Nacido y criado en Indianápolis, Indiana, Kurt Vonnegut se alistó en el ejército en 1943 y fue trasladado a Europa. Fue capturado por los alemanes durante la batalla de Bulge. Fue encarcelado en Drésden y sobrevivió al bombardeo aliado refugiándose en un depósito de carne. A continuación una carta que escribe a su familia.
Más abajo investigamos sobre la Convención de Ginebra
referida al trato a los prisioneros de guerra. En vocabulario: delouse.
Dear people:
I'm told that you were probably never informed that I was anything other than "missing in action." Chances are that you also failed to receive any of the letters I wrote from Germany. That leaves me a lot of explaining to do – in brief:
I've been a prisoner of war since December 19th,
1944, when our division was demolished by Hitler's
last desperate attack through Luxemburg and Belgium. Seven Fanatical Panzer
Divisions hit us and cut us off from the rest of Hodges' First Army. The other American Divisions on our
flanks managed to pull out: We were obliged to stay and fight. Bayonets aren't
much good against tanks: Our ammunition, food and medical supplies gave out and
our casualties out-numbered those who could still fight - so we gave up. The
106th got a Presidential Citation and some British Decoration from Montgomery
for it, I'm told, but I'll be damned if it was worth it. I was one of the few
who weren't wounded. For that much thank God.
Well, the supermen marched us, without food, water
or sleep to Limberg, a distance of about sixty miles, I think, where we were
loaded and locked up, sixty men to each small, unventilated, unheated box car.
There were no sanitary accommodations -- the floors were covered with fresh cow
dung. There wasn't room for all of us to lie down. Half slept while the other
half stood. We spent several days, including Christmas, on that Limberg place.
On Christmas eve the Royal Air Force bombed and fired our unmarked train. They
killed about one-hundred-and-fifty of us. We got a little water Christmas Day
and moved slowly across Germany to a large P.O.W. Camp in Muhlburg, South of Berlin. We were released from
the box cars on New Year's Day. The Germans herded us through hot delousing showers. Many
men died from shock in the showers after ten days of starvation, thirst and
exposure. But I didn't.
Under the Geneva Convention, Officers and Non-commissioned
Officers are not obliged to work when taken prisoner. I am, as you know, a
Private. One-hundred-and-fifty such minor beings were shipped to a Dresden work
camp on January 10th. I was their leader by virtue of the little German I
spoke. It was our misfortune to have sadistic and fanatical guards. We were
refused medical attention and clothing: We were given long hours at extremely
hard labor. Our food ration was two-hundred-and-fifty grams of black bread and
one pint of unseasoned potato soup each day. After desperately trying to
improve our situation for two months and having been met with bland smiles I
told the guards just what I was going to do to them when the Russians came.
They beat me up a little. I was fired as group leader. Beatings were very small
time: -- one boy starved to death and the SS Troops shot two for stealing food.
On about February 14th the Americans came over,
followed by the R.A.F. their combined labors killed 250,000 people in
twenty-four hours and destroyed all of Dresden -- possibly the world's most
beautiful city. But not me.
After that we were put to work carrying corpses from
Air-Raid shelters; women, children, old men; dead from concussion, fire or
suffocation. Civilians cursed us and threw rocks as we carried bodies to huge
funeral pyres in the city.
When General Patton took Leipzig we were evacuated
on foot to ('the Saxony-Czechoslovakian border'?). There we remained until the
war ended. Our guards deserted us. On that happy day the Russians were intent on clearing up isolated outlaw resistance
in our sector. Their planes (P-39's) fired and bombed us, killing fourteen, but
not me.
Eight of us stole a team and wagon. We traveled and
stole things on our way through Sudetenland and Saxony for eight days, living
like kings. The Russians are crazy about Americans. The Russians picked us up
in Dresden. We rode from there to the American lines at Halle in Lend-Lease Ford
trucks. We've since been flown to Le
Havre.
I'm writing from a Red Cross Club in the Le Havre
P.O.W. Repatriation Camp. I'm being wonderfully well feed and entertained. The
state-bound ships are crowded, naturally, so I'll have to be patient. I hope to
be home in a month. Once home I'll be given twenty-one days recuperation at Atterbury, about $600 back pay and --
get this -- sixty (60) days vacation… (Letter
from PFC Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., to his family,
May 29, 1945)
Vocabulary
Delouse:
Treat (a person or animal) to rid them of lice and other parasitic insects.
‘they were given showers and deloused’
Para saber
Los Convenios
de Ginebra son cuatro tratados y tres protocolos adicionales que establecen
estándares legales internacionales para el trato humanitario en la guerra. El
término singular Convención de Ginebra
generalmente denota los acuerdos de 1949, negociados después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial (1939-1945), que
actualizó los términos de los dos tratados de 1929 y agregó dos nuevas
convenciones. Los Convenios de Ginebra definen ampliamente los derechos
básicos de los prisioneros de guerra, establecen protección para los heridos y
enfermos y brindan protección a los civiles dentro y alrededor de una zona de
guerra. Además, la Convención de Ginebra también define los derechos y
protecciones otorgados a los no combatientes. Los tratados de 1949 fueron
ratificados, en su totalidad o con reservas, por 196 países. Los Convenios de Ginebra se refieren
únicamente a los prisioneros y no combatientes en la guerra. No abordan el uso
de armas de guerra.
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