Seydlitz's gunner, waiting for his commander's order, thought that Seydlitz was yelling for him. "What is it, Herr Hauptmann? Trouble?"
"No, Ernst. No more trouble. We are going to get out of these damned woods and head east." Folding his map, he looked about. "If there are Americans here, then they are the best camouflage artists in the world. We tried as hard as we could. We went north, as ordered, and tried to find the Americans. Our duty is done. Now it is time to end this insanity." Keying the radio mike, Seydlitz contacted Sergeant Wihelm Zangler, the platoon leader of Seydlitz's lead platoon, and ordered him to make a left turn onto the next hard-surfaced road and follow it until they hit the first village. From there they would make their way to the autobahn and then, as per his orders, head east. Humans, even humans who were German soldiers, could only go so far. Seydlitz was reaching his end and suspected that his platoon leaders and tank commanders were collectively nearing theirs too. To continue would be a foolish waste of good men and machines.
Glad to finally be free of the worry of tree branches, the tanks of Zangler's platoon made the turn onto the hard-surfaced road as ordered and immediately began to pick up speed. Though they should have known better, since this left the tanks further back in the column still in the woods and struggling to reach the road, tired minds never think of everything. So when Zangler's tank came swinging around the bend and smack into an American military police vehicle sitting in the center of the road, his platoon was alone and instantly in contact. There was no time to think, no time to pull back. Without any hesitation, Zangler ordered his gunner to open fire and passed the word down to the tank commanders in his platoon to close up, follow him, and attack.
Hilary Cole had just reached the rear of the first ambulance when the chatter of machine-gun fire shattered the stillness of the night. Turning toward the sound, Cole watched as a great black lumbering form spewing orange tongues of flame came around the bend in the road and rammed the MP humvee without slowing down. In horror, she watched as the tank's left track rose ever so slightly onto the MP vehicle, then slowly crushed it under its full weight before any of the occupants, including the MP manning the machine gun, could escape.
Transfixed by the sight, Cole watched as another tank came up next to the first, which was still in the process of crushing the MP humvee. It slowed when it caught sight of the line of engineer trucks. Hilary watched as the second tank lowered its long menacing main gun, took a second to aim, and then fired on the first target that looked worthy of a tank main-gun round. Its choice of target had been a good one, for the fuel truck sitting near the head of the engineer unit's column ripped itself apart, sending a huge yellow fireball into the air and lighting the entire length of the column.
Cole, standing little more than a hundred meters from where the fuel truck blew up, could feel the heat of the fireball. As she watched the burning fuel run out from the sides of the ruptured fuel truck onto the road and into the ditch on the side of the road, Cole realized that she was standing on the edge of hell, and there was nothing that she could do about it. Without any further conscious thoughts, without any control of what she was doing, Cole turned and fled into the forest as a third Leopard tank came careening around the bend and began to charge down the road, machine-gunning anything and everyone who stood in its way.
After having done it, Zangler realized that ramming the American humvee hadn't been a good idea. It had proven to be a little tougher than he had originally thought. Because of his preoccupation with the wreck that had once been a humvee, the two tanks that had come up behind him had passed his. Now looking down the road, he saw them come together, almost hub to hub, and begin to run march down the road, firing as they went. The Leopard tank on the left, with its turret traversed forty-five degrees in that direction, was busy machine-gunning American trucks and personnel at point-blank range with all the machine guns that the tank's crew could bring to bear. The Leopard on the right was concentrating on trucks and personnel further down the road. Since it had greater range, that tank began to alternate between firing its main gun and its coaxially mounted machine gun. Because the loader was busy feeding the main gun, he couldn't bring the turret-mounted machine gun into play. Not that it mattered. By the time it had fired its second 120mm high-explosive anti-tank round, the chaos and confusion, not to mention the destruction, were complete.
Unable to lead, and seeing that it was not possible to get around the side of the line of American trucks and run down along the shoulder of the road, Zangler ordered his driver to slow down. Looking to his rear, he saw the fourth tank in his platoon finally come up. With a series of wild motions, Zangler directed the commander of the fourth tank to pull around and come up on the right side of his own tank. This formed a second pair of vehicles that stretched from one side of the road to the other. Ready, Zangler waved and ordered his own tank and his consort to begin moving down the road, following the first two at a distance of fifty meters and engaging any personnel or vehicles with their machine guns that the first two tanks of his platoon had missed.
The fireball that had marked the destruction of the engineers' fuel truck was the first indication Seydlitz had that the lead platoon was in contact. He immediately attempted to contact Zangler. His calls went unanswered. Still not on the hard-surfaced road yet, Seydlitz listened to the steady rattle of machine guns, punctuated on occasion by a main gun firing. Frustrated, he ordered his driver to pick up speed and his loader to change the radio frequency of his radio to Zangler's platoon frequency.
Pulling his head down to avoid the tree branches now wildly whipping over the open hatch above him, Seydlitz listened to Zangler's radio net for a second. To his surprise, Seydlitz didn't hear any of the excited chatter or confused orders that one usually hears on a radio during initial contact. Instead the radio was silent. Looking over to his own receiver-transmitter, Seydlitz made sure that it was on and set to the proper frequency. Satisfied that all was in order, Seydlitz keyed the radio and called to Zangler. "Leo One Five, this is Leo Four Five. What is your situation? Over."
Zangler responded without a pause. "We've run into a column of trucks. An engineer unit, I think. We're engaging them now." Though his voice was calm, his failure to use full call signs or radio procedures told Seydlitz that he was either busy in an engagement or directing his platoon. Since he was already engaging, there was little that Seydlitz could add.
Still he felt that he needed to say something. So Seydlitz rekeyed the radio. "Leo One Five, continue your attack and destroy everything on the road. Repeat, destroy everything on the road. I am coming up with the rest of the unit now. Over."
With nothing more than a quick "Affirmative," Zangler accepted his commander's orders and passed them on down to his tank commanders.
When they came across the red crosses on white backgrounds on vehicles further down the column, Zangler's tank commanders didn't hesitate. Why they didn't was lost in the confusion and panic of the night. For the moment, Zangler's tank crews had become mindless killing machines. Perhaps they simply looked at the trucks and personnel fleeing from them as nothing more than the enemy, someone to be acquired, engaged, and killed. Perhaps they saw this as an opportunity to repay the bastards who had attacked them the day before with artillery while they had sat buttoned up in their own tanks shitting their pants every time a round detonated nearby and praying that they would live for another minute. Perhaps some even had higher, loftier thoughts such as defending Germany against invaders. Perhaps.