Open Letter from Ctirad Mašín, Josef Mašín and Milan Paumer

The Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes received an open letter from Josef Mašín, Ctirad Mašín and Milan Paumer, in which they express themselves regarding the event from the beginning of the 1950’s of the last century that has been hitherto inaccurately reported in the media, concretely, information about one of the planned actions of their resistance group – the assassination of the chairman of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the President of the Czechoslovak Republic, Klement Gottwald. In the letter, among other things, they advise that information about their activities had already appeared in television documentaries and historical works before it was repeatedly stirred up by the media in April of last year.

Dear Director, We consider it necessary to correct the news repeatedly appearing in the Czech daily press concerning the publication of documents about the activities of our group from the archives of the StB, which concern the testimonies of our uncle, Ctibor Novak, during his interrogations after our departure from the Czechoslovak Republic and his arrest. In these records, Ctibor Novák testifies about our resistance group’s plan to liquidate the high dignitaries of the Communist regime of the then Czechoslovak Republic, Klement Gottwald, Alexej Čepička, Antonín Zápotocký and others. Further, information about the plans of our group to blow up a train carrying uranium to the Soviet Union, likewise the carrying out of an assassination of a government delegation travelling by train to the USSR, or the liquidation of a bus carrying members of the StB from Kolín to exercises in Milovice. These testimonies, without exception, are based on the truth. In his statements, Ctibor Novák restrained himself only from facts which could later have led to his conviction. For those knowledgeable, these documents are even more interesting in what is not mentioned. In his interrogations, Ctibor Novák succeeded in holding back, both during his first arrest in 1951 and his second arrest in 1953, information whose revelation would have led to the loss of many further lives from the ranks of those who united in the fight against the Communists. Some actions described in the forementioned documents had already been made public before the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes rendered them accessible — in the book by Ota Rambousek „Jenom ne strach“ (Just Not Fear) in Jan Němeček’s „Mašínové – zpráva o dvou generacích“ (The Mašíns – a Report on Two Generations), and in Martin Vadas’ documentary film „Země bez hrdinů, země bez zločinců“ (Land Without Heroes, Land Without Criminals), not to mention in the book by Barbara Mašínová „Odkaz“ (Gauntlet). This partial and belated disclosure of documents from the archives of the StB confirms the testimonies of witnesses and the authenticity of documents obtained by historical researchers from other sources. According to the interrogation records of the former Investigation Directorate of the Ministry of the Interior of the Czechoslovak Republic, other group members — Zdena Mašínová, Václav Švéda, Zbyněk Janata, Zbyněk Rousar, Vladimír Hradec and others, the Communist press from the period not excluded – spoke, similar to Ctibor Novák, about our planned actions against the Communist regime and its representatives. The articles and commentaries published in the Czech media which criticize the publication of these documents by the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes are based on alleged statements of Ctirad Mašín and Milan Paumer which are, however, out of context without the examination of facts in the documents accessible today in your Institute. We are also obligated to remind that some of the above-mentioned actions against the Communist regime were planned during the period when Ctirad Mašín was in prison in Jáchymov (1952-1953) and Milan Paumer was already in the military in Slovakia. The Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, to whose creation you have in a significant way contributed, and which you run today, is one of the few, perhaps the only institution or organization created in the present Czech Republic after November 1989 on which the moral recovery of this nation can rely. The former archives of the StB and other instruments of oppression are a legacy with which the Czech nation must come to terms. This coming-to-terms with the past is possible only with the acquiring of an objective knowledge of history, to which, among others, belongs even the truthful knowledge of the past of all actors of national history, without consideration for their position today. Without such a rigorous approach, the moral recovery of the nation is not possible. The current campaign being led in the media against the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and its leadership, and the making public of documents demonstrating complicity of present-day cultural and political luminaries with crimes committed by the Communists, is not only an insult to the memories of those who fought and fell for today’s democracy and freedom, but unfortunately distinctly aids the Communists, who to this day legally take part in the political and economic course of events in the Czech Republic. Ctirad Mašín, Josef Mašín, Milan Paumer