The transformation of a series of short campaigns into a protracted military struggle required a difficult adjustment from soldiers and civilians. To be sure, the “phony war” in the West gave way to a quick conquest of Denmark and Norway. Also the long-awaited battle with France resulted in a surprisingly rapid and complete German victory in June 1940, surpassing all gains of World War I. But the submarine campaign remained inconclusive and the air attacks on Great Britain were a strategic failure, since the Luftwaffe’s change of targets and the tenacious resistance of the Royal Air Force blunted the German assault. While the initial Nazi victories had followed the blitzkrieg script of defeating one opponent at a time and then using his resources to subdue another, the stubborn British defense turned the war precisely into what Hitler had wanted to avoid—a prolonged conflict. When the euphoria of the early successes wore off, German soldiers were faced with the prospect of an endless struggle, stripping the war of its heroic appeal.
The manpower needs of the Wehrmacht kept Konrad Jarausch in uniform while changing his assignment from guarding POWs to training new recruits in January 1940. Even the Polish and French campaigns had exacted a considerable price in dead and wounded, requiring soldiers and officers to be replaced in order to continue the fighting. Therefore, the reserve army sought to upgrade its combat ability by issuing light machine guns and field artillery. On March 30, Jarausch’s unit was transformed into a “field recruit company” for training fresh draftees while remaining stationed in Poland. On May 31, it became a Schützen-Feldersatzkompanie in infantry regiment 660 as part of the combination of such outfits into Landwehr divisions. In early July of 1940 the unit was shipped back to Germany and dissolved, but he was assigned to the “Infantry Replacement Battalion” in Bernburg in central Germany on October 9. Successive entries in his Wehrpass (military identity card) show that he was busy training recruits during most of 1940 and the first half of 1941.
Due to the experience of actual combat, the training process became increasingly arduous for the NCOs and draftees involved. It took considerable effort to shape a diverse group of civilian recruits, some of whom resented being in the military, into a fighting unit of soldiers who would obediently carry out orders, even if they did not immediately understand their purpose. The German army sought to accomplish this goal through instilling routines, keeping men busy, and frequently checking their performance so as to break the will of individuals and meld them into a coherent group. In contrast to the customary practice of only drilling in weapon presentation and marching in formation, new orders emphasized shooting with live ammunition as well as field exercises, based on combat situations. The former required long hours of target practice while the latter consisted of deep forays into the countryside, sharpening orienteering skills and engaging in mock battles. While the troops found outdoor exercises simulating combat diverting, they resented the mindlessness of more traditional training routines.
The graphic descriptions in the letters show that the training of recruits was exhausting, since it demanded considerable physical stamina and psychological resilience from the instructors. The lengthy field exercises tested the endurance not only of the draftees but also of their officers, because the latter were supposed to master the relevant skills and lead by example. Especially in the winter with subzero temperatures, deep snow, and chilling wind, drilling outdoors proved painful and often had to be broken off to avoid frostbite. In spite of the new orders, the attempt to instill military discipline continued to involve more “reporting, running back and forth, bawling out and threatening” than weapons’ training or fieldwork. Moreover, the short time to get recruits ready for the front, limited to four weeks, rendered it impossible to establish lasting forms of comradeship. Finally, many draftees resented the toughness of their training as excessive, since after the victory in France they hoped that the war would be over soon. My father seems to have enjoyed those aspects of the training that resembled his teaching, but he loathed the prevailing barracks tone.
Konrad Jarausch was, nonetheless, pleased to be considered for officer training due to his leadership potential. On March 9, 1940, he was selected as “reserve officer candidate” with a few others, and a couple of days later invited to attend a “course on defending against espionage, sabotage, political disinformation, punishment, and penitentiary during the war and on special assignment.” On May 1, he was promoted further to staff sergeant. This advancement came in recognition of his sense of responsibility, organizing talent, and capacity for teaching. But ultimately he failed to become an officer for several reasons: Due to his age, his health was not robust enough for active duty, turning it into “a struggle to get through from day to day.” Since his superiors had not prepared him properly for the test, he flunked a surprise examination in “soldierly knowledge.” Finally, his “soft approach” to leading men lacked that stentorian voice and arrogant bearing considered necessary for advancement into the officer corps. Although this outcome disappointed the social aspirations of his wife, he was too bookish and independent to fit well into the Nazi war machine.
On October 31, 1940, he had “a little accident” that ended all hopes for further promotion and began to alienate him from military service. Already beforehand, the training of ever-younger recruits had become increasingly onerous, since his ambitious superiors set too high a standard. But then during exercising in a hall he fell down an unsecured stairway and thereby ruptured a meniscus, incapacitating his right knee. Since the military physicians opted for noninvasive treatment, he spent the next two months in an army hospital in Wernigerode without really improving much. This was not only a boring time of bed rest, which could only be passed by resuming his classical reading, but it also got him out of touch with what was going on in his unit and made him subsequently more vulnerable during physical exertion in the line of duty. Moreover, the three months of convalescence also increased his psychological distance from the service and made him cast about for alternative assignments. When he was stricken from the officer candidate rolls on April 28, 1941, he no longer protested, since he had already given up on this ambition.
Due to this disenchantment Konrad Jarausch increased his efforts to be reassigned to reserve duty at home or declared “indispensable” for the war effort so as to be released from military service. However, both alternatives were complicated by the more stringent requirements for transfer or exemption of battalions that had served in Poland, since they were now considered part of the field army. As long as he was still toying with the idea of an officer career, he did not want to be transferred to the home guard since further promotion would then be impossible. Exemption from service was also difficult, because teachers were not included in the list of “essential occupations” such as postal clerks, metal workers, or farmers, and his health was not bad enough to keep him out of uniform. Moreover, the procedure required an emphatic request by the director of the Cathedral Gymnasium who first had to be persuaded to support such a move. When all the paperwork was finally assembled in the summer of 1941, the impending attack on the Soviet Union canceled all plans for release, and another application during the fall of the same year was also turned down.
As a result of such frustrations, the letters commented more acerbically on the military and the war during the second half of 1940 and the first half of 1941. While still in Poland, he considered the “watch in the East” necessary, but during garrison duty in the Reich he found the endless grinding of recruits increasingly tiresome. Konrad Jarausch grew quite critical of “the completely mistaken kind of education” that sought to eradicate individuality and foster “blind obedience,” because it clashed with his own Prussian ethos of internalized responsibility. In contrast to the boisterous racism and nationalism of many comrades confident in victory, he preferred a quiet humanistic patriotism and was less sanguine about the eventual outcome of the war. While back in Germany he enjoyed his leave time to visit with his wife, he also felt increasingly cut off from intellectual developments and peaceful pursuits. No wonder that during this indecisive period of the war the tone of the letters grew more irritated, because he was trying to find a way to make these months meaningful so as to solve his personal problems and reassure himself about the future of the country.