Vladimír Pešek

„I saw it with my own eyes, because in Kaznějov, there was a large station where there was access from all sides – they made a marshalling yard there, where Germans were loaded into wagons. German peasants had special, more robust wagons than our Czechs – in Bohemia they were mostly less wealthy people, while the Germans had larger wagons where they transported grain, they simply brought that kind of culture with them. And then, when wagons with emigrants passed through the village, they were fortresses that were packed with furniture and everything possible – they packed whatever they could. Our house was in a short street where there were only two houses and on the corner there was a tavern with a large hall, where German women and children spent the night. The men, for a change, sat on the wagons and we, as children, just peeked out and watched.“

„One of the best Russian radars was built on Skřivánčí vrch in Aš, which had a reach of almost all of Europe. Western countries needed to know what the radar could do, so they showed the Russians all sorts of troop movements, which were also faked, various flights of helicopter squadrons, and the like. Since they needed to get the result from the radar, the Aš promontory was filled with spies - there were English, French, and German spies there who were still serving under the Wehrmacht, and I was a military counterintelligence driver. My cronies, whom I drove, had various debates in the car, and I was forbidden to talk about these things with anyone, including my friends in the barracks. So it was a very interesting war.“

„In 1973, the first secretary of the Communist Party of the Czech Republic, Dr. Husák, declared that it was unbearable for such a number of people to be in the party, and that those who felt that they were no longer a benefit to the Communist Party and wanted to get rid of their membership could do so without consequences. There was a big event going on at the nuclear power plant, where I went up to the podium and tore my photo off my party card, saying, 'this is yours, this is mine, I'm quitting' and that was it. And I was declared the best innovator at the nuclear power plant several times - improvement proposals and thematic tasks were announced, I solved two tasks out of three, with the reward for one being around 3 700 CZK. My colleagues envied me, so I told them, 'it was hanging here on the bulletin board, you could have done it too'. I took it because I had nothing else to do. I knew that something serious had to happen there, because the conditions there were different than in Škodovka – we simply had to show some productivity there, and in Jaslovské Bohunice it was just gossiping, delegations went there and the like. There was terrible morale there and there was a lot going on there.“

"I received some training that when I have employees who are already of retirement age and have survived the assembly, I will get used to them only working if there is alcohol at hand. 'Have a bottle ready, and if you want this guy to work, pour him some in the morning.' I say, 'But I work in the territory of a nuclear power plant, it's not the same as when you worked with them at the Vojany power plant, it was possible there, but if I have a bottle of alcohol somewhere, it will be a mess, it's simply not possible.' 'You have to have it, otherwise you won't keep those guys. If you dose it to them and manage it so that they get it when they need it - for example, pour them in the morning or before lunch, then everything will be fine. But if one of them brings a bottle, they will hide behind a cupboard and you will have them for scrap in no time. That's not possible, they have been doing it for years and you won't change that.' I didn't believe it, and it really worked that way."