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

Chapter IV
This “final solution”, as has already
been said, was to be postponed until after
the German military victory, in line with
Frank's concept. This however did not
mean that certain features of it could not
be prepared during the war as part of
immediate “pacifying” tactics. Such
features included a racial inventory of
the Czech nation, partial germanisation
of Czech lands, the “Aryanisation” of
Jewish property and, associated with
this, the liquidation of the Jews, which
Heydrich not only ordered, but started
to put into practice. The principal
measure to this end was the
concentration of the Jews in the town of
Terezín – a “ghetto behind walls” –
where many of them died, with the rest
being deported to the death camps,
prominent among them Auschwitz. In
this way some 70 to 80 thousand Czech
Jews were eventually murdered,
including those who espoused the
German language, such as the
outstanding cultural circle of Prague
Jews that had included figures such as
Kafka. Overall, some 260 to 272
thousand Jews were exterminated from
the whole territory of pre-Munich
Czechoslovakia – the figure varies from
one author to another. According to
P. Škorpil in his work Cesta do katastrofy
(The road to catastrophe), Prague 1993,
p. 122, the number of other
Czechoslovak victims of Nazism was as
follows:
- 8,500 were executed
- more than 20,000 died in
concentration camps and prisons, during
death marches and during interrogations
- some 8,000 were victims of armed
clashes in the Czech lands and their
annexed border regions
- between 15,000 and 19,000 died in
the Slovak national uprising and the
reign of terror that followed it
- 6,800 fell on the battle fronts
- 4,000 died during air bombardments
- about 7,000 Romanies did not
survive the racial persecution.
Škorpil puts the total figure of
Czechoslovak victims at 337 to 343
thousand. Other authors give a figure of
up to 360,000, which is not so very
The Break up of Czechoslovakia and the Genesis
of the Transfer
180
different, if we take into account
statistical inaccuracies associated with
the period. The “speciality” of Heydrich’s
preparations for the “final solution” was
the decimation of the officers of the
Czech resistance movement and the
effective liquidation of university
students. This meant that the nation was
deprived of its national elites – those
whom Heydrich most feared.
During the war phase, as we have
already said, the occupying forces were
primarily concerned with squeezing as
much as they could out of the substantial
resources of the “Protectorate” to support
their war effort. And this meant
maintaining calm and order so that
production would not be interrupted,
which in turn required suppressing not
only any form of sabotage or diversion,
but also open displays of dissent, using if
necessary the most brutal means (which,
as is well known, the Gestapo were
capable of applying with great
inventiveness). It also made it necessary
“to put something in the Czech workers’
bellies”, as Heydrich put it, “so that they
are able to do their work”. This meant
that the “peaceful” daily tactics included
brutal terror – but “only” to such an
extent that the Czechs, “whether they
love us or not… at least can now see…
that it can harm them if they organise
uprisings and put up resistance”. We
cannot win over the Czechs, concluded
Heydrich, but it is enough if we show
them that even if they think about their
freedom, it is best for them if they carry
on working, for “we need this peace and
quiet in order to be able to annex this
region once and for all”.
This strategy and tactics used by the
occupying forces meant the Czechs were
faced with a dilemma and a treacherous
trap: ensuring their personal survival
meant they were digging a grave for their
nation. And it was partly because they
had to bend in both directions like this,
not just because of the terror, which was
not as limitless as in Poland, that hate for
the Germans, already strong enough,
increased still further in the minds of the
Czechs. A good illustration of this is
provided by the views expressed by