; they simply stood there, like rows of specimens nailed to the wall.

Hitler walked back to the table but did not sit down. He stood there, his hands on the edge of the table, leaning forward like a wild beast poised to pounce. His gaze swept over the faces of the generals, looking at them one by one, finally settling on Rommel.

"Gentlemen," Hitler began, his voice suddenly becoming very formal, as if he were giving a speech in the Reichstag, "we are gathered here today to discuss a serious issue. We have lost the North African campaign."

""

The room was so quiet you could hear someone breathing.

"It wasn't a loss to the British. It wasn't a loss to the Americans. It was a loss to a Frenchman. A Frenchman who escaped from Stoney, a nobody who wasn't even a regular soldier. What was his name again?"

He looked at Rommel.

"Mark Lorraine," Rommel said calmly.

"Marc Lorrain," Hitler repeated the name, as if savoring something unpalatable, "a lieutenant. A subjugated slave. A traitor sentenced to death by the Vichy government. He cut off the Italians' supply lines with three hundred men. He surrounded Tobruk with two thousand men. He held off your sixty thousand men at Agaira with twenty thousand men."

His voice grew louder and louder.

"And you? You were a German Field Marshal. You commanded the 7th Panzer Division, fighting from Sedan to Cherbourg in France. You commanded the Afrika Korps, fighting from Tripoli to Tobruk. The newspapers called you the Desert Fox, the soldiers called you Field Marshal, and I called you the general I trusted most. And then you lost to a lieutenant."

He sat up abruptly, removed his hands from the edge of the table, and put them in his waistband.

"Do you know what this means? It means our enemies know one thing: the Germans are not invincible. A French lieutenant, with a bunch of remnants, could defeat a German field marshal. What about the British? The Americans? The Soviets? Won't they think the Germans are nothing special after all?"

A deathly silence fell over the room. The generals stood there, heads bowed, none daring to look at Hitler's face, nor at Rommel. Keitel's fingers trembled slightly along his trouser seams. Jodl bit his lip until it turned white. Brauchitsch closed his eyes, as if enduring some intense pain.

Rommel stood there, listening to those words, word by word. His face was expressionless, his back ramrod straight, but his hands, hanging at his sides, were trembling slightly.

Hitler walked back to the window, his back to everyone. Outside, the Berlin skyline stretched out, the Victory Column gleaming golden in the sunlight, the dome of the Reichstag appearing and disappearing in the distance. He stood there for a long time, so long that the generals thought he would never speak again.

"Rommel." He didn't turn around.

"exist."

"I'm not satisfied with your performance in North Africa." His voice was low, almost as if squeezed out from between his teeth. "You were too reckless. You chased the British too far, stretched your supply lines too long, and dared to charge forward when your fuel reserves were insufficient. You used tanks like cavalry and deserts like grasslands. You forgot that the essence of war is not speed, but logistics. No matter how fast your tanks are, without fuel they are just a pile of scrap metal. No matter how brave your soldiers are, without food they are a bunch of starving corpses. You are a genius in tactics, but blind in strategy."

He turned around and looked at Rommel.

"But I don't intend to do anything to you."

Rommel froze, his eyes narrowing sharply. The generals also froze. Keitel snapped his eyes open, Jodl looked up, and Brauchitsch's lips twitched. Everyone looked at Hitler, waiting for him to continue.

Hitler walked back to the table and placed his hands on the edge of the table again.

"Why didn't I punish you? Because you were my best battlefield commander. No one could surpass your performance in France. Although you lost in North Africa, your retreat was very well organized. Sixty thousand men marched across the desert on foot and only seventeen thousand were lost. Under those conditions, anyone else might have been wiped out."

His self-illumination swept over the generals.

"And I need you. Germany needs you. This war isn't something that can be decided by a single battle. We lost in North Africa, but we will win in the Soviet Union. We retreated on the Western Front, but we will advance on the Eastern Front. War is a game of chess, and sometimes you have to sacrifice a piece to save the whole game."

He walked back to Rommel and extended his hand. Rommel looked at the hand, hesitated for a second, and then grasped it.

That hand was cold, thin, with distinct knuckles, but very strong.

"Field Marshal Rommel," Hitler said, his voice suddenly softening, unlike the man who had just been roaring, "You've worked hard. Go back and rest. Take good care of your injuries, eat well, and sleep well. Germany needs you."

Rommel released his hand, saluted, and turned to walk towards the door. He walked slowly, each step firm and measured, as if measuring the path he had traversed since he entered. The generals watched him pass by; some cast sympathetic glances, some envious ones, and some looked at nothing at all, simply lowering their heads to look at their boots.

He walked out the door and into the hallway. The door closed behind him.

The corridor was quiet, save for the echoing of his own footsteps on the marble floor. He walked slowly, his legs trembling, not from fear, but from exhaustion. He remembered Hitler's words: "Germany still needs you." He didn't know if he should believe them. Did Hitler need him because he was truly useful, or because killing him would discourage the other generals? He didn't know. He only knew that he was alive, not yet executed, not yet imprisoned. He could still go home, see his wife, see his children. He was still alive.

He walked out of the Prime Minister's office and stood on the sidewalk of Victory Street. The sunlight was blinding, and he squinted at the pedestrians passing by. They were dressed in ordinary clothes, ordinary shoes, and ordinary hats. They didn't know where North Africa was, where Agairah was, or who Rommel was. They only knew that the war was still going on, prices were still rising, and bread was still being rationed. They didn't know that just moments before, in a huge office, their leader had lashed out at a marshal who had crawled back from the desert, and then forgiven him.

Rommel turned and walked toward the car parked by the roadside. The driver opened the door, he got in, leaned back in the seat, and closed his eyes.

"Go home," he said.

The car started and slowly drove off Victory Street, merging into the traffic of Berlin. Rommel leaned against the window, looking at the familiar streets outside, the places he had walked countless times. He thought of North Africa, of the desert, of the soldiers he had abandoned beneath the dunes. They would never return. They remained forever on that unfamiliar land, facing the direction of Mecca, waiting for a spring that would never come.

He closed his eyes.

Tears slid down his cheeks and into his collar. It's common for generals to suffer defeats, but to be able to rise again after such a heavy price and the torment in his heart is truly remarkable.

The next day, at the Prime Minister's Office, in the Head of State's office.

Hitler sat behind his desk, a thick document spread out before him. The cover bore the large words: "Operation Barbarossa, Phase One Summary." His fingers moved slowly across the pages, examining the numbers line by line: the attacking unit numbers, the distance advanced, the number of prisoners captured, the equipment seized. The numbers were enormous, almost dizzying, but Hitler scrutinized them carefully, checking each number twice to ensure its accuracy before turning to the next page.

Keitel stood at the table, pen and notebook in hand, ready to jot down the Führer's instructions. Yodl stood beside Keitel, also holding a notebook, but not writing a single word. He simply stood there, looking at Hitler's face, waiting for him to speak.

Hitler turned to the last page, closed the document, and looked up.

"Progress on the Eastern Front is slower than I expected."

Keitel tapped his finger on the notebook. "Your Führer, Army Group North has advanced to Pskov, less than 200 kilometers from Leningrad. Army Group Center has captured Minsk and is advancing towards Smolensk. Army Group South has encircled the Soviet Sixth and Twelfth Armies at Uman, capturing over 100,000 prisoners. Progress is not slow."

Hitler shook his head. "It's not a matter of speed. It's a matter of time. The Soviet Union is too big, too big for our tanks to cover. Their railway gauge is different from ours, so even if we capture locomotives, we can't use them. Their roads are dirt roads, which turn into swamps when it rains, and tanks get stuck. Our supply lines are getting longer and longer. For every kilometer we advance, we have to build another kilometer of road, transport another ton of oil, and send another company to guard it. If we keep fighting like this, by the time we reach Moscow, it will already be winter."

He stood up and walked to the huge map of the Soviet Union hanging on the wall. On the map, red arrows extended from the border in three directions: north to Leningrad, middle to Moscow, and south to Kiev and the Caucasus.

"We must adjust our strategy," Hitler said. "We cannot fight on three fronts simultaneously. We lack sufficient manpower, supplies, and time. We must concentrate our forces and attack on one front."

Keitel and Yodl exchanged a glance. Keitel cleared his throat. "Your Excellency, what do you mean?"

Hitler's finger landed in the center of the Soviet map.

"Moscow," he said. "If we take Moscow, the Soviet railway network will collapse, the command center will be paralyzed, and the people's hearts will break. Stalin will flee, and the Soviet Union will crumble. Just like France, when Paris fell, the whole country surrendered."

Yodl hesitated for a moment. "Your Majesty, Army Group South has proposed that we should take Kyiv first. Kyiv is the center of Ukraine, and Ukraine is the breadbasket of the Soviet Union. If we take Kyiv, we will control the food supply. Without food, the Soviet Union cannot continue its advance."

Hitler turned and looked at him. There was a chilling light in those grey-blue eyes.

"Kiev," he repeated the word. "Do you know how many Soviet troops are around Kiev? Seven hundred thousand. Seven hundred thousand men, hiding behind the Dnieper River, waiting for us to attack. If we attack Kiev, we have to surround and annihilate those seven hundred thousand men. That takes time, manpower, and ammunition. By the time we finish attacking Kiev, it will be autumn. After autumn comes winter. After winter, Moscow will still be there."

He walked back to the map and tapped the dot for Moscow hard with his finger.

"Moscow. We must take Moscow before winter."

Keitel and Jodl said nothing more. They knew that the Führer's decision was final. Argumentation was useless, opposition was useless, and suggestions were useless. Before Hitler, generals were merely tools, not advisors.

Hitler walked back to the table and sat down.

"Send a telegram to Brauchitsch," he said. "Army Group Center should halt its advance on Moscow and deal with the Soviet forces on its flanks first. Army Group North should continue to pressure Leningrad, but not launch a full-scale assault. Army Group South's mission remains unchanged: take Kiev and annihilate the Soviet forces east of the Dnieper."

He paused.

"Also, tell Rommel to get some rest. Although we lost North Africa, he's still useful. Germany won't give up on North Africa. We'll go back after the Soviet Union is finished."

Keitel jotted down notes quickly in her notebook.

Hitler stood up, walked to the window, and looked at the sun-bleached sky. He remembered Rommel standing before him—thin, dark-skinned, with sunken eyes, like a standing corpse. He remembered reprimanding Rommel in front of those generals, remembered extending his hand in forgiveness. He didn't know if he had truly forgiven him, or if it was just for show. He only knew that he needed Rommel. Not because Rommel was particularly skilled in combat, but because Rommel was a symbol. A symbol of an invincible German soldier.

If even Rommel has been defeated, what is there for the German soldiers to fear? Rommel must pull himself together again.

He turned around.

"There's one more thing."

Keitel looked up.

"That Frenchman. The Frenchman who defeated Rommel at Argyll. What was his name again?"

"Mark Loran," Yodl said.

"Mark Lorrain," Hitler repeated the name. "Where is he?"

Yodl opened his notebook and searched for a while. "Intelligence indicates that he recently left North Africa for London. From London, he went to the Soviet Union. Our intelligence personnel last spotted him in Murmansk."

Hitler's eyes narrowed. "The Soviet Union? What would he be doing in the Soviet Union?"

"I don't know. It could be to make contact, to observe, or it could be to fight."

Hitler was silent for a few seconds. He walked back to the table, sat down, and placed his hands on the table.

"A Frenchman defeated our marshal in North Africa, then went to the Soviet Union to teach the Soviets how to fight the Germans." A cold smile appeared on his lips. "This man is quite interesting."

He looked up at Keitel.

"Tell Himmler, I want all the information about this person. Everything from birth to now. Where he went to school, where he worked, who he married, who he befriended. What books he read, what articles he wrote, what he said. What he likes to eat, drink, and wear. What he fears, hates, and loves."

Keitel memorized it quickly.

"And another thing," Hitler continued, "have Canaris find a way to locate this man in Moscow. If he does, do nothing. Monitor him, follow him, see who he contacts, what he does, and what he says."

I need to know what he was doing in the Soviet Union.

Keitel nodded.

Hitler stood up, walked to the window, and turned his back to everyone.

"A French lieutenant. A captive. A traitor," he murmured. "He defeated my 60,000 men with 20,000. He trapped my tanks in the desert. He wore down my fuel supply with time. If this man hadn't been an enemy, he would have been a great general."

He turned around and looked at Keitel and Yodl.

"Unfortunately, he was the enemy."

Outside the window, the sky over Berlin began to darken. Clouds rolled in from the west, obscuring the sun and casting a hazy shadow over the entire city. In the distance, the golden angel on the Victory Column still shone with its last glimmer of light, before that light was swallowed by the clouds, leaving only a blurry outline, like a finger pointing to the sky.

It rained in Berlin the night Rommel returned home.

The rain was light, fine and dense, as if someone had torn a hole in the sky, letting the water leak down little by little. He stood by the living room window, watching the raindrops fall obliquely in the beams of the streetlights, thinking of North Africa, of the desert, and of the soldiers who would never return.

His wife, Lucy, came over and stood beside him without saying a word. She simply slipped her hand into his arm and gently took it. Her hand was warm, soft, and small, as if it might be crushed at any moment.

"You've lost weight," Lucy said.

Rommel remained silent. He gazed at the rain outside the window, at the blurred outlines of buildings, and at the dome of the Empire State Building appearing and disappearing in the mist. He suddenly remembered something: in Agaira, there was a man standing on the edge of a riverbed, firing a revolver at a tank. Why was that man standing there? Why did he do such a thing? Why didn't he die in a trench, behind cover, but instead stood in open ground, firing at a tank?

Now he understands. Because that person didn't want to live anymore. Not that he didn't want to live anymore, but he didn't want to live like that anymore. Spending too much time in the desert changes a person. You start thinking about things you wouldn't have thought about before. You start asking yourself, why am I fighting this war? Why am I killing these people? Why am I dying here? If you can't find the answers, you start doing strange things. You have a hallucination, like someone standing in the sun, and then involuntarily asking themselves, why am I me? And not someone else?

"Erwin," Lucy said softly.

Rommel lowered his head and looked at her face. Her face appeared very soft in the light.

"You won't go again, right?" Lucy asked.

Rommel was silent for a few seconds. As long as the war wasn't over, he would be called back. Not because he wanted to go back, but because he couldn't refuse.

"No more," he said.

He didn't know why he was lying. Maybe it was because Lucy's eyes were so bright that he dared not tell the truth. Maybe it was because he himself wanted to believe that the war was really over, that he would never have to go back to North Africa, and that he would never have to see that Frenchman again.

He pulled Lucy into his arms, rested his chin on the top of her head, and closed his eyes.

It's still raining.

In the distance, the lights of the Reich Chancellery were still on. Hitler stood by the window, watching the rain outside, a battle report just sent from the Eastern Front in his hand. The report said that Army Group Center had captured Smolensk and was only 300 kilometers from Moscow. 300 kilometers—in France, that's a day's journey for a tank. In the Soviet Union, it was a three-day journey for a tank, a week for infantry, and half a month for supply convoys.

He placed the battle report on the table, picked up a red pencil, and drew a circle around the location of Moscow on the map.

"Moscow," he murmured, "must be taken before autumn."

The rain outside grew heavier, pattering against the glass with a loud thud, like countless fingers tapping on the pane. Hitler stood there, watching the raindrops emerge from the darkness, flash briefly in the lamplight, and then disappear back into the shadows. He suddenly remembered something: in Vienna, when he was still a poor painter, he had stood by the window watching the rain in the same way. Back then, he had nothing, only a bellyful of anger and ambition. Now he had everything: an army, territory, power. But he was still not satisfied. He wanted more.

He wants the whole world.