Chapter 132: The Siege of Danzig
Inside Danzig, two kilometers from the barracks of the Polish Second Cavalry Division's First Infantry Regiment, the German assault units heard the distant web of gunfire spreading through the city.
The plan had already deviated from its cleanest version.
At the temporary command post, the officer in charge understood at once that the original schedule could no longer be followed. He radioed the provisional headquarters stationed at the port and requested permission to abandon the planned mortar strike on the enemy camp.
Instead, they would turn the approach road into a killing ground.
Approval came almost immediately.
The company officer who received the order relayed it down to the squad leaders without delay. From the first radio transmission to the final confirmation, the entire process took less than five minutes.
Then the street changed.
The broad cobblestone road, wide enough for vehicles to pass through, was pried open by combat engineers with crowbars and bayonets. WT anti-armor disc mines were carefully buried beneath the stones. Every nearby high point was seized by riflemen and machine gun teams. MG 34s were set up at staggered angles, establishing overlapping fields of fire across every road leading toward the position.
Inside the side alleys, infantrymen crouched low and carefully stretched tripwires across the shadows.
The experimental S-type anti-personnel mines had not yet undergone real battlefield testing, so the engineers handled them with extreme caution. No one wanted to become the first corpse in a report proving their effectiveness.
"Careful," the squad leader growled. "This thing jumps before it explodes. Waist height. If you survive it, you'll wish you hadn't."
He had barely finished speaking when the growl of engines rose through the distant gunfire.
Everyone moved faster.
The soldiers stepped carefully over the tripwires, then kicked open the door of a high-rise apartment building.
On the second floor, two assault troops took position. One pointed his G43 semi-automatic rifle down toward the alley, locking it under his sights. The other aimed at the first-floor stairwell, ready to work with the machine gunner to turn any Polish soldier who tried to storm the building into torn flesh.
On the fifth floor, the snipers had completely lost patience with the Polish residents who kept trying to reclaim their dining tables.
After knocking one man unconscious with a rifle butt, they dragged a heavy wooden table to the window facing the road. The snipers lay prone behind it, Mauser 98ks fitted with optical sights resting firmly against the edge.
Then they waited.
A moment later, several armored vehicles appeared at the far end of the road. Behind them came columns of Polish soldiers, advancing cautiously while scanning the surrounding buildings.
Perhaps the unnatural silence had dulled their vigilance, or perhaps they still could not believe German troops had already turned Danzig's streets into a prepared battlefield.
An officer waved his arm and shouted, "Armored cars and tanks to the central district! Everyone else, establish firing points and barricades. If you lack materials, take them from the residences. Move!"
The armored vehicles accelerated.
Behind them lumbered a Renault FT-17 light tank imported from France, its old frame rattling over the cobblestones like a relic dragged out from another war.
From the fifth-floor window, the sniper watched the armored vehicles roll toward the buried mines.
A faint smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
Then the street erupted.
Boom!
Two iron flowers bloomed in the middle of the road.
The machine gun turret on the roof of the lead armored vehicle was blown straight into the air. The vehicle itself collapsed into a twisted, burning wreck. Beside it, the Renault tank lurched violently, its tracks destroyed and its hull cracked open by the blast.
"Ambush!"
The warning came too late.
The next moment, machine guns on both sides opened fire.
Tracer rounds drew bright, merciless lines through the darkness. Polish soldiers who had failed to take cover were cut down in rows, their bodies thrown backward by the impact. Those who tried to crawl beneath trucks or behind rubble found the angles had already been calculated.
There was nowhere safe.
Behind one of the trucks, the Polish commander shouted himself hoarse.
"Storm the buildings! Take the buildings! Bring down the heavy machine guns!"
Two soldiers bent low and tried to climb onto a truck to retrieve a heavy machine gun.
At that instant, a glint flashed from the rooftop.
Two bullets followed.
Both men fell before their hands touched the weapon.
The Polish soldiers who rushed into the alleys met an even worse fate. The night hid the tripwires at their feet. One boot caught the wire.
Click.
The mine disengaged.
"Take cover!"
The warning became the last words many of them heard.
Boom!
Steel balls tore through the alley at waist height.
Several soldiers closest to the blast jerked as if struck by an invisible scythe, then collapsed with their lower bodies shredded into unrecognizable ruin. Others stumbled and screamed as steel fragments buried themselves in their legs and bones.
"Drag them out! Quickly!"
The order was drowned by gunfire.
Tat-tat-tat.
A G43 spat from the second-floor window, stirring a mist of blood in the narrow alley. The entrance, barely wide enough for one man to pass through, became a heap of corpses, limbs, and shattered equipment. Other Polish soldiers tried to force their way through the building door despite the losses, only to be met by a machine gun waiting inside.
The burst cut them down at the threshold.
The same scene repeated across the eastern district of Danzig.
A patrol ran into a concealed rifle team and vanished under crossfire.
A truck convoy turned into the wrong street and was burned where it stood.
A squad tried to advance through a courtyard, only to trigger mines laid beneath laundry lines and flowerbeds.
By noon, the gunfire in the city gradually thinned.
It did not stop because the fighting had become less brutal.
It stopped because there were fewer Polish positions left to fire from.
Outside the city, in the town of Posika, the barracks of the Polish Second Cavalry Division had turned into a storm of messengers, radio operators, and shouting officers.
Lilandor stood over the operations table, his face livid as he read the compiled battle report.
Then he crushed the paper into a ball and hurled it across the room.
"An entire regiment!" he roared. "An entire regiment of troops, and in less than a day they have lost most of Danzig! They had French tanks and armored vehicles, and they still lost most of the city!"
His adjutant had no time to let him finish venting. He stepped forward quickly, voice tight with urgency.
"Sir, the First Infantry Regiment has requested permission for a complete withdrawal from the city again. Last night's ambush cost them more than half their strength. Their remaining strongholds are close to being surrounded."
He swallowed and continued.
"If they do not retreat now, we must prepare to lose an entire regiment's weapons and equipment."
Lilandor slammed his fist onto the operations table.
"Damn Germany! Damn them all!"
His knuckles whitened against the map.
"Order them to withdraw immediately. Then inform Warsaw that Germany sent at least a division's worth of troops into Danzig last night."
His eyes burned with anger.
"I request the immediate deployment of the neighboring Twentieth Infantry Division to encircle the city."
The adjutant saluted.
"Yes, sir!"
In Warsaw, Piłsudski stared at the telegram in disbelief.
He had expected resistance. He had expected protests, diplomatic noise, perhaps even a stern German communiqué that could be ignored until the international situation changed.
He had not expected Germany to send troops.
And so quickly.
The operation in Danzig had not been fully communicated to parliament. If this matter exploded, someone would have to give an explanation. Worse still, the legal position was troublesome. Danzig still belonged to Germany in formal terms. German military action on territory Germany could claim was not easily framed as aggression.
The private understanding reached through the Foreign Ministry and the British was not something that could be dragged into the sunlight.
If everything was exposed, Poland would look like the aggressor.
But abandoning Danzig was impossible.
If he made peace now, if he withdrew now, his opponents in parliament would tear him apart. He would be branded forever as the president who negotiated away Poland's position and retreated before German pressure.
Piłsudski's expression darkened.
Since the battle had already begun, then the story had to be rewritten.
Germany had attacked first.
Poland would answer.
But he still dared not ignite a full-scale war immediately. The situation was too delicate. Britain's attitude was still unclear, and France's hesitation was even more uncertain.
So he would test them.
He would deploy border troops and push forward, forcing Germany to see Poland's strength. At the same time, submarines would blockade the Baltic Sea and trap the German troops in Danzig.
Once Danzig became a cage, the Germans would naturally withdraw and negotiate.
Then the city would remain in Polish hands.
He picked up the telephone and connected to headquarters.
"Order the Third and Fourth Divisions to launch probing attacks toward the border. Blockade the sea. Not one ship is to enter Danzig."
His voice became colder.
"Inform the Second Cavalry Division and the Twentieth Infantry Division to advance toward Danzig. Once the blockade is complete, lay siege to the city."
He paused, then added:
"As for East Prussia, transfer two more divisions from Warsaw to defend the line. Monitor German movements at all times."
He had barely finished speaking when a voice from headquarters interrupted him with a piece of news that made the entire room seem to freeze.
Germany had already crossed the border from East Prussia.
Their forces were advancing toward Danzig.
.....
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