PARTISAN REVIEW
and his Moscow-picked retinue-so as
to
have an additional weapon of
control. It would not do in May 1945 to offer a Russian soldier a
brotherly embrace. He needed just to see the "luxury" of a radio, watch,
or couch to be convinced that he was not dealing with a Tovarisch but
with a capitalist. At any rate, as he was out to loot, he was not in–
terested
in
probing the personal history and social position of his victim.
The rape of Berlin was not the aftermath of the struggle but part
of it. The fight was less a military affair than a gigantic raid of a mil–
lion-fold army of bandits. Even the appearance of the Russian soldiers
ceased
to
be military; they discarded filthy and torn parts of their
uniforms for German civilian clothes. They wore two and three suits
under the military blouses and pants. Hardly able to walk, they ad–
vanced from street to street, tommy-gun in one hand and a suitcase of
loot in the other. The bayonet broke open closets and drawers; what was
removable was taken, only to be lost again to the Commissars who
organized the eastward track of the previously westward Nazi caravans
of plunder.
In great demand, of course, were things that could be carried on the
body, such as watches and jewelry of all descriptions. As the victory
must be celebrated, schnapps and vodka were also in great demand.
Every bottle of vinegar was opened and tasted before the Russians ac–
cepted their possessors' protestation that they contained no alcohol. And
with the schnapps the fighting and thievery gained in elan. Those who
could not deliver quickly enough were shot down; women, not willing
to give in at once, were thrown out of the windows with their throats
slit. Fires were set to the houses that yielded too little, their occupants
fleeing the basements into the deadly cross-fires of the streets.
During the battle, the interval between life and death is the occa–
sion for love. Stopped for days at a particular spot, there was time for
enjoyment before the sniper's bullet found its mark. Women and girls
dragged from their basements were lined up on the sidewalks. They tried
to make themselves appear old and ugly by smearing their faces with
soot and by dirtying the shabby rags they wore in the cellars. But a
soldier's hand would wipe away the filth and discover good looks behind
the mask of fear. Children would follow their mothers and sisters, only
to see them ordered to bend over and lift their skirts to make ready for
love in daylight and collectivity, to be loved by drunken soldiers still
able, however, to keep an eye on the rooftops so as not to be killed in
the act of copulation. Long afterwards, the smaller of the children would
play the newly-learned "game of raping."
The end of the battle is the start of the clean-up
period.
Groups of
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