National Minorities in the Western Borderlands of Czech Silesia from the Perspective of State Security Corps in 1945

• Authors: Lubomír Hlavienka

Title variants

PL

National Minorities in the Western Borderlands of Czech Silesia from the Perspective of State Security Corps in 1945

• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

In May 1945, Western Silesia, originally inhabited predominantly by the German population, found itself in a completely new situation. The region was once again controlled by the Czechoslovak state power, which wanted to re-organise life in the borderlands. Therefore, it was necessary to handle the issue of the German population, as well as the influx of new settlers from the Czechoslovak inland and abroad. Changes took place on the other side of the border as well, and neighbouring Germany was replaced by Poland. These aspects gave rise to a completely new security situation that the newly formed security corps had to address. The article attempts to follow the relationship of the Czechoslovak security corps to the members of other nationalities who lived in the researched area or with those whom they came into contact while guarding the non-fixed state borders. Research shows that, in 1945, the National Security Corps (SNB) indeed took qualitatively different approaches to various nationalities, ranging from strong hostility and distrust towards the Germans, through vigilance towards the Polish, to an ambiguous attitude towards re-emigrants.

Keywords

EN

Czechoslovakia; national issue; national security; Silesia; Third Republic

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Opolski, Instytut Politologii
• Journal: Border and Regional Studies
• Year: 2021
• Volume: 9
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 7-37

Dates

published

2021-05-10

Contributors

author

Lubomír Hlavienka

• Silesian University in Opava

Identifiers

DOI

10.25167/brs2965