Czech forge of German weapons. How the Czechs selflessly worked for the Reich Czechoslovakia during the Second World War

So, after the formation of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, and the entry of German troops into its territory, the entire arsenal of the Czechoslovak army went into the service of the Third Reich. And the arsenal was notable...

Very detailed factual material is provided by historian A. Usovsky.
Let's start with the tank units: “...by the spring of 1939, the LT-35 was already a little outdated (although the Germans gladly took 219 of these vehicles for themselves) - but the ChKD plant had already developed a new, much better, TNHP tank for a year already, and was just waiting for an order for its serial production. Since after Munich Prague was recommended by “senior comrades” to moderate its ardor in armaments, the Czechoslovak General Staff did not order the agreed series of 150 vehicles until the very end back in 1938. And therefore, the management of the ChKD company with joy and even, I would say, with delight, received the news of the death of Czechoslovakia - in full confidence that their beautiful, fashionable and modern tank would suit the new owners of Bohemia. And they were right!

The Wehrmacht generals, having familiarized themselves with three ready-made LT-38 tanks, as well as with the relevant documentation, came to the conclusion that this vehicle was quite suitable for the German army. The first 9 production vehicles, designated 38(t) Ausf. And they left the walls of the BMM plant on May 22, 1939. In total, 98 tanks of this modification were built before the start of World War II. So, an entire tank corps (including LT-35) of Czech “Panzers” took part in the attack on Poland! For some reason, it is customary to call these tanks “trophy” - for goodness sake! Trophies are property TAKEN IN BATTLE. If the LT-38 was produced BY ORDER of the Wehrmacht, then what kind of “trophies” can we talk about?
So, already during the Polish campaign, the Wehrmacht used a whole tank BODY, equipped with the latest Czech LT-38 tanks. Needless to say, these tanks were also used in June 1941, during the attack on our Motherland...

Let's continue the list of what the Wehrmacht received from the Czech army in 1939:
“In total, the Germans took 254 mountain 75-mm cannons, 241 80-mm field guns, 261 150-mm howitzers, 10 152-mm cannons, 23 305-mm mortars and more than two thousand anti-tank guns 37 mm and 47 mm caliber.
Of course, the Germans gladly replenished their arsenals with excellent Czech machine guns - fifty thousand manual ZB-26s and twelve thousand easel ZB-53s, fortunately, these machine guns (like the Czechoslovakian Mauser rifles) were created for the German 7.92 mm cartridge."
These excellent Czech machine guns (and tens of thousands of new ones made by Czech workers over the 6 years of the protectorate’s existence) fired at our fathers and grandfathers throughout the Great Patriotic War on all its fronts...

“But it cannot be said that Germany completely disarmed the Protectorate - Prague was left the right to have its own native army... of seven thousand bayonets.

...Having taken the Czech Republic under their wing, the Germans received colossal production capacities of heavy industry - thanks to which they doubled production military equipment and weapons. Plus, these new facilities were located deep in the European continent and, unlike the Ruhr, were completely and absolutely safe from enemy air raids (at least until 1943...
After Munich, the Germans began to look at the arsenals of the Czechoslovak army, not as a threat to Germany, but as a potential opportunity to instantly and repeatedly strengthen the Wehrmacht.
Which, in fact, happened six months later...

Until March 15, 1939, Czech industry, especially heavy industry, operated at barely a quarter of its potential - orders for its products were too small and sporadic. But joining the Reich breathed new strength into all Czech factories - orders poured in as if from a cornucopia!
After the Czech Republic became the “Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia,” the German administration came to all the factories of the Skoda concern, and in the summer they were included in the Hermann Goering concern. At the end of 1939, the assembly of light trucks 6LTP6 for the Romanian army began at the Skoda plant in Pilsen, and the Czechs began supplying the Wehrmacht with versions of the Skoda commercial trucks of the “100/150;”, “254/256;” series modified according to German requirements. and “706D”, as well as diesel versions of heavy vehicles 6ST6 and 6VD...

With the arrival of the Germans, the Skoda concern plant in Mlada Boleslav, which until 1939 produced passenger cars and barely made ends meet, also revived...
The plant's program included a car designed for operation in the Russian cold climate and off-road conditions. It was an artillery tractor with all drive and rear steered steel wheels 1.5 m in diameter with high metal lugs. By May 1944, 206 copies had been collected. The Skoda factories also assembled 5 thousand Hkl6 (Sd.Kfz.11) half-track transporters and produced DB10 tanks and tractors under the symbol S10.
But cars and tractors were by no means the main products of numerous Czech factories. Much more important for the Reich were combat vehicles- tanks, self-propelled guns and armored personnel carriers - with which Czech workers generously supplied the Wehrmacht fighting on countless fronts.”
After annexing the protectorate, Germany received equipment that would be enough to equip 35 divisions. In addition, the Skoda factories, the second most important arsenal, fell into the hands of the Germans Central Europe, which, according to Winston Churchill's calculations, in the period from August 1938 to September 1939 produced almost as much military products as all British enterprises produced during the same time.

According to the Center war economy In Germany, on March 31, 1944 alone, the Fuhrer received almost 13 billion 866 million brands of weapons and equipment from the workshops of 857 factories of the previously annexed Czech Republic.
“ChKD factories (which became the VMM company after the Protectorate joined the Reich) produced 1,480 LT-38 tanks in 1939-1942. When this tank became hopelessly outdated, the plant’s specialists took an initiative to convert it into an anti-tank self-propelled gun. At first, the Germans looked at these Czech delights with disdain, but by the end of 1943, it became clear to the Wehrmacht command that the front needed a new, well-armored compact self-propelled gun - a tank destroyer, at a price as cheap as possible.
The ideal vehicle for these requirements was the self-propelled gun based on the 38 (t) tank - which received the name “Hetzer” in the Wehrmacht.

We need to tell you more about this “Hetzer” (its name can be translated as “jaeger”).
In March 1943, Inspector General tank troops Colonel General G. Guderian gave the order to begin work on creating a small, light and well-armored tank destroyer. In December of the same year, a prototype was ready, based on light tank PzKpfw 38(t). After completion of the tests, the results of which exceeded all expectations, the new vehicle was put into service under the name Hetzer.
On January 28, 1944, A. Hitler personally identified the speedy start of production and an increase in its volume as the most important task for the army in 1944. A production schedule was established that called for production of 1,000 vehicles per month by March 1945.

Since April 1944 mass production new anti-tank self-propelled guns began at the enterprises of the company VMM (formerly ChKD), and in September Skoda joined it. During production, self-propelled guns were constantly improved and modernized. It was also planned to produce modifications with Pak 39/1 cannons of 75 mm caliber and StuG 42 cannons of 105 mm caliber.
A total of 2,584 Hetzer tank destroyers were produced in 1944 and 1945.
"Hetzer" turned out to be best easy anti-tank self-propelled gun of the Second World War. The vehicle had a completely new low hull, characterized by a large slope of the frontal, side and rear armor plates, the thickness of which varied from 10 to 60 mm. Due to the increase in weight compared to the standard tank PzKpfw 38(t) chassis was strengthened and expanded. In fact, only the transmission and chassis components were borrowed from the base tank. A more powerful 160-horsepower engine was used as the power plant.

A remote-controlled (!!!) MG 34 machine gun of 7.92 mm caliber appeared on the roof of the hull. The 75-mm cannon was covered with a “pig snout” type mask.
“Hetzer” received its baptism of fire in July 1944. The vehicle was actively used on all fronts until the last days of the war.
On April 10, 1945, there were 915 Hetzer self-propelled guns in the combat units of the Wehrmacht and SS troops, of which 726 were on the Eastern Front and 101 on the Western Front.

These statistics perfectly show WHICH front was the MAIN one for Hitler, don’t they?!

But that’s not all: on the basis of the Hetzer self-propelled guns, Czech enterprises produced 20 flamethrower tanks, 30 self-propelled guns with a 150-mm sIG 33 infantry gun and 170 armored vehicles.
And in 1944 and 45, thousands of our tank guys in their “thirty-fours” burned from the fire of these damned “Hetzers”, created on their own initiative by wonderful Czech engineers and workers...

In October 1944, two Allied air raids were carried out on the Skoda factories, during which 417 tons of bombs were dropped, which sharply slowed down the increase in Hetzer production at this plant, although it did not stop it.
In December, the number of self-propelled guns produced fell again, including as a result of three new air raids on Skoda factories, during which 375 tons of bombs were dropped. However, in January 1945, the peak production of Hetzers was achieved, after which the rate of production began to fall sharply. The reason for this was the increasing problems with the supply of materials and parts that the entire industry of the Third Reich was experiencing, and the continued bombing of the Skoda factories, and from March 25 - of the BMM.
Production of the Hetzer, despite bombing, shortages of components and regular power outages, continued until the first days of May 1945.

To compensate for the decrease in the production of self-propelled guns at BMM as a result of the bombing, in the first half of April the production of Hetzer was transferred from the BMM factories in Prague to the plant in Milovice. The main problem for the release of the Jagdpanzer 38 in April was the shortage of 75-mm PaK 39/2 cannons produced at factories in Germany, and therefore it was planned to install StuK 40 cannons produced by Skoda on the Hetzers in May.

As we can see, the Czechs, like Stakhanov, worked for the Third Reich until its very end. With creativity, initiative and sparkle. Neither Allied bombing nor the Germans' lack of 75-mm PaK 39/2 cannons, produced in Germany, hampered them. To replace them, proactive Czech specialists immediately offered THEIR StuK 40, of their own production.

“But it was not the Hetzers alone that kept the Czech industry alive!
In 1944, it shipped 30 thousand rifles, 3 thousand machine guns, 625 thousand to Germany MONTHLY. artillery shells. The Skoda plants in Pilsen and the Mürz Zuschlag-Bohemia plant in Ceska Lipa produced the Sd.Kfz 251/1 Ausf.С and Sd.Kfz/251-1 Ausf D armored personnel carriers; assembly of Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6 and Bf 109G-14 fighters.
In general, it must be said that the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was a reliable “cannon yard” and the arsenal of the Third Reich, largely thanks to which the Germans were able to hold out in this war for so long.”

Here is what A. Petrov wrote about Czech assistance to Hitler’s Reich in the article “Cunning Petition”:
By June 1941, German units were almost one-third equipped with Czech weapons. The hands of the Czechs assembled a quarter of all tanks, 26 percent of trucks and 40 percent of small arms of the German army. According to the German Center for War Economics, as of March 31, 1944, the Fuhrer received weapons and equipment worth almost 13 billion 866 million Reichsmarks from the workshops of 857 factories in the Czech Republic.

Soviet historians, obeying ideological guidelines, painted a picture of the proletarian solidarity of Czech workers with their Soviet class brothers. The unfortunate Czechs, they say, were driven to the machines almost at gunpoint. And so, suffering unbearably, the labor collectives of these 857 Czech enterprises increased the production of their deadly products from year to year.

According to German sources, in 1944, the Czech Republic monthly (!) supplied Germany with about 11 thousand pistols, 30 thousand rifles, more than 3 thousand machine guns, 15 million cartridges, about 100 self-propelled artillery pieces, 144 infantry guns, 180 anti-aircraft guns, more than 620 thousand artillery shells, almost a million shells for anti-aircraft guns, from 600 to 900 wagons aircraft bombs, 0.5 million signal ammunition, 1000 tons of gunpowder and 600 thousand explosives. As for the labor productivity of Czechs, it was not inferior to that of German workers.
It is interesting that the main workshops of Prague's military factories did not open until May 5, 1945.
The half-kilometer ambulance train, “a gift of the Czech people to the warring Reich,” somehow was not “deposited” in the selective memory of the Czechs. Forgotten are parcels with warm knitted mittens - “from mothers” to the Stalingrad “cauldron”, and friendly Nazi greetings from conscientious Czech workers, leaders of production, sent to health camps for their hard work for the sake of victory. German weapons, created by their skillful hands... which kills Russians, Poles, Jews, Americans and British...
By the way, it was the Pilsen Skoda factories that at the very end of the war would become almost the only source of weapons for the Wehrmacht.

True, Czechs don’t like to remember this. In the military museum in Prague, the period of their life during the occupation is illuminated by only two or three small stands with shells, which are the result of “slave labor”, which did not stop until May 5, 1945. Moreover, the “forced workers” punctually reported to Berlin, already defeated by the Red Army, about the early fulfillment of their obligations to the Nazis. Almost until the very day of the surrender of the Third Reich, the “freedom-loving” Czechs could not understand that riveting weapons for Germany was completely pointless and their work would not be paid.

There is something else worth telling about.
Russian White emigrant B. Tikhonovich recalled: “The Czechs got incredibly rich from Jews in 1939-1945. They took Jewish jewelry, paintings, and property “for safekeeping,” and then wrote denunciations against former friends. There was a saying in circulation: “They (that is, the Jews) will never return from there anyway.” Madeleine Albright, US Secretary of State under Bill Clinton, has still not returned paintings that belonged to her family and were stolen by two Czech sisters from Prague.
All this was “shamefully” kept silent by the Soviet leadership in the post-war period due to the fact that the Czechs are Slavic brothers and our allies in the socialist camp. Thanks to the Soviet Union, they, as well as other actual comrades-in-arms of the Third Reich, escaped with only a slight fright for collaborating with the Nazis and killing Soviet citizens.”

I almost forgot... I must also say about those Czechs who immediately decided to fight Hitler. A. Usovsky also wrote about this:
“... regarding the Czechoslovak troops who fought on the side of the Allies, on September 17, 1939, Lieutenant Colonel Ludwig Svoboda took his battalion to the Soviet Union, formed from those Czechs who decided to fight the Germans. And there were ONLY 300 PEOPLE..."

In the next chapter we will talk about the actions of the Czech Resistance during the Second World War.

In September 1938, Hitler presented Czechoslovakia and its Western allies with a demand to give Germany the Sudetenland, populated mainly by Germans. England and France, not wanting war, did not support the territorial integrity of the Slavic country. Its president, Benes, was afraid of the all-conquering German military machine and, after September 29–30, agreed to Hitler’s demands. This is the standard story that is told on this matter. But there is another one. To get to know it better, you need to look not at words, but at numbers.

Was Czechoslovakia weak?

As you know, World War II was a war of engines, especially tanks. Of course, with skill it was possible to survive in it without having noticeable tank units (Finland), but still this is the exception, not the rule. Therefore, the analysis of combat effectiveness must begin with them.

By September 1938, Prague had 350 tanks armed with 37 mm cannons. There is a fact: the Wehrmacht in October 1938 in this parameter is difficult to distinguish from the Czechoslovak army. Formally, he had as many as 958 cannon tanks. The problem is that 823 of them were Pz.II - tanks armed with 20-mm cannons, with a shell seven times lighter than the Czech 37-mm. The shell of such a gun hit the frontal armor of the Czech Lt. Didn't make 35. On the contrary, the Czech shell penetrated the frontal armor of all then existing German tanks. The Germans also have 59 Pz.III with “Czech” caliber guns and 76 Pz.IV with more powerful 75-mm guns. They, of course, evened the odds: their guns could cope with Czech armor.

KwK 30. Collage © L!FE Photo: © Wikipedia Creative Commons

But there were only a few of them - Germany could field 135 tanks against the Czechs, capable of hitting the Czech ones. The Czechs could field 350 vehicles capable of hitting any German ones. What is especially important: Czech tanks were consolidated into four highly mobile divisions - just like the German ones. While the tanks of France or the USSR in the late 30s were dispersed in brigades. That is, Czechoslovakia had more modern tanks than Germany, and at the same time intelligently organized them into “fists”.

The best assessment of the quality of Czech tanks was that they were actively used in the Panzerwaffe for many years after the capture of Czechoslovakia. Their production at local factories continued for a very long time - some of these vehicles reached Stalingrad, in the ranks of the Wehrmacht, of course. It is interesting that the Germans did not put Soviet, French and other tanks into service in such quantities, preferring Czech ones. Guderian also noted this in “Memoirs of a Soldier”: “I examined the material part of the Czech armored forces, which impressed me with complete suitability. material part served us well during the campaigns in Poland and France."

The huge advantage of the Czechs was that their army did not have such a colossal gap in normal military development as Germany, shackled by the Versailles restrictions. Because of them, the Germans did not have tanks for a very long time, and their Panzerwaffe was three years old by September 1938. The soldiers and officers of these troops had little experience. In March 1938, during the peaceful march to Austria after the Anschluss, German tank units lost 30 percent of their tanks stranded on the roads due to breakdowns.

Needless to say, machines that would simply be repaired in peacetime are war time it would be more difficult to fix. In addition, marches from Germany to Austria took place along good (even at that time) roads. In Czechoslovakia, the Germans would have to fight, moving off roads, along anti-tank barriers (more about them below). How many tanks would they have lost on the march in such conditions?

The Czechs did well with aviation. Their main aircraft, the B.534 fighter, was as good as, or even superior to, all German fighters, except for the Bf 109. The Luftwaffe had the latter, but still in small quantities. In addition, most of them, like the best German pilots, were in Spain, where they fought an air war with Soviet aircraft. It was almost impossible to transfer them quickly. The Czechs also had decent bombers, albeit smaller than the Germans.

How the Slavs impressed Hitler

Finally, don’t write off fortifications either. Prague started their construction in the mid-30s and therefore managed to take into account the experience of the French defensive Maginot Line. In total, more than ten thousand pillboxes and more than a thousand forts were built, distributed in the most tank-accessible directions. They were present both on the side of the border with Germany and on the Austrian border. Pillboxes and forts withstood direct hits from shells up to 152–155 millimeters. From the frontal projections they were covered by piling up boulders, on which they also poured earth. An ordinary projectile detonated on them even before contact with reinforced concrete.

Embrasures were only on the flanks of heavy structures. They shot through the space in front of the neighboring fortification, but were out of line of sight of the enemy. To shoot at them, the Germans would have to bring infantry and tanks between two fires - exposing themselves to cannons and machine guns from both flanks at once. Most light pillboxes were armed with a pair of machine guns. The forts also had cannons.

All of them had not only communication systems, armor plates for mechanized closing of embrasures, but also diesel generators, sewage systems and other life support systems. Including air filters, with the help of which it was possible to protect garrisons from chemical attacks.

The Czechs also came up with a number of their own - unique - innovations in the field of defense. One of them was the Czech anti-tank hedgehog - or “Czech hedgehog”, as it is called in some European languages. They are widely known to our readers as a symbol of Soviet anti-tank defense, but the USSR only borrowed this invention. At first these were concrete structures in the shape of anti-tank hedgehogs, and then their more effective and cheaper metal versions. Running over them, the tank practically lost contact of the tracks with the ground, and the thin lower armor (in 1938 - no thicker than 10 millimeters) was often pierced by a rail or concrete part of the hedgehog. It was useless to fire at them: even having jumped from a close explosion, the hedgehog simply rolled, remaining a formidable obstacle. Tanks learned to overcome them normally only starting with large and massive structures - such as the German "Panthers" or "Tigers" of 1943. Even during post-war tests against Soviet ISs, the Czech military noted: in 60 percent of cases, hedgehogs heavy tanks could not be overcome.

In 1938–1939 there were no traces of any “Tigers” or “ISs”. That's why the metal hedgehog - that is, the majority Czech hedgehogs- was an extremely difficult anti-tank obstacle that had to be removed under enemy fire. Near the hedgehogs in the Czech defense lines they placed barbed wire, pillboxes, and even anti-tank guns. In addition, the Czech industry was very powerful - and not only the arms industry, which, by the way, then exported more weapons than the German industry. It was not difficult to rivet more rail scraps.

Albert Speer

The future minister of armaments of the Third Reich, Albert Speer, summed up well the Germans’ feelings about these fortifications: “The Czech defensive fortifications caused general surprise. To the amazement of specialists, test firing at them showed that our weapons, which were supposed to be used against them, were not effective enough. Hitler himself went to the former border to form his own opinion about the underground structures, and they made a strong impression on him. The fortifications are amazingly massive, exceptionally well designed and, perfectly taking into account the features of the landscape, deepened into several tiers in the mountains: “With a strong defense it would be very good. it is difficult to master them; it would cost us a lot of blood. And now we got it without spilling a drop. But one thing is clear: I will never allow the Czechs to build a new defensive line."

Yes, Hitler was right. A huge advantage of the Czechs was their special “anti-tank” terrain, in which their positions were at heights, and the enemy had to advance towards them in open areas. But this happened not only at the forefront, but also in the depths of the country. Let us remember: even the Soviet army experienced enormous problems with the offensive on Czechoslovak territory and captured Prague well after Berlin. This is because forested mountains are difficult terrain, and the roads in the narrow valleys between them are easy to defend. If, of course, there is someone.

What did the Czechs have with manpower? Here, at first glance, everything is bad. In terms of population, Czechoslovakia was like three Finlands, that is, it was many times inferior to Germany. However, the total number of manpower available for mobilization was two million people. Even a one-time mobilization without additional recruitment yielded 972 thousand - one and a half times less than what the Wehrmacht could deploy in this direction. And the Czechs also had an almost inexhaustible reserve... of Red Army soldiers.

Red Helping Hand

Since the spring of 1938, the USSR has offered assistance to the Czechs - both manpower and air units. And not only help: in diplomatic correspondence he openly threatened potential opponents of Czechoslovakia. When it became known that Poland intended, together with Germany, to seize the Cieszyn region from Prague, the Polish government was warned on September 23. It was brought to his attention that in case of an invasion of Czechoslovakia, the USSR would consider it an act of aggression and would denounce the non-aggression pact with Poland without further warning. After this, Warsaw could at any moment receive what happened to it after the real denunciation: a sudden attack by the Red Army from the east.

The USSR made no secret of the fact that it was ready to help the Czechs with troops, even if the Poles were against it. When the British press asked the Soviet ambassador in London how Soviet soldiers would get into Czechoslovakia without a common border, he replied: “If there is a will, a way will be found.” Taking into account the threats to Poland, this path is quite easy to imagine.

Kliment Voroshilov

The documents of the Soviet People's Commissariat of Defense indicate that on September 28, the Chief of the General Staff, Shapochnikov, prohibited the transfer of conscripts to the reserve in the western military districts. This actually meant pre-war readiness. The USSR moved dozens of divisions to the borders. In the event of the outbreak of war, the head of the People's Commissariat of Defense Voroshilov noted in those days, the Red Army is ready to send four air brigades consisting of 548 combat aircraft to Czechoslovakia. The Czechoslovak government was immediately informed about this. However, it did not accept any help, which is why all Soviet readiness was in vain.

Why did the Czechs surrender without a fight?

All this is puzzling. There were more than ten thousand Czech pillboxes and forts, and on the Mannerheim Line, for example, there were only a few hundred of them. Their quality was also good - it impressed even Hitler, who usually treated the Slavs with contempt. Czech tanks were clearly superior to German ones, aviation was comparable in number, and taking into account Soviet military assistance, it was no less numerous. The excellent artillery of the Skoda is also familiar to our army - the Wehrmacht fired at us from it. The USSR also tried the small arms of the Czechs on its own skin. The SS troops preferred the Czech ZB-26 machine guns to the German MGs for their high combat qualities and fought with them. Why did the Czechs not dare to fight, surrendering to German demands?

The most correct answer to this question is: why did they have to resist at all? Let us remember that Russia gained its independence and sovereignty through war and need. Czechoslovakia received its statehood from the Allies after World War I on a silver platter. Before that, the Czechs did not have statehood for many centuries. And all these centuries they were subordinate to the Germans: first as part of the Holy Roman Empire, and then as part of the Austrian and Austro-Hungarian empires. If the Hungarians fought a bloody war for independence and won a place in the elite of the empire, the Czechs could not do anything like that. All these centuries they were not so much an ethnos as an ethnic substrate - next to the Germans who were actively absorbing this substrate. The key aristocratic names of the Czechs were Germanized (they, as a rule, could not even speak Czech fluently).

The Germanization of the Czechs was so obvious that even the SS leaders who were planning the “Final Solution of the Czech Question” proposed not to destroy them (like the same Russians), but simply to resettle them. Or simply rename them Germans, as Heydrich suggested.

The German military, in contrast to the SS men, found Czech complaisance alternately funny and disgusting. The head of the eastern department of the German High Command, Major Kinzel, perhaps expressed it best:

“Question: German official reports always said that, except for the snowfall, nothing hindered the victorious advance of the German troops. Therefore, the snowfall was the only enemy?

Answer: that's correct. Communiqués always sound a little funny. But even funnier was what our military attaché in Czechoslovakia told us before the occupation of Prague. I emphasize that the day before the occupation of Prague, our military attaché made the following report to us here: “All our provocations are in vain, since the Czechs simply do not allow themselves to be provoked. When we send our people into the streets to shout “Heil Hitler,” the Czechs shout with them. When we force our people to shout “Down with the Republic!” the Czechs shout with them, and when we tell our people that they should sing “Horst Wessel” in the streets, then the Czechs cannot sing with them, no matter how much we want. Such behavior of the Czechs could provoke not the slightest incident." ...they gave us all their weapons... we received wonderful heavy artillery. And aviation is not bad. At first we couldn’t even believe ourselves that not a single cannon or machine gun was disabled. Not a single ammunition depot was blown up, not a single tank was emptied - everything was handed over in perfect order. ...At the same time, only one or two officers refused to give us a hand. Everyone else was crawling on their bellies. It’s just disgusting to have opponents like that.”

It cannot be said that this was only a Czech misfortune: the Lusatians and other Slavs are so Germanized today that they are difficult to distinguish from the Germans themselves. The only bad thing about this situation was that for some reason a people with such an undeveloped sense of nationality was given sovereignty that they did not really need. What is gained without a fight is often not appreciated. September 1938 is an excellent example of this. The main reason for the Czech capitulation was not the Munich Agreement. This reason was their reluctance to do anything for the sake of their independence.

Background

In 1918, the First Czechoslovak Republic (hereinafter - Czechoslovak Republic) was created. According to the 1930 census total population Czechoslovakia was 14.5 million, of which 9.7 million were Czechoslovaks and 3.2 million were Germans. It is important to note that the vast majority of Czechoslovakian Germans lived compactly in the Sudetenland.

As a result of the natural loss (after the proclamation of the sovereignty of Czechoslovakia) of their privileged position that the Germans had in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the psychological conviction that they were under the yoke of the Slavic population of Czechoslovakia became widespread among them. Adolf Hitler, who proclaimed irredentism (a policy of uniting the nation within single state) one of its main tasks, provided significant support to the Czech Germans.

The main and only political organization of the Czech Germans was the Sudeten-German Party, led by Konrad Henlein. At first, the party had a negative attitude towards the idea of ​​National Socialism, but gradually fell under the influence of the NSDAP and became the fifth column of the Third Reich in Czechoslovakia. In the parliamentary elections of May 1935, the Sudeten German Party received 68% of the Sudeten German votes.

In March 1938, Austria was annexed into Germany, which inspired the Sudeten Germans. In May, Henlein and his people intensify pro-German propaganda, put forward a demand for a referendum on the annexation of the Sudeten lands to Germany, and on May 22, the day of municipal elections, prepare a rebellion in order to turn these elections into a plebiscite. This triggered the first Sudetenland crisis. Partial mobilization took place in Czechoslovakia, troops were sent into the Sudetenland and occupied border fortifications. At the same time, the USSR and France announced their support for Czechoslovakia. Even Italy, an ally of Germany, protested against the use of force to resolve the crisis. An attempt to seize the Sudetenland, relying on the separatist movement of the Sudeten Germans, failed.

Hitler offered Poland Cieszyn Silesia from the Czechoslovakia. 80 thousand Poles and 120 thousand Czechs lived in Cieszyn Silesia. Poland took anti-Czech and anti-Soviet positions.

At the beginning of September 1938, armed clashes between the Sudeten Germans and the Czechs took place, which were openly provocative in nature. The whole of September was spent in negotiations and consultations between the leaders of world powers, mainly bilateral. As a result, the political situation developed as follows:

• The Soviet Union is ready to provide concrete military assistance to Czechoslovakia under two conditions: if Czechoslovakia asks Moscow for such help and if it itself defends itself from the military intervention of the Third Reich.
• Poland's position was expressed in statements that in the event of a German attack on Czechoslovakia, it would not interfere and would not allow the Red Army to pass through its territory; in addition, it would immediately declare war on the Soviet Union if it tried to send troops through Polish territory.
• France and Britain said: “If the Czechs unite with the Russians, the war may take on the character crusade against the Bolsheviks. Then it will be very difficult for the French and British governments to remain on the sidelines.”

The USSR turned out to be the only power that was ready to provide real military assistance to Czechoslovakia. And this despite the fact that Czechoslovakia took an anti-Soviet position for a long period of time and only in 1934 made international legal recognition of the USSR (Great Britain and France did this in 1924, the USA in 1933).

Munich agreement

On September 29, 1938, in Munich, on Hitler’s initiative, he met with the heads of government of Great Britain, France and Italy. Contrary to Hitler's promise, Czechoslovakia representatives were not allowed to participate in the discussion; they waited in the next room. The USSR was not invited to the meeting. On September 30 at one in the morning, Chamberlain, Daladier, Mussolini and Hitler signed the Munich Agreement. After this, the Czechoslovakia delegation was allowed into the hall. Having familiarized themselves with the main points of the agreement, representatives of Czechoslovakia protested, but ultimately, under pressure from the leadership of Britain and France, they signed an agreement on the transfer of the Sudetenland to Germany. In the morning, President Benes accepted this agreement for execution without the consent of the National Assembly, and resigned on October 5.

The note. Later, Germany established a medal for irredentism “In memory of October 1, 1938”, which was awarded to troops who participated in the annexation of the Sudetenland. On the reverse side of the medal in the center was the inscription “One people, one state, one leader.”

It is important to take into account that from a military point of view it was impossible to successfully defend the territory of Czechoslovakia due to the extremely unfortunate geographical shape of Czechoslovakia. After the Anschluss of Austria, the Czech lands were surrounded by Germany on three sides. Cartoons of that time depicted the Czech lands in the jaws of a predatory German beast. In the event of hostilities, the danger also came from Hungary, which laid claim to territories with a compact population of ethnic Hungarians, lost under the Treaty of Trianon in 1920. According to the 1930 census, 700 thousand Hungarians lived in Czechoslovakia.

By this time, a serious conflict had already matured in Czechoslovakia between Slovak nationalists and the Prague government. It was this conflict that Hitler used as a reason for the final division of the state. On October 7, 1938, under pressure from Germany, the Czechoslovakian government decided to grant autonomy to Slovakia, and on October 8 - to Subcarpathian Ruthenia.

On November 2, 1938, by decision of the First Vienna Arbitration, Hungary received the southern regions of Slovakia and part of Subcarpathian Ruthenia.

On March 14, 1939, the parliament of the autonomy of Slovakia decided on the withdrawal of Slovakia from the Czechoslovakia and the formation of the Slovak Republic, loyal to Germany.

Interesting fact. In February 1938 in Prague at the World Hockey Championship, in the match for third place, the Czechoslovakian national team defeated the German national team with a score of 3:0.

Occupation of Bohemia and Moravia. Protectorate

On the night of March 14-15, 1439, Emil Haha (the new president of Czechoslovakia) was summoned to Berlin, where Hitler invited him to agree to the German occupation of Czech lands, then “the entry of German troops will take place in a tolerable manner.” Otherwise, "Czech resistance will be broken by force of arms using all means." As a result, Haha signed a communiqué, the text of which read: “... The President of the Czech Republic stated that... he is ready to entrust the fate of the Czech people and the country itself into the hands of the Fuhrer and the German Reich. The Fuhrer listened to this statement and expressed his intention to bring the Czech people under the protection of the German Reich and guarantee their autonomous development in accordance with national traditions.

March 15, 1939 Germany introduced troops into the territory of Bohemia and Moravia and declared a protectorate over them (form interstate relations, in which one state is protected by another). Czech army did not offer any resistance to the invaders. The only exception is the 40-minute battle of the company of captain Karel Pavlik in the city of Frydek-Mistek.

Germany came into possession of significant reserves of weapons from the former Czechoslovak army, which made it possible to arm 9 infantry divisions, as well as Czech military factories. Before the attack on the USSR, out of 21 Wehrmacht tank divisions, five were equipped with Czechoslovak-made tanks.

In May 1939, Czechoslovakia gold deposited in British banks was, at the request of the protectorate government, transferred to Prague and subsequently ended up in the hands of the German Reich.

The Protectorate was an autonomous Nazi territory that the German government considered part of the German Reich. Constantin von Neurath was appointed the first protector. The formal post of president of the protectorate, which was held by Emil Gaha throughout its existence, and the post of chairman of the government, which was replaced by several politicians, were also retained. The personnel of departments similar to ministries was staffed by officials from Germany.

During the first months of the occupation, German rule was moderate. The Gestapo's actions were directed primarily against Czech politicians and intellectuals. The population of the protectorate was mobilized as a labor force that worked for German victory. Special departments were created to manage industry. The production of consumer goods was reduced, a significant part of them was sent to supply German armed forces. The supply of the Czech population was subjected to strict rationing.

On October 28, 1939, on the 21st anniversary of the declaration of independence of Czechoslovakia, a demonstration against the occupation took place in Prague, which was brutally suppressed. Baker's assistant Vaclav Sedlacek was shot and wounded in the stomach by Jan Opletal (a medical student at Charles University), who died of peritonitis on November 11).

On November 15, thousands of students took part in the funeral of Jan Opletal, their gatherings grew into new wave anti-Hitler demonstrations. Protector von Neurath used student unrest as a reason to close all Czech universities and introduce other repressive measures. More than 1,200 students were sent to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, and nine students and activists were executed November 17, 1939.

In 1941, as a sign of memory of the tragic events, November 17 was declared International Day students, and in 2000 in the Czech Republic - the Day of Struggle for Freedom and Democracy.

"The Sandwich Affair"

President Emil Haha secretly collaborated with the Benes government in exile. He appointed Alois Elias to the post of prime minister and, apparently, hoped that his previous connections with Protector von Neurath would help to one degree or another defend the interests of the Czech Republic.

Alois Elias planned to poison prominent journalists who collaborated with the Nazi regime, and officially invited them to his place. September 18, 1941 The Prime Minister treated journalists to sandwiches, which he, with the help of his urologist, poisoned by injecting them with botulinum toxin, mycobacterium tuberculosis and the typhus-causing rickettsia. The only person who died after eating the sandwiches was the editor-in-chief of the magazine České slovo, Karel Laznovsky. Other journalists just got sick.

Alois Elias regularly maintained contacts with the Resistance movement. Soon this became known to the Nazis, he was arrested and executed. However, his involvement in the “sandwich case” was not yet known at that time.

In the fall of 1941, Germany took a number of radical steps in the protectorate. According to Hitler, von Neurath did not fight the Czech resistance effectively enough, so at the end of September 1941 he was replaced by Reinhard Heydrich. The Czech government was reorganized and all Czech cultural institutions were closed. The Gestapo began arrests and executions. The deportation of Jews to concentration camps was organized, and a ghetto was created in the town of Terezin.

Reinhard Heydrich (born 1904) - statesman and politician of Nazi Germany, head of the Main Office of Reich Security in 1939–1942, SS-Obergruppenführer and police general.

Operation Anthropoid

The plan to destroy Heydrich took shape in October 1941. Reason: Edward Beneš wanted to raise the prestige of his government in exile and activate the Czechoslovak Resistance. The assassination of one of the major Nazi politicians would have triggered punitive operations, which in turn would have embittered the Czechs and likely provoked more active resistance to the occupiers. It is generally accepted that after the repressions at the beginning of his reign, Heydrich softened policies in the Czech Republic, which was also not in the interests of the government in exile.

The note. "Anthropoid" means "human-like"

Two saboteurs were selected to participate in the operation: ethnic Czech and Slovak- Jan Kubiš and Jozef Gabčík. Five more saboteurs were to provide direct assistance to them. On the night of December 28-29, 1941, the entire group and two cargo containers, which contained money, forged documents, weapons and ammunition, were landed. The saboteurs hid their equipment and reached Pilsen, where they stayed in predetermined apartments of Resistance members. Subsequently, they established contacts with many other active underground figures and began to prepare the operation.

Reinhard Heydrich lived in the suburbs of Prague and drove to the city center every day in a Mercedes-Benz convertible without security, which made it possible to commit an assassination attempt along the way. The saboteurs chose the place for the ambush a section of road with a sharp turn, on which Heydrich's open car was supposed to slow down and become a convenient target.

In the morning May 27, 1942 The saboteurs Kubis and Gabchik, who arrived on bicycles, took advantageous positions. Heydrich's car with the top down arrived at 10:32 and stopped at the turn. Gabchik grabbed a STEN submachine gun and wanted to shoot Heydrich point-blank, but the weapon jammed. Then Kubis, with a throw from below, threw a grenade that had been previously put into combat mode towards the car that had slowed down, which had a contact fuse and detonated when it hit the outside of the body near the right rear wheel. Both Heydrich and Kubis were wounded by the explosion (his face was hit by shrapnel). The incident area also included passengers on tram No. 3, which had stopped at a turn, and people at the tram stop.

Heydrich and his driver Klein (SS Oberscharführer) left the car, grabbed their service pistols and tried to engage in a firefight with the saboteurs who were preparing to retreat. Klein was unable to prevent the bleeding Kubiš from shooting his way through the crowd at the bus stop and riding away on a pre-arranged bicycle. By order of Heydrich, the driver began to pursue the fleeing Gabchik, who, breaking away from the chase, hid in a butcher shop (Valčíkova, 22). The owner of the shop, running out into the street, informed Klein about the hiding agent, after which Gabchik, who had left the shelter, wounded Klein in the thigh with a pistol shot and disappeared. Heydrich, seriously wounded by the explosion, fell near the Mercedes. He suffered a fracture of the 11th rib on the left, a ruptured diaphragm and a wound to the spleen, which was hit by a metal fragment and a piece of car seat upholstery. Heydrich was taken to the hospital in a truck, which was stopped by a Czech policeman who happened to be nearby.

The note. Nowadays, at the site of the assassination attempt on Heydrich, there is the Operation Anthropoid Memorial, the inscription on the bronze plate at the base reads “... the heroic Czechoslovak paratroopers Jan Kubis and Josef Gabčík... could never have completed their mission without the help of hundreds of Czech patriots, who paid for their bravery with their lives." Also on one of the adjacent buildings there is a memorial plaque with the inscription “Patriots do not forget, unlike Czech politicians” (a hint to the period 1948–1989, when Czechoslovakia was officially dominated by negative attitude to the activities of the Czechoslovak government in exile, and they tried not to mention its sabotage operations). Two streets were named in honor of the saboteurs in the area of ​​the assassination attempt - Gabčíkova and Kubišova

Around noon on May 27, Heydrich was operated on and his spleen was removed. On the same day, Himmler's personal doctor arrived at the hospital. He prescribed large doses of morphine to the wounded man. On the morning of June 3, information appeared about Heydrich’s condition improving, but by the evening he fell into a coma and died the next day. The final cause of death has not yet been established.

The note. Documentary footage of Heydrich's funeral and a short story about the importance of this event are shown in the film "Seventeen Moments of Spring."

After Heydrich's death, it was suggested that the protector could be saved by using sulfonamide. Under the leadership of Karl Gebhardt, a series of experiments were carried out in concentration camps, during which wounds were inflicted on experimental prisoners with implantation of glass, earth, sawdust, dirt, followed by treatment with sulfonamide and other drugs. The doctors who carried out the experiments became defendants in the Nuremberg Doctors' Trial.

After the assassination of Heydrich, a group of seven saboteurs (Jan Kubis, Josef Gabczyk, Josef Walczyk, Adolf Opalka, Josef Bublik, Jan Hruby, Jaroslav Schwartz) took refuge in the crypt of the Orthodox Cathedral of Saints Cyril and Methodius. On June 16, 1942, the traitor Karel Czurda (a paratrooper abandoned on March 28) voluntarily revealed to the Gestapo the names and places of residence of dozens of resistance fighters and their family members, who were promptly arrested. During interrogations using torture, the Germans learned that a group of saboteurs was hiding in the cathedral.

Karel Churda (born 1911) was caught in 1947 and executed. As a result of his betrayal, 254 people died. During trial When asked by the judge how he could betray his comrades, he replied: “I think you would do the same for a million marks.” That's exactly what monetary reward was promised for information about the participants in the assassination attempt (for comparison, Heydrich’s new convertible cost about 12 thousand Reichsmarks). The authorities of the protectorate paid Churda half the promised amount, issued new documents, he accepted German citizenship and married a German woman. Despite his progressive alcoholism, he worked for the Gestapo until the end of the war. He believed in Hitler’s victory and planned to move “to the east” after the war. In May 1945, Czurda tried to escape to the American zone of occupation, but on May 5 he was arrested by Czech gendarmes near Pilsen.

Fight in the Cathedral of Saints Cyril and Methodius

On June 18, 1942, German SS and Gestapo troops stormed the cathedral. The battle began at 4:10 am. The Germans entered the building and were inspecting the choir when Kubiš, Opalka and Bublik opened fire. For two hours they exchanged fire with the Germans until they ran out of ammunition. Opalka and Bublik, using their last bullets, shot themselves, not wanting to surrender, and Kubish died from his wounds.

Another group consisting of Gabchik, Valchik, Hruba and Schwartz took refuge in the crypt of the temple. According to some reports, they tried to break through the wall of the crypt in order to leave the cathedral through the sewer. Through a small window in the western part of the cathedral, the Germans threw hand grenades and fired tear gas, but the saboteurs could not be smoked out. Firefighters rushed to the aid of the Germans and tried to flood the besieged with water, but they used a wooden ladder to push the fire hose back onto the street and fired at the firefighters themselves. The situation became more complicated after the attackers blew up the old entrance to the crypt. At the same time, firefighters managed to pull the ladder out of the crypt and direct water through fire hoses directly into the basement, but they were unable to completely flood the crypt. The paratroopers fired back to the last, and when each of the fighters had one cartridge left, all four shot themselves to avoid being captured.

Nowadays, the National Memorial to the Heroes of Heydrich’s Terror has been erected near the bullet-riddled window of the cathedral’s crypt.

The note. In 2016, the feature film “Anthropoid” (based on real events) was released. The main roles were played by actors Jamie Dornan and Cillian Murphy. The filming took place entirely in Prague to make it as close as possible to Czechs. To film the fight scene inside the cathedral, an exact replica of it was built in the studio. Filming locations included Prague Castle and Charles Bridge. The shooting of the assassination scene took place at the intersection of Chotkova and Badelnikova streets, where old Prague landscapes were still preserved.

Punitive actions for the assassination of Heydrich

The assassination attempt on Heydrich made a deep impression on the Reich leadership. On the day of Heydrich's death, the Nazis began a campaign of mass terror against the Czech population. Mass searches were carried out in Prague, during which other members of the Resistance, Jews, communists and other persecuted categories of citizens were identified hiding in houses and apartments. 1,331 people were shot, including 201 women.

The Gestapo received information that two Czech pilots who fled to Britain, whose relatives lived in the village, could be involved in the murder Lidice. Despite the fact that this information was not confirmed, a decision was made to destroy the village. On June 9, 1942, the day of Heydrich's funeral, the village of Lidice was destroyed as retaliation. All men over 16 years of age (172 people) were shot on the spot, 195 women were sent to a concentration camp, children were distributed among German families, traces of most of them were lost.

Later, the Gestapo received information that in the village Sunbeds radio operator Jiri Potucek was hiding, who, with the help of the only surviving radio transmitter, ensured, in particular, communication between the saboteurs of the Anthropoid group and London. He was warned in time, managed to leave the shelter and save the radio transmitter. However, the fate of the village and all its inhabitants was predetermined. The Nazis shot 18 women and 16 men, and 12 of the 14 children were gassed. Only two sisters survived, who were sent to German families “to be Germanized.”

On September 4, 1942, the priests of the Cathedral of Saints Cyril and Methodius Vaclav Cikl and Vladimir Petrzyk, the head of the Cathedral Jan Sonnewend and Bishop Gorazd, who voluntarily joined them, were shot. September 27 Czech Orthodox Church was banned, its property was confiscated, the clergy were arrested and imprisoned.

Resistance movement

In Britain, there was a Czechoslovak government in exile (the unofficial name of the National Committee for the Liberation of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic) headed by Edvard Benes, which received diplomatic recognition as a government from the leading world powers (in particular, the Soviet Union established diplomatic relations with it). The Czechoslovak government in exile collected information and collaborated with the British military services, which trained and sent several reconnaissance, sabotage and intelligence groups from among the Czechoslovak military and volunteers to the occupied territory of Czechoslovakia.

There were four main resistance groups operating in the territory of the occupied Czechoslovakia, the majority of their members were former officers of the disbanded Czechoslovak army. At the beginning of the occupation, propaganda work and strikes were carried out, later sabotage and sabotage became widespread. Whenever possible, Czech workers tried to produce defective military products. The partisan movement did not spread.

The note. On July 20, 1941, during the battles for the city of Türi (Estonian SSR), it was noticed that many mines fired by German troops did not explode. When studying them, it was found that instead of explosives, the mines were filled with sand. One of the mines contained a note “we will help as much as we can,” written by Czechoslovak workers.

The note. In February 1942, the German occupation authorities registered 19 acts of sabotage and sabotage, in March 1942 - 32, in April 1942 - 34, in May 1942 - 51.

In September 1942, on the Labe River, underground fighters sank barges with cargo for German army, and in October 1942, a train was derailed on the Prague-Benešov railway, resulting in the destruction of 27 platforms with tanks.

In 1943 alone, approximately 350,000 Czech workers were deported to Germany. At the same time, by order of Hitler in October 1943, the German authorities refused any use of Czech officials in public service. Within the protectorate, all non-military industry was prohibited.

On February 14, 1945, 60 US Air Force B-17 Flying Fortress aircraft dropped 152 bombs on the most populous areas of Prague. More than a hundred unique historical buildings, dozens of important engineering and industrial facilities were destroyed, 701 people were killed and 1,184 were injured.

Formation of an infantry battalion

In 1942, the First Czechoslovak Infantry Battalion was formed in the USSR from former Czechoslovakian soldiers. The commander was Lieutenant Colonel (later Colonel) Ludwik Svoboda. The battalion's strength was 974 people. In addition to the Czechs and Slovaks, the military included six Rusyns and Jews. The personnel were dressed in British uniforms (which had previously been supplied to Polish units) with insignia of the army of the pre-war Czechoslovakia.

The formation of the battalion was carried out with significant problems and delays. However, they also had a downside: all this time, the commander of the Svoboda battalion was conducting intensive combat training, so the level of training of the battalion personnel turned out to be very high.

Battle of Sokolovo

In February 1943, the battalion was sent to the front in the Kharkov region and took up defense along the left bank of the Mzha River (the width of the front was 10 km). The defense system also included the village of Sokolovo, located on the river bank.

On March 8, the battalion's positions were attacked by approximately 60 German tanks and a motorized infantry battalion. The Czechoslovakians defended themselves bravely. On this day, the Germans lost 19 tanks, from 4 to 6 armored personnel carriers and up to 400 people killed and wounded. The battalion held the defense on the Mzhe River until March 13, when an order was received to leave their positions. 87 military personnel were awarded Soviet orders and medals. Losses amounted to 112 killed, 106 wounded (according to other sources: killed - 153, wounded - 92, missing - 122).

Feat of Otakar Yarosh

Otakar Jaroš (Czech: Otakar Jaroš, born in 1912) - lieutenant, company commander. Ethnic Czech. On March 8, 1943, while defending the village of Sokolovo, Yarosh was wounded twice, but continued to command the company and fire at the advancing enemy. During the battle, Yarosh tore a bunch of grenades from his belt and rushed to the German tank that had broken through. The Czech hero was posthumously awarded the rank of captain, and on April 17, the first foreign citizen was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Nowadays, one of the embankments in Prague is named after Captain Jaros.

Formation of an infantry brigade

In May 1943, the formation of the First Czechoslovak Infantry Brigade began on the basis of an infantry battalion. Replenishment took place at the expense of Soviet citizens of Czechoslovak origin and Ruthenians. Most of these Rusyns crossed the Soviet border (after the capture of Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia by Hungarian troops in March 1939) and were initially convicted of “illegal border crossing”, but later granted amnesty.

By September 1943, the brigade numbered about 3,500 soldiers and officers. Of these, about 2,200 people were Rusyns by nationality, about 560 Czechs, 340 Slovaks, 200 Jews and 160 Russians. Later, another 5 to 7 thousand Carpathian Ukrainians were included in the brigade.

The brigade personnel were dressed in Czechoslovakian uniform military uniform, had Czechoslovak military ranks and served in military regulations Czechoslovak army. By organizational issues The battalion was subordinate to the Czechoslovak government in exile; operationally, it was subordinate to the higher command of those Soviet military units to which it was attached. Subsequently, this order was maintained until the end of the war.

The brigade took part in the third battle for Kharkov and the liberation of Left Bank Ukraine. In November 1943, the brigade took part in the liberation of Kyiv, and later in the liberation of Right Bank Ukraine.

Formation of the Army Corps

In April 1944, the formation of the First Czechoslovak Army Corps began on the basis of the brigade. Its number was 16 thousand, 11 thousand of which were Rusyns and Ukrainians by nationality. Later, the brigade was replenished with mobilized residents of Transcarpathia of all nationalities.

In the fall of 1944, the army corps took part in the East Carpathian operation. On September 20, the city of Duklja was liberated, and on October 6, the fortified Duklja Pass, located on the old Czechoslovak border, was stormed. On this day, Czechoslovak and Soviet units entered the territory of Czechoslovakia, marking the beginning of its liberation from the enemy. Until the end of the war, the corps was no longer withdrawn to the rear; offensive battles alternated with defensive actions. On April 30, 1945, units of the corps entered the territory of the Czech lands with fighting. The forward detachment of the corps on Soviet tanks entered Prague on May 10, 1945. On the same day, units of the corps fought their last major battle.

On May 17, 1945, the parade of the entire personnel of the First Czechoslovak Army Corps (18,087 corps soldiers, and together with the rear and training units 31,725 ​​people). In June 1945, the formation of the Czechoslovak People's Army began on the basis of the corps.

Corps losses (taking into account the losses of the battalion and brigade) amounted to 4,011 people killed, missing and died from wounds, 14,202 people were hospital workers. The German troops experienced animal hatred towards the captured corps soldiers, subjecting them to brutal torture and torment. Thus, the Germans hanged five captured wounded soldiers of the Czechoslovak battalion near Sokolovo alive upside down in the cold, before which their ears, noses, and tongues were cut off. Having discovered 8 seriously wounded battalion soldiers in one of the hospitals during the capture of Kharkov, German soldiers killed them right in their hospital beds. In battles in Slovakia in 1945 painful executions of captured fighters (even to the point of being burned alive) were widespread. Over 26 months of fighting, Czechoslovak troops destroyed 24,600 Nazis.

The note. Four Czechoslovak squadrons fought as part of the British Air Force: 310th, 311th, 312th and 313th. British intelligence services trained and sent several reconnaissance, sabotage and intelligence groups to the occupied territory of Czechoslovakia.

Joseph Burshik

Josef Bursik (1911–2002) - Czechoslovakian officer, participant in World War II, who went through the full combat path as part of a battalion, then a brigade and a corps. He is known primarily for the fact that in 1968, as a sign of protest against the entry of troops of the Warsaw Warsaw countries into the Czech Republic, he handed over all his Soviet awards to the Soviet embassy in London. His awards: Hero of the Soviet Union (December 21, 1943), Order of Lenin (December 21, 1943), Order of Suvorov III degree (August 10, 1945), Order of the Red Star (April 17, 1943).

In 1949, Burshik was arrested on charges of anti-communist propaganda and sentenced to 10 years “for treason.” Having ended up in a prison hospital due to a severe form of tuberculosis, he managed to escape in August 1950 and cross the border to Germany. In 1955 he emigrated to the UK, where he underwent a course of treatment and underwent two operations. At the personal request of Queen Elizabeth II, Burshik was granted British citizenship, which he refused. Appreciating this noble act, the Queen endowed Burshik with all the rights of a citizen of the United Kingdom. Burshik still had a wife and two daughters at home, who were sent to the West to join their father in 1963. In 1969, he was officially stripped of the title of Hero of the Soviet Union and all USSR awards. In 1992, the title of Hero of the Soviet Union and all Soviet awards were returned to him.

Bombing of Prague in February 1945

On February 14, 1945, US Air Force flying to bomb Dresden went off course and mistakenly bombed Prague. As a result of the raid, 701 people were killed and another 1,184 were injured of varying degrees of severity. The vast majority were civilians. About 11 thousand more Prague residents lost their homes. Not a single plant or other strategic facility was damaged. Bombs fell exclusively on civilian buildings in the areas of Radlice, Vysehrad, Zlichov, Nusle, Vinohrady, Vršovice, Pankrac and Charles Square.

In just three minutes, 62 B-17 Flying Fortress bombers dropped 58 tons of bombs on the central part of the city. 183 buildings were reduced to ruins and about 200 were seriously damaged. Some of the buildings were of cultural and historical value, for example, the Emmaus Monastery, the House of Faust, and the Vinograd Synagogue.

Prague Uprising (1945)

The material is in the process of being written...

After the war, Soviet troops were withdrawn from Czechoslovakia in November 1945.

This article examines aspects of the participation of the state of Czechoslovakia in World War II, from the beginning of the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in March 1939 until the end of hostilities in Europe in May 1945.

Czechoslovakia arose from the fragments of Austria-Hungary after the First World War, while by the Treaty of Versailles it was freed from reparations distributed mainly between Germany and Austria. This allowed the Czechoslovaks to get ahead in industrial development Germany.

The industry of Czechoslovakia, including the military one, was one of the most developed in Europe (for example, the Skoda factories in less than a year - from the moment of occupation by Germany until the start of the war with Poland - produced almost as much military products as in at the same time the entire military industry of Great Britain). The Czechoslovak army was excellently armed and relied on powerful fortifications in the Sudetenland. However, it was the Sudetes that were populated predominantly by Germans, who, in the declaration of the sovereignty of Czechoslovakia, in the words of Ernst Nolte, “were rooted in the opinion that they had suffered injustice on the part of the Czechs, and not on the part of general historical processes” and tried to defend “their privileged position”, being essentially “remnants of medieval East German colonization.”

On May 21, the Polish ambassador in Paris Łukasiewicz assured the US Ambassador to France Bullitt that Poland would immediately declare war on the USSR if he attempted to send troops through its territory to aid Czechoslovakia.

On May 27, in a conversation with the Polish Ambassador, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet stated that “Goering’s plan for the division of Czechoslovakia between Germany and Hungary with the transfer of Cieszyn Silesia to Poland is not a secret.”

On September 21, Poland and Hungary presented territorial claims to Czechoslovakia in the form of ultimatums, concentrating their troops along the border. Soviet troops on the western borders of the USSR were put on alert to come to the aid of Czechoslovakia.

At the Nuremberg trials, Keitel was asked the question: “Would Germany have attacked Czechoslovakia in 1938 if the Western powers had supported Prague?”

The answer was: “Of course not. We were not strong enough from a military point of view. The goal of Munich (that is, reaching an agreement in Munich) was to oust Russia from Europe, gain time and complete the armament of Germany."

The territory of Czechoslovakia was reduced by 38%, the country turned into a narrow and long, easily vulnerable state, which later became a protectorate of Germany. German troops found themselves 30 km from Prague. In addition, on December 3, 1938, a secret agreement was concluded with Czechoslovakia, according to which it could not “maintain fortifications and barriers on the border with Germany.” The fate of the remaining territory of the country was thus sealed.

Meanwhile, a serious conflict was brewing in Czechoslovakia between Slovak nationalists and the Prague government, which was used by Hitler as a pretext for the annexation of the “Remnant of the Czech Republic” (German: Rest-Tschechei).

In exile in London at the outbreak of World War II, Edvard Beneš, the second president of Czechoslovakia, created Czechoslovak government in exile, which enjoyed the support of the anti-Hitler coalition (since the USA and the USSR joined it). [ ]

The rapid and successful annexation of the relatively small but strategically and economically significant Czechoslovakia, with its large (23.5%) German population, created the impression of an easy victory and encouraged Adolf Hitler to continue his offensive against the countries of Central Europe.

The population of the Czech Republic and Moravia was mobilized as a labor force that was supposed to work for the victory of Germany. Special departments were organized to manage industry. Czechs were required to work in coal mines, metallurgy and arms production; Some of the youth were sent to Germany. However, as the German researcher Detlef Brandes notes, , iron ore mining remained at pre-war levels, work on opening and preparing deposits was abandoned, machines were overloaded; by 1944 production capacity had increased by only 18%.

During the first months of the occupation, German rule was relatively moderate. The Gestapo's actions were directed primarily against Czech politicians and intellectuals. Nevertheless, .

The deportation of Jews to concentration camps was organized, and a ghetto was organized in the town of Terezin. In June 1942, after Heydrich's death, Generaloberstgruppenführer SS Kurt Daluge was appointed his successor.

On February 14, 1945, 60 US Air Force B-17 Flying Fortress aircraft dropped 152 bombs on the most densely populated areas of Prague. More than a hundred unique historical buildings, dozens of important engineering and industrial facilities were destroyed, 701 people were killed and 1,184 were injured.

The spontaneous resistance of the citizens of Czechoslovakia to the German occupation and the creation of the first underground organizations on the territory of Czechoslovakia and beyond its borders began shortly after the German occupation of Czechoslovakia. So, on October 28, 1939, on the 21st anniversary of the declaration of independence of Czechoslovakia in 1918, protests against the occupation took place in Prague, Brno, Ostrava, and Kladno, which were suppressed. German troops opened fire on the demonstrators. On November 15, 1939, medical student Jan Opletal, wounded on October 28, died; his death sparked student demonstrations. In response, the occupation authorities began mass arrests: politicians, public figures, and 1,800 students and teachers were arrested. On November 17, all universities and colleges in the protectorate were closed, nine student leaders were executed, and hundreds of people were sent to concentration camps.

Representatives of various organizations and associations of Czechoslovak emigrants focused their activities on various states and political forces:

Anti-fascist resistance in Czechoslovakia took various forms, forms of passive resistance (boycott, failure to comply with orders of the occupation administration), as well as strikes, anti-fascist propaganda and sabotage (in particular, the production of substandard military products) became widespread. Thus, during 1939 alone, 25 strikes took place at 31 industrial enterprises in Czechoslovakia. On July 20, 1941, during the battles for the city of Türi (Estonian SSR), it was noticed that many mines fired by German troops did not explode. When studying them, it was found that instead of explosives, the mines were filled with sand; in one of the mines there was a note “ we help as much as we can", written by Czechoslovak workers.

In November 1939, as a result of a series of arrests, German intelligence services destroyed the “Political Center” ( Politické ústředí) - an underground organization that united supporters of E. Benes.

At the beginning of 1940, the underground anti-fascist organization ÚVOD ( Ústřední výbor odboje domácího).

In February 1940, special “extraordinary courts” were created to hear political cases.

In October 1940, protests by miners took place in Gandlova.

In total, in February 1942, the German occupation authorities registered 19 acts of sabotage and sabotage, in March 1942 - 32; in April 1942 - 34; in May 1942 - 51.

In the summer of 1942, underground fighters set fire to the Czech-Moravian-Kolben-Dansk plant in Prague.

In September 1942, on the Labe River, underground fighters sank barges with cargo for the German army.

In October 1942, a train was derailed on the Prague-Benešov railway, resulting in the destruction of 27 platforms with tanks.

In the summer of 1943, strikes took place among workers at the Skoda factories, as well as among textile workers in Žilina and Ružomberok.

In December 1943, the leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and a number of bourgeois underground organizations entered into an agreement on joint activities, as a result of which the Slovak National Council was created.

In mid-March 1944, the leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and several anti-fascist organizations in the Slovak army entered into an agreement to coordinate activities.

In 1941, the II regional headquarters of SOE was created in Cairo, within which a department was created responsible for the activities of British intelligence services in Czechoslovakia.

Later, the British intelligence services trained and dropped several reconnaissance, sabotage and organizational groups into the occupied territory of Czechoslovakia:

On July 18, 1941, an agreement was signed between the USSR and the government of E. Benes on the restoration of diplomatic relations and mutual assistance in the fight against Germany, which provided for the creation of Czechoslovak military units on the territory of the USSR. On September 27, 1941, the Soviet-Czechoslovak military agreement was signed.

In October 1943, the formation of the 1st Separate Czechoslovak Fighter Aviation Squadron began in Ivanovo.

On December 30, 1943, the formation of the 2nd Czechoslovak Airborne Brigade began in the area of ​​the city of Efremov.

In April 1944, the 1st Czechoslovak Army Corps was created in Rovno.

In June 1944, the 1st separate Czechoslovak fighter regiment (32 aircraft) was created.

At the end of July 1944, the 1st separate Czechoslovak tank brigade(65 tanks, three tank and one motorized infantry battalion).

After the start of the Slovak National Uprising on August 30, 1944, the deputy commander of the East Slovak Army, Colonel of the General Staff of Slovakia William Talsky and Major of the Slovak Air Force Trinka with a group of officers and military personnel of the Slovak Army flew to the side of the Soviet troops. Together with them, an air group of 27 aircraft of the Slovak Air Force (6 Focke-Wulf-189, 3 Messerschmitt-109B and 18 transport aircraft) landed at the location of the Soviet troops.

In December 1944, a separate mixed Czechoslovak air division was created (two fighter and one attack air regiment, a total of 99 aircraft and 114 pilots).

The USSR provided significant assistance in the creation and maintenance of the activities of Czechoslovak military units. In total, during 1944 alone, the USSR transferred to them 9,187 rifles and carbines, 5,065 submachine guns, 520 light, heavy and anti-aircraft machine guns, 258 anti-tank rifles, 410 guns and mortars, 35 tanks and self-propelled guns, 28 armored personnel carriers and armored vehicles, 25 aircraft (not counting training weapons and captured weapons); in addition, during 1944 alone, 425 Czechoslovak military personnel were trained in ten Soviet military educational institutions.

From the moment of its formation until the end of the war, in combat operations against Nazi Germany and satellite countries of the Third Reich, units of the 1st Czechoslovak Corps disabled 30,225 enemy troops, destroyed 156 tanks, 38 aircraft, 221 guns, 274 vehicles and a certain amount of other equipment, seized a significant amount of weapons, equipment and military property. The losses of the 1st Czechoslovak Corps amounted to over 11 thousand military personnel killed.

On May 15, 1945, all Czechoslovak units were united into the 1st Czechoslovak Army.

Citizens of Czechoslovakia took an active part in.

On June 17, 1944, a resolution was adopted by the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine (Bolsheviks) “On providing assistance to the Czechoslovak Communist Party in organizing partisan movement on the territory of Czechoslovakia,” according to which the Ukrainian headquarters of the partisan movement began training Czechoslovak cadets and preparing Soviet-Czechoslovak partisan organizing groups for activities on the territory of Czechoslovakia. The first groups were transferred to the territory of Czechoslovakia in the summer of 1944. In total, from August 1944 to April 1945, at the request of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, 37 partisan organizing groups were transferred from the USSR to the territory of the Czech Republic and Moravia. In February 1944, a Soviet partisan detachment was organized in northern Bohemia. The detachment was called “Konstantin” and was led by Konstantin Ivanovich Zhukovsky, a native of the Voronezh region. He was in a concentration camp, escaped with a group of comrades, grabbed weapons from the guards and disappeared into the forests. Had contact with factory workers. The detachment carried out sabotage in the Sudeten region and in the city of Jablonec. In January 1945, there were 300 people in the detachment; the deputy commanders of the detachment were Soviet officers and sergeants of the Red Army. In 1945, the detachment met a sabotage group from Colonel Khan's headquarters. After the meeting, they jointly led the subversive activities. In April 1945, the Konstantin detachment consisted of 3,000 fighters, of whom there were 6 women. On May 9, 1945, it merged with the 31st Army of the 1st Ukrainian Front. From May 24 to May 30, the partisan detachment and equipment were transferred to the Army at p/p 36595. K.I. Zhukovsky himself was sent for treatment to Prague for 2.5 months, where he prepared a report on the work done to the government of the Czech Republic and to the Central Asia of Moscow NGO THE USSR. For his participation in the restoration of Czechoslovakia from the occupation of Germany during the war, Zhukovsky was presented with a Skoda Rapit car from General Vocek. The pass to travel to the USSR was signed by the commander of the 88th Infantry Division.

In December 1944, the Soviet-Polish-Slovak partisan brigade named after. Shchorsa (commander; the brigade included the Soviet partisan detachments named after Shchorsa, Vzryv and Sokol, as well as the Slovak partisan detachment Liptovsky). Having received information that the Germans had begun mining the city of Zakopane, the brigade made the transition to the city. On the evening of January 29, 1945, fighters of the reconnaissance and assault group in civilian clothes entered the city and attacked the commandant's office, while the main forces of the brigade attacked the outskirts of the city. As a result, the German garrison was defeated and the city was cleared of mines.

On February 14, 1945, 62 USAF B-17 Flying Fortresses, each carrying 16,500-pound bombs, . 93 unique historical buildings and some statues on the Charles Bridge were destroyed, about 200 were damaged, dozens of important engineering and industrial facilities were damaged, 701 people were killed and 1,184 were injured, 11 thousand people were left homeless. Not a single military installation was damaged, and only civilians were among the dead.

In May 1945, the German Army Group Center numbering about 900,000 people (1,900 tanks, about 1,000 aircraft and 9,700 guns) under the command of 52-year-old Field Marshal Ferdinand Schörner was located in the Czech Republic. Despite the fact that Berlin had already capitulated and Hitler was dead, 200 kilometers east of Prague the Germans fought stubborn battles with Soviet troops. The Americans approached Prague to a distance of 80 km.

On May 2, Berlin fell, and on the same day, late in the evening, a delegation of Czech officers arrived at the location of the 1st KONR Infantry Division, introducing themselves as representatives of the uprising headquarters in Prague and asking for help and support. “The Czech people will never forget that you helped us in difficult times.”- they said. Negotiations took place on May 3 and 4.

On the morning of May 5, the parties agreed on a “joint struggle against fascism and Bolshevism.” Vlasovites were provided with maps of Prague and guides, and white-blue-red armbands were sewn onto the military personnel to distinguish them from Wehrmacht soldiers.

It was probably the calculation of the military strength of the 1st KONR Infantry Division that prompted the Czech leaders to start a popular uprising against the German occupation on May 5, since the civilian population had practically no weapons.

On the morning of May 5, following the permission of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia to hang national flags on the streets, Prague residents began to protest against the occupiers. German military units were offered surrender, and Czech troops and police were invited to join the rebels. The rebels occupied the post office and telegraph office, a power plant, railway stations with military trains, including German armored trains, a number of large factories and the German air defense headquarters.

In response, the German police opened fire. The battle begins near the building of the Czech Radio and the construction of barricades in the city, of which more than 1,600 were erected. The commander of the 1st Infantry Division KONR, Major General Sergei Bunyachenko, gave the order to support the uprising. 18,000 people moved into battle against yesterday's allies, capturing the Luftwaffe bomber airfield in Ruzyn and the Prague district of Smichov, taking control of two bridges over the Vltava. On May 7, the Vlasovites broke through into the center of Prague and cut through the German group on the left bank of the Vltava. Taking Mount Petrin and the Kuliszowice area, they captured about 10,000 Wehrmacht soldiers.

Having learned about the uprising, Schörner begins urgently transferring reinforcements to the city.

On May 6, German SS units and three tank divisions approached Prague. Pilot Heinrich Höffner dropped a bomb on the radio building. The Germans, with the help of tanks and aircraft, again captured part of Prague. The rebels were inflicted big losses, which forced them to radio "to everyone who can hear them" for help. The troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front under the command of General Ivan Stepanovich Konev at that moment were 200 km from the city, the Americans were 80 km away. But the Americans were not going to help.

On May 7 at 14:30 one of the last German bombs was dropped on the Mala Strana region. That same evening, a German plane dropped a bomb on the Kinski Palace on Old Town Square, next to which the rebel headquarters was located.

In total, during the Prague operation, the losses of the Red Army amounted to 11,997 people killed and 40,501 wounded, material losses amounted to 373 tanks and self-propelled guns, 1,006 artillery installations and 80 aircraft.

Soviet troops were withdrawn from Czechoslovakia after the war, in November 1945

In one of the previous posts, I posted photographs and told how the Czechs showed their faces, how cheerfully and joyfully they greeted the Nazis. Moreover... After the meeting of the Nazis, they began to selflessly work for the Third Reich. The Germans freely entered the Czech Republic. Nothing was destroyed. All factories, in particular weapons factories, were preserved.
Czechoslovakia also distinguished itself in the war against the USSR.
More than 100,000 Czechs and Slovaks fought back in various parts of the Wehrmacht. 70,000 were captured. About 7,000 of them were killed. This is certainly not very much - only about ten divisions. However, there were practically no combat units staffed only by Slovaks and Czechs on the eastern front. Their combat effectiveness was zero and the Germans simply did not form them, preferring to use Czechs and Slovaks where it could bring the most benefit - in auxiliary and repair units. And here they had no equal.
During the war, Czechoslovakia became a real Orthank of Saruman - the weapons forge of the Third Reich.

By June 1941, the Wehrmacht was almost one-third equipped with Czech weapons. The Czechs collected 25% of all German tanks, 26% of trucks and 40% of small arms. The Czechs worked diligently for Germany until the very end. The labor productivity of industrial workers was on par with that of German workers.
From the Czechs the Germans received more than 1.4 million rifles and pistols, over 62 thousand machine guns, about 4 thousand guns and mortars. In 1939, 5 Wehrmacht infantry divisions were equipped with Czech trophies, and in 1940 - 4 more.
On June 22, 1941, Czech-made armored vehicles made up a quarter of the fleet of all 17 German tank divisions of the 1st echelon - 623 Pz.Kpfw.38(t) tanks.
The Czech share in the Wehrmacht's armored vehicles grew until the end: from January to March 1945, working hard for Hitler, the workers of Prague and Pilsen produced 1,136 of the 3,922 tanks and self-propelled guns produced for Germany. Almost a third!

At the same time, Czech engineers tirelessly improved weapons. So the Czech-developed self-propelled gun "Hetzer" turned out to be the most successful self-propelled gun of the Wehrmacht. Created on the basis of the Pz.Kpfw.38(t). The 16-ton vehicle with 60 mm armor and a 75 mm Pak 39 cannon with a 48-caliber barrel showed brilliant results on the battlefield. And since May 1944, the Czechs have built as many as 1,577 Netzer self-propelled guns. One of the main means of fighting Soviet tanks.
The self-propelled gun turned out to be so successful that for almost 10 years after the war it was in service with the doormen and the Czechs.
And also 1271 "Magdeg III", 370 SdKfz 138/1 "Bison". In total, almost 3,000 self-propelled guns based on the 38 after 1942.
In general, throughout the entire Patriotic War, Czech factories riveted weapons for the Nazis simply without a break...

It’s interesting that the main workshops of the Prague arms factories stopped working only on May 5, 1945 - three days after the capture of Berlin by the Red Army (!!!), when the freedom-loving Czechs finally realized that riveting weapons for Germany was completely pointless, the work would not be paid for , and raised an unusually timely uprising in Prague.
In conclusion, it is worth recalling that 144 thousand of our soldiers and officers gave their lives in the battles for the liberation of Czechoslovakia...

Here I am posting photos. Skoda arms factories in the Czech Republic. After the Nazis arrived, they began producing weapons for the Reich. Practically, these weapons were used to kill Soviet people..., Huge siege cannons that took part in the siege of Leningrad, tanks that took part in the attack on Moscow, on Kursk... And these weapons were made by the Czechs...