The Czechoslovak Review/Volume 3/Siberian Fighters Returning

Siberian Fighters Returning

Little has been heard recently of the Czechoslovak soldiers in Siberia. Just a year ago they appeared for the first time in the war bulletins as an Allied force, the very existence of which was unknown up to that time by the average citizen of Allied lands. For several months they held the attention of the world and every one sang their praises. They scattered the Red Guards, wherever they came in contact with them; they saved Siberia from Bolshevik rule and German exploitation; they rebuilt broken down tunnels on the Siberian railroad and helped the Russians to organize a new government. Some of their regiments got as far Vladivostok, but when President Wilson early in August announced that he would send American soldiers to assist the Czechs, the troops at Vladivostok promptly marched back to the Urals to help their hardly pressed brothers to keep the Bolsheviki out of Siberia. American, Japanese, British, French and Italian troops landed at Vladivostok in August and September, but all they did was to clean out the remnants of Bolshevik bands in the Amur country. If they had pushed forward at once and joined the Czechoslovaks between the Urals and the Volga, the Bolshevik bogy would have disappeared long since.

The Czechoslovaks fought steadily from May till December. With them it was not a question of four days in the trenches and four days or a week in the rest area. They were on duty all the time, every day and every night; their casualties were enormous; the strain on their endurance was ever more severe. And when the armistice with Germany came, when they heard that the Czechoslovak state for which they battled in Siberia was a reality, when they saw the Allied soldiers in Siberia spend their time in billets and make no move to get to the front, what wonder that finally the Czechoslovak soldiers themselves decided to withdraw from the war area and let the newly raised Siberian army do the fighting.

At the end of November General Milan Štefanik, Czechoslovak minister of war, arrived in Ekaterinburg, at that time head quarters of the Russian branch of the Czechoslovak National Council. This revolutionary organization, elected at a congress of the delegates of the soldiers, surrendered their authority into the hands of the man who represented the government of their liberated country. Stefanik confirmed General Syrový in command of the army and appointed Bohdan Pavlu representative of the Czechoslovak government at Omsk, the seat of Admiral Kolchak’s authority. Dr. Václav Girsa who was in charge of Czechoslovak interests in Vladivostok ever since the first three regiments detrained there in May was continued in his post at the Pacific port, where all the intricate diplomatic negotiations concerning the Russian muddle took place. Out of these long negotiations came forth the plan to have the Allied troops in Siberia make themselves useful by guarding stretches of the long iron road from the Pacific to the Urals, so as to enable the newly raised Siberian troops to push into European Russia. In the division of territory among the various Allies the Czechoslovaks were assigned the line between Omsk and Irkutsk. There they are today, performing the comparatively easy duty of guarding the only artery of traffic from attack of local Bolshevik bands. They ride up and down in their armored cars and occasionally pursue the bandits into the wild Siberian forests. Their technical experts have taken charge of hundreds of factories and shops, and as far as repairing railroad rolling stock is concerned, they have beaten the engineers of all nations, including the Americans; for the Czechoslovaks know how to handle the Russian worker, and that is more than the Americans can do.

After General Štefanik had settled the affairs of his countrymen in Siberia, he hastened to Paris by sailing around Asia, in order to make arrangements for the return of the boys home. Since the Allies could not make up their minds to undertake an offensive against Lenine, there was nothing to be gained by leaving the Czechoslovaks indefinitely thousands of miles from their homes. Much complaint has been voiced in this country about the hard lot of American soldiers who have been fighting for the greater part of a year in the province of Archangel, and agitation is now carried on to bring home the American “exiles” in Siberia who did not have the luck to see any fighting at all. What about the Czechs who have been away from their families four or five years, of whom so many are married, who suffered tremendous casualties, whose equipment and food the doughboy would scorn? They feel that they have done their work and they want to go home.

Two shiploads of Czechoslovak invalids have already sailed for Bohemia from the harbor of Vladivostok by way of Suez. One hundred invalids have arrived in San Francisco on May 27, and it is now announced that the American government will take charge of the transportation home of the entire Czechoslovak force which still numbers about 55,000. At home the boys are expected with much impatience, and nothing will be too good for them, when they get there; for the nation realizes that it was their appearance in Siberia at the right moment which induced the Allied governments to extend full recognition to the Czechoslovaks.

A year ago the Czechoslovaks were lauded as heroes. Today those that praised them have forgotten them, but on the other hand the American sympathizers of the Bolsheviks take every opportunity to knock the men who gave the first serious blow to Lenine and Trotzky. Radical papers call the Czechoslovaks scabs because they were supposed to fight a proletarian government in the interest of imperialism, and place on their shoulders the blame for any unfortunate occurences in Siberia, such as the notorious refugee trains. And so one welcomes with special joy an article, like the story of the American soldiers in Siberia by Kenneth L. Roberts in the Saturday Evening Post of May 17.

Speaking of the policy of non-interference which was imposed on the American expedition after its arrival in Siberia the author mentions the problem faced by American officers with reference to Turkish prisoners. They were worked at first under American guards, until somebody remembered that the United States was not at war with Turkey. They were then turned over to the Czechoslovaks.

“The Czechs were the goats of Siberia, if I may be permitted the expression. When one of the Allies wanted something done which it dared not or could not do itself, it allowed the Czechs to do it—made them the goats, as the saying goes. The Czechs, being in Siberia for the sole purpose of fighting any person or persons who were against their principles, ideals and aims, had none of the qualms that affected larger and more cautions nations. The Czechs were as qualmless as it is possible for any one to be and still be a desirable member of the community. Were the Czechs at war with the Turks? Really, they couldn’t say. But the Turks were with the Germans, weren’t they? Yes. Well, then there was no room for argument. “Just hand over your Turks. We’ll put them to work, dang’em; and if one of them tries to get away—” (business of killing a Turk with neatness and dispatch).

“Sometimes the Intelligence Section of one of the Allies would unearth a particularly virulent Bolshevik or German. Being handicapped by the non-interference shibboleth an Intelligence officer would surreptitiously acquaint Czech headquarters with the facts in the case. And the Czechs, recking not a whit whom they interfered with so long as they interfered for the general good, would promptly go out on the trail and make things unpleasant for some one. The Czechs are good people—honest, intelligent, courteous, brave, clean, and what the British call top-hole scrappers—the salt of the earth.”

Mr. Roberts goes on to speak of saluting, as practised by Americans toward Allied officers and by Allies toward American officers.

“The Czechs, when we first arrived for the purpose—as we and they believed—of helping them to fight the Bolsheviks, could not show their appreciation and esteem of the Americans to a sufficient degree. They saluted American officers as punctiliously as our own men saluted them. They saluted so snappily and energetically that every one within a radius of thirty yards knew what was happening. They clicked their heels together until the sparks flew, stared straight at the recipient with an affectionate smile, and kept their hands at their cap brims until the salute had been returned. At the beginning it was not at all unusual for Czech enlisted men to salute every uniformed American they met—enlisted men, non-commisioned officers and commissioned officers. We were their brothers in arms; they could not do the uniform too much honor.

“But as time went on and American fighting forces failed to go to the assistance of the Czechs in spite of their repeated appeals for just one company to bolster up the rapidly dropping morale of their fighters, the Czech saluting began to lose its verve and elan, so to speak. Czech enlisted men on approaching an American officer would suddenly become deeply interested in something on the opposite side of the street. Czech officers would pass by deep in thought. When we first arrived, it was unusual to see a Czech pass an American officer without saluting. By the end of December it was unusual to see a Czech salute an American.

“To speak frankly, all but a very few of the Americans in Siberia considered that the Czechs were justified in their attitude. The Czechs expected us to come to their assistance; the Americans expected to go, wanted to go and were ready to go. The Czechs needed our help, and needed it badly. Ambassador Morris urged them to keep on fighting; and since he was regarded as the mouthpiece of the Administration his words were construed by Czechs and Americans alike to mean that he would not ask them to keep on fighting, unless Americans were to be sent to their assistance.

They never were sent. The Administration probably knew what it was doing, when it prevented our forces from going to the help of the Czechs; but it never told the Czechs, and it never told the Americans either. Quite naturally, the Czechs did not have a very high opinion of the American policy there. At any rate it did not take either a careful or keen observer to discover that the manner in which the Czechs saluted the Americans was an accurate barometer of their feeling toward them.”

Every Czechoslovak is proud of those brave men of his race who played such a noble part in Siberia. And when one reads scurrilous remarks in radical sheets about those hard-fisted, straight-hitting men, it is comforting to remember that every correspondent and every observer who came in contact with the Czechoslovak soldiers in Siberia had nothing but highest praise for their deeds and their behaviour.