“On Saturday night I was transported from ‘Little House’ to a military headquarters of general Klapalek situated on Malostranske square. Other men from OBZ were already waiting there – other questions, other beating commando. I have to note, that two soldiers from USSR had attended. They spoke very poor Czech and behaved really rogue. The interrogation lasted till the afternoon. The name of colonel Korda was mentioned so I knew someone had disclosed his name and we were in big troubles. We had never held this against the man who had spoken out. On one hand it is the question of strong character, but on the other hand it is the question of a physical resistance and bad luck in case the interrogators and torturers use such methods that the detainee breaks completely. They even showed me colonel Korda face to face. It was clear he was treated badly as well, but they didn’t dare to treat him so harshly at the beginning. Korda was really tough guy. Today the word is downgraded but he was true hero in regard what he had sustained.”
“My trial was an orchestrated comedy. The trial was scheduled for Monday. On Saturday I was transported from prison Pankrac to military headquarters to captain Kočí again. There they put me in a solitary confinement for three hours. Then Kočí called me to his office and told me: ‘I you would try to say before the trial on Monday you were badly treated during the interrogation, a prosecutor would accuse you of false accusation of interrogating officials and then you would be handed over here again. Let God have mercy on you – if you believe in some – in case this happens.’ With these words he let me go.”
“I was sitting on rear seats at the car. The two knaves – driver and man from military counterintelligence – were sitting at the front. One of my hands was handcuffed to my opposite ankle. The whole ride I was tide like an animal. I have tumbled down several times, so they handcuffed my hands behind my back. We arrived at the square of Loreta. It was three o’clock in the morning. Because of a black ice we had to walk the last part of our way to The Little House afoot. Inside in a warm room few knaves waited. Major Turek and General Musil stood among them as year ago. In short Musil told me: ‚Last time you have spruced us. Therefore other rouges as you had escaped and had continued to commit crimes. Now you will tell us all the names. If you will hide a slightest thing, you will be hanged unlike the last time. Hope exist for you only in case you will disclose everything, if you will show penitence – this was like confession, these bastards were able to misuse everything – or else you will be finished like this...’ Than he threw some photos on the table: there was a hanged man. This was the welcome.”
“We were trying to get some information from abroad because we had no reliable political information here. Everything was controlled by communists in those days. We wanted to know what a prospect we had and what is going to happen. Our activities were punishable by death or by long-term imprisonment. We had to do everything in the deepest secrecy. I had collected the greatest part of our reports because I had been living in Prague. The most important was my memory. Later we used secret code and cipher. One code used Capt. Němec, one code had I. The same had people abroad. A radio transmitter was positioned in Pilsner, there the broadcasting took place. The last meeting of our group took place at the beginning of May. In the middle of May Capt. Němec visited me unexpectedly and told me he was going to emigrate because some information leaked out about him had. I told him I would rather emigrate with him, but he persuaded me to stay because of my important position in Prague. I decided to follow his advice.”
“Was one to evaluate the things now, then one had to admit that the sacrifices which people had endured were useless. That it had been futile to fight for freedom when freedom has treated as it has in this country these days. Criminals responsible for murders and other criminal offences have found employment in the state departments, on all sorts of important posts within the national economy, and the decent people – the prisoners, the old and the ill – have been truly made to pay for their naiveté which has made them think that their efforts could have improved anything. To make an objective recapitulation is really said: 240 people had been hanged; hundreds or thousands had perished on state boundaries, in prisons, had been beaten to death during interrogations or had died because of cruel working conditions. So many families had been moved out of their homes, houses or homesteads to another part of our country. Children were not allowed to attend schools or to get trained in craft.
Concrete cases in which the perpetrators have been identified have been well known, as well as the offences they had committed. I do not wish to name anyone - Grebeníček has not been the only case...and nothing has happened to them. To talk about justice in this country, that is like talking about chastity with a prostitute or about clear conscience with a murderer. We dispose of the ÚDV (Commission for the Documentation and Investigation of the Crimes of Communism); how many lawsuits has it filed and what has happened to them? When a case on trial could have been prolonged for13 years and then end up only in a conditional sentence? Judicial proceeding...? Let us hope that those who come after us will not be as stupid as ourselves and will proceed forcefully and equitably. That they will insist on what they believe in, will keep their conscience clear and will have sense of honor and justice. And please do not underestimate the religious faith because bad things, which are happening today, are closely connected with people’s relationships to God.”
Lieutenant-general Miroslav Kácha was born on September 21st in 1923 in Prague. Already as a student he took part in the resistance movement Obrana národa (´Defense of the Nation´) and after its downfall he became engaged in espionage activities aimed at a factory producing tanks and transporters located in Libeň. After the war he embarked on a military career and after the rise of the communists to power he joined the resistance movement through the espionage group lead by the Colonel Alexandr Korda. After having had been indicted, he was detained in May 1949. As an army officer he had to repeatedly undergo tough interrogations lead by the State Security - twice he was subject to interrogations in the ´House´ at Hradčany which have left him with permanent damages to his health. In September 1949 Kácha was convicted to life imprisonment and he had been held subsequently in the prisons of Pankrác, Bory, Opava and Leopoldov. He was granted release during the amnesty of 1960. After his return to civil life the State Security (StB) had tried to force him to cooperation. But on account of a construed event resulting in a serious injury he was able to avoid further persecution on health grounds. In 1995 Kácha was awarded the Legion of Merit of the White Lion by the then President Václav Havel.
