Strafbataillon 999 (1960)

The film is set in the German Reich during the late stages of the Second World War. Even minor offenses are enough to bring charges of high treason or cowardice in the face of the enemy. These “verdicts,” which mock ordinary standards of justice, are usually followed immediately by a death sentence being carried out. The Wehrmacht leadership soon realizes, however, that sentencing soldiers to prison or execution for minor offenses is a pure waste of “cannon fodder.” The Wehrmacht is retreating in the east, and every able-bodied man is urgently needed. A special unit is therefore established to give these convicted soldiers a “second chance”—a chance to prove themselves: Penal Battalion 999. In this unit, men with prior convictions for minor crimes, Communists, and deserters are conscripted into so-called “suicide missions” and sent to the front. The day-to-day life—and death—in the penal battalion is dramatically documented through the story of one man. The bacteriologist Dr. Ernst Deutschmann was convicted of self-mutilation to avoid military service. The truth, however, is different: Deutschmann conducted an experiment on himself in order to develop a serum. But his experiment stood in the way of the SS in general, and of its member Dr. Kukil in particular, who wrote an expert report against Deutschmann. Now he, too, gets the chance to prove himself by serving in Penal Battalion 999. Meanwhile, Deutschmann’s wife Julia fights at home to have her husband’s sentence overturned, and must therefore also deal with Kukil and the responsible SS-Standartenführer. Both men try to exploit Julia’s situation, with her husband far from home, and make improper advances toward her. In the battalion camp, Ernst Deutschmann meets other soldiers who have been punished just as harshly: former Colonel von Bartlitz, who disobeyed his superiors’ orders when he saved the lives of his wounded soldiers by retreating; the ordinary soldier Wiedeck, who did not end his leave at home on time because he did not want to leave his pregnant wife alone with the harvest; and the defiant Schwannecke, convicted of repeated burglaries. They face a particularly harsh ordeal when Sergeant Major Krüll takes command. The burly, squat noncommissioned officer, with his loud, barking command style, is known as a merciless drillmaster. He and the other officers, such as First Lieutenant Bevern, have no qualms about relentlessly drilling and grinding down their subordinates, because there is never a shortage of replacements. Opposing the sadistic, inhuman Krüll and Bevern is First Lieutenant Obermeier, a humane and idealistic officer who treats his men as human beings even in exceptional situations, because he believes in their second chance. He even covers for Schwannecke after the latter causes Bevern’s death, and gives Krüll command of a mission even though Krüll had previously proved psychologically unfit for frontline service. In the end, however, everyone must do their duty at the front, where they are used up one after another in a criminal war. Along with von Bartlitz and Wiedeck, Obermeier also loses his life in the fighting. Deutschmann succumbs to his severe injuries after Schwannecke rescues him from a burning house; Schwannecke himself dies shortly afterward during an attempt he had been planning for some time to defect. Only Krüll always manages to keep his head down in time and survives the deployment, one of the few to do so. Back at the penal battalion, a new company is already waiting to take over.