The Trial of the Kalmyks

  "...this so-called Kalmyk shock troop, composed of traitors to the Motherland, scum of the nation, enemies of the people and social rabble, has done its dirty work. A few days ago, they disguised themselves as the great Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, sneaked into Alyov's home, and brutally murdered his entire family. The vile and shameless leader, a scoundrel among Kalmyks (we do not want to mention his long and foul name, lest we sully our mouths), raped Alyov's sixty-year-old grandmother and took away the two chickens she had raised with such care..."

  Liao Liao read a few lines, laughed for a while, and unexpectedly read for ten minutes, including two minutes of quarreling: Tartar intentionally or unintentionally kept pulling on the two chickens, Gruelbs was convinced that this was a hint that he was a **offender, and the two almost started fighting.

  "When the Mongolians read the last two sentences, everyone fell silent: 'Glorious Red Army soldiers, if you capture this band of traitors who recognize the enemy as their father, whether they are fascist robbers or Soviet traitors, do not spare a single one, kill them like wild dogs, and never let these filthy running dogs defile the sacred Russian soil.'"

  Tartars silently cursed, crumpled into a ball and threw it on the ground, Dog Dan picked it up and smoothed it out, together with Bao's that one stuffed into his pocket: "Not my small shop (small), use this rolled dry smoke is good."

  The car stopped, and Rania jumped out of the driver's cab, hastily hiding behind a clump of trees. A few minutes later, she emerged and took advantage of getting back on the bus to toss a sentence at the thief sitting at the far end: "The captain is in trouble."

  The thief said the first sentence since he got on the car: "Kalmyk people sued me in a military tribunal." He found that everyone was staring at him, and changed his words to: "German army, German military tribunal."

  Everyone started guessing the riddle, and Tartar seemed to be muttering to himself: "What did the captain do? Let others make such a big fuss." Dog Egg carelessly chimed in: "Is it really what was said on the materials picked up by Tartar..."

  "You fart." The Tartar's neck muscles bulged, "Give you a 60-year-old old lady, will you go and rape her?"

  The rapist hesitated: "Or did you do something else? Like unintentionally taking some military supplies? One time he brought back a lot of American canned goods for us to eat, and excitedly said that the quartermaster didn't see them." When everyone looked at him in unison, then looked at the thief in unison, and turned back to his face again, their eyes were filled with worry.

  As expected, someone on that side spoke up: "A wild vulture has arrived over there, and it's releasing a fart that's unbearably smelly." The thief seemed to be enraged, but still knew the difference between wild vultures and domesticated ones. And also knew that there were farts even smellier than those that are unbearably smelly.

  The car passed by the Volkhov aluminum factory, their heads were tied with an invisible rope, staring at the workshop where aluminum flowers bloomed, and the warehouse that was once their training ground. These assault teams, not formally established in the German General Staff, flowed like a small stream into one of the workshops at the aluminum factory over a month ago, first Karl Mek and then Renny re-forged them, making them like a clear spring to wash away the mud on the battlefield. The mud was washed clean, but the spring became turbid, so they were sent to court, hoping to turn them back into a clear spring.

  Cars drove through the Volkhov district, with local residents stopping to watch as they were escorted by armed guards. Some of the bolder ones whispered to each other: "How can our own people be arresting our own people? Is their situation not good?"

  The vehicle drove into a small pavilion next to the hydroelectric station, which was said to have been built in the 1920s to entertain German engineers who helped repair the hydroelectric station and is now used as a battlefield court.

  They were thrown off the car and stood in a heap beside it, the captain of the military police jumped down from the rear car and stormed to their front: "You are like a group of pigs, German pigs stand straighter than you. Attention - quick march, that tall thin one walks in front."

  Misha followed a constable, leading everyone through a dump, over an anti-aircraft gun emplacement, to the front door of the small hall. Two constables stood at the door, their dog tags glinting in the winter light.

  The scum were taken to a small house next to the courtroom, filled with clothes, and told that they must not make any noise, as there was an important person listening in today. Rania sat alone in the corner, the assault team members regarded her as the mainstay, she guessed that the important person was the commander of the group army, if she knew that the leader was in the box above her head, she would not look so lonely and desolate no matter what.

  "The courtroom discipline is now announced: Several rules of the court are hereby declared: First, no one is allowed to move around at will, no loud noise is allowed, and applause is prohibited. Please take your seats." Then there was a hesitant sound of people taking their seats.

  The small courtroom was packed with people in uniform. In the center of the court hung a half-length portrait of the head of state, gazing off into the distance, below which sat the judges. To the left were the prosecutors, not far from the stenographers' seats; to the right were the lawyers' seats, and near the defendants were the places for witnesses. Below the presiding judge's bench was the dock for the accused, facing the judges so that they could observe each other's expressions.

  The three judges on the bench were flipping through thick files, the presiding judge wore a judicial robe over his military uniform, and when he made larger gestures, the robe would reveal his senior colonel rank and crimson insignia, showing that the level of the trial was still relatively high. The two judges on either side had lower openings on their robes, no need to guess their ranks, the two military ranks were vastly different: one was a lieutenant colonel, and the other was a junior second lieutenant.

  The lieutenant colonel announced the opening of the court. The lieutenant on the other side glared at the list in front of him, took a deep breath and loudly declared: "Bring Krasovsky Ilyumzhinov to court——" The voice was loud enough to explain why he sat in such a humble position on the noble trial bench.

  The voice was relayed, copied and pasted all the way to the door. The Kalmyk people were sandwiched between two bailiffs, walking from the corridor towards the defendant's seat. Li De Ma, who was sitting in the box, discovered the problem and whispered to He Pu Na: It should not be necessary to go through the corridor, but directly enter the defendant's seat from the back door of the theater.

  In the dressing room, the SWAT team members were vying to peek through the door gap at the unlucky-looking head, discussing while looking. The door was slammed shut by the bailiff with a "bang", and Misha self-deprecatingly said: "It's better this way, peeping through the door gap will make people look flat."

  Kalmukov walked in fully decorated, perhaps intentionally wearing all his medals and orders to make an impression on the military officers in the audience. Even Bowman had to admit: "He's dressed up nicely, where did he get so many medals?" Hepner was a bit smug: "Of course, he earned them with his life." "But how is it that he's standing in the defendant's dock?" Hepner fell silent.

  Lee stared with wide eyes as the gendarmes removed the dazzling array of medals one by one. The Germans, with their characteristic thoroughness, took off the shoulder badges, collar badges, sleeve badges, arm badges, eagle emblems, sword belts, a Storming Medal, First Class Cross and Wound Badge, Silver Anti-Partisan Badge, Knight's Cross hanging from his neck, Iron Cross Second Class ribbon on the second button, and even the Army Victory Ring on his hand.

  The presiding judge began with some indispensable nonsense:

  "What's your name?"

  "Major Kraske Ilyumzhinov".

  The judge glared at him sternly and asked again, this time noticing that he didn't bring out his military rank.

  "Sex." The presiding judge continued to ask solemnly.

  "It's not a woman." After hesitating for two seconds, the courtroom erupted. The judge became even more severe: "You must answer the court's questions accurately, otherwise you will be held in contempt of court."

  "Ethnic group?"

  "My father is a Kalmyk." The hall erupted into noise again. "My mother is German." The hall fell silent at once.

  "Where are you from?"

  Kalmukov curtly replied: "I don't know." He nodded guiltily to the questioner, "Sorry, really don't know."

  A murmur ran through the audience, Li De and his two companions looked at each other in turn from their private box, and the judge's bench restored order with a bang of its gavel.

  The presiding judge had a seasoned and worldly air about him, "ancestral home."

  "It seems like it was in Elista city of the Kalmyk Republic, they say I arrived in Tsaritsyn when I wasn't even a month old, oh, that's now Stalingrad..."

  "I knew that." The presiding judge interrupted him impatiently, "In other words, you grew up in the nest of those Bolsheviks?"

  He hastily explained: "No, my father is a grain merchant, that is to say, the kind of person ordinary people call 'backpacker', who has been drifting around and even I was born in a lama temple."

  "Nonsense, it's an Orthodox church?" The judge said affirmatively. The person next to him whispered an explanation: "There are lama temples in the Volga region, and the Kalmyks are actually descendants of Mongolians."

  Karlmeck paused for a moment, then continued, "In August, I watched a movie during training in Brandenburg. The plot was about a group of Volga Germans who fled the persecution of the Bolsheviks in 1928, traveling thousands of miles to cross the border between China and the Soviet Union into Manchuria..."

  "The court forbids irrelevant narrations." The presiding judge sternly interrupted him and then asked: "Are you married?"

  "When I was a kid, I had an arranged marriage with a little Tartar girl," he said. The audience laughed lightly and Li De also smiled, turning to Hepburn and Bowman as interpreters. The Tartar in the dressing room laughed: "Hey! This guy, he should call me uncle."

  "But Bolsheviks?" the presiding judge continued calmly.

  Kalmukov's voice suddenly dropped: "Half a year ago I was deputy commander of the Soviet Army, non-party members cannot be promoted."

  "Please answer directly with a yes or no." The judge seemed to have had enough of this nonsense and raised his voice.

  "In 1936 I joined the Party." The Kalmyk muttered to himself, and the judge shouted: "Answer loudly!"

  The Kalmyk man replied loudly with gestures: "In 1936, when the whole Soviet Union was carrying out purges, I joined the party at that time, otherwise..."

  "The defendant is not allowed to gesture in court," the judge reprimanded.

  "I am answering your question." The Kalmyk's face reddened slightly.

  "This is a court of law, not a diplomatic venue. Do not use the term 'your honorable court'." The judge looked at him with disdain.