Upfall

The Jewish prisoners‘ barrack was sufficient to house several hundred people, and Wirth was distressed to see that the SS platoon had spread itself throughout the compound, looting and stealing from the Jews the little they had managed to save or hide away. The SS platoon acted quite as if they were at a summer camp. Several had brought along bottles of Schnapps and others had uncovered bottles secreted away by the Jewish Kapos, who were given a small liquor ration. All the men, it appeared, were drinking. Wirth seethed. Again, not out of sympathy for the Jews, but out of fear for his own career and personal safety.

But Wirth was too smart to confront a group of heavily armed drunks, who he hardly knew, in the middle of the night. Technically, the men SS sergeants and corporals, but in reality, Wirth recognized that they were largely thugs and sadists—fine for murdering Jews, but potentially dangerous if provoked by a strange and stuffy officer.

Wirth found himself a bunk in one of the barracks and lay down.

Finally, about an hour after midnight the revelers grew tired and the sub-camp quieted. Wirth was able to drop off to sleep for the first time in two days. Despite the bunk's discomfort Wirth slept deeply. Too soon he was roused by a commotion in the room.

"Was ist Ios" he asked an SS sergeant, as he tried to orient himself. Slowly he remembered that instead of lying in his comfortable bed in Lubin he was in a filthy death camp barrack.

"There is shooting Herr Obersfurmfirehrer. It sounds like it is coming from the Lager IV—the extermination camp."

"That's not so unusual" said Wirth, rising on an elbow, but not leaving the bunk. He listened to the shooting, and though he was not an expert, it sounded like German Mausers and MG 34s. That would be normal coming from the extermination lager, in the event a gas engine gave out. Not an uncommon occurrence Wirth reassured himself and the SS man.

"As you say Herr Obersturmfuhrer" said the sergeant, grateful to return to his bunk.

”Nichts! " said Wirth suddenly, realizing why he was at Treblinka in the first place. "Get all the men up and have them assemble immediately. I'm going to see the Commandant." The disappointed sergeant, still tipsy, saluted and stumbled out the door.

Wirth pulled on his boots, and strapped on his pistol belt. By the time he got outside the shooting had almost stopped. Within the camp there seemed to be some stirring but no general alarm. He walked quickly toward Erbel's quarters, increasingly hopeful. Perhaps, it was just the guards eliminating some leftover transport Jews, or recalcitrant Sondercommandos. He stepped through the gate leading to the Forward Camp when Treblinka was rocked by a huge explosion, and just as suddenly, the lights went out.

Rafi had put the rocket from the B-300 precisely on target. The projectile itself contained a tandem thermobaric warhead designed to penetrate several inches of reinforced concrete or armor. It went through the wooden generator shack as if it was paper, and the secondary charge turned the entire building to matchsticks. The radio antenna atop the shack was destroyed in the blast as well. He'd fired from one of the towers overlooking the extermination sub-camp, with Yatom acting as his spotter. Yatom waived to Nir and Feldhandler, who remained at the foot of the tower to avoid the launcher's backblast. The two men now joined Yatom, while Yatom sent Rafi to the northwest tower to join Roskovsky and Ido. Using his thermal binoculars Yatom scanned the death camp now shrouded in complete darkness.

They had broken into the extermination sub-camp just moments before. That proved to be more difficult than expected. The outside perimeter was not mined nor patrolled, but the camp's fences, though neither electrified nor wired to emit a warning signal, still turned out to be a significant obstacle. The Germans built some first-rate fences, difficult and time consuming to cut through, and in doing that the Israeli assault had almost faltered As Roskovsky and Itzak crept forward to cut the wire, the commandos, with suppressed weapons, engaged the platoon of Ukranians and Germans guarding the sub-camp.

The Israelis fired from cover in the brush, but they were unable to take advantage of their night-optics in the heavily illuminated camp. Ilan and Bolander took on the guards in the towers while Mofaz, Yatom and Itzak poured suppressed fire at the exposed perimeter guards. They killed several, but soon enough the surviving guards and immediate reinforcements started to shoot back. One Ukranian team got a burst off from their MG 34 before Bolander put them down, and other Ukranians got off several volleys toward the commandos. This was the shooting that Wirth had heard.