The Coat

It wasn’t the man they were shooting at.

It was the coat.

The soldiers had entered Warsaw only days after the Germans began their retreat. The war was ending. After years of occupation, the city was finally being liberated.

Then they saw him. A man emerged from the ruins and began running toward them. He was thin, exhausted, and desperately waving his arms. But he was wearing the unmistakable gray overcoat of a German officer. The soldiers reacted instantly. They raised their rifles and opened fire.

The man turned and ran for his life, diving behind the shattered remains of a brick wall as bullets struck the rubble around him. From behind the wall, he shouted with everything he had left.

“Don’t shoot! I’m Polish!”

The firing stopped. One soldier cautiously approached, his rifle still at the ready. Looking down at the terrified man, he asked a question that must have seemed almost absurd.

“Why are you wearing that coat?”

The answer was only three…