THE TERROR IN PRAGUE
By J. R. GLORNEY BOLTON
EXECUTIONS in Prague last Sunday and Monday marked the Deputy-Protector's observance of St. Wenceslas' Day and the third anniversary of the signing of the Munich Agree- ment. It would scarcely have been possible for Germany to make a plainer confession that her policy in the Protectorate has been a lamentable failure. Before the war against Russia the Germans, undoubtedly encouraged by Baron von Neurath, tried to give a veneer of conciliation to their repressive policy in Bohemia and Moravia. Early last year they laid their plans for a customs and monetary union between the Protectorate and the Reich. Industries in the Protectorate were deliberately curtailed. The Bata factories, for instance, lost all their former importance. The Protectorate was to be nothing more than an agricultural satrapy of the West. Its people, hence- forward to be provided with little more than an elementary education, were to be a subjected peasantry. These German theorists struggled against stubborn geographical and economic factors, and it was not until October 1st, 1940, that the customs-union could be actually imposed.
It was then no longer possible to shape events to a Nazi pattern. The harvest had failed. Many thousands of German civilians sought in Bohemia an escape from the Royal Air Force attacks. The Germans had decided—for a reason not immediately obvious—to make the Protectorate a vital centre for aircraft-production. Altogether about six hundred thousand troops and civilians had been brought into the Protectorate from the Reich, and although their numbers were to some extent offset by sending Czechs to other parts of submerged Europe as forced labourers, food-shortages and economic dislocation were inevitable. There was distress throughout the Protectorate. It affected the German civilians. Many of them decided to leave the Protectorate. A few weeks ago, for instance, Frau Alfred Goering, the Field-Marshal's sister-in- law and wife of the Nazi controller of the Skoda works, left Bohemia for Switzerland and took with her a sealed truck- load of furniture and personal possessions. The people's distress also affected the German soldiers. They are not shock-troops. Most of them are country lads, bored by the inclusive series of German victories in which they take no part and anxious to return to their own homesteads.
For a while the Germans pretended that all was well. Czech journalists were invited to visit Germany. The Czech Press, directed by Germans, elaborated the thesis that the people had nothing to fear from the New Order. Whatever his voca- tion or employment might be, the Czech could find a genuine, if disciplined, freedom. There was an outward calm which deceived many German observers. Hitler himself toyed with the idea that he could hold a plebiscite in the Protectorate and by its results convince Washington, if not Moscow, that the Czechs had accepted their inferior status in the New Order. It would become more difficult—and, perhaps, impossible—for statesmen at a future peace conference to dissolve the union between the Protectorate and the Reich.
The real opinions of the Czechs were very different. They did not believe that the Germans had converted the Protec- torate into an aircraft-production centre solely as a means of escaping from the British air-attacks in Western Germany. They knew that the railroads of dismembered Czechoslovakia could link the industrial areas of Austria with an Eastern front, and soon there were unmistakable signs, both in the Protectorate and in Slovakia, that Germany was preparing to make war upon Russia. This meant that• the Skoda works would turn out armaments for use against Russia, and the newly established aircraft-factories would produce machi for inflicting death upon fellow-Slays. The prospect of n with Russia was a particular nightmare to the inhabitants the separate Slovak Republic. It was a direct challenge the loyalties of the Czechs and Slovaks.
Those loyalties might well have been divided. The poll of the British, French and Polish Governments at the of the Munich Agreement had aroused acerbities which coul not be speedily destroyed. Resentment against Russia was nc expressed until she signed her fateful Pact with German and assisted in the Polish partition. Czech schoolmaste taught that the military genius of France was the chief bast of European freedom, and her capitulation was a stunt blow. A land-locked people naturally found it difficult understand the implications and formidable strength of Britt sea-power. The skilful Czechs who organise the radio-tran. missions from London knew that it would be hard to convinc their fellow-countrymen of British resilience, resourcefulnes and determination, but the Battle of Britain helped to to the scales. It is not even yet clear when Hitler first decid to make war upon Russia, but the Germans soon came t realise that it would never meet with Czech approval. Ak among the subjected people of Europe the Czechs have been invited to join the League against Bolshevism. masque of conciliation was thrown aside. The Germam Press became vituperative and senseless in its denunciations.
If, a year ago, it was the task of the Czech broadcas controllers to encourage a brave and dejected people, the task after the beginning of the war with Russia was to gin the right guidance to a people who were inflamed with indig nation and for whom the war had ceased to be geographica remote. When the war began, the German war communiqu made flattering references to the Slovak ally. But the Skov members of the Czechoslovak Government and the State Cou cil in London met together and issued a manifesto which broadcast to Slovakia, called on their fellow-countrymen net to take up arms against the Russians. The Slovak forces fight ing on the Eastern front were soon reduced from forty thousand to ten thousand. Many deserted to the Russians. The were brought back to Slovakia ostensibly to help with the harvest. In actual fact, they were withdrawn after the harvest had been gathered, and a large proportion were at once sent to internment-camps.
Once again the Czech broadcast-cofitrollers gave the right guidance in the week's complete boycott of the German. controlled Czech newspapers. They suggested that boycott alone would convince the Germans of the futility of theu newspaper-attacks. The boycott was perfectly timed and fat fully executed. Again and again the German wireless II Prague made statements which might have tempted the Czech' to dip into their newspapers. But their cajolery did noe succeed, and the Germans displayed their anger. It was clear beyond doubt that the Czechs looked to London not only fa their guidance, but also for their news. Within a week of the end of the boycott Neurath had made his ignominious depar- ture from the Hradcany Castle.
The Germans have betrayed their fear. They knew that the illegal Czech paper, V boj, retained an undiminished cur culation during the boycott, and they showed their angel by executing Josef Skalda, an old French legionary who launched the illegal paper after the German occupation and d already been imprisoned for more than two years. Berlin ordered an investigation into an almost uninterrupted series railway accidents at key-stations during the past two months ; d so far the investigators have failed to detect any sabotage. wring has been furnished with a report on war-production the Protectorate which shows that during August produc- o'n fell by as much as forty per cent. in such important con- cerns as the Skoda works in Pilsen. Yet Heydrich, who has imposed martial law in several districts, dare not impose it in the Pilsen district. Timidity, in other words, is the keynote of the renewed German ruthlessness.
The Czechs are an intelligent and disciplined people. They have something of the British capacity for organising them- selves, and it is probable that the Germans already regret their admission into other parts of Europe as forced labourers. Bismarck warned his countrymen against letting the Czech rats into the German granary. The present situation is one of the utmost gravity. Czechs, persuaded that the war can be won or lost in Russia, are restive. Germans can fan that restiveness for their own ends and thus bring upon stricken Europe the calamity of abortive revolt. The indications are that the Czechs will continue to accept guidance from London, their war-time capital, and that on major issues they will collaborate with the other subjected people of Europe. London transmissions have warned the Czechs and Slovaks not to be provoked. But it is necessary for those who plan the revolt against the Nazis to remember that revolutions are made by peoples. Plans are seldom faithfully followed.
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