Storm of Steel: Langemarck Summary & Analysis

When the Germans occupy Cambrai, they overturn the sleepy lifestyle of the old cobblestone town. With all the soldiers quartered there, it comes to resemble more of a college town. Colonel von Oppen assigns Jünger to train a group of storm troops. He designs the training regimen himself. He spends his leisure hours living with a kindly jeweler couple. By the end of July, however, they move to Flanders, where they’ve heard there is an even heavier artillery war raging than they’d seen at the Somme.

Soon the regiment arrives in the Flemish countryside, hearing “that rough tongue that we almost thought we understood.” As they head toward the front line, Jünger hears some young recruits speaking admiringly of his apparent lack of fear. The truth is that Jünger is just experienced enough to determine the course of an overhead shell by its sound, so he doesn’t take cover every time.

After taking his position with the reserve commander in the battered town of Mauseberg, Jünger soon witnesses a “demented fury” of shelling, and an infantry battle begins soon after. He observes that his company has arrived at just the right time. He leads them to their position in the midst of a desolate shell crater. They hunker down in the midst of the horrible shelling and wait for their turn on the front line in an impending counterattack.

Jünger leads his company toward the Dobschutz woods in an effort to support the counterattack. Amidst the prevailing confusion, Jünger leaps right into the heart of the shelling, somehow reaching the objective with five men in tow. There they find Lieutenant Sandvoss, commander of the 3rd Company, and Schultz. They explain that the position is cut off from other troops, with the British pressing right against them. Sandvoss informs Jünger that Jünger’s brother, Fritz, had been reported missing after last night’s attack. Jünger feels “appalling, irreplaceable loss” at this news.

Then Jünger learns from another soldier that his brother is wounded in a nearby shelter. Jünger runs through sniper fire to get there. He finds Fritz with a punctured lung and shattered shoulder, barely able to speak. Jünger comforts his brother as best he can and then assigns some men to carry Fritz through the storm of shells to the medical station. He feels it’s the best he can do, both as a brother and as his mother’s son.

Later, the regiment is relieved and sent to occupy a battered-looking fortress, the Rattenburg, beside a river. Jünger checks on his brother during a break in the firing and happily learns that Fritz has been sent back to Germany in stable condition. Soon he and a small band are defending the Rattenburg against an enemy advance; he forces some stragglers at gunpoint to join the defense. But by the time the British infantry is closing in, it’s hard to get the formerly reluctant men to stop shooting. Jünger is the last man to withdraw. On the way out of town, they encounter Kius, from the 2nd Company, whose men had urged him to come and rescue Jünger. The groups occupy a roadway and picks off as many British as they can with rifle fire, enduring a storm of shell explosions.

The next morning, Jünger’s foxhole is swamped by relentless rain, which he finds more demoralizing than any artillery bombardment. It turns out to help the Germans, though, because it bogs down the English advance. Survivors assemble in the village of Koekhuit to assess their immense losses. The remnants of the battalion are quartered on a farm, where Jünger is put in charge of the 7th Company, with whom he stays for the rest of the war. He finds satisfaction in the knowledge that, despite the staggering resources of the enemy, just a handful of Germans held off their attack, having an impact beyond their numbers.

Jünger gets a letter from Fritz, who’s recovering in Germany. He inserts part of Fritz’s account of being under artillery and gas bombardment from the British as a newer recruit. After Fritz was hit in the lung and shoulder, he found himself stranded in a crater as the battle and thunderstorm raged above. He was eventually rescued by officers, who got him to the medical station where Ernst found him and secured his evacuation.