I Became Stalin?!

Chapter 164

The Oder River. 

A massive river that originated in Czechia and flowed across Silesia and Pomerania, meeting the Baltic Sea at Stettin.

The Oder River was the last geographical obstacle between the Soviet army that had trampled Prussia and advanced to Berlin.

The soldiers who defended the Oder River line looked at the Lebensraum that the empire had lost.

From Riga, from the Curonian Peninsula, and from Königsberg, which had become Budennegrad. 

The German army had resisted desperately, but they were eventually crushed under the wave of the Soviet army.

Rather, the Soviet army had only given them time to leisurely occupy Budapest, Venice, and ‘Ostmark’.

The officers and soldiers of the Third Reich had resisted the Soviet army until the end, but they knew that the end was near.

The endless procession of refugees reminded them of that grim reality.

***

Kiel, Lübeck, Flensburg, Rostock.

The ports that faced the Baltic Sea were constantly flooded with boats carrying refugees.

The East Prussian residents knew well what the German army had done to the Soviet army. 

Even under strict discipline, crimes against the people were harshly punished, but the residents still fled to the ‘mainland’ as if their feet were numb.

But the war came faster than the slow steps of the refugees.

“Air raid! Air raid! It’s the Soviet air raid!”

Fighters flew in the sky, covered by clouds and darkened by sirens. 

The last remaining pilots of the Luftwaffe fought desperately to prevent the city bombing, but they had no chance against the overwhelming numbers.

The fighter squadrons were only clearing the sky for the bombers to enter the city, but the citizens trembled at the sight of the fighters.

They knew what would come next, having experienced it dozens of times.

[Citizens, please evacuate to your designated locations. Evacuate in an orderly manner.]

Ironically, everyone was the most orderly at the moment when they should have been the most chaotic. 

They all showed surprising calmness in front of the situation they had seen many times.

Tatatatatatatatata! Tatatatatatatata! 

The anti-aircraft guns on the towers fired machine guns at the Soviet planes.

They had a heavy physique and a crushing momentum that matched it. They didn’t care about machine guns. 

While the anti-aircraft gunners whined about the deteriorating barrels and the jamming caused by the steel, the Soviet prisoner hanging on the tower mocked them.

“***!!! ******!!!”

The Germans couldn’t understand what the Soviet was saying. 

They only felt fear from his appearance, who cursed and sneered with a rough pronunciation and a cracked voice.

One of the helpless anti-aircraft gunners hit his head several times with a stick, but the soldier still laughed like a madman.

[The air raid is over. Citizens, please don’t worry and return to your livelihoods. If you are caught with the distributed subversive propaganda, you will be punished.]

These days, the Soviet army had dropped more than bombs.

Hundreds of bombers had scattered leaflets all over Germany. The leaflets had Russian and German written on both sides, and their contents varied.

‘The Nazis can no longer win. Citizens, rebel and overthrow Hitler!’

‘The Soviet Union and the Soviet army guarantee that there will be no atrocities against the Germans.’

‘Leave the city and flee to the countryside. The Soviet army will announce in advance the days of the air raids.’

Paper fluttered from the sky and fell to the ground. 

Someone looked at the leaflet as if they had seen something dirty and headed back into the building.

Someone else picked up a few leaflets in the alley, or on the street, secretly avoiding the eyes of others.

Even if it was something given by the enemy, they had to accept it without filtering it, because the Germans lacked information.

[German people! Rise up! The evil Soviet army has already violated and plundered the unique territory of our Germanic people. Victory or Siberia!]

The only thing that didn’t change while everything changed was the voice of Goebbels, who cawed like a crow.

The stories about the ‘new weapons’ prepared by the wisdom of the Führer, or the ‘powerful German tanks’ that smashed the Soviet army, had gone in one ear and out the other. 

Now Minister Goebbels said that they had to stop the Soviet army with the passion and will of the people.

[The final battle awaits us! Germanic people! For Germany! For the Führer…!]

The people wrapped themselves in thick coats, crossed their arms, and bowed their heads, wanting to know nothing.

The Gestapo with bloodshot eyes and the Hitler Youth who were too young to be conscripted roamed the streets.

“Still, there were no air raids or bombings for a few days.”

“That’s right.”

The people desperately looked for something to talk about, something to enjoy. 

The two people who lit their cigarettes with a matchstick each took a deep breath.

These days, the Soviet army had not bombed Berlin. 

The Soviet planes flew over the corpses, or soon-to-be corpses, like a flock of crows that roamed the sky ominously. 

The citizens noticed that the amount of leaflets they dropped had increased.

“…What will happen?”

There was no need to ask what the question was about.

They all worried.

What about tomorrow? The day after? ‘Zero hour’ was a word that they couldn’t even utter.

“…”

***

“There, in front of us, Berlin is visible!”

“Waaaaaaaah!”

It would be ‘zero hour’ for Germany, but the Soviet army expressed it with a different word.

“The day of victory! The day of victory!”

The armored division that had defeated the last remnants of the German army reached a river.

On the other side of the river, there was a group of Germans who had set up their last defense and resisted.

Like the countless Germans they had defeated, killed, and captured, that group was also made up of old men or youngsters who had barely grown any hair.

“Hey! Surrender! Hahahahahaha!”

A Soviet soldier climbed on top of a tank and shouted loudly. The other side didn’t seem to understand what he was saying and fired their guns.

“Hahaha, they don’t even have a machine gun…”

Most of them had old-fashioned rifles that they probably used in the last war, or at best, a Panzerfaust if they were part of the ‘elite’ Volkssturm. 

Sometimes, they were thrown in front of the Soviet army with just a uniform and a rifle, and one magazine.

The Soviet soldiers thought of their old fathers or young brothers at home, rather than the brutal fascist army that massacred the people.

“Hey, stop it. The advance order was only up to here.”

“Yes! Ah, yes! Comrade Lieutenant.”

The soldier laughed and got off the tank. The war was almost over. The soldiers were excited.

They could go home after this hellish war.

“My hometown must be the same, when I step off the train…”

“Mother! Father! They will be waiting for me and reaching out their hands~”

The soldiers sang a popular song like a nursery rhyme and shared stories of their hometowns with their comrades. 

They tried to remember their mothers, fathers, and sometimes their grandparents.

When they crossed the round hill, they could see the Silgae stream that surrounded their hometown, and the smoke rising from the bread-baking hut where their parents would be.

Their parents would have more wrinkles and bent backs, but they would still look the same as they remembered. 

The political officer read the letter that the village party secretary had written for them, clearing his throat.

[My son, are you well? I received your last letter. We only wish that you are not hurt and healthy on the battlefield. I worry every night that you might be injured. Your mother still calls for you in her sleep…]

“Mother…”

[Your grandmother had the flu a few days ago, but she got better after drinking the American chocolate that the village party secretary brought. It was a relief. There are some people who have the flu around here, but the American chocolate seems to have some miraculous effect. Bring some more when you come. My back has been bothering me lately. It would be easier for me to sow next year if you were here.]

The soldiers left the political officer alone and the platoon leader of the tank unit, Lieutenant Nikolai Petrov, went down to the river with a canteen.

The sun was setting on the other side, scattering a red light. 

The river shimmered and glowed beautifully with the fading sunlight.

Nikolai filled his canteen with river water and drank it.

“…”

On the other side, he saw a German soldier who was also scooping water. 

He couldn’t see him well because of the distance, but it seemed like their eyes met as he looked this way.

‘I wonder if he has a family and someone he loves?’

The place where he was assigned after finishing the political officer training was the front line of the tank unit that entered the German territory. 

Fortunately, the German resistance was minimal, and especially, they lacked anti-tank weapons that could stop the tank unit.

Nikolai didn’t get hurt much until he got here and he indulged in his feelings.

Was it because of the darkening sunset? He liked looking at the sky.

He thought that Katya would also see the same sun, stars, and moon that he was looking at, and his heart felt warm.

Now he could read well and he didn’t need to ask the political officer to read the letter for him like before. 

There were few who dared to open and read the personal letter of the platoon leader, so he could savor the contents of the letter by himself.

He took out the letter that he had read several times and the edges were stained with his fingerprints and started reading it again.

[To Nikolai. Are you not hurt anywhere? If you are, I will be really angry. At the Germans who hurt you, and at you for scaring me…]

Her letter was still written in a round and neat handwriting, filling the end of the military letter paper.

He read it over and over again, knowing what would come next, and he could recite it with his eyes closed, but Nikolai looked at Katya’s handwriting again.

There was a circle on one corner of the letter paper. A small arrow next to the circle said:

‘I kissed here. If you kiss here too, we can touch each other, right?’

As he did every time he read the letter, Nikolai kissed the circle and carefully folded it and put it away, in case the wind would blow it away.

Behind him, his platoon member came running.

“Lieutenant! Lieutenant! The Major has called all the officers!”

“Oh, okay! I got it!”

He was still not used to being an officer, but he dusted himself off and headed to the barracks. 

The last thing he saw as he turned around was the sun burning the horizon and fading away.

‘Over there… is Berlin…’

The capital of the fascists, Berlin, was there. His unit was the vanguard that entered there. 

He didn’t know how much sacrifice he would have to make. Nikolai enjoyed the leisure before the operation.

He was determined to survive and greet the day of victory.