Rather than serve the new masters of Czechoslovakia, Jan Masaryk had gone to his death. This week, in his own way, ailing, 64-year-old Eduard Benes made his choice, too. He resigned as President of the republic—just one day before he would have had to approve the new Soviet-style constitution which makes his country another "Peoples' Republic."
The decision had not been easy for Benes. Last year, Czechs believed, he had suffered from a partial stroke; he had largely recovered from that, but he was almost alone, and very tired. In his letter of...
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