Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Although constantly denying any wish to secede from the republic, the activities of Henlein
and the SdP were increasingly funded and directed from Nazi Germany. To make matters
worse, the Czechs suffered a severe blow to their morale with the death of Masaryk late in
1937, leaving the country in the less capable hands of his Socialist deputy,
Edvard Beneš
.
With the Nazi annexation of Austria (the
Anschluss
) on March 11, 1938, Hitler was free to
focushisattention ontheSudetenland, calling Henlein toBerlin onMarch 28andinstructing
him to call for outright autonomy.
The Munich crisis
OnApril24,1938,theSdPlauncheditsfinalpropagandaoffensiveinthe
KarlsbadDecrees
,
demanding (without defining) “complete autonomy”. As this would clearly have meant sur-
rendering the entire Czechoslovak border defences, not to mention causing economic havoc,
Beneš refused to bow to the SdP's demands. Armed conflict was only narrowly avoided and,
by the beginning of September, Beneš was forced to acquiesce to some sort of autonomy. On
Hitler's orders, Henlein refused Beneš's offer and called openly for the secession of the Su-
detenland to the German Reich.
On September 15, as Henlein fled to Germany, the British prime minister, Neville Cham-
berlain, flew to Berchtesgaden on his own ill-conceived initiative to “appease” the Führer.
A week later, Chamberlain flew again to Germany, this time to Bad Godesburg, vowing to
the British public that the country would not go to war (in his famous words) “because of a
quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing”. Nevertheless, the
French issued draft papers, the British Navy was mobilized, and the whole of Europe fully
expected war. Then, in the early hours of September 30, in one of the most treacherous and
self-interested acts of modern European diplomacy, prime ministers Chamberlain (for Bri-
tain) and Daladier (for France) signed the
Munich Diktat
with Mussolini and Hitler, agree-
ing-withoutconsultingtheCzechoslovakgovernment-toallofHitler'sdemands.TheBrit-
ish and French public were genuinely relieved, and Chamberlain flew back to cheering home
crowds, waving his famous piece of paper that guaranteed “peace in our time”. Naturally the
Czechs still feel some bitterness about these events.
The Second Republic
Betrayed by his only Western allies and fearing bloodshed, Beneš capitulated, against the
wishes of most Czechs. Had Beneš not given in, however, it's doubtful anything would have
come of Czech armed resistance, surrounded as they were by vastly superior hostile powers.
Beneš resigned on October 5 and left the country. On October 15,
Germantroopsoccupied
Sudetenland
, to the dismay of those Sudeten Germans who hadn't voted for Henlein (not to
mention the half a million Czechs and Jews who lived there). The Poles took the opportun-
ity to seize a sizeable chunk of North Moravia, while in the short-lived “rump”
Second Re-
