Czechoslovakia in World War II

In negotiations with the Czechoslovak government on regulating the status of the German minority in Czechoslovakia, the Sudeten German Party proceeded according to Adolf Hitler's instructions with the principal aim of not coming to an agreement and thereby increasing international tensions in regard to the status of Germans in the republic.

The United Kingdom and France, paralysed by the experiences of the First World War and conscious of their lack of preparedness for war, decided on a policy that involved making concessions to Germany. In November 1938, the Viennese Arbitration following the Munich Conference resulted in Hungary gaining southern Slovakia and Sub-Carpathian Ukraine, while Poland won part of Cieszyn and parts of northern Slovakia. The state was affected by a loss of industry, the severance of transport connections and a flood of refugees (due to the fact that 150,000 people had to leave the Sudetenland).

After six months of the "Second Republic" - as the old Czechoslovakia, minus its border regions, was known - Bohemia and Moravia were occupied by the Nazis. Slovakia had ceded from Czechoslovakia the day before - on March 14, 1939 - to form an "independent" Nazi state, and thus very short work indeed was made of the former Czechoslovakia. Overnight, everyone had to start driving on the right side of the road (they had previously driven on the left, as the British still do).

The Czechoslovak President, Edvard Benes, and other government politicians had already fled abroad - mostly to France and to Britain. (Those that were in France went to Britain when France was occupied). These leaders' political campaign to represent Czechoslovakia's interests was an uphill battle at first, as western European powers still favored the policy of appeasement at that time.

By July 1940, however, Britain recognized President Benes as the leader of the provisional "free Czechoslovak government in exile." In addition to the London center of the provisional government, the Moscow Communist center - where politicians who favored the Soviet political system had fled - also played an important role in the Czechoslovak resistance movement during the war. Unfortunately, many of the Czechs and Slovaks who had chosen to go to Moscow spent at least part of the war years in Russian Gulags as suspected spies. Czechoslovak pilots in England's RAF were particularly distinguished fighters (even if they were initially segregated from regular troops for the same reason) and they would play a fundamental role in the Battle of Britain - but we are getting ahead of ourselves yet again. Czechoslovak army units were also formed in France and in North Africa.

On October 28, 1939 - which would have been the 21st anniversary of the Czechoslovak Declaration of Independence had Czechoslovakia not ceased to exist - popular celebrations turned into massive demonstrations of protest against the German occupation. A young medical student, Jan Opletal, was fatally wounded in the incident. His funeral, on November 17, 1939 turned into yet another spontaneous demonstration. (Fifty years later, on November 17, 1989, a march by students to commemorate this event helped bring about the fall of Communism). In 1939, the Nazis reacted to the student demonstration by sentencing nine student leaders to death, by closing the Czech universities, and by sending some 1,200 university students to concentration and labor camps.

The Nazi regime was very cruel and strict, and active resistance was harshly punished. Not surprisingly, then, the Czech and Slovak resistance movements were small. Yet they were very dedicated, very determined, and often surprisingly successful, especially in the field of sabotage.

Hitler issued a decree establishing a Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. A protectorate government worked under German administration and supervision. The outbreak of the Second World War was welcomed by the resistance movement, which was striving for the restoration of pre-war Czechoslovakia. Only a complete defeat of Germany could liberate the nation from the Nazi occupation.

The role of President Hacha and Prime Minister Alois Elias was a deeply ambivalent one. Prime Minister Alois Elias and to a lesser extent also President Hacha tried not to sabotage, but to put the Czech nation first and the German efforts second. They tried to lead the Czech nation through the dangerous period, and to save as much of the autonomy, the integrity of the nation as they could. The Proctectorate government was undeniably collaborationist, but at the same time, up until mid-1940 Prime Minister Elias was also in direct contact with the Czechoslovak Government in exile in London and actively helped to conceal the activities of the underground resistance from the Germans. Participation in the resistance was punishable by death or, at best, by being sent to a concentration camp.

Germany's terror tactics increased even more after Reinhard Heydrich was installed as the Deputy Reichsprotektor - the man in charge of the occupied Czech lands - in September 1941. Heydrich was the architect and coordinator of the "Final Solution" that led to the murder of millions of Jews; he was also head of the security services throughout the Reich. Heydrich had long suspected Prime Minister Elias of contacts with the resistance and immediately had him arrested. On 2nd October 1941 Protectorate radio report on Elias's execution - for betraying the German Reich. To this day Elias is a paradoxical figure of Czech history - the collaborator who in the end gave his life for his country.

Heydrich, as architect of the "Final Solution" had his own special plans for the Czechs: his concluded that 45% of Czechs could be successfully Germanized, 40% were inferior "mongrels", and 15% were racially intolerable. In a speech in October 1941 he stated: "Bohemia and Moravia must become German, Czechs have no business to be here."

But Heydrich's reign was to be shortlived. The idea of killing a prominent Nazi official or a highly placed collaborator was central to Benes' plans by 1941 - the exiled president had been desperate to show the Allies that Czechoslovaks had not given up. And he had good reason: for many in the countries still fighting Germany Czechoslovakia had ceased to exist after Munich in 1938. Some historians say that Benes was obsessed that even if the Allies won the war, Czechoslovakia would never regain its former borders and remain forever a rump state.

During the war, Czechoslovak army units fighting abroad often parachuted foreign-trained Czech and Slovak soldiers into occupied Czech territory to perform special assignments. The most significant of these special assignments was the assassination, in 1942, of Reinhard Heidrich - the German Reichsprotektor of Bohemia and Moravia and one of the architects of the "Final Solution."

His assassination was one of the most daring missions of World War II. Titled "Anthropoid", the mission saw two Czechoslovak soldiers - Jan Kubis and Josef Gabcik, trained in Britain - parachute into the Protectorate. The aim was to bolster Czech resistance to Nazi rule. Against almost impossible odds Kubis and Gabcik fatally wounded the Reichsprotektor on 27 May 1942, as his car drove through Prague.

The assassination had drastic consequences. The Nazis' desire for revenge would catch up with both Kubis and Gabcik along with countless others. The assassination of Reinhard set off a reign of terror throughout the Czech lands. Martial law was declared and the Nazis conducted house-to-house searches looking for the parachutists and the members of the Czech resistance movement who had helped them. More than 1,600 men, women, and children were executed and more were sent to concentration camps in the period immediately following the assassination. The terror reached its height with the annihilation of the village of Lidice, where 339 men were executed and the women and children of the village were sent to concentration camps. A few weeks later, the village of Lezaky, where the Nazis killed 54 men, women and children, was also razed to the ground. By the time this terror - known as the "Heydrichiada" - was over, the Nazis had damaged the resistance movement so much that it was only able to resume its activities at the very end of the war.

The brunt of Nazi aggression was felt by Czech Jews and other minorities who were rounded up and deported to concentration camps in systematic waves. Approximately 390,000 Czechoslovak citizens, including 83,000 Jews, were killed or executed, while hundreds of thousands of others were sent to prisons and concentration camps or used as forced labor.

The position of the government and President Edvard Benes abroad was made difficult by virtue of the fact that the truncation, breakup and occupation of Czechoslovakia had occurred before the war. Even so, they gained international recognition as the valid representatives of Czechoslovakia; they got the French and the British to revoke their signing of the Munich Agreement; and, last but not least, they achieved the restoration of Czechoslovakia. After 1941, the Czechoslovak Communist Party became increasingly involved in the work of both branches of the national resistance (foreign and domestic). Its foreign leadership was based in Moscow.

President Benes, who had a decisive say in the formation of Czechoslovak foreign policy, was aware of the growing influence of the USSR on post-war events. In 1943, he concluded an alliance treaty with the Soviet Union.

The resistance movements in Czechoslovakia culminated in the Slovak National Uprising of 1944 - which was brutally put down - and in the Prague Uprising in the Czech lands in May of 1945 - which started just a few days before foreign armies arrived to officially liberate the city.

In Slovakia, which was fighting on the German side, the national democratic and communist resistance joined forces and created a supreme body - the Slovak National Council. On August 29, 1944, the so-called Slovak National Uprising broke out. Its exponents fell in with Czechoslovakia. A mobilization of the Czechoslovak Army was declared on the territory of the insurrection. It resisted superior German forces for two months. Afterward, the fight continued in the mountains, but the uprising was eventually suppressed.

Prague rebelled on 05 May 1945, and the German Army surrendered to the insurrectionists on the understanding that they would allow it to depart freely. That same day, the General Patton's American Third Army (with 150 thousands soldiers) was in Pilsen (only a few hours away from Prague) while Marshal Konev's Soviet Army was on the borders of Moravia. General Patton was in favor of liberating Prague, but he had to comply with the instructions from General D. Eisenhower. General Eisenhower requested the Soviet Chief of Staff to permit them to press forward, but was informed that American help was not needed (a prior agreement from the Yalta Conference was that Bohemia would be liberated by the Red Army). Finally, on May 9, 1945 (the day after Germany officially capitulated) the Soviet tanks got to Prague. The Red Army clashed in battle with the last fanatical German divisions. It was not until May 12, 1945 when the fight was completely over in the Czech Lands. The Czechs genuinely felt gratitude towards the Soviet soldiers. Czechoslovakia was mostly liberated by the Soviet Union, but western Bohemia was freed by the U.S. Army. People did not know that they became the victims in rival politics. The Soviet victory was both military and political. (Bismarck once declared: "He, who is master of Bohemia, is master of Europe...").

The events of Munich, the time of the Protectorate and the German terrorization of the population during the war caused general hostility among Czechs toward Germans. The German population, which had formed the majority of the Prague's inhabitants until the 19th century, was massacred, expelled or fled for saving only their lives and leaving all the property in the aftermath of the war.

As regards the issue of the resettlement of the German population outside of Czechoslovakia, there was general unanimity and conviction that it was essential for this measure to be implemented. In the initial phase in the months after the war, the displacement of the German population took place in an unrestrained manner during a period of so-called wild expulsions. The manner of the resettlement provoked criticism among the country's Western allies. The resettlement of the German minorities from Czechoslovakia, Poland and Hungary was officially approved at a meeting of the allies in Potsdam in 1945.