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just like their artists and singers (Kubelik, Emmy Destinn).
Their spirit is thoroughly anti-German, since throughout their history they had to defend themselves against the Germans. In this respect their attitude always was and always will be clear. They may be fully relied upon by the Allies as the pioneers and leaders of the anti-German barrier in Central Europe, both in the political and in the economic sphere. Being sincere friends of their Slav and Latin neighbours, the Czecho-Slovaks will always work for stability and co-operation among the non-German nations of Central Europe.
The Czecho-Slovaks and the War.
The significance of the British declaration may be gauged from the fact that at the outbreak of the war the Czecho-Slovaks have not only had no Army and no Government of their own, but even no united organisation and no leaders abroad. Their soldiers were conscripted in the Austrian Army, their journals were suppressed, their leaders (like Kramar, Rasin, Klofac, Burival and many others) were imprisoned and even sentenced to death. Thousands of Czech soldiers and civilians were shot for manifesting their sympathies with the Allies, and thousands of others have been interned like subjects of an enemy State. Austria-Hungary in which the German-Magyar minority rules the Slavs and Latins (Czecho-Slovaks, Poles, Ruthenes, Yugoslavs, Rumanians and Italians)
