Oldřich Kalousek

“The so-called forbidden zone was another matter altogether. There were signs there, the signs marked in black, the forbidden zone had the same big signs marked in red, and they had on them: Warning, forbidden zone, all entry forbidden. The forbidden zone was created precisely so as to give the Border Guard space to manoeuvre, and mainly for when shots were fired, to keep to international regulations, that is that bullets were not allowed to land on foreign soil, all this was upheld.”

“We weren’t there to shoot people - as one good man said it, a long time ago... so I talked him out of it - to shoot people like rabbits. When there was a breach, every breach was a so-called extraordinary event. These extraordinary events were perfectly mapped and documented. It wasn’t that, as one good man said: ‘They were shooting people left, right and centre.’ Nonsense! An extraordinary event was when there was a breach or a detention, whether anyone was detained or not, whether weapons were used or not, it was always documented as an extraordinary event.”

“As far as the movement of people was concerned: for those who lived in the border zone it was no problem, if someone wanted to come visit them, they received a permit for the date, hour and place they wanted to go to, say to their relatives. We checked them just the same as any other citizen. It’s true that as far as the forbidden zone was concerned, as I said before, that was clear, as soon as anyone was in the forbidden zone, he was treated as a violator of the state border.” (Q: “That was three kilometres away from the state border?”) “That was less even, it varied depending on the terrain.”

“Except that the nearer it got, and especially as we had had our service extended three months extra, I convinced myself all the more that I would not sign. Even though in my file I had: The uniform suits me nicely, I am a soldier body and soul. As with other things in life, I simply tried to do it honestly and properly. I guess that’s why things ended up how they did, why I ended up choosing my craft instead.”