HiSTORY

 To commemorate the 75th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day, the English section of Radio Slovakia International has prepared a special series on the Slovak, or rather the Czechoslovak-British wartime connections. Over the next six episodes, Zuzana Botiková will walk you through some historic milestones, places and personal stories that shaped the outcome of World War II in the Central European region. The first episode looks at the First Czechoslovak Republic, during those years which may be described  as “the calm before the storm”.

 The second episode of this special “We shall never surrender” podcast series is dedicated to those men and women who escaped from the fascist Slovak state in order to join the resistance against the Nazis. We will speak about the routes they took, the obstacles they overcame on the journey, and the destinations at which they arrived.

 In the third episode of this “We shall never surrender” podcast we will take a walk around some of those places in the UK where thousands of Czech and Slovak soldiers spent time during the war - in training, learning the English language, and socialising with the locals.

The fourth episode looks closer at two military operations in which Czechoslovak soldiers based in the UK got involved. One was a comprehensive air combat mission, with the other being perhaps the most notable as well as controversial act of Czechoslovak resistance. Both of these stories have a name starting with the letter A: Altsterufer and Anthropoid.

Even though the official name of the 1944 armed insurgency would suggest that only Slovaks were involved, the truth is that people from 35 nations and nationalities took part in the uprising, thanks to which Slovakia officially joined the alliance of countries that won the Second World War. This fifth episode introduces the British intelligence officers who took part in the Slovak National Uprising.

In the final episode of this historic series dedicated to the Czechoslovak-British wartime connections, we will speak about what happened to those connections after May 8, 1945, when peace was declared in Europe.