Wintershield II

   Below is a patch I found on line.  I have never seen it before and we sure didn’t get one for participating in the Wintershield II exercises.

Getting ready to head to Graf.  This was a normal occurrence each year when units went to Grafenwohr or a unit was being relocated to Passau for border duty.  Load the APC’s and/or tanks on rail cars for transport to the “field.”

I was told that the Wintershield II exercises cost the US government over a million dollars just in damages to farm land and buildings in small hamlets through out Bavaria.  The jeep below was just a minor problem.  Picture tanks in mud up to the top of their tracks and frozen in place!  We were following  tanks through a small town headed to Hohenfels when one made a wide turn and the barrel of his cannon tore off the corner of a house on the corner.  It was around 2:30 in the morning and you could see the couple standing in their bedroom wonder what the hell hit them.

  I found the picture below on line. It is a Ranger unit during Wintershield II that was collecting egg shells so they could fill them with powder and use them as fake grenades. Are war games fun? Duh. All the time that Wintershield was happening they were beginning to build the WALL.  An expensive few years for the US government.

  To think I was there when they built it and I was back in the 80’s when they tore it down. WOW…

Turkish soldiers

   I’m not sure where the Turks were stationed but I do remember there being in and around the Stuttgart (Robinson Barracks) PX and commissary.  I didn’t think too much about it until we were attending maneuvers in Baumholder.

 

   The Turks were involved in the war games and I remember a Staff Sergeant telling me that when they were pulling guard duty in the field a couple of his soldiers were surprised when Turk soldiers crawled up behind them, tapped them on the leg and said, '”you OK GI.”  The guards never heard them approach. A little unsettling to say the least.

    I decided it would probably be nice to be on the same side during a war. My lasting impression is that they all looked like Cpl. Klinger but bigger and meaner looking. I didn’t know who Cpl Klinger was in 1962 but when I saw him on M*A*S*H on TV later in life I had a immediate flash back to Baumholder.

You never want a major driving an armored personnel carrier!

   In December 1962 the colonel said to head to Stuttgart airport (Eckterdingen).  It was New Years eve and I was planning on attending a party that had been planned for that evening. He said I would be coordinating the transfer of Armored Personnel Carriers (APC) from VII Corps to the US Air Force.  He said he would meet me at the airport. The APC’s were headed for the Congo.

   I got to the airport around 8 PM about the same time 3 APCs arrived.  I recognized the SFC in charge and we all went inside a small building in the US military section of the airport.  We waited for almost 4 hours for the 4 of the biggest planes I had ever seen.  Each plane could easily hold an APC.  Just as the planes were arriving a Major from VII Corps showed up and “took charge” of all the VII Corps people. The SFC mentioned that he was new to the outfit and no one cared for the guy.

 

   I went out and met with the bird colonel who was in charge of the 4 planes.  He said the delay was caused by the fact that they were notified around 1PM of the mission and they had to find crews.

   It is amazing to think that you can fit an APC into these big flying machines.  It was even more amazing to see that the Load Master of the first plane was only an E-5.  As the Air Force colonel said the Load Master is GOD on our planes.  If it isn’t centered and in the right location, “we don’t fly good.”  I asked why they had 4 planes and he said the fourth is a back up.

   The first plane got loaded easily.  The APC drivers were buck sergeants and they could move those 40 ton vehicles like they were sports cars.

   The weather was snow and ice and made for some tricky loading. By the time they were ready to load the second plane I was on the catwalk with the load master.  I was soaking up everything about the plane and it’s people.  I was just amazed.

   The second APC to be loaded was ready but there was a delay.  The SFC and the major were having words outside by the APC.  The SFC turned and walked away and the major got into the APC and started driving onto the plane.  It was obvious that he wasn’t as good as the sergeants who usually drove.  He got it on but really wasn’t watching the Load Master and the directions he was giving.  The major stopped the APC turned it off and got out.  The Load Master informed him that he had to move the APC back so many inches and to the left so the APC would be properly placed for tie down.

   The major unloaded on the E-6 Load Master and told him that he was in charge of the loading.  The Air Force bird colonel, on the catwalk with us told the major to get off his plane and get a good driver in here to move the APC.  “This Load Master is GOD on my plane and you will follow his orders or get off my ship.” The rest is not printable here….

   Unfortunately the major got back in and started the APC.  He was obviously  mad about being royally chewed out in front of enlisted men. He began to back up and was turning to correct his position and tore a whole in both side of the airplane.  Not big holes but this puppy wasn’t flying any time soon.  I thought the Load Master was going to cry. I also thought the Colonel was going to shoot the major.

   The 6 AM departure was delayed because they still had to have a third backup plane.  As I recall the replacement plane came from England rather than Frankfurt.

You’re missing WHICH railcar?

  The only close call we had was when we thought we had a railcar with warheads go across the East German border. It was a very real and scary situation.

  We had two phone systems in my office.  We had the regular military phones which you could also receive civilian phone calls on.  The other phone in my office was a BASA phone.  It was the Germany railway phone system.  I used the BASA phone when talking with the rail yard masters.  I also used the BASA phones from railroad sidings when I was meeting troop and equipment trains.  It was so much easier to call my office from the BASA phone than to go into some small town and find a civilian phone. The phone below looks exactly like the phone I had in my office and the ones at most sidings and rail stations in Germany.

  I remember getting a call one day from a railway military policeman who was sitting on a siding just south of Stuttgart.  He said, “is this the 594th?”  I said it was and he was almost crying.  He said, “We lost our railcar!” Once he calmed down I got his routing number (like a convoy clearance number but for rail transportation) and found that he and his men had been guarding a railcar that I thought contained warheads.  The warheads were being transported to an artillery unit near Augsburg.  Needless to say I contacted the colonel and told him what was going on. Alexander was usually pretty cool but he lost it on this occasion. Shown below is a typical box car from the 1960’s.

  Turns out once we got things somewhat sorted out this unit of MP’s took a few cases of beer and other booze along for the ride.  The unit was to have three railcars. Two passenger coaches and one box car.  The box car that held the “warheads” was placed between the two passenger cars.  I have forgotten how many MP’s there were but I’m thinking maybe a dozen spread between the two passenger cars.  They were to act as a buffer for the shipment. They had left Bremerhaven the day before and drank most of the way.  During the night they were shuffled onto a siding and the two passenger cars were unhooked and left on the siding.  The boxcar continued on with the rest of the train.

  I called Ulm and Augsburg – no car.  I called the Munich rail yard and they said it had gone through on the train to Leipzig. By this time the colonel had shown up as well as Harry Wickart.  By two in the afternoon we finally found the railcar on a siding in Munich.  The railcar serial number had been misread.  The number we were looking for was something like 3300210 and the car that had gone across the border was like 3300201.  What are the chances of these two cars ending up on the same train when they had been built prior to WWII????

  Turns out there weren’t any warheads in the boxcar, only spare parts. It was still a sensitive shipment because they were parts for the warheads being used at that time.  Not sure what happened to the MP’s.  I do know that all future shipments were flown into Eckterdingen airport (Stuttgart) and transported by truck to Augsburg. I don’t think the colonel every got over that one.  A lot of heat from Group Headquarters in Orleans.  Whenever we got heat they never seemed to remember that all we did was schedule and monitor shipments.  Hell we lost enough cigarettes and booze each year to supply the entire population of Germany and France.  Amazing how a whole railcar of cigarettes could just disappear. It probably still happens.

Christkindlesmarkt

   I always loved going to Nurnberg.  Harry Wickart, who I worked with in Stuttgart, said you have to go to the Christmas Market in Nurnberg.  He said that it is the best of all the Christmas shows in Europe.  I didn’t know they had Christmas shows anywhere…

   Buyers from all over the world attend as well as families from near and far.  After my first Christmas holiday trip to Nurnberg I promised myself that I would go back in 1962 and I did.

   Just to watch the faces on the little kids was worth the trip.  I also enjoyed a few of the beer halls in the Alt Stadt.  The “burned” beer took a little getting used to.  But once you had one under your belt the rest went down quite easily.

   I don’t care what you are looking for you will find it at the Nurnberg Christmas show.  If it isn’t here they don’t make it!

   I know they still have this market every year.  If you are headed that way in December be sure to put Nurnberg on you itinerary. The kid in you will be delighted!

   Leave a comment if you’ve been here.

Court Room

   My first time to Nurnberg was really enlightening.  The 594th Transportation Movement Control Office in Nurnberg was in a building called the Palace of Justice.  I drove to Nurnberg for the first time in the early Fall of 1961. We met most of the morning and then Capt Gorman asked if I would like to see where the trials were held.

   I had no clue what he was talking about and he said the Nurnberg Trials.  I said as in the Nazi trials and he said yes.  I got up and started putting my overcoat on and he said you don’t need a coat its just down the hall!  Sure enough the actual court room was down the hall and around the corner. At that time the court room wasn’t open to the public.

   A lot happened here.  I remember a minister in Grants Pass, Oregon who was in a Ranger unit that dropped into France prior to D Day.  He was first generation German and was one of the few survivors of his Ranger unit.  Because he spoke German he was assigned to be a guard at the Nurnberg trials.  Unfortunately he was separated from the service prior to the trials starting.  He said most all the original GI guards spoke fluent German.  Once the trials began most of these soldiers had been sent home. He said had they been there no one would have committed suicide. Not sure how they would have prevented the suicides but they happened.

She dropped her drawers RIGHT there!!!

  There were a number of things that one had to get used to when moving to Germany.  One was that many of the women didn’t shave there legs or under arms very often.

   Harry Wickart explained it best. He said that many of the urban women were more sophisticated than those working on the farm. Generally those in the small towns and farms didn’t shave very often and after a while looked more like men than women.  The urban girl’s who followed the fashion magazines quite often shaved.

   It was also not unusual to see young and old men and ladies sunbathing with little or no clothes on.  Englischer Garden in Munich is a great example.

   As I mentioned earlier the putzfrau that came through the men’s room at the hauptbahnhof in Stuttgart washing the floors.  There must have been a dozen guys taking a leak and the only ones  embarrassed were the newly arrived American GI’s.

   That brings me to the two lane road (now four to six lane road) between Kornwestheim and Ludswigburg.  My first week in Germany I was riding in a jeep to the motor pool in Ludwigsburg when all the traffic stopped.  We sat and sat with no movement for almost 30 minutes.  There was VW bug in front of us with two young gals inside.  We were having a cigarette when one of the young gals (probably about 19 or 20 years old got out of the VW, walked 2-3 feet to the side of the road, faced us, pulled up her skirt, dropped her panties, squatted and peed in the grass.  Sylvester who was driving forgot what he was doing, took his foot off the brake AND clutch and rammed the VW in front of us!

   SP4 Sylvester got an Article 15 for his error and we learned again that the rules were different in Germany in 1961.