"I was offered to join the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia twice, and it was almost funny because you could see in those people that they knew they wouldn't succeed. In the same way, I was offered to sign up for a military career, and that was downright comical. I was called by two lieutenant colonels or majors, I don't know now, but they were definitely senior officers. When I reported, they laughed hard and said, 'Sit down. We're supposed to explain the benefits of military life to you so you'll sign up, but knowing you, we don't think you'll want to,' and I told them, 'Well, I really don't want to,' and they said, 'Fine, but if anyone asks, tell them we did a lot of convincing, okay?'"
"Younger employees would go very often, mostly as the leaders of these student group. I was in Riga as a student and then in Tashkent and Novosibirsk as deputy head. I'm very happy I got there. The problems were, for example, that two of our people in Tashkent ended in the infectious disease hospital. They got dysentery and it was pretty bleak for them. Other typical problems were that the flights always went via Moscow, and a tour of Moscow was compulsory. We arrived in Moscow and found out that nobody cared that we had a plane to Tashkent or Novosibirsk booked. Nobody cared, and the next plane we could get there would fly in maybe two or three weeks. But we were supposed to be back in three weeks. Those were always tough fights."
"He infiltrated us by talking to our older boys during the Brdy crossing trip. He somehow arranged with them to help the club out with a lot of good ideas. He started working with the club. He really had good ideas; he contributed to our programme, spent a lot of time in the clubhouse, and even infiltrated the Odehnal family. He was single, he just lived with his parents, and eventually he basically lived with the Odehnals. Mrs. Odehnal did his laundry, made his meals, and though he didn't stay overnight and always went home in the evening, he spent a lot of time with them. He worked at ZUKOV, a company that made various metal badges and stuff, somewhere near Tesla Hloubětín. That was close to their place in Hloubětín; he always went home in the evening. But he was deployed there to collect information, and when he had gathered enough - because even though the Odehnals were careful, there were some remnants of the scouting days left - action was taken to disband the troop. Mrs. Odehnalová took the brunt of it; she was even fired from her job, and it looked the troop was going downhill fast."
"At the same time, the troop was under pressure in 1972 to either join the Pioneer Organization or be disbanded. At least that's what we were told at the time, and I believe that's the way it was. That's why I joined the Pioneer Organization for the second time in 1972. We continued quite smoothly, at least I sensed no pressure at my age. How Mr. and Mrs. Odehnals were, I don't know, but everything worked out. Then 1975 came and the StB ran its Project Scout. It targeted former scout troops to see if closing them down would benefit the StB and the period regime."
Václav Nehasil was born in Prague on 12 September 1956. He spent the first seven years of his life with grandparents in Bosyně by Vysoká near Mělník. His mother Jaroslava Nehasilová was a housewife and father Václav Nehasil was a machine fitter. Václav joined the boy scouts in 1968. Junák (Czech Scout) was dissolved in 1970, his troop was transferred to the Pioneer organization and dissolved one year later. Václav Nehasil became a member of the 35th youth hiking club with Slavoj Hloubětín led by the Odehnal family. The club was infiltrated by a secret collaborator of the State Security (StB) who caused the the club’s methodologist Ludmila Odehnalová to be dismissed. The troop was subsequently incorporated into the Pioneer organisation. The witness completed the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Charles University (MFF UK), majoring in electronics and vacuum physics in 1981. He joined the Faculty the same year as a researcher and he still works there part-time (2024). He travelled abroad on business in the 1980s as well as after the Velvet Revolution, to the former Soviet Union, France and Belgium. He has worked with young people since his own youth, taking over the leadership of the club in 1977. Due to health reasons, he has to cut down on his work for the club but as of 2024 he was involved in it, albeit on a smaller scale.
