English Translation

- 4 - give the redeployment team, if they are serious and the sooner the better, it can be too late and the catastrophe threatens and we must still be able to maintain our army!" At this point it is especially evident that Švec sees not the catastrophe in a victory of Bolshevism, but in the disintegration of the Czech legionary army. This letter offers the best glimpse into the mental condition of Colonel Svec, in front of the eye of the critical observer, already the picture, which is well known from the period after l9l8, emerges, showing the crippled state of Czechoslovakia as a helpless attachment of the Entente Powers The official report on the end of Colonel Svec drafts about the internal decay of the Czech troop divisions a very vivid presentation that leaves no doubt about their correctness in view of the other sources.Desertion, marauding, refusal to obey, insidiousness, open distrust and rebellion, these were the manifestations that took place almost daily in those octo-bera- ries also in the regiment of the Supreme Švec and As time progressed, more and more increased. The official report culminates in the sentences: "Just as our soldier loses faith in the Russians, he loses belief in the alliances, It seems to him that he is deserted, lonely." Another reason for the official report for this bleak mental situation, for this almost psychotic mood in the ranks of the legionaries, remains of great importance. It reads: "There is a lack of a generally understandable idea for which one fights. The fighting spirit in our departments is only under the deep impression of the battle goal: the attainment of the independence of the Czechoslovak people. When the Volga Front was set up, it became clear to the soldier that the goal was to save Russia and create an Eastern Anti-Deugian Front. This idea was sufficient as long as the soldier glavote against it. In time he did not see fit.set... As for the second goal, the formation of an anti-German and possibly anti-Bolshevist front of the gent civilized Velt on the Volga, it became more and more clear to our soldiers that this world would come to the Wölga at an even slower pace and he began to lose confidence that it would come at all.... The guilt of these circumstances made the battle targets increasingly foggy and over it our soldiers lost the belief that even these foggy goals can be achieved."