Sudetenland (Czech and , ) is the German name used in English in the first
half of the 20th century for the western regions of Czechoslovakia
inhabited mostly by ethnic Germans, specifically the border areas
of Bohemia, Moravia,
and those parts of Silesia associated
with Bohemia.
The name
is derived from the Sudeten
mountains, though the Sudetenland extended beyond these
mountains which run along the border to Silesia and contemporary Poland
. The
German inhabitants were called
Sudeten Germans (German:
Sudetendeutsche, Czech:
Sudetští Němci, Polish:
Niemcy Sudeccy).
The German minority in Slovakia
, the
Carpathian Germans, is not
included in this ethnic category.
History
The areas later known as Sudetenland never formed a single
historical region,
which makes it difficult to distinguish the history of the
Sudetenland apart from that of Bohemia, until the advent of
nationalism and the coining of the term in the 19th century.
Early origins
The regions later called Sudetenland were situated on the borders
of the Kingdom of
Bohemia, which also
consisted of Moravia and other lands (Silesia, Lusatia, etc.).
After the extinction of the
Přemyslid dynasty, the kingdom was
ruled by the
Luxemburg, later
the
Jagiellonians and finally the
Habsburgs. Already from the second half of
the 13th century onwards the border regions of
Czech lands, called Sudetenland in the 20th
century, were settled by
ethnic
Germans, who were invited by the Bohemian kings – especially by
Ottokar II and
Wenceslaus II. The border was set by the
signing of the Peace of Eger in 1459.
From 1620 (loss of the
Bohemian
Revolt) onwards the Habsburgs gradually integrated the Kingdom
of Bohemia into their
monarchy,
and it remained a part of that realm until its dismemberment after
World War I. Conflicts between Czech and
German nationalists emerged in the 19th century, for instance in
the
Revolutions of 1848 in
the Habsburg areas: while the German-speaking population wanted
to participate in the building of a German nation state, the
Czech-speaking population insisted on keeping Bohemia out of such
plans.
Emergence of the term
German Wehrmacht forces in Sudetenland
City Teplice
In the wake of growing nationalism, the name "Sudetendeutsche"
(Sudeten Germans) emerged by the early 20th century. It originally
constituted part of a larger classification of three groupings of
Germans within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which also included
"Alpendeutsche" (Alpine Germans) in what later became the Republic
of Austria and "Balkandeutsche" (Balkan Germans) in Hungary and the
regions east of it. Of these three terms, only the term
"Sudetendeutsche" survived, because of the ethnic and cultural
conflicts within Bohemia.
Changes after World War I
After
World War I,
Austria-Hungary broke apart.
Late in October 1918,
an independent Czechoslovak state, consisting of the lands of the Bohemian
kingdom and areas belonging to the Kingdom of Hungary, was
proclaimed. The German deputies of Bohemia, Moravia, and
Silesia in the Imperial Parliament (
Reichsrat) referred to the
Fourteen Points of U.S.
President Woodrow Wilson and the therein granted right
of self-determination, and
attempted to negotiate the union of the German-speaking territories
with the new Republic of German Austria
, which itself aimed at joining Weimar Germany
.
However
Sudetenland was incorporated into a newly created Czechoslovakia, a multi-ethnic state of several nations: Czechs, Germans, Slovaks, Hungarians and
others. On 20 September 1918, the Prague
Government
asked the United
States
's consent for the annexation of the Sudetenland.
President
Woodrow Wilson sent ambassador
Archibald Coolidge into the newly
created state Czechoslovakia. After Coolidge became witness of Czech police brutality against peaceful Sudetengerman demonstrators (54 killed, among
them women and children ), Coolidge suggested the possibility of
ceding certain German-speaking parts
of Bohemia to Germany
(Cheb) and
Austria
(South Moravia and South Bohemia). He also
insisted that the German inhabited regions of West and North
Bohemia remain within Czechoslovakia. However, the American
delegation at the Paris talks, with Allen Dulles as the American's
chief diplomat who emphasized preserving the unity of the Czech
lands, decided not to follow Coolidge's proposal.
Four regional governmental units were established:
- German Bohemia
(Deutschböhmen), the regions of northern and western
Bohemia; proclaimed a constitutive state (Land) of the
German-Austrian Republic with Reichenberg
as capital, administered by a Landeshauptmann (state captain),
consecutively: Rafael Pacher (1857-1936), 29 October 1918 – 6
November 1918, and Rudolf Ritter von Lodgman von Auen (1877 -
1962), 6 November 1918 – 16 December 1918 (the last principal
city was conquered by the Czech army but he continued in exile,
first at Zittau in Saxony and then in Vienna, until 24 September
1919)
- Province Sudetenland, the regions
of northern Moravia and Austrian
Silesia
; proclaimed a constituent state of the
German-Austrian Republic with Troppau
as capital, governed by a Landeshauptmann:
Robert Freissler (1877-1950), 30 October 1918 – 18 December
1918
- Bohemian
Forest Region (Böhmerwaldgau), the region of Bohemian
Forest
/South
Bohemia
; proclaimed a district (Kreis) of the
existing Austrian Land of Upper
Austria; administered by Kreishauptmann (district
captain): Friedrich Wichtl (1872 - 1922) from 30 October
1918
- German South
Moravia (Deutschsüdmähren), proclaimed a District
(Kreis) of the existing Austrian land Lower Austria
, administered by a Kreishauptmann: Oskar
Teufel (1880 - 1946) from 30 October 1918.
The U.S. commission to the
Paris Peace Conference issued a
declaration which gave unanimous support for "unity of Czech
lands". In particular the declaration stated:
Several
German minorities in Moravia,
including German populations in Brno
, Jihlava
, and Olomouc
also attempted to proclaim their union with German
Austria, but failed.
The Czechs thus rejected the aspirations of the Sudeten Germans and
demanded the inclusion of the Sudetenland in their new state,
despite the presence of 23.4% (as of 1921) ethnic Germans, on the
grounds they had always been part of
Bohemia
and
Moravia. The
Treaty of Saint-Germain in 1919
affirmed the inclusion of the German-speaking territories within
the new state of Czechoslovakia.
However, over the next two decades, some Germans in the Sudetenland
continued to strive for a separation of the German inhabited
regions from Czechoslovakia.
Within the Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938)
According to the February 1921 census 3,123,000 Germans lived in
all Czechoslovakia, i.e. 23.4% of the total population.
The controversies between the Czechs and the German minority (which
constituted a majority in the Sudetenland areas) lingered on
throughout the 1920s, and intensified in the 1930s.
In the
years of Great Depression the
mostly mountainous regions populated by the German minority,
together with other peripheral regions in Czechoslovakia, were hurt by economic depression more than the
inland. Unlike the less developed regions (
Ruthenia,
Wallachia), there was a high
concentration of industry dependent on export (such as glass works,
textile industry, paper-making and
toy-making industry) and thus very vulnerable in the period of
global depression.For example: 60% of the
bijouterie and glass-making industry were
located in the Sudetenland, 69% of employees in this sector were
Germans, and 95% of
bijouterie and
78% of other glassware were produced for export. Then the
glass-making sector was affected by decreased spending power and
also by protective measures in other countries and many German
workers lost their work.
The high unemployment made people more open to populist and
extremist movements (
Communism,
Fascism and German
irredentism). In these years, the parties of
German nationalists and later the
Sudetendeutsche
Party (SdP) with its radical demands gained immense popularity
among
Germans in
Czechoslovakia.
Sudeten Crisis
Immediately after the Anschluss of Austria into the
Third Reich in March 1938, Hitler made
himself the advocate of ethnic Germans living in Czechoslovakia,
triggering the "Sudeten
Crisis".
On 24 April 1938 the SdP proclaimed the
Karlsbader Programm, which demanded in
eight points the complete equality between the
Sudetengermans
and the
Czech people. The
Czech president Beneš refused the
Karlsbader Programm.
In August, UK Prime Minister,
Neville Chamberlain, sent
Lord
Runciman to Czechoslovakia in order to see if he could obtain a
settlement between the Czechoslovak government and the Germans in
the Sudetenland. Lord Runciman's first day included meetings with
President Eduard Benes and Milan Hodza as well as directly meeting
the Sudeten Germans from Henlein's SdP. On the next day he met with
Dr and Mme Benes and later met non-Nazi Germans in his
hotel
[7074]
A full account of his report - including summaries of the
conclusions of his meetings with the various parties - which he
made in person to the Cabinet on his return to Britain is found in
the Document CC 39(38). Lord Runciman expresses sadness that he
could not bring about agreement with the various parties, but he
agreed with Lord Halifax that the time gained was important. He
reports on the situation of the Sudeten Germans, and he gave
details of four plans which had been proposed to deal with the
crisis, each of which had points which, he reported, made it
unacceptable to the other parties to the negotiations. The four
were: Transfer of the Sudetenland to the Reich; hold a plebiscite
on the transfer of the Sudetenland to the Reich, organize a Four
Power Conference on the matter, create a federal Czechoslovakia. At
the meeting, he said that he was very reluctant to offer his own
solution; he had not seen this as his task. The most that he said
was that the great centres of opposition were in Eger and Asch, in
the north-western corner of Bohemia, which contained about 800,000
Germans and very few others. He did say that the transfer of these
areas to Germany would almost certainly be a good thing; however,
he did add that the Czechoslovak army would certainly oppose this
very strongly, and that Dr. Benes had said that they would fight
rather than accept it.
British
Prime Minister Neville
Chamberlain met with Adolf Hitler
in Berchtesgaden
on 15 September and
agreed to the cession of the
Sudetenland. Three days later, French Prime Minister
Édouard Daladier did the same.
No Czechoslovak representative was invited to these
discussions.
Chamberlain met Hitler in Godesberg
on September 22 to
confirm the agreements. Hitler however, aiming to use the
crisis as a pretext for war, now demanded not only the annexation
of the Sudetenland but the immediate military occupation of the
territories, giving the Czechoslovakian army no time to adapt their
defence measures to the new borders. To achieve a solution, Italian
prime minister
Benito Mussolini
suggested a conference of the major powers in Munich and on
September 29, Hitler, Daladier and
Chamberlain met and agreed to Mussolini's proposal (actually
prepared by
Hermann Göring) and
signed the
Munich Agreement
accepting the immediate occupation of the Sudetenland. The
Czechoslovak government, though not party to the talks, promised to
abide by the agreement on
September
30.
The Sudetenland was relegated to Germany between October 1 and
October 10, 1938. The Czech part of Czechoslovakia was subsequently
invaded by
Germany in March 1939, with a portion being annexed and the
remainder turned into a satellite state, the
Protectorate of Bohemia and
Moravia. Slovakia declared its independence from
Czechoslovakia, becoming the
Slovak Republic, a Nazi
ally.
Sudetenland as part of Nazi Germany
The Sudetenland was initially put under military administration,
with General
Wilhelm Keitel as
Military governor. On 21 October 1938, the annexed
territories were divided, with the southern parts being
incorporated into the neighbouring Reichsgaue
Oberdonau
and
Niederdonau.
The
northern and western parts were reorganized as the Reichsgau
Sudetenland, with the city of Reichenberg (present-day
Liberec) established as its capital. Konrad Henlein (now openly a
NSDAP member) administered the district first as
Reichskommissar (until 1
May 1939) and then as
Reichsstatthalter (1 May 1939–4 May
1945).
Sudetenland consisted of three political
districts: Eger (with Karlsbad
as capital), Aussig (Aussig
) and Troppau
(Troppau).
Shortly after the annexation, the Jews living in the Sudetenland
were widely persecuted. Only a few weeks afterwards, "
Kristallnacht" occurred. As elsewhere in
Germany, many synagogues were set on fire and numerous leading Jews
were sent to
concentration
camps. In later years, the Nazis transported up to 300,000
Czech and Slovak Jews to
concentration camps. where 90% of
them were killed or died. Jews and Czechs were not the only
afflicted peoples; German Socialists, communists and pacifists were
widely persecuted as well. Some of the German Socialists fled the
Sudetenland via Prague and London to other countries. The "
Gleichschaltung" would permanently damage
the community in the Sudetenland.
Despite this, on 4 December 1938 there were elections in Reichsgau
Sudetenland, in which 97.32% of the adult population voted for
NSDAP. About a half million Sudeten Germans
joined the
Nazi Party which was 17.34% of the
German population in Sudetenland (the average NSDAP participation
in
Nazi Germany was 7.85%). This means
the Sudetenland was the most "pro-Nazi" region in the Third Reich.
Because of their knowledge of the
Czech
language, many Sudeten Germans were employed in the
administration of the
Protectorate of Bohemia and
Moravia as well as in Nazi organizations (Gestapo, etc.). The
most notable was
Karl Hermann
Frank: the SS and Police general and Secretary of State in the
Protectorate.
Expulsions and resettlement after World War II
After the end of World War II, the
Potsdam Conference in 1945 determined
that Sudeten Germans would have to leave Czechoslovakia (see
Expulsion of
Germans after World War II). As a consequence of the immense
hostility against all Germans that had grown within Czechoslovakia
due to Nazi behavior, the overwhelming majority of Germans were
expelled (while the relevant Czechoslovak legislation provided for
the remaining Germans who were able to prove their anti-Nazi
affiliation). The number of expelled Germans in the early phase
(spring-summer 1945) is estimated to be around 500,000 people.
About 244,000 Germans were allowed to remain in Czechoslovakia.
Many German refugees from Czechoslovakia are represented by the
Sudetendeutsche
Landsmannschaft.
Many of
the Germans who stayed in Czechoslovakia later emigrated to
West
Germany
(more than 100,000). As the German
population was transferred out of the country, the former
Sudetenland was resettled, mostly by
Czechs
but also by other nationalities of Czechoslovakia:
Slovaks,
Volhynian Czechs,
Gypsies and
Hungarians (though the Hungarians were forced
into this and later returned home - see
Hungarians in
Slovakia#Population exchanges). Some areas remained depopulated
for several strategic reasons (extensive mining, military interests
etc.) or simply for their lack of attractions.
There remained areas
with noticeable German minorities only in the westernmost
borderland around Cheb
; in the
Egerland German minority organizations
continue to exist.
In the 2001 census, approximately 40,000 people in the Czech
Republic claimed German ethnicity.
See also
Notes
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