Army Commanders 

Marshal Andrei I. Yeremenko (1892–1970)

He was born in Markivka, Kharkov Governorate. He joined the tsarist army in 1913.

From 1918, he was an officer of the Red Army. He participated in the occupation of eastern Poland in 1939 and in the occupation of Lithuania in 1940. In 1942, he underwent a lengthy convalescence after two serious wounds. In the autumn, he took part in the defence of Stalingrad. In 1944, as commander of the Littoral Army, he took part in the liberation of Crimea and subsequently took part in the occupation of the Baltic States at the head of the 2nd Baltic Front. In March 1945, he was appointed to head the 4th Ukrainian Front, which, under his command, liberated the territory of Silesia and North Moravia.

Army General Karel Klapálek (1893–1984)

He was born in Nové Město nad Metují. He took part in World War I in the Czechoslovak Legions in Russia.

After the occupation, he joined the domestic resistance in southern Bohemia. In 1940, he fled from arrest via the Balkans. He commanded Czechoslovak units in the fighting in the Middle East between 1941 and 1943.

In 1944, he was transferred to the Eastern Front and took part in the fighting at Dukla. At the end of the war, he served as commander of the 1st Czechoslovak Army Corps in the USSR. Between 1952 and 1956, he was imprisoned by the communist regime, released on the intercession of Marshals Zhukov and Konev.

Marshal Ivan S. Konev (1897–1973)

He was born in Lodeino in the Nikolayevsky District. In 1917, he joined the Red Army.

At the end of 1941, he participated in the defence of Moscow. In 1942, he commanded the Western Front during the unsuccessful Battle of Rzhev as part of Operation Mars. From May 1944, he headed the 1st Ukrainian Front with the rank of Marshal. From March to May 1945, his units took part in the fighting in Silesia and Saxony. At the end of the war, they penetrated to Prague through northwestern Bohemia.

Marshal Rodion J. Malinovsky (1898–1967)

He was born in Odessa. During World War I, he fought on the Eastern Front and in France, and, in 1919, he joined the Red Army. Between 1942 and 1944, he took part in the defence of Stalingrad and the expulsion of German forces from Ukraine. As commander of the 2nd Ukrainian Front, in January 1945, he took control of Budapest and subsequently commanded the Red Army's advance on Bratislava. During April and May, his troops liberated the territory of South Moravia.

A Country Infested with Explosives

After the fighting ended, the landscape was littered with mines, unexploded aerial bombs and artillery ammunition, as well as discarded grenades and small arms. In particular, the Opava and Hlučín regions were heavily littered with explosives, and their gradual removal took two years. During this time, a number of accidents occurred, including fatal ones. Both the armed forces and civilian volunteers were involved in clearing the countryside. Their experience became the basis for the creation of a police bomb disposal service. Ammunition is still found on the former battlefield of the Ostrava Offensive. As recently as 2022, a construction worker in Ostrava was killed at work by an aerial bomb explosion.

German Defence of the Ostrava Region

The Germans deployed about 150,000 troops, around 300 tanks and self-propelled cannons and 120 aircraft to defend Ostrava. They were opposed by 255,000 Red Army troops with 300 combat vehicles and 400 aircraft.

The defensive line reached a depth of 40 to 48 kilometres. The 1st Panzer Army formed the basis of the German forces, but SS and Volkssturm units also took part in the fighting. The defenders used some of the pre-war Czechoslovak fortifications. Heavy fighting took place in towns and villages, often from house to house. On April 21, 1945, Major General Gustav Hundt, one of the highest ranking German officers, was killed in the defence of Opava.

Beginnings of the Foreign Resistance in 1939

On March 21, 1939, the Czechoslovak ambassador in Paris, Stefan Osuský, founded the Central Committee for Foreign Action in France. On April 30, 1939, the Czechoslovak Foreign Military Group was established in Krakow. On June 19, Lt. Col. Ludvík Svoboda, as the most senior and highest ranking officer, took over the command of the military group from First Lieutenant Jiří Král. At the beginning of July, the group moved to the camp in Male Bronowice. By the end of August 1939, over 1,159 Czechoslovak soldiers left Poland for France to join the Foreign Legion. The French government promised to release them in the event of war and assign them to the Czechoslovak army. On September 3, two days after the German attack on Poland, the Legion of Czechs and Slovaks was formed under the command of General Lev Prchala. On October 17, 1939, the Czechoslovak National Committee was established in Paris and recognized by the British and French governments as the representative of the Czech and Slovak people.