At 04:32 on a dull morning, under cover of low clouds and plausible deniability, the first motorized column of the 8th Army rolled past the Bavarian border post near Freilassing.
The guards Austrian and visibly cold made no motion to stop them.
They lit cigarettes instead.
Whether it was resignation or quiet approval, no one spoke.
The engines filled the silence.
Officially, no orders had been issued.
But the maps had changed.
Berlin called it "Operation Ostmarsch."
A mobilization.
A symbolic repositioning.
Nothing aggressive, of course not even in the radio broadcasts that accompanied the rumble of treads with soft violin concertos and interviews with emigrated Austrian poets, now "returning" under the promise of unity.
To the locals watching from kitchen windows, it felt like fog being replaced by shadow.
Vienna, still technically sovereign, was paralyzed.
Markel had ordered no formal resistance but also gave no official welcome.
