Jan Beránek

“One more item of interest from the time of my military service. Here in Holešov was a special forces unit who refused to let the Russians into their barracks. They were the only unit in the country to do so. It is an interesting fact and details of the incident recently surfaced in media coverage on the 50th anniversary (of the Warsaw Pact invasion). The unit was disbanded because they swore loyalty to (President) Dubček. The soldiers were from all over the country and some of their officers ended up working with me doing construction work.“

“One more story from 1968. When the Russians arrived, we were so disillusioned that we piled into an old US Army Jeep and drove to meet them with flags. When I now think about what could have happened if they took offense that would have been bad news.” “Can you provide more details? Where did you get a US Army Jeep? What kind of an idea was that?” “Having a Jeep was a trend at the time. My friend Honza Batík, whose opinions are also well known in Zlín, had one that he fixed up very nicely. Eventually other people, including me, also got old military Jeeps. On this particular ride we drove in Honza’s Jeep. There were maybe ten of us sitting all over the vehicle as we drove towards Vizovice. We expected the Russians to approach from this direction. Later, I used to drive this particular Jeep, but it frequently backfired. When I used to drive it through Dobrotice where there were soldiers stationed in the forest I was bit concerned about the backfiring.“

“When the planes flew overhead and it was a highly unpleasant experience, because my mom woke me up during the night and she was crying. My father was also shaken up by the fact that we were under attack. This had a profound effect on me. For example, one of the consequences was that when the ballroom dance season began – the girls from our dance club were involved in organizing events – and we were asked by the Communists to perform an opening act for the ballroom dance, we refused to do it as a group. The revolt probably began with me stating that I am not going to do it because I am starting my military service. So my dance partner also refused to go and everyone else followed. Ms Mědílková (dance instructor) later said that she thought this would have been the case and that she had already cancelled our club’s participation. Our dance troupe was lot less active after this point.“