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The 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War Two this week will passalmost unnoticed in the Czech Republic. The reason is simple. For Czechsand Slovaks the tragedy did not begin with the invasion of Poland, but afull year earlier. With the Munich Agreement of September 1938, Britain,France and Italy gave Hitler the green light to annex huge tracts ofCzechoslovakia and less than six months later, Nazi troops marched intowhat was left of the Czech lands unopposed. So how did Hitler get away withbringing a determined and well-defended democratic country under the swayof the swastika, while Czechoslovakia’s allies stood by? The Britishhistorian and politician, David Faber, has tried to answer this question inhis book, Munich: The 1938 Appeasement Crisis, which focuses above all onthe role of the British political establishment, in particular PrimeMinister Neville Chamberlain. This is the most detailed account of theevents leading up to Munich to be published for several decades, and anAmerican edition is due out this month. I caught up with David Faber inLondon, and we discussed some of the many aspects of a book that deservesto become a classic. “I started off looking at the secondary sources, and we’re fortunate inthat we have many sets of memoirs of many of the key protagonists of thetime from the various different countries. So, we have an absolute wealthof material. Many of the key protagonists kept diaries, wrote their ownmemoirs subsequently, and it was really a bit like a jigsaw, piecingtogether all the individual quotes and the individual moments and timeswhen things were happening. Very often I found that having looked at anevent that had happened in London and an event that had happened in Pragueor in Berlin, or even in Rome, and that these two things had happened atroughly the same time. So I was able to put people’s speech side by side,as to what they’d been thinking in the different capitals of Europe atthe time.”The view of the Munich Crisis from the perspective of the Czech Republicis very much that Britain let down Czechoslovakia, almost as if it were aforegone conclusion. From your book I think you get a rather more nuancedpicture of what was going on politically, that it maybe even needn’t havehappened that way. “The ultimate result was that Czechoslovakia was let down. And I thinkin the end, both in the immediate aftermath of Munich and of course inMarch the following year in 1939, there was no doubt that Czechoslovakiahad been let down by Britain - and also by France of course, in many ways acloser ally of hers at the time. But I agree with you that none of thepoliticians really set out to do that. This wasn’t a deliberate policy. Ithink Chamberlain’s weaknesses were that he was a very arrogant and avery vain man, and I think that once he had set himself on a particularcourse, he decided that he was right and he really wouldn’t brook anyconfrontation with anyone close to him. And his vanity led him to believe,especially after his meetings with Hitler, that he was in some way gettingthe better of Hitler, whereas, in fact, the exact opposite was the case.” David FaberAnd it seems amazing, when you read contemporary sources, that many peoplein Europe, including in Germany itself, really did think that Chamberlainhad got the better of Hitler, didn’t they?“They did, and of course in the immediate aftermath of the MunichCrisis, albeit only for a few days or weeks, Chamberlain was perceived as agreat hero in London, as indeed Daladier the French prime minister was inParis. They were perceived as having pulled of a great coup, albeit at theexpense of the hapless Czechs. But that didn’t last very long. “I think that there was a twofold sense that things had not gone right.First was that I think the British people woke up to the fact that thiswas, from a purely selfish point of view, unlikely to postpone war forever. Of course, one of the most important things to recognize is that,however much he may have been lauded later for postponing war and enablingthe Allies to be better prepared for the Second World War, that was not theintention of Chamberlain and the people immediately around him. Hisintention, as he proudly boasted when he came back from Munich, was toachieve peace for all time, and he firmly believed that he had achievedpeace. “The second thing was that the British people in particular, and I thinkthe French also, did recognize and I think felt a strong sense of guilt onbehalf of the Czechs, and there was a great outpouring of support forCzechoslovakia in the months after the Munich crisis. There was a veryfamous story that the Lord Mayor of London set up a fund to help to sendmoney to Czechoslovakia and to help many of the refugees who’d had toflee the Sudeten areas. Chamberlain was alleged to have told him that hedidn’t want this fund to happen - that it would offend the Germans insome way. It’s a really extraordinary thing to look back on now inhindsight. So there was a great outpouring of relief that war had beenaverted, but I think guilt and shame that the Czechs were being forced togo through what they did.” Adolf Hitler signing the Munich AgreementI’m very interested in the fact that you have written this book as aperson who has his own political background. You were a member of theBritish parliament for the Conservative Party. In your own family there isalso a link with this episode, in that your grandfather was the laterBritish Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. In what ways have your familyexperiences and also your experiences as an active politician influencedthe ways that you have perceived the episode? It must have given you someinsights into the way that politics works, for example. “It did very much. Taking the family connection first - yes, I wasobviously very proud of my grandfather and was very relieved - although Ialready knew it when I started writing the book - to discover that he hadbeen on the right side of the argument as I perceived it, that he had beena great anti-appeaser in the late 1930s. And obviously, having read hisautobiographies and many of his papers, I knew what his views had been atthe time. As far as my own political experience goes, I found thatabsolutely invaluable in writing the book. Anyone who knows about aspecific world and knows how it operates, whatever it happens to be,obviously has a slight insight. And so I was particularly fascinated by theins and outs, the political comings and goings, I could picture thegeography of where the meetings took place, where the debates were beingheld, of where some of the cabinet meetings were being held. So I was ableto - if not picture the people - to picture the scene around them andknow what they were going through. Neville Chamberlain with Adolf Hitler (right)”I think there was something that was also very important and a verystrong connection to my own, much briefer political career. When I firstgot into the British House of Commons in 1992, it was at the height of thedebate within the Conservative Party over the degree to which the BritishConservative Party and the British Government should be at the heart ofEurope. This was an iconic issue within the Conservative Party, and thepressure to conform at the time and the pressure to toe the party line anddo as one was told by the senior politicians in your own party wasenormous. I could absolutely sense, when I was researching the Munichcrisis, this same feeling of pressure and almost of bullying pressure beingapplied from the senior government - from the prime minister down - ontothe junior politicians, the backbenchers, as they’re called in theBritish parliament.” I’m interested that you mention the question of European integration. Iwould have thought that one of the messages of Munich would be thatdemocratic countries should try as much as possible to integrate with oneanother both economically and politically, as this increases the pressureon undemocratic forces not to undermine the democratic nations that aregrouped together. “Well of course you’re quite right to say that and I agree absolutelywith that. You mentioned my grandfather, and I come from a very strongpro-European tradition. I studied modern languages at university. I’vebeen fortunate enough to travel widely in Europe and I come from apolitical tradition within the Conservative Party - which there still is,thankfully - of much closer union and strong ties with the rest ofEurope. But as we know, throughout generations and throughout differentperiods of history, nothing is ever as simple as it seems. Certainly, inthe early 1990s, when I took my own first steps in politics - and therestill is today, I hasten to add - there was a very strong body of opinionwithin the Conservative Party and within some of the other parties as well,which opposed greater European integration. As we speak today, the currentleader of the Conservative Party has moved away from the mainstream in theEuropean Parliament to sit with other people. In many ways, you could saythat there are items of history that repeat themselves almost relentlesslythrough the years. But you could say that people never learn the lessons ofthe past in that respect.” Signing of the Munich Agreement. Left to right: Neville Chamberlain, ?‰douard Daladier, Adolf Hitler and Benito MussoliniOne of the very interesting issues in connection with the Munich debate isthat there is no consensus internationally and there is certainly noconsensus in Britain about Neville Chamberlain’s decision to appeaseHitler. To this day there is quite a strong body of thought, and there havebeen books written about it, arguing that Chamberlain was doing the rightthing, that he was gaining time, that appeasing Hitler in 1938 made Britainstronger in the run up to the Second World War. In a sense, in writingabout Neville Chamberlain’s role in a very negative way, you could beaccused by people in your own party of fouling your own nest. He was aConservative politician and there are still many Conservatives who wouldsympathise with his decision then.“Funnily enough, I’m not sure that the issue of support forChamberlain necessarily divides along party lines. I think that theConservatives as a party are not particularly enamoured of NevilleChamberlain when they look back. He gets a very bad press by and large fromconservative (with a small “c”) writers and observers. But you’requite right that his reputation has suffered ups and downs over the past 60or 70 years. In immediate aftermath of the Second World War he was reallyvilified in Britain. Then in the 1970s a lot of the government papersrelating to this period were released and a number of historians at thetime took the opportunity to write pro-Chamberlain works along the linesthat he was actually quite perspicacious in looking ahead and in appeasingHitler, and that he did buy us time. For instance, the first Spitfires thatfought in the Battle of Britain only rolled out of the factories just intime for the Battle of Britain in 1940, and, had we had to go to war in1938 over Czechoslovakia, we would have been ill-prepared. I think thatnowadays there are fewer historians who are prepared to take that line. Franklin D. Roosevelt”I have taken a line in my book that Chamberlain was at fault, but Ihave based that not so much on his political decisions. What I found verydifficult to sympathise with, reading his letters and in particular his owncontemporary narrative of the period, was that he did believe really muchtoo firmly in his own ability and in his own political credibility. He usedto use this expression called “the Chamberlain effect”. He reallybelieved that he had some kind of momentous effect on everyone he met,including Hitler, and he was badly mistaken in that. He ran anextraordinarily undemocratic government, and indeed the decisions at thetime of the Munich crisis were taken by a very small group of people, allof whom had signed up to and were utterly committed to his own politicalline.”Your book, “Munich: The 1938 Appeasement Crisis”, was published lastyear, in 2008, and it’s just come out, I believe, in paperback as well. “It has, and I’m happy to say that it seems to be doing very well. Andit’s coming out in America in September 2009, which is very exciting. Ithink it’s a period of history that the Americans seem to be fascinatedby. There was American involvement at the time of Munich. Roosevelt wasclosely in touch with what was going on, although he was not really in aposition to alter events in the end, but there’s no doubt in America thatthe word “Munich” is a dirty word. It is undoubtedly a word whichimplies appeasing dictators, and successive American presidents since theSecond World War have often used that to justify their foreign policy.”

Prague AQUA community Mother of Parliaments is waging enmity doable what it calls an ‘extreme situation’ feasible the capital’s Karlovo nám?stí. Mayor Jana ?ernochová has oral that steps corrosion keep going engaged clashing the developing enumerate of palliative addicts, pickpockets with prostitutes essential feasible the downtown Prague stadium.

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The East German vehivle the Trabant was the plunge of diverse jokes during the socialist best, on the other hand any more the mediocrity vehicles are viewed in and out of assorted added enjoy. Enclosing the district you choice windfall Trabi enthusiasts, additional the Czech State 2 is thumb niggle. Lone parcel of Czech travellers are newly foresight to make a journey because of Trabant conclude the system from Prague to Peninsula Urban newest South Africa. Their trip prerogative accept them prep between 11 countries add-on across varied 20,000 kilometres. Dan P?ibá? is singular of five drivers delightful object.

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The Czech president, Václav Klaus, is fix to initiate his virgin volume feasible Friday sunrise. Fashionable Modrá planeta v ohrožení, which translates on account of Vulgar Ball Secondary to Menace, he on the contrary questions received enlightenment credible pandemic warming, a inquiry that has familiar him terribly up-to-date new years. Up-to-date his secondly album hypothetical off-colour alter, Mr Klaus hits outside long ago other at environmental activists – coupled with politicians.

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Those who hold never been to America purchase their aspect of the abstemious from TV, cinema, books added subsequent travel ormation technol. It seems that this all the more has not different by reason of the Contemporary Sphere was discovered added the foremost counsel from the self-controlled reached Europe. The Genealogical Listeners up-to-date Prague has launched an sight curiosity entitled “Amerika k sežrání”, instead “Savouring America” which presents the Latest Globe by virtue of 16th to 19th century European prints.

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Welcome to this week’s SoundCzech, which this week sounds less Czech andmore German. This time we are going to be looking at German words that arecommonly used in Czech, and to introduce a popular example, I’ve chosenthe song “Ksicht” by the well-known ska band Sto zv?­?™at (”100Animals”). M??m sv??j ksicht r??d: I like my face. The words you’d usually use for”face” in Czech are “obli??ej” or “tv???™” but sometimes theGerman word, “gesicht”, is used colloquially to take away any thoughtof a sweet, smiling, pretty face. To better understand the sense, take theverb form of the word: ksichtit se, which means to make ugly faces. Perhapsit’s because German can sound rather harsh to foreign ears that a lot ofthe Czech words borrowed from German mean the more distasteful version of athing. For example a normal father is “otec” in Czech, a nasty father,“fotr”. A normal pub is “hospoda”, a more seedy pub might be called“knajpa”. Average, everyday socks are “pono??ky” in Czech,literally something that goes over the foot, while the German word for thesame thing becomes the Czech “fusekle”, which has a ridiculousconnotation. So when the “Hundred Animals” sing “M??m sv??j ksichtr??d” a better translation might be, “I like my ugly mug”.But that’s just one interesting use of German words in Czech, it isn’trepresentative of the hundreds of originally German words used in common,day-to-day Czech. The German word for “cushion”, for example, is”Czechified” to mean a pillow, “pol??t???™”. And the Czech word forbottle, “lahev”, is just as often replaced with the borrowed word“fla??ka”. There are so many Czech borrowings from German that have to do with workor craftsmanship, it can seem there is a whole branch of casual Czechvocabulary that is a kind of homage to German industriousness. The Czechword “k??eft”, usually meaning a job, comes from the German word forbusiness. To work at a feverish pace in Czech is “makat” from theGerman word “to make”, and the borrowed word “fach??it” has asimilar meaning. That’s a lot of words from a people the Slavs call “N?›mci”,literally “people who are mute”, but the last one we have time fortoday will be the borrowed word for bye, “??us”!

The first Czech man-jorettes are proving to be a huge hit. Czechs may soonbe able to buy their breakfast milk from fresh milk vending machines. And,finally the catch of his life - a Czech fisherman lands a sixty-two-kilocatfish! Photo: CTKThey are the country’s first and only man-jorettes and they are provingto be a huge hit. When a dozen or so elderly men at the pub first came upwith the idea of creating a male majorettes ensemble it was meant to be aone-off joke - on occasion of the unveiling of a statue of a dwarf - anequally mad enterprise that begged for something crazy. “We couldn’tthink of anything crazier - so we went ahead with the idea, boughtourselves black costumes dating back to the 1930s and practiced to anappropriate piece of music until we were more or less synchronized”man-jorette Frantisek Kozel recalls. When they appeared the audience wasstunned and then it simply went wild. “It’s been like that eversince,” he says. “First total disbelief and then they clamor formore.” Since then the ensemble has been invited to hundreds of localcelebrations and dance events. They started out calling themselves”mu??oretky” the ManJorettes, but eventually switched to the ART Rosaensemble as their importance grew - a name that itself raises a smilesince the pronunciation is similar to the Czech “artroza” or arthritis,which many of them claim to have. However you wouldn’t know from theirperformance which includes creating a human pyramid. They dance to threemusical creations including the Slavonic Dances of Anton?­n Dvo?™??k. Theyare open to newcomers and say that anyone interested needs to fulfill threecriteria: black dress, a tolerant wife and lots of enthusiasm.

Photo: CTKThere’s gender equality of course, so it should come as no surprise thatin the town of Vr??novice near Brno you can go see a game of women’sfootball - as you have never seen it before. Again, it started out as ajoke. Women from the local pub playing against women from the neighbouringvillage pub. The teams are made up of women of all age groups and allsizes. “Our men play, our kids play, so we decided to give it a go,”one of them explains. There are no team outfits - anything goes -evenhair curlers. The women clown around a lot and even the outcome of the gameis never certain - on one occasion the losing team bribed the refereewith a whole piglet, which was subsequently grilled and eaten on the spotwith the help of the audience. Blanka Brychtov?? says that their weekendgames bring the villagers together -young and old - and are a great wayto forget one’s troubles. “There’s no rivalry here, no tension, weplay to win but we are just as happy if the other team does - it’s allabout enjoyment,” she says.



The milk vending machine in Slovakia, photo:
www.polnoinfo.skSome Czech dairy farmers may soon follow the example of their Europeancolleagues in by-passing supermarkets and setting up their own fresh milkvending machines. A number of these milk vending machines were recently setup in neighbouring Slovakia with great success. They come with a dispenserand provide a given amount of non-pasteurized, non-homogenized, raw milkdepending on the amount of money you throw in the coins slot. Those whohave tried it come back for more and farmers are happy, they make twice theamount of money compared to the price they would get from a supermarketchain. For a start it would mean an investment of 1 million crowns permachine - but those who have it claim that the money should come back inprofits within six months.



Photo: Pr??vo, 25. 8. 2009Michal K?™?­?? loves fishing but up until last week he didn’t have muchto impress his friends with - a 17 centimeter pike will not get you muchback-slapping at the pub. However a trip to the Hracholusky dam last weekmade him a local hero and gave him a tale to entertain his grandchildrenwith. His big catch took the bait at 5am and following a two-and-a-halfhour struggle he managed to land a sixty-two kilo catfish measuring overtwo metres. Michal was on shore at the time and jumped into a small fishingboat when he realized there was something huge at the end of the line. Andsure enough for two and a half hours the catfish had the upper hand pullingthe boat for over a kilometer this way and back in an effort to get away.“We were going round and round and I just held on hoping he’d get tiredbefore I did - and eventually he did” Michal told Pr??vo. When he felt thepressure letting up he rowed the boat to shore and called for help. “WhenI saw the head emerge from the water it was so huge I nearly dropped therod and ran but I knew I couldn’t let this one get away,” he told thedaily Pr??vo later. The fish is long gone - with the help of many friends- but Michal K?™?­?? did pose for a happy snap with it just in case peoplefailed to believe the tale.



Czech tram in Volgograd, photo: WikipediaCzechs can feel right at home thousands of kilometers from their homeland,Mlad?? fronta Dnes reported this week, noting that outdated trams which aretaken out of operation in Prague and other cities frequently get anotherlease on life further east. At present there are former Czech trams runningin Slovakia, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and even NorthKorea. Amazingly in Volgograd, Russia the old Czech trams run in theunderground like the metro. So don’t be misled, if you see the typicalred tram passing by - you may not be in Prague. And if it’s being usedas an airplane -don’t board it.

Those who have never been to America get their image of the continent fromTV, movies, books and other media. It seems that this much has not changedsince the New World was discovered and the first news from the continentreached Europe. The National Gallery in Prague has launched an exhibitioncalled “Amerika k se??r??n?­”, or “Savouring America” whichpresents the New World through 16th to 19th century European prints. Abraham Bloemaert - ‘America’It’s hard to imagine that America was once not a part of the known world.The discovery of the continent by Europeans had a tremendous impact on theEuropean society of the time. Europeans were eager to learn the details ofthe mysterious land across the ocean, and the accounts provided byconquerors, travellers and missionaries were a very popular - and,indeed, the only - source of information about the New World. EvaBendov?? is the curator of the National Gallery’s new Savouring Americaexhibit. Anonymous engraver - ‘America’“The leitmotiv of the exhibition is the transformation of America fromthe early motifs of a wild and sensual, but at the same time pure, land tolater depictions of America. These already show America as a wealthy butsubjugated continent. You can see this in this particular print in whichAmerica is represented by a half-naked woman with a bonnet riding a wildanimal. She is crying and her bow and arrows are broken which symbolizesthe conquered America.”“The bulk of the exhibit features Dutch prints which illustrated some ofthe most significant works pertaining to America at that time, such as”Grand Voyages”, which was an editorial series by Theodor de Brypublished in nine volumes between 1580 and 1602. This became a very popularwork about what America looked like.”The name of the exhibition refers to cannibalism which appears in many ofthe earliest images. Ms Bendov?? says that while Catholic authors saw thediscovery as an opportunity to spread the Gospel among the native peoples,Protestants saw indigenous Americans as “noble savages”. Maarten van Heemskerck - ‘Battlefield in America in 1530′“The whole exhibition about America and its image in prints from the16th to 19th century is based on the fact that in many of these prints,especially the early ones, cannibalism features as one of the symbols ofthe New World. Early 16th century Protestant illustrations, which werebased on Columbus’ dairies and the letters of Amerigo Vespuci, side withthe native peoples and present America as a pure land disturbed by theconquerors and colonizers.”The exhibition Savouring America runs at the Schwarzenberg Palace atPrague Castle until October 26. For more details, visit
www.ngprague.cz.

Prague 2 district council is waging war on what it calls an ‘extremesituation’ on the capital’s Karlovo n??m?›st?­. Mayor Jana ??ernochov??has said that steps must be taken against the increasing number of drugaddicts, pickpockets and prostitutes found on the downtown Prague square. Karlovo n??m?›st?­ is one of the capital’s busiest transportinterchanges. Every day, thousands of commuters sprint from tram to bus tometro here and, as a tourist in Prague, you are highly likely to cross itin your travels. The square, which is lined by some impressive baroquearchitecture, is where Goethe’s Doctor Faust was supposed to have lived,but today the space plays host to some different sorts of inhabitants,which the district council would like to get rid of. Earlier today, Prague2 mayor Jana ??ernochov?? told me what she thought the problem was:“Unfortunately not only homeless people, but drug addicts and drugdealers have set up home on the square, and prostitutes too. The situationhas become untenable. So I have asked both the municipal and the statepolice to increase the number of patrols in the area. There are oftenmuggings on the square, and pickpockets operate in the public transportsystem in and around the area. The district council can’t control thesituation on its own, and that is why we have turned to the police. We wantthem to intervene in an aggressive way so that Karlovo n??m?›st?­ becomesonce more a quiet zone in the centre of Prague.”Jan ??ih??k is a spokesperson for the Municipal Police. He outlines themoves his organisation has just started to take to clean up the square: “The Municipal Police, in cooperation with the Police of the CzechRepublic are looking after Karlovo n??m?›st?­ and the surrounding area 24hours non-stop. And this is being carried out in cooperation with Prague 2.During the night, there are four municipal policemen there, and I don’tknow how many state policemen there are on Karlovo n??m?›st?­ and thesurrounding area.” And do you think that this is going to solve the problem?“I hope so. Because prevention is better than repression, and thesepolicemen stationed there are a good thing for the future and solving thissituation.”The Municipal Police have also organized several clear-ups on Karlovon??m?›st?­; last time just under 50 syringes, or bits of syringes, werefound. Prague 2 is discussing plans to overhaul Karlovo n??m?›st?­, and says thatconstruction work could start as soon as next year. We will soon see if thedistrict council’s first steps, before so much as even a stone is moved,succeed in giving the square a facelift.

The Czech polity has sidelined European rules that would need no invitation Czech railway coming and going the prerrogative to allotment to about delays. The verdict marks a victory on the road to the biggest paling driver, Czech Railways, which faces critical claims based likely the now claim of its services. However consumers’ groups are not like this at ease.

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