At the edge of the town, the truck stopped, and they all piled out once again, joining a larger group of soldiers assembling there. Some of the men had already been fighting in Bastogne for several days, and others, like Cole’s own squad, had been rushed in to hold off the German attacks.
A veteran of the Bastogne fight wandered over to bum a cigarette. Those had become scarce. Supplies had been dropped from the air, but ammo and medical supplies had been the priority, not cigarettes.
“Here you go, buddy,” Vaccaro said. “Take the rest of the pack. It looks like you could use it.”
“Thanks,” said the soldier, who was muddy and had a large patch of what looked like dried blood down the leg of his britches. Considering that he wasn’t limping, it probably wasn’t his own. He lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. “Welcome to the circus,” he said.
“It’s quite a show,” Vaccaro agreed.
“The Krauts won’t quit and neither will we. Did you hear what we said to the Germans when they asked us to surrender?” the soldier asked.
He spoke with a pride as if he had personally negotiated with the Germans.
“From the looks of the place, I’m guessing you told them to forget it. The Krauts are still pounding away.”
“You’ve got that right, buddy. General McAuliffe had one word for them, that’s what. ‘Nuts!’”
“Boy, are we glad to see you,” another soldier said as the reinforcements jumped down from the truck. “It’s about time you ladies got here.”
“Yeah, yeah, we already licked our Germans south of here in La Gleize, so they sent us up here to help you handle your Krauts.”
The soldier snorted. “Be my guest. The thing is, the Krauts don’t like being handled by you or anything else.”
“We’ll see about that.”
The soldier noticed their rifles. “Are you guys snipers? That’s a good thing. The Krauts like to set up in the hills or in one of the church steeples outside town and pick us off. It’s about time we had somebody who could shoot back.”
“That’s what we do.”
As it turned out, their skills as snipers wouldn’t be put to use right away.
Lieutenant Mulholland gathered the men to be addressed by a captain who seemed to be in charge.
“All right, I know you men are from different units and some of you just got here,” the officer said. “I’m Captain Brown. We appreciate the help, believe me. Since this group is kind of cobbled together, you’re now officially part of Team SNAFU.”
Several of the men chuckled. SNAFU was a popular military acronym for “situation normal, all fouled up.” The name Team SNAFU seemed to fit the circumstances. The unit had been thrown together by order of Colonel Roberts as a way to get every possible soldier into action. Meanwhile, the 101st Airborne anchored the defense of Bastogne.
“SNAFU sounds about right!” someone yelled.
“Listen up,” the captain said, raising his arms to tamp things down. “The first job for Team SNAFU is to hold back the Germans who will be coming along this road soon enough. They want to get into Bastogne, and we’re not going to let them, are we?”
“No, sir!” several men shouted in unison.
Cole had to hand it to Captain Brown. He was managing to rally tired and exhausted troops in time to face a new threat from the enemy.
“We’re going to follow this road here and then get into the trees and dig in. Remember that if the Krauts get past us, this road takes them right into Bastogne. So don’t let them by, goddammit.”
That was it for the speech, and it was too damn cold to stand around listening to speeches anyway. Captain Brown climbed into a jeep that rushed up the road, and the infantrymen followed on foot.
Holding Bastogne against the Germans was a bit like the Dutch boy trying to stop all the holes in the dike by using his fingers. In this case, they might need their toes too.
“What I’d like to know is, Where the hell did all these Krauts come from?” Vaccaro wondered. “They’re supposed to be beaten — or close to it. That’s what everybody says, anyhow.”
“I reckon Hitler had other plans,” Cole said.
“You have to hand it to those Kraut bastards,” Vaccaro said, offering the enemy some grudging praise. “They just don’t know when to give up.”
“How do you know they don’t think the same thing about us?” Cole pointed out. “It’s got to gnaw at them, us putting up such a fight.”
The weary soldiers of Team SNAFU were trudging beside elements of the 101st Airborne, being rushed to plug the latest hole in the dike. All of them were cold, weary, muddy, and hungry. Their C rations did little to quell their deep hunger.
The only consolation, at least as Cole could see it, was that the Germans couldn’t be in much better shape. Not if they had been advancing in these same conditions.
