CZECHOSLOVAKIA: Brave Retreat

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Since last spring many visitors to Czechoslovakia have reported one thing, Every Czech, high and low, with whom they talked—and President Eduard Benes gave scores of audiences—declared in substance with passionate conviction: "Even if our allies fail us, no matter if we are left to face overwhelming odds and certain defeat, nevertheless Czechoslovakia will fight rather than yield!"

This was no bluff, because all who uttered it were convinced they spoke the truth. But last week, with brave Czech crowds still shouting in Prague "We want to fight! Give us arms!." their gallant army obeyed heartbreaking orders from Premier Jan Syrovy and President Eduard Benes, began to withdraw from gigantic fortifications upon which this far-from-rich little country had spent heavily.

In a nationwide broadcast tough, one-eyed General Jan Syrovy said: "As soldier and as Premier ... I am passing through the saddest moment of my life, for I am fulfilling a most painful duty, a duty which for me is worse than death. . . . We were confronted with a choice between desperate and hopeless defense, which would have meant the sacrifice of our whole younger generation, their children and their wives, and acceptance of the conditions imposed on us under pressure and without war, which in their mercilessness are unexampled in history. There are smaller states than ours that lead healthy existences. . . . We shall be within narrow frontiers, but we shall be all together in one family! . . . Our army will stand guard over the nation as before. . . . Trust us!"

The soldiers, as they withdrew, gave bystanders dark scowls and muttered oaths, the Czech officers avoided meeting civilian eyes, discharged their bitter duty with compressed lips. Nazi folk of the Sudeten town of Cesky Krumlov were the first Germans to dishonor themselves by opening dastardly fire upon the retreating Czech soldiers' backs. These Sudetens were also the first to smash windows and pillage shops and homes owned by Czechs, Jews and non-Nazi Sudetens such as Communists, Socialists and Social Democrats. Such outrages were not typical but exceptional, according to latest dispatches. The German army entered those parts of Czechoslovakia which it is to take over progressively by October 10 (see p. 75) in the same peaceful fashion as it entered Austria, was cheered last week by civilians.

The German troops, ordered to swing across the frontier at three different points between Helfenberg and Finsterau at 2 p. m. precisely, had set their legs in motion on German soil at 1:58 p. m. by the wrist watch of their commander, Colonel General Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb. They entered first that part of the Bohemian Forest in which Schiller laid his play The Robbers. Since in these rustic parts there were no accommodations deemed suitable for high officers, these, on the first night, left their German troops sleeping in tents or peasant huts, themselves returned to sleep in hotels in Germany, hurried back next morning into Sudetenland.