Black Cross. Greg Iles
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You would do well to get on with it.”
Brigadier Smith watched the young Jew try awkwardly to slide the package that was under his arm into his cuffed hands.
“Bloody waste of time,” muttered Major Dickson.
“Mr. Stern,” General Little said with seemingly paternal concern, “do you mind my asking if Moshe Shertok or Chaim Weizmann know you are in London?”
“They don’t.”
“I thought not. You see, Mr. Stern, there are proper channels for pursuing matters relating to European Jews. His Majesty’s Government generously maintains excellent relations with the Jewish Agency here in London. Messrs. Weizmann and Shertok are the men you should be seeing about this matter. And I think you will find, having done so, that they are doing all in their power to help the European Jewry.”
General Little waited what he considered to be a suitable time for his wisdom to be assimilated, then said, “Have I put your mind at rest, Mr. Stern?”
“You’ve done nothing of the kind,” Stern replied. He took a step closer to the table. “I’m well aware of the efforts of Shertok, Weizmann, and the Jewish Agency. They have the best of intentions, I’m sure. But I have not come here to plead for Palestinian entry certificates for trapped Jews, or to ask you to declare them protected British persons, or to beg you to buy their freedom with war materiel. I don’t believe any of that will be done. General, I have come here to speak to you, to military men, about a purely military solution.”
Duff Smith pricked up his ears. As the tall young man gathered himself to deliver his appeal, Smith noted a certain self-possession, a centeredness that was remarkable in one so young. It was the mark of the natural soldier—or agent.
Stern gestured with the package in his shackled hands. “The depositions in this file contain eyewitness accounts of a program of mass extermination being carried out by the Nazis at four concentration camps in Germany and occupied Poland. I have precise tallies of the dead and detailed descriptions of the killing methods employed by the Nazis, from mass shootings and electrocutions to the most widely practiced method: death by poison gas and subsequent cremation of the corpses.”
General Little glanced uncomfortably at Major Dickson. “May I see those reports, Mr. Stern?”
Stern took a step forward, but Little raised his hand. “Please do not approach the table,” he said coolly. “Sergeant Gilchrist?”
A military policeman took the folder and carried it to the general. Little opened it and briefly scanned the papers inside. “Mr. Stern,” he said, “do you have any evidence that this information is accurate? Other than the testimony of other Jews, I mean.”
“General, reports of Jewish deaths in the hundreds of thousands have appeared in the London Times and Manchester Guardian, sometimes quoting the exact names and locations of death camps. I believe one such story even appeared in the New York Times. What I do not understand is why the Allies still refuse to do anything about them.”
General Little brushed the edge of his neat gray mustache with his left forefinger. “I believe,” he said with cold precision, “that you have accomplished what you set out to do here. I can assure you that these reports will be given all the attention they deserve.”
Jonas Stern snorted in contempt. “General, I have not begun to accomplish what I came here to do. I’ve given you those reports merely to justify the desperate action I am about to ask you to undertake on behalf of the Jewish people.”
“I’ve had about all I can stand from this whelp,” Major Dickson said. “Let’s stop this charade.”
“Just a moment, Clive,” said the officer on General Little’s left, a Guards major. “Let’s hear him out. I suspect he’s a member of the ‘bomb the railways’ school. That’s it, isn’t it, Mr. Stern? You want the RAF to bomb the railways leading to the concentration camps?”
“No, Major.”
“Ah. Then you must be one of the advocates for forming a Jewish Brigade to take part in the invasion. I should have known. You saw some action in North Africa, didn’t you?”
“That is not why I’ve come.”
General Little slapped his palm down on Stern’s file. “Then why the devil have you come? Put an end to the bloody suspense, will you?”
“General Little,” Stern said, “I understand politics. I know that a Jewish Brigade would contain the seeds of a Jewish army, which could return to Palestine after the war and fight the British and the Arabs. I do not ask for that. I know it’s been suggested that the Polish Resistance try to destroy the Nazi gas chambers. But the Poles are too weak to do this, and even if they weren’t, they would not risk their lives to save Jews.”
“Too bloody right,” Major Dickson muttered.
Stern ignored him. “I do have a certain amount of military experience, and I realize that bombing the railways leading to the camps is impractical. Rail tracks are relatively easy to repair, and the Nazis could always substitute trucks for rolling stock.”
Brigadier Smith could see that the young man’s realistic assessments had gotten the attention of General Little and the Guards officer, if not Major Dickson.
“General,” Stern concluded, “my request is simple. I am asking you for four heavy-bomber sorties over Germany and Poland. I have the names and exact locations of four concentration camps at which Jews are being gassed and shot to death at a conservatively estimated rate of over five thousand per day. That’s five thousand per day in each camp. In the name of humanity—in the name of God—I ask that those four charnel houses be wiped from the face of the earth.”
The silence in the room was total. Major Dickson sat up and stared wide-eyed at Stern. After the initial shock dissipated, General Little cleared his throat. “Do you mean, Mr. Stern, that you want these camps bombed with the Jewish prisoners inside them?”
“That is exactly what I mean, General.”
Duff Smith felt a thrill of satisfaction.
“He’s mad,” said Major Dickson. “Absolutely barking.”
“I’m quite sane, Major,” Stern said. “And quite serious.”
“And I am quite sure,” General Little said, “that Messrs. Shertok and Weizmann, in all their desperate pleadings, have suggested nothing so drastic as this. You claim to speak for the Jewish people in asking for this madness?”
Stern spoke calmly and clearly. “General, Weizmann and Shertok are political men—distant from the truth of what is happening in Europe. The idea of bombing the camps was first suggested by members of the Jewish Underground in Poland and Germany. I have talked to some who escaped. General, I have looked into the eyes of women who had their infants snatched away by the heels and crushed against walls by SS officers. I have listened to fathers who watched their sons bayoneted as they stood weeping not a meter away—”
“That’s enough,” Little said sharply. “I don’t need a lecture on the horrors of war from you.”
“But these people are not at war, General! They are civilian noncombatants. Innocent women and children.”
General Little gazed down at the papers Stern had brought, then looked up and began speaking in a soft voice. “Lad, I can’t help but admire the courage it takes to make a request like that. But your request simply cannot be considered seriously. Not even from a purely military standpoint. Our bombers don’t have the range to reach these camps. Their fighter escorts can’t fly that far—”
“That’s no longer true, General,” Stern interrupted. “The new American P-51 Mustangs have a range of 850 miles. That puts the camps within striking distance from Italy.”
“You’re surprisingly well informed,” Little rejoined. “But even