It's 1944, the Battle of the Bulge in Europe. An American squad has been
cut off behind enemy lines. They're surrounded. As night falls, a new
recruit finds the sergeant who's acting commander. "Sarge," he says, "I
don't know how it happened, but in the fighting today, I lost my rifle.
What do I do?"
The sergeant favors him with a few comments not fit for a polite mailing
list, then he looks around and finds an old broomstick. "OK," he says, "Any
German soldier who sticks his head up, you point this
at him and go 'bangity-bangity.'"
"That won't work!" replies the private, but the sergeant tells him to just
do it.
The private says, "Yeah, but what if we get to hand-to-hand combat?"
The sergeant looks around and finds a butter knife, and ties it to the end
of the broomstick. He says, "If the Germans come in close,
you go 'stabity-stabity' with this."
At sunrise the Germans attack in hordes. There's shouting and screaming and
shooting and dying going on all around. In the middle
of this chaos, the private stands up and starts going "bangity-bangity."
And it seems to be having some effect! So he goes "bangity-bangity,"
"bangity-bangity," "bangity-bangity-bangity." Well, he's just murdering the
Germans. He's mowing them down with that
broomstick. But still they keep coming. He goes "stabity-stabity" at the
ones who get close, and they start bleeding and dying all around.
Pretty soon, he's the only American left alive. There are piles of dead
bodies all around him. He shoots the last few Germans with his
broomstick, and an unearthly quiet settles on the battlefield. Then he
notices this one lone German soldier off in the distance, coming toward
him. The German isn't shooting at the American, just sort of shuffling
along straight for him. The American private lets him get within easy
broomstick range, then he goes "bangity-bangity." No effect.
"Bangity-bangity." Nothing. The German's still not shooting, he's sort of
mumbling to himself, still coming. When he gets close the American goes
"stabity-stabity," but that doesn't work either. The German walks right up
to the American, pushes him over, walks on top of him and keeps going. That
little ol' German crushes the hell out of the American just by stepping on
him. And as he's lying there, the life draining from his body, he can hear
the German heading away, mumbling "tankity-tankity."