My War Memoirs/Author's Preface

This book contains a record of my war-time experiences. Life moves so rapidly that the approach of new political events is apt to make us forget the old ones too easily. Much of what I saw and heard during the war deserves to be remembered, and that is why I have decided to wait no longer, but to tell the story of our revolutionary movement now. This book will be supplemented by later works on the Peace Conference and on our post-war foreign policy, for my work during the war and subsequently as Czechoslovak Foreign Minister forms an inseparable whole.

This book does not contain the complete history of our revolutionary movement. It will be supplemented by others; and I may add that I have not exhausted my own material. This book was written in fragments at a period when I was closely occupied both with home and foreign policy, and when there were difficult post-war problems to cope with. In many instances my remarks should be read in conjunction with President T. G. Masaryk’s World Revolution,(1) which the present volume supplements by more detailed descriptions of various important episodes. I have written the book in my capacity as former General Secretary of the Czechoslovak National Council, and not as Czechoslovak Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Throughout the war I had ample opportunities of observing the extent to which our national cause was an inseparable factor in the leading events of the Great War and how it was affected by them. It is not possible to form a correct estimate of our revolutionary movement unless this fact is realized. In this book I have made this clear by narrating the details of our movement in relation to the general scope of the points at issue during the war. As regards the war itself, it was on such a vast scale that I have touched upon it only as it affects my narrative. Here and there I was compelled to repeat myself, because our movement had many ramifications, and was connected with events in the various States, which I deal with separately. This may tend to make my account clearer and more comprehensive.

​I hope that the book will help to remove a number of political misunderstandings or ambiguities, as well as certain historical inaccuracies or erroneous statements which have accumulated during the last few years. It will at least, I think, reduce a number of matters under dispute to their right proportion. In any case, it is my wish to make clear what should not be doubtful to anybody, namely, that we never drew any distinction between our revolutionary movement at home and abroad, that we placed our diplomatic work on the same footing as the achievements of our troops, and that, in short, we look upon our revolutionary activities at home and abroad, in the council chamber and on the battlefield, as a single unified movement.

My chief endeavour has been to give an accurate account of facts, and in writing these memoirs I have been prompted by my attachment to our national cause and also by my attachment to the truth; and I want the book to be not only a record of what happened, but also a lesson to be applied to our present and future political problems.

In conclusion, I should like to thank all those who have helped me to collect and arrange the material, etc. I am particularly grateful for the assistance rendered by Dr. A. Hartl, Dr. J. Werstadt, J. Papoušek, Dr. J. Opočenský, V. Škrach, and A. Babka.