The May Mobilization

JAN 01 1938 · 12:00

Czechoslovak troops at the Sudeten border during the partial mobilization of May 1938, the army the country built and then was not allowed to use. Place: the Sudeten border districts · General Staff, Prague Figures: Edvard Beneš, President · Ludvík Krejčí, Chief of the General Staff · Konrad Henlein, leader of the Sudetendeutsche Partei · Lord Runciman, British mediator (arrives August) On the evening of May 20, 1938, Czechoslovak military intelligence reports unusual Wehrmacht movements near the Saxon border. The reports turn out to be wrong, or at least exaggerated; the German formations are exercise concentrations, not invasion preparations. The cabinet does not wait to find out. By midnight the general staff has issued partial mobilization orders. Through the night and the following day, 174,000 reservists report to their units. The Czechoslovak army, the eighth-largest in Europe in 1938, occupies its prepared border fortifications: a continuous concrete line from the Ore Mountains to the Carpathians. The diplomatic effect is immediate. Berlin denies any intention to invade. London and Paris pat themselves on the back for having prevented a war. The Czechoslovak public, briefed by radio through the morning of the 21st, mobilizes too: queues at recruiting offices, blackouts, a sense (briefly) that the army would hold.