| Transcript |
1
—^-™«™m
Does RFE Promote
the Cause of Freedom?
(Continued from Page 28)
Bohemia, but someone else occupied
my place at the last moment, and I
had to wait until October, 1948, when
my friend sent me via Moravia and
Vienna to Austria, thence to Germany.
He himself escaped in Spring, 1949,
to Germany.
In this way I have learned through
my own experience the tactics by
which the Communists force the people in the East to inform for them, the
means by which they fully infiltrate
the entire life in a Communist country
through informers who control and
check each other, and who then report
to sly men in the background enabling
them to paralyze every real resistance
and make the Communist rule firm,
instituting a totalitarian control which
cannot even be imagined by the people in the West.
All these things were stated in my
sworn statement to the Kersten Committee of the U. S. House of Representatives in 1954. Although I spoke
several times to Congressman Kersten, many times to Congressman Fred
E. Busbey of Illinois, and many times
to the Director, the Chief Investigator
and others of the Committee, I did not
deliver my statement in person, and
have never maintained that I did, as
Shepardson indicates. I sent it by
mail, as I was advised to do, and received an official acknowledgement
from the Committee dated July 27,
1954. Photostatic copy of the last page
of my testimony is enclosed. ° Among
others, I sent copies of this to Congressman Kersten, to Congressman
Busbey, to Congressman Clardy, to
Congressman Walter, and I discussed
my case and experiences at length in
1953 with Congressman Kit Clardy of
Michigan, then member of the House
Committee on Un-American Activities.
I also mentioned its main points to
Congressman Francis E. Walter,
Chairman of the Committee on Un-
American Activities of the House of
Representatives, whom I met in October, 1955, in Geneva, Switzerland.
Naturally, all men with whom I cooperate here in Germany know my
ease thoroughly. Before my article was
published in Facts Forum News, Facts
Forum obtained a copy of my testimony, also.
In my testimony to the Kersten
Committee, I mentioned that I had led
the Foreign Section of the "Central
Union of Czechoslovak Students in Exile" for several months. Although this
organization served to unite Czech
students, and some fine young Czechs
•This documentation is on file with Facts Forum
Xetvs.
Page 54
were members, it was run by the Benes
Socialists. However, some of the Socialists and adherents of the National
Front charged that I was excluded in
1948 by the Communists because of
my studies in Germany. I told them
(but did not admit to them, as Shepardson states) what had actually happened in 1948, and also told them that
their idol, President Benes, had signed
agreements with the Communists. The
Czechoslovak Socialist students were
enraged at this, and this was the end
of my cooperation with their Committee. This was in 1950.
fn 1951 I was employed by Radio
Free Europe in Munich, where I told
in my application papers, and orally as
well, of everything I have written here.
I was accepted for work in the Archives, Reference Assistant and Librarian (editorial positions being reserved for Socialists and former Communists).
In June, 1951, I told an American at
Radio Free Europe that I was in contact with the Czech Democratic Federalists in Munich, who opposed the
National Front, and thus also the personnel of Radio Free Europe. I was
then interviewed by the European Director, Richard J. Condon, and finally
spoke to Mr. Otto, then Security Officer of Radio Free Europe. Mr. Otto
asked me to continue to visit the Federalists, to act friendly toward them,
and to report their activities and inquiries to him. Thus he asked me to
"cooperate" in exactly the same manner as had Thaler at an earlier date. I
politely rejected his requests, and was
then discharged in July, 1951. From
the standpoint of Radio Free Europe
I was certainly "grossly inefficient —
just as grossly inefficient as I had been
in cooperating with Paul Thaler.
This, too, was included in my testimony to the Kersten Committee. After
Radio Free Europe fired me. my application for emigration to the United
States was rejected in August, 1951.
However, since the time I started to
work here in the field in which I am
now working, the immigration agency
has informed me (in 1954) that there
is no objection to my emigration to the
United States. Under the International
Refugee Organization I have always
had the status of political refugee, and
have all the privileges of the U.S.
President's Escapees' Program.
I have never been a paid worker for
the "Prehala Youth Movement." This
is also gossip by the Socialist students,
which Mr. Shepardson docilely re-
peats. However, I would not object if
this were true, for I highly e-ste-e-m the
Czech General of the Army Lev
Prehala, who spent World War II in
Great Britain, opposing Hitler, and
also rejected the pro-Communist policy of Dr. Benes and remained in London after 1945. Prehala is the Chair
man of the Czech National Committe
in London, and his program vvoul'
promote restoration of justice, ordel
private enterprise and property, ai*
free economy in Czechoslovakia, #
well as the right for self-determination
of all nations of Czechoslovakia — tb<
Czechs, the Slovaks, the Hungarians
the Poles, the Ruthenians, and the Sudeten Germans. The aim of Genera
Prchala's organization is to form '
federation of free nations in the Boh?
mian countries. Mr. Shepardson, whos*
Free Europe in practice rejects tbf
right of self-determination for antjj
Communist nations, calls the aim "
General Prehala "the dissolution of tW
national Czechoslovak state."
While working in the archives
Radio Free Europe, I discovered t^
speeches of General Douglas MacAj
thur, Senators McCarthy, Taft, JenOT
and others, in the U. S. Congressiotjj
Record and in newspapers. Also, il''
the first time, I read about and sfl
pictures of Communists and subvfl
sives in America. With astonishment!
recognized these subversives as K
longing to the same internatiooj
group as do the Secret Police in a"
Mast, as well as the men in Radio Fi**
Europe and in the U. S. Intellig^j
Service. I realized then what gfg
sabotage is being committed b\ I
Free Europe against the people of'"
East when it suppresses every in<*
tion of the identity of the subv.
in the West. Because they have
heard of the work done- anel the Bgjj
put up to expose subversives bv Sl)J
men as Taft, McCarthy, Walter, M
ner, Velde and others, many people?
the East remain in apathy and in ^']
servience to the Communists. 11
the cause of communism in the I'j
when Radio Free Europe conceals "*
sly methods of the Communists to ?:l1
others as informants.
The same attacks which the V&\
dent of the Free Europe Coiiin'1'1'
makes were made against me tbrj
years ago by that American writer
frothy comment, Dorothv Thom|,M-
when I published a booklet on
ii»;
Council of Free Czechoslovakia ,1 i
the personnel of Radio Free Eur'lljj,
Dorothy Thompson's letter to
llanighen of Human Events was f
\|f
was J
lished with a reply in the Mav, \t.
issue of the Slovak Newsletter, SU''(L
town, Pennsylvania. Of Ferdinand r
routka, Dorothy Thompson wrote:
He is my husband's first cousin. • Im
Walter Lippmann and I we-re- among .j
sponsors. . . . He possesses high "tt'r,'r3'
gift anil extraordinary political pi'11 .jf,
tion. He can be- eloquent, ironic, s,t,',vi'
anel, being a man who burns with t'ic,.
eif truth and freedom, he- casts off lip'''*,
Who are these men who are 9
ning the most powerful station
East, ruling the refugees by mea"*-,-
the purse, and receiving high sa \.£ll
from America? Who are these ''
Facts Forum News, May,
Miom i
ing den
The 1
routka,
K the f>
of the
Flee- Ell
Ace or
jtnand
Pependf
"Uinist.
son. he
Perou
Partv. li
Socialist
jnto the
front. B
ferofesse
"lention
1955), I
Jressive'
Thus,
\i-vi-i
•ever «
pightful
history. I
"linking
gas not j
mat it is
In our
'"'ll puss
Peroul
feweek
r»>ch
'Sim/ i
fought
M>er :
, Is i, „
">K polit
»hout 1
^"iiinim
"tried?
,, No in
Bunking
;" ti
-"iiiiiMHi
. Ac-c-ore
Se of
N-we,
h(' "Ihe,'
Bnizatio
|
