(AND “USEFUL”USE OF WORD “TERRORIST”)
Translated and commentated by Rodney Atkinson
The following report of an attack on a rather unpopular monument to “Czech-German reconciliation” is from a German, euro-federalist source. Readers must remember the obnoxious German Nazi regime which terrorised the Czechs from 1939 to 1945 and in particular the murderous rule of Heydrich in Prague. The regime had the full support of the Germans in Czechoslovakia – the “Sudeten Germans” and their expulsion after the war was an understandable reaction to their support for the Nazis. The Sudeten German question was kept alive by the expellees in Bavaria from the war-time period until today. The Sudeten Germans were led by many who had been active in the Nazi regime and who had served under Heydrich. For years they were regarded as far right extremists but in recent years ministers from the Social Democrat Government – including Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer – have addressed their conferences.
The use of the word “terrorist” (see below) to describe an attack on a piece of stone is a dangerous prelude to the now popular use of “terrorism” to justify war. Berlin has recently adapted the Americans’ case against terrorism to mean that all abuses of human rights (especially in Africa) can justify military intervention – and the building of a “European Army”. This policy was used to “justify” the illegal war against Yugoslavia but is totally against the principles established at the Nuremberg Trials- ie that humanitarian help must not be a pretext for war.
BUT WE CAN SEE CLEARLY HOW THE SUDETEN QUESTION IN THE CZECH REPULIC IS BEING USED TO JUSTIFY FUTURE INTERVENTION. AND THE USE OF THE WORD “TERRORISM” FOR THIS MINOR INCIDENT IS A “USEFUL” STEP IN THAT PROCESS.
Rodney Atkinson June 2003
Attack on “German Czech Reconciliation Cross”
Report “Sudwest Aktiv”, 31st May 2003
Reconciliation between Czechs and Germans suffers another blow. At least that seems to be the lesson of an attempted attack on a symbol of reconciliation.
Last week, more or less at the last minute, the destruction of the German-Czech reconciliation cross was prevented in the east Bohemian town of Replice nad Metuji (in German Wekelsdorf). As Czech television reported explosives planted by unknown persons at the Memorial were about to go off. Only 15 minutes after the police managed to defuse the bomb the charge was due to explode.
Police described the planned attack as a “terrorist act”. Those responsible had scrawled across the monument the words “Death to the Germans”. The Cross commemorated the murder of Sudeten Germans by the Czech military after the end of the Second World War. It had been inaugurated by high ranking Czech and German politicians last year.
From the outset the monument caused bitter opposition from Czech nationalists. The Czech initiators of the monument received death threats. Last November unknown vandals painted swastikas on it. Czech politics has reacted in a remarkably calm and detached manner. President Vaclav Klaus, shortly after coming to office, praised the monument, albeit in an interview for the German language “Prager Zeitung”, a paper scarcely read by any Czechs.
