Předvoj

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The group Předvoj (German about Vorhut, also Avantgarde), also Revoluční skupina Předvoj (Revolutionary Group Předvoj), was a Czechoslovak anti-fascist resistance group that fought against the National Socialist occupation of the country during the time of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia . Předvoj was active from 1943 to 1945 and is mostly referred to as a left-wing to communist-oriented group of the Czechoslovak resistance from 1939 to 1945 . Many of the members were executed.

Alignment, classification

" The Revolutionary Group Předvoj is an organization of communist revolutionary workers, which was created in the Bohemia and Moravia by the amalgamation of remnants of the CPC organizations, supplemented by new workers who gained communist consciousness during the fascist occupation and who moved around of the Předvoj magazine . Předvoj as a whole considers itself a legitimate member of the CPC ... "

This verbally quite radical excerpt from the programmatic declaration of the group from the beginning of 1944 could serve as an explanation for a very contradictory assessment of this resistance group.

The economists Václav Průcha and Lenka Kalinová, who dealt with the economic concepts of some resistance groups, also concluded in 2005 that Předvoj's understanding of socialism as a perspective of revolutionary development was much closer to Soviet ideas than other left groups, and they underscore it Předvoj postulated the role of the proletariat. The former member of the group, Jiří Pergl, who had to fight several conflicts with the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (CPC) himself after 1948 , explains in an interview in 2014 that there was a very distant relationship between the group and the CPC because the Předvoj's positions were too far removed from Stalinist rhetoric; He also said that the CPC displeased some of the Jewish founding members of Předvoj ("Zionists").

In 2005, the editor of an anthology of the conference on Předvoj summarized the reasons for the controversial appreciation of the resistance group: the Předvoj group, which indeed risked a lot during the protectorate period, including the lives of its members, appeared in the post-war period, especially after the Communist takeover 1948, as too lax, not communist enough; after the velvet revolution of 1989 it was identified again with the old communist regime and therefore rejected.

Such a simplified approach is also criticized by the sociologist Alena Wagnerová in her essay on the Czech Marxist philosopher Karel Kosík ; Kosík was a member of Předvoj. Wagnerová emphasizes that most of the young people only discovered and internalized Marxist ideas in a situation of resistance and struggle. She considers this circumstance to be specific to this generation, from which the cultural elite recruited after the war. She only got to know the Stalinist varieties of socialism, the Moscow trials of the 1930s, the Hitler-Stalin Pact and practical party politics after the war. She also explains the phenomenon of the Prague Spring, where this generation, including many Předvoj activists, played an essential role. In opposition to them, she contrasts those who only joined the Communist Party after the war (after 1948), often out of followers. In a radio talk, Wagnerová then speaks of an "Evangelical-Communist resistance group". The historian Jan Kuklík puts it together in similar words: in the resistance groups formed in 1943/1944, young people who had no party experience at all got involved; they were enthusiastic about the ideals brought about by the radicalization of society. The historian Jan Smíšek , when he wrote about the group and their open confession of communism, used the term naivety.

history

Předvoj emerged as an illegal resistance group in the summer to the end of summer 1943 (there is also the 1942 information). They were students from various universities who came from among the Protestant youth of the parish of the Evangelical Church of the Bohemian Brethren in Prague-Smíchov (another resistance group, the Zpravodajská brigáda , was formed in the same environment ). Soon afterwards, the group established contacts with similar organizations not only in Prague but throughout the Protectorate, and new groups also formed in the Předvoj area. From these cells a dense network emerged in 1944, which became one of the largest resistance groups in the Protectorate and also maintained connections with some partisan groups . There were also contacts with leading members of the CCP's illegal central committee, such as Rudolf Vetiška .

There are contradicting statements about the size of the Předvoj resistance group: while today's KSM (Communist Youth Association) gives the number 2000, the sociologist Wagnerová speaks about the largest resistance organization of the time in Bohemia and Moravia with up to ten thousand members.

In the autumn of 1944 the Gestapo succeeded in decisively weakening the resistance group. The reason was that when some contacts were made (with the KPTsch, as well as with an alleged armed military organization) Gestapo agents received relevant information. In October 1944 the Gestapo attacked and arrested a large number of members of the resistance group, including almost the entire leadership, including Karel Hiršl , Václav Dobiáš and Jiří Staněk ; they were subjected to severe interrogation and torture and imprisoned in the Small Fortress Theresienstadt . Předvoj was still able to restore activity and contacts and worked until 1945.

Shortly before the end of the war, many members of the group were arrested. Václav Dobiáš was deported to Zwickau and executed there on April 10, 1945; After their arrest, other members of the resistance group were in the Small Fortress Theresienstadt , where they were also executed on May 2, 1945 with a group of almost 70 prisoners.

activity

In the beginning, the publication of the illegal magazine Předvoj was one of the most important activities of the resistance group. It served the ideological confrontation with the reality of the protectorate and the preparation of a national social revolution with the aim of building a socialist society. Because there was a high proportion of young students from various technical schools in the group, the magazine Boj mladých (Struggle of Youth) was published especially for this target group from around May 1944 ; they later established themselves as a subgroup of Předvoj under the same name. Karel Kosík was entrusted with the management of this magazine. Between March and October 1944, eight issues with an edition of 500 copies of the magazine were mentioned, each copy being read by several hundred people. In addition, leaflets directed against the occupation as well as agitation and mobilization documents were printed, Předvoj also made use of numerous contacts and connections in companies. At the end of April 1945 American and Soviet aircraft attacked Blansko with the aim of weakening the Wehrmacht's defense capabilities; the attack took place according to the information provided by Předvoj.

The group also participated in acts of sabotage . Such actions were carried out by various military troops and departments, which were later referred to as Národní revoluční armáda (NRA, German National Revolutionary Army). As far as is known, some incendiary bombs were detonated in Prague , the power supply at the airport was disrupted and attempts are known to derail trains. The assassination attempt on SS officer August Gölzer in Brno, carried out in February 1945 by Alois Bauer and Vladimír Blažka , both members of Předvoj / NRA, also went unnoticed for a long time .

Members, composition

From a sociological point of view, the composition of the group was not uniform. The group consisted of students from various universities and young people who met in a parish in Prague, as well as young workers from communist organizations in the north of Prague.

Some of the famous members and activists of the Předvoj resistance group:

Trivia

After all stages in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia were closed in September 1944, the Divadlo satiry (Theater for Satire, today Divadlo ABC ) prepared a literary-cabaret trilogy, the content of which was based on the programmatic declaration of the Předvoj group and mocked the situation in the Protectorate . It was performed illegally a number of times, the first time in public (after the Liberation) on May 18, 1945.

Jaroslav Suk , who was convicted in a show trial with members of the Hnutí revoluční mládeže (HRM, Revolutionary Youth Movement) by Petr Uhl after the breakdown of the Prague Spring in 1971 and was later expatriated, mentions in a contribution that the Předvoj group was a member of the opposition group HRM Idol.

annotation

  1. ↑ In some sources the Czechoslovak Church is erroneously mentioned here .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Programmatic declaration of the Předvoj group , quoted in from: Filip Bartůšek: Životopis odbojáře Karla Hiršla, oběti 2. světové války , online at: archiv.prirodniskola.cz/
  2. ↑ Václav Průcha, Lenka Kalinová: Koncepce budoucí hospodářské a sociální politiky v československém odboji za druhé světové války , in: Acta Oeconomica Pragensia , 3/2005, p. 96, online at: vse.cz
  3. ↑ a b c Ivana Myšková: Ing. Jiří Pergl (1925–2015) , narrative reproduction of an interview recorded by I. Myšková with J. Pergl on August 28, 2014, prepared as part of the Paměť národa (Memory of the Nation) project Joint project of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes together with the Czech broadcaster Český rozhlas and the Post Bellum Association , online at: pametnaroda.cz/
  4. ↑ Vendula Běláčková in the introduction to the anthology edited by her and Václav Lachout with contributions to the conference Sdružení domácího odboje a partyzánů Předvoj 1943–1945 , 2005, cited above. based on: Sdružení domácího odboje a partyzánů Předvoj 1943–1945 , online at: zasvobodu.cz / ...
  5. ↑ a b c d e Alena Wagnerová: Ještě o Karlu Kosíkovi , in: Listy 4/2006, online at: listy.cz / ...
  6. ↑ Hergot s Alenou Wagnerovou: Rudý předvoj Božího království , an interview by the Český rozhlas radio station on April 10, 2017, online at: wave.rozhlas.cz / ...
  7. ↑ Druhý odboj , an interview by Vladimír Kučera with the historians Jan Kuklík, Petr Koura and Jan Boris Uhlíř in the Historical Military Institute, report by the TV station Česká televize from June 4, 2008, online at: ceskatelevize.cz/
  8. ↑ Jan Smíšek: “Chováme se jako revolucionáři?” R. Richta a příběh mezioborového týmu , in: Marathon 4/1997, quoted. after reprint, online at: sds.cz / ...
  9. ↑ a b c d e Předvoj organizace , short keyword of the online encyclopedia Vševěd, online at: encyklopedie.vseved.cz / ...
  10. ↑ a b c Školákem v Protektorátu. Památníku Terezín project , online at: skolakemvprotektoratu.pamatnik-terezin.cz / ...
  11. ↑ a b c d e Z kroniky smíchovského sboru - odboj , chronicle of the parish in the Prague-Smíchov district about the resistance groups Předvoj and Zpravodajská brigáda , material from the parish of the Evangelical Church of the Bohemian Brethren (about the history of the district), online at: ccesmichov .cz / ...
  12. ↑ a b Václav Vlk: OSOBNOST: In memoriam Oldřicha Černého , in: Neviditelný pes online portal, April 9, 2012, online at: neviditelnypes.lidovky.cz / ...
  13. ↑ a b c František Kovanda: Připomínáme si zatčení "Předvoje" nacisty , portal ksm.cz, May 14, 2007, online at: ksm.cz/
  14. ↑ Zdeněk Hoření: Věrni svému názvu , interview with the founder of Předvoj Boris Šesták, in: Haló noviny (May 20, 2013), online at: halonoviny.cz / ... ( archive )
  15. ↑ Matěj Metelec: Revoluční skupina Předvoj: 75 let od popravy mladých odbojářů , news magazine A2larm, May 5, 2020, online at: a2larm.cz / ...
  16. ↑ Bombardování Blanska v dubnu 1945 , report on the website of the municipality of April 25, 2009, online at: blansko.cz/
  17. ↑ Jiří Skoupý: Případ zapomenutého atentátu , in: II. Světová , Extra Publishing, Prague 2016, 2016/4, pages 22-25, ISSN 1805-0298, quoted. according to material from the Brno City Encyclopedia, online at (cache): encyklopedie.brna.cz / ... , page 2
  18. ↑ Till Janzer: Resistance in the Protectorate: the unknown assassination attempt in Brno , a report in Radio Praha of April 22, 2017, online at: radio.cz / ...
  19. ↑ Vladimír Just: Divadlo satiry , keyword in: Česká divadelní encyklopedie (Czech theater encyclopedia ), online at: encyklopedie.idu.cz / ...
  20. ↑ Jaroslav Suk: Miloš Hájek statečný, vtipný a moudrý , in: paměť a dějiny 1/2016, a publication by ÚSTR , online at: ustrcr.cz / ...