布拉格起义

The Prague uprising (Czech: Pražské povstání) was a partially successful attempt by the Czech resistance movement to liberate the city of Prague from German occupation in May 1945, during the end of World War II. The preceding six years of occupation had fuelled anti-German sentiment and the rapid advance of Allied forces from the Red Army and the United States Army offered the resistance a chance of success.

On 5 May 1945, during the end of World War II in Europe, occupying German forces in Bohemia and Moravia were spontaneously attacked by civilians in an uprising, with Czech resistance leaders emerging from hiding to join them. The Russian Liberation Army (ROA), a collaborationist formation formed from former Soviet prisoners of war, defected and supported the insurgents. German forces counter-attacked, but their progress was slowed by barricades constructed by the insurgents. On 8 May, the Czech and German leaders signed a ceasefire allowing all German forces to withdraw from the city, but some Waffen-SS troops refused to obey. Fighting continued until 9 May, when the Red Army entered the nearly liberated city.

The uprising was brutal, with both sides committing several war crimes. German forces used Czech civilians as human shields and perpetrated several massacres. Violence against German civilians, sanctioned by the Czechoslovak government-in-exile, continued after the uprising, and was justified as revenge for the occupation or as a means to encourage Germans to flee. George S. Patton's Third United States Army was ordered by Supreme Allied Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower not to come to the aid of the Czech insurgents, which undermined the credibility of the Western powers in post-war Czechoslovakia.……

Background

German occupation

In 1938, the Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler, announced his intention to annex the Sudetenland, a region of Czechoslovakia with a high ethnic German population. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and French Prime Minister Édouard Daladier acquiesced to Hitler's demands at the Munich Agreement, in exchange for guarantees from Nazi Germany that no additional lands would be annexed. No Czechoslovak representatives were present at the negotiations.……

Military situation

During the spring of 1945, partisan forces in Bohemia and Moravia totalled about 120 groups, with a combined strength of around 7,500 people.……

Uprising

5 May

Staff of Czech Radio opposed to the occupation began the morning by broadcasting in the banned Czech language. The Bartoš Command and Communist groups met separately and both scheduled the armed uprising to begin 7 May. Czech citizens gathered in the streets, vandalised German inscriptions, and tore down German flags. Czechoslovak flags appeared openly in windows and on jacket lapels. Tram operators refused to accept Reichsmark or to give the stops in German, as was required by the occupiers. Some German soldiers were surrounded and killed.……

War crimes

German

German forces committed war crimes against Czech civilians throughout the uprising. Many people were killed in summary executions, and the SS used Czech civilians as human shields, forced them to clear barricades at gunpoint, and threatened to shoot hostages in revenge for German soldiers killed in action. When tanks were halted by barricades, they were known to fire into surrounding houses. After violently evicting or murdering the inhabitants, German soldiers looted and burned Czech houses and apartment buildings.……

Czech

The Czechoslovak government-in-exile planned to expel the German minority of Czechoslovakia in order to create an ethnically pure Czech-Slovak nation-state.……

Legacy

As "the greatest military action of the Czechs for freedom and national independence fought on their own territory," in the words of journalist Jindřich Marek, the Prague uprising became a national myth of the new Czechoslovak republic and the subject of much literature.

The Western Allies' failure to liberate Prague was seen as emblematic of their lack of concern for Czechoslovakia, first demonstrated by the Munich Agreement.……