Czechoslovakia could not defend itself against Germany

Czechoslovakia could not and should not have efficiently defended itself against Nazi Germany in 1938, after the Munich agreement that accorded its borderland to Germany, Czech historians said today.

From the military viewpoint, Czechoslovakia stood no chance of defending itself and no European state would have helped it, they said at the conference "Czechoslovakia and the Crisis of Democracy in Central Europe in the 1930s and 1940s. Search for Ways Out."

Besides, it would have been called the initiator of a world war, which would have threatened its post-war renewal in its original border.

A trauma similar to that Czechs have due to Czechoslovakia's capitulation was experienced by the nations that defended themselves, but their defence was not successful or only lasted for days or weeks, historian Jindrich Dejmek said.

However, some historians still say that Czechoslovakia ought to have defended itself.

Jan Nemecek from the Historical Institute of the Academy of Sciences said they did not take into account Czechoslovakia's further fate.

Nemecek said defence would have had a positive impact on national morale, but it would have had a disastrous impact on Czechoslovakia's renewal as it would have been called the initiator of a world war.

As a result, Czechoslovakia may not have been renewed in its full extent, Nemecek said.

Nemecek said that in 1939 U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt was thinking of the Czech Lands becoming a permanent part of Germany, while Slovakia was to be independent within his peace efforts.

After an unsuccessful defence there would not have been any chance for a post-war renewal.

Historians referred to the opinion of Czech lawyer, historian and journalist Ivo Duchacek. He wrote 50 years ago that Czechoslovakia was an eloquent testimony that a small land-locked state, living in the shadow of a totalitarian power, could only under exceptional circumstances become a real sovereign architect of its fate.

Nemecek said the ideas that were the motto of the conference were valid even at present.

The role of a small nation has always been limited by its size, Nemecek said.

It was so 70 years ago, it is so now in the EU and this also relates to Georgia and other countries, he added.