the nationality of all inhabitants of the czech provinces and ...

Chapter IV
Germans; with the intensification of
Nazi terror and the favourable evolution
of the war, that proposal was modified in
the direction of a total transfer and gave
rise to slogan of a national Slovak state
free of Germans and Hungarians.
HEYDRICH’S TERROR
RADICALISES TRANSFER PLANS
The fact that Hitler appointed Heydrich
as Acting Reichsprotektor was
connected with the development of the
Czech resistance movement. This grew
to such an extent after the attack on the
USSR on June 22, 1941 that the leading
Nazis began to worry about whether
peace could be maintained in the
Protectorate. Heydrich even advanced
the theory that there was the threat of a
revolution. This was certainly an
exaggeration, but the very fact that this
prognosis was made is testimony both to
the growth in the resistance movement
and to the attempts by the SS to take
advantage of the situation that was
arising in order to assert control over the
Czech region.
Heydrich saw his mission in the
Protectorate as being on the one hand to
implement immediate pacification
measures, and on the other to further
clarify the fate of the Czech nation. This
was of course in keeping with Hitler's
intentions.
He tried to fulfil the first task by
abandoning the alleged weakness of his
predecessor in the Reichsprotektor’s
office, Baron von Neurath, and switching
to a government of out-and-out terror.
Heydrich believed that Czechs should be
brought to heel whenever they raised
their heads or – God forbid – thought
about a revolution. It was true that it was
not possible to break them completely,
but it was possible, and necessary, to ride
roughshod over them, and “force them to
obey and to pull in the right direction”.
And so once Heydrich arrived at Prague
Castle at the end of September 1941 he
proclaimed a state of emergency and
martial law, under which executions were
ruthlessly carried out on the orders of socalled
military courts, which were in fact
composed of high-ranking Gestapo
The Break up of Czechoslovakia and the Genesis
of the Transfer
178
officers. Officially 437 resistance fighters
(with a few black-marketeers thrown in
for tactical reasons) fell victim to these
courts. However, the real number was
higher, as some of those condemned to
death were deported to the Mauthausen
concentration camp, where a swift death
awaited them, without this being
publicised on the sinister red notices that
were stuck up on street corners in order
to terrify the Czechs. In addition to this,
Heydrich made use of social demagogy,
by for example raising certain rations of
food or shoes – although it was usually
the Protectorate that had to pay for this
– or receiving delegations of workers
and farm labourers. This strategy also
involved providing soup in the factories.
(Hitler, however, was somewhat
sceptical about the success of this ploy,
because – as he remarked during
discussions at mealtimes – Czech
women were excellent cooks, and
Heydrich’s soups did not go down too
well with the Czechs.)
Among the other measures he
introduced was the uncompromising
reduction of the autonomy of the
Protectorate. As part of his repressive
approach he intimidated the government
by having the Prime Minister, General
Eliáš, condemned to death and executed.
Neither the government nor “State
President” Hácha resigned, as Presidentin-exile
Beneš called on them to do, but
became Heydrich’s acquiescent tools. It
seems that towards the end of 1941
Heydrich was considering the total
abolition of the autonomy of the
Protectorate, but eventually, partly
influenced by the military defeat of the
Germans near Moscow, he directed his
efforts towards changing its status from
one of autonomy to that of an
“administration authorised by the
Reich”. In particular, he reorganised the
Protectorate government by ordering the
meetings of the Council of Ministers to
be abolished; the government was only
able to take decisions on how to carry
out the directives of the Reichsprotektor.
He appointed “his” people to
government posts, people he knew
would obey him, including above all the