The Sudetenland: The Trigger for WWII

Comments · 1.7K

• JE

  @jedetraktor_cz · 6 years ago (edited)

  Greetings from Sudetenland - Mikulášovice ( Nixdorf ) . Writing this , sitting in the house , formerly owned by ethnic germans , seized from them 74 years ago &nbsp; . You can see ghosts of the past all over here , if you care to look . Still we have old german inscriptions on houses , where shops used to be . In our part of Sudetenland , maybe 1/2 of pre-war houses are gone - some crumbled to ruins by neglect ... many intentionally set on fire after the war ....some were set on fire by their original owners - to deny them to newcomers &nbsp; ..... many more burned later by czechs to destroy all hope of germans to ever come back . And yet more demolished in massive scale clean-up programme in 1960´s + 70´s . &nbsp;Where somebody had a kitchen - now 50-60 year old trees grow , amongs piles of bricks and stones . One curious consequence : with huge surplus of housing , there was very few buildings constructed since the war . As result , whole region looks like one huge open-air architecture museum .... most of the houses being from late 19th or early 20th century . Some of them with no repairs being done since the war . This is getting somewhat better only in recent years &nbsp;. <br><br>Population here is mixture of Czechs , Slovaks , Hungarians , Gypsies and Germans...or rather their descendants . Most of the people here identify themselves as Czech , even when having some other ancestry . The figure &nbsp;i have on Germans is, &nbsp;that about 500 000 were allowed to stay. Also one unmentioned way to stay for germans was if they were skilled in some craft , which was in high demand and short supply &nbsp;. Quite a lot of people here have german surnames ....but i would say that 99,9% of them are fully assimilated and dont even speak german any more . For example , my uncle was born to German mother and Czech father in 1950´s . They spoke german at home , so when he went to school , he spoke almost no Czech and had to learn it . Now he is in his 60´s and doesnt speak German anymore , he even used to take classes to re-learn the german . <br><br>As a whole , i would say the region was pretty much fucked up and 70 years after the war it hasnt yet recovered . It is getting better in recent decades , but i think it still will take several generations to heal .<br><br>One short story for the end : Recently , while walking in forest , where house used to be , i found broken porcelain cup , with very clear german inscription &quot; Zum Geburtstag&quot; ( For brithday ) .... i must say , that was very intense experience .

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• MR

  @MrVvulf · 6 years ago

  Defenestration is the word of the day. &nbsp;It means &quot;the action of throwing someone out a window&quot;. &nbsp;Now you know. &nbsp;Go forth and enlighten your friends. &nbsp;Just don&apos;t defenestrate them.

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• KL

  @klaxxon__ · 6 years ago

  I love how my (Czech) history teacher described the situation after WW2: &quot;The expulsions were completely understandable, but not in the slightest forgivable&quot;. The regions that comprise former Sudetenland (the name is not used anymore by anyone, really) are still among the poorest in the country. After the war, it was settled by Czech fortune seekers and opportunists, entire estates taken over by former servants, by people with little to no bonds to the land, with no familial skills and no education and the whole place failed to develop (no that the communist takeover offered much opportunity for that).

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• JI

  @jimtalbott9535 · 6 years ago

  Ok Simon - you&apos;ll need to do something similar on this for East Prussia.

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• RU

  @rustyspurs771 · 6 years ago (edited)

  When you kill two people with a single bullet, it&apos;s impressive and we call it a &quot;Quigley&quot;. When you kill 20 million, it&apos;s horrifying and we call it a &quot;Gavrilo Princip surprise party&quot;.

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• AN

  @andycocchia4202 · 6 years ago

  “It’s not history to learn to get comfy before bed”....<br><br>Me sitting here comfy and ready for bed 😳

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• AL

  @alm5992 · 6 years ago

  &quot;A vital history: one that deserves to be remembered!&quot; Feel a &apos;History Guy&apos; vibe here.

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• CO

  @copperhamster · 6 years ago

  The best part about &quot;The Defenestration of Prague&quot; is you have to actually qualify it. Why? Because you have to qualify, was it the &quot;First Defenestration of Prague&quot; in 1419, the &quot;Second Defenestration of Prague&quot; in 1483, or the &quot;Third Defenestration of Prague&quot; (which is this one) in 1618. Which is the only one of which there were survivors. &nbsp;One of those survivors was later ennobled, with the title &quot;Baron von Hohenfall&quot;, literally Baron of Highfall.

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• FY

  @fyrstormer · 6 years ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prJaWk7ZGT0&amp;t=361">6:01</a> - Am I the only person who, after a few decades of learning about history, gets very jumpy when anyone starts talking about &quot;utopia&quot;?

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• PE

  @PepperoniMilkshake · 6 years ago

  Eye for an eye makes the world go blind

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• SU

  @sussekind9717 · 6 years ago

  As a descendant of Sudetenland &nbsp;Germans, &nbsp;I feel that it is high time that these stories be told. The atrocities committed on both sides before, during and after WWII are often glossed over in history books. The fact that they were annexed by Nazi Germany, is about the most anyone ever hears about it. <br> The horror stories I heard from my one surviving grandmother was appalling, and would always bring her to tears. However, regardless of the &nbsp;PTSD that was surely brought to the surface in her final years, she thought that it was imperative that it be known, so that such atrocities would never &nbsp;again occur.

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• JI

  @jimtalbott9535 · 6 years ago

  A large chunk of my family is from the Sudetenland - my Great Grandfather was from Lomigsdorf, in Olomouc. He left around 1900, and ended up in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. He had NO desire to end up as part of the Kaiser&apos;s army.

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