APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110008-5
trolled by German Catholics. Interestingly, the incident that touched off the fighting was the defenestration of a number of Prague town counselors by their angry Hussite compatriots, a unique form of violence (the victim is literally thrown through a window) which has twice since played a prominent role in Czech history.
The Hussite Wars, which lasted about 20 years, ravaged Bohemia and left a legacy of bitterness and distrust. Basic issues were left unresolved, and the Hussite movement remained active. With the land thus divided, powerful nobles extended their estates at the expense of both the church and the crown. In time, the succession to the Bohemian throne again became confused, passing briefly into Hungarian and Polish hands before being successfully claimed for the House of Hapsburg by Ferdinand I of Austria in 1526.
Although a precursor of later traumatic developments, the advent of Hapsburg rule had little immediate impact on the political, social, and economic structure of the Czech Lands. As legal masters of a complex domain embracing Austria and Hungary as well, Ferdinand and his successors were content to share their royal power with the local church and lay nobility. Thus it was that in an era when the Hapsburgs were becoming more and more involved with the Counter-Reformation, Czech Protestantism drew fresh strength from Luther's teachings and placed Prague on a collision course with Vienna.
Frictions between the House of Hapsburg and native Bohemian nobles finally erupted into open warfare in 1618, setting off a series of conflicts that raged over much of central Europe for 30 years. Once again, hostilities were precipitated by the defenestration of Catholic officials—in this instance, the appointed representatives of Ferdinand II—by assembled Protestant dignitaries in Prague. This time, however, retribution was swift in coming. After joining forces with Maximilian I of Bavaria (the head of the Catholic League) and the Elector of Saxony, Ferdinand dealt a decisive defeat to the Czech armies at the Battle of White Mountain, near Prague, on 8 November 1620. From that day forward—and for the next 300 years—traditional Czech independence and civil liberties were forfeit to the Austrian crown.
The leaders of the rebellion were promptly beheaded. Catholicism was proclaimed the area's only religion. The German language was elevated to a higher status than Czech. Religious and political persecution forced most of the surviving nobility to flee, and their estates were handed over to a new gentry composed primarily of Catholics from southern Germany who had supported the Hapsburg cause. All high administrative offices were taken over by crown appointees, and the powers of town and village officials were sharply curtailed. Deprived of both political and intellectual leaders, the Czech nation was reduced to a mass of serfs.
Although the Czech Lands became mere provinces of the Hapsburg monarchy, their resilient inhabitants did not lose their sense of national identity. Regional patriotism surfaced once again in the more relaxed atmosphere of 18th century "enlightened despotism" and subsequently gathered strength under the conditions of comparative prosperity and intellectual freedom that prevailed during much of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Moreover, despite the Hungarians' continuing treatment of the local populace as subhuman, Slovakia experienced a parallel national revival. Thus, when World War I offered an opportunity to win independence from the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, there was no dearth of capable Czech and Slovak leaders—men like Thomas G. Masaryk, Eduard Benes, and Milan Stefanik—willing and able to join forces to launch what turned out to be a finely orchestrated and highly successful campaign to attract widespread international support for their cause.
The establishment of Czechoslovakia as an independent democratic republic was proclaimed on 28 October 1918, and its self-appointed National Assembly elected Thomas Masaryk to be the country's first President a few days later. Masaryk was returned to office in the general election which followed final determination of the new state's boundaries and remained there until old age and ill health forced him to retire in 1935. Under his leadership, Czechoslovakia developed into a relatively liberal, prosperous, and democratic nation dependent for its security on treaties linking it with Romania, Yugoslavia, France, and ultimately, the U.S.S.R. Nevertheless, Eduard Benes, Masaryk's friend and foreign minister who succeeded him as President, was confronted with some formidable problems. Economic difficulties born of the worldwide depression were aggravating old minority-based internal tensions. Moreover, Hitler had already exploited this situation to foster the organization of a large—and growing—Nazi-oriented Sudeten German Party which was calling for autonomy for all Germans in the republic and being generally disruptive politically.
Then, in 1938, when Hitler openly espoused the cause of self-determination for the Sudeten Germans and began levying political and territorial demands on Prague, Czechoslovakia's allies deserted her. The Soviets made a point of announcing their readiness to
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110008-5
