The Face of War by Martha Gellhorn

Author:Martha Gellhorn [Gellhorn, Martha]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780802191168
Google: wkoyBgAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00V8SS9QK
Goodreads: 456103
Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
Published: 1959-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

The Russians

April 1945

One Russian guard stood at the pontoon bridge on our side of the Elbe. He was small and shaggy and bright-eyed. He waved to us to stop and came over to the jeep and spoke Russian very fast, smiling all the time. Then he shook hands and said, "Amerikanski?" He shook hands again and we saluted each other. A silence followed, during which we all smiled. I tried German, French, Spanish and English, in that order. We wanted to cross the Elbe to the Russian side and pay a visit to our allies. None of these languages worked. The Russians speak Russian. The GI driver then made a few remarks in Russian, which I found dazzling. “You got to talk a little bit of everything to get around these days,” he said. The Russian guard had listened and digested our request and he now answered. The operative word in his answer was: nyet. It is the only word in Russian I know, but you hear it a lot, and afterwards there is no use arguing.

So we drove back to the CP of a Russian officer, who perhaps controlled that bridge. Here we had another brilliant and enjoyable conversation, filled with handshakes, laughter and good will; the operative word again was nyet. It was suggested that I go to a building in Torgau, a little way farther back from the river, where I would find more of my compatriots who were waiting for one thing or another. This was a square gray German house, outside of which were parked various jeeps and staff cars belonging to various American and English officers who were waiting to cross the Elbe on business. The situation seemed to be permanently snafu. The atmosphere was one of baffled but cordial resignation. Officers stood in the street and speculated on Russian time, which was either one or two hours earlier or later than ours. They asked themselves whether the Russian General who was due today (they thought), but who had actually arrived and departed yesterday, would possibly come tomorrow and if so at whose hour, ours or theirs. They said that it was pointless to try to telephone across the river because the telephone, which was located in the first Russian office I had visited, was in a purely experimental stage and anyhow you never got an answer to anything by telephone, if in the first place the telephone worked and you happened to reach anyone at the other end. They said, this is the way it is, chum, and you may as well get used to waiting because wait is what you do. You could cross the Elbe to the Russian side only if accompanied by a Russian officer who had come to get you to take you to a specific place for a specific purpose. There was no nonsense about walking across a few hundred yards of pontoon bridge and fraternizing with our allies.

It was quite agreeable in the sun, and the street was interesting.

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