August I, 19 18 
Land & Water 
II 
soo 7>rUes^ 1000 
q too 10 
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Slavonic world, has a very practical significance for the cause 
of the Allies in the present war. The great majority of the 
people of Bohemia and — more important still — of the Bohemian 
soldiers, who ipso jaclo belong to the Austrian Army, were 
openlv hostile to the Austrian Government. One regiment 
after another refused to fight the Russians or the Serbs. 
The eight regiments of the Czech Landwehr, the nth Czech 
Regiment of Pisek, the 36th Regiment of Mlada Boleslav, 
and others, were, in part, massacred by the Austro-Gernian 
and Hungarian soldiers, in part dispersed among German 
and Magyar Regiments. 
The old Russian Government treated their Slavonic 
prisoners more indulgently than the Germans and Hungarians ; 
many of them could earn quit^ high wages and lived on a 
fairly free footing. When, however, some of these Czechs, 
in conjunction with their countrymen living in Southern 
Russia, organised themselves into a Legion to assist the 
Russian Army as a separate unit, their action was received 
with indifferenic, to say the least of it, from the military 
authorities of tlie regime. Nevertheless, the legion has 
played its part on the Russian front. The Revolution pro- 
vided new opportunities. 
In May, 1917, the Czech unit had increased to the size of 
an army, and received every support and encouragement 
from the first Revolutionary Government, It is no longer 
a secret that the creation of this army was due to the energy 
and ability of the Czech leader. Professor Masaryk, once 
Deputy at Vienna, more recently Professor at King's College, 
London. 
The tragedy of this army, which, in contradistinction to 
that of the White and Red Guards, is sometimes called the 
Black Guards, began with the disarming of the Russians' 
Here were well-trained and organised forces willing to fight 
the enemy even tliough every singly man knew that if cap- 
tured he would be branded by the enemy as a " rebel " and 
shot accordingly. Here was the enemy more than ever 
provoked since the Bolshevik peace was signed at Brest- 
Litovsk, and yet they were not allowed to fight. Conse- 
quently, some of them left the Russian front for France, 
where they form a separate unit, but, according to Mr. 
Vladimir Nosek, of the London Czech Press, some eighty 
thousand of them remained in Russia. It is with this eighty 
thousand, whose ranks have now swelled to the number of 
150,000 or more, that the papers of the Allied and enemy 
countries have lately so much concerned themselves. 
Much care and exactitude is necessary in reviewing the 
great adventure of these regiments, for there are two dis- 
tinct and antagonistic opinions. There are people who call 
them reactionary supporters of the old or, in any case, anti- 
Bolshevik regime, and there are others who recognise them 
as brave fighters for the Allied cause in Russia against Ger- 
many, like their Czech brethren on the French and Italian 
fronts. Though these latter are nearer the truth, it must be 
remembered that the Czecho-Slovaks are fighting in the first 
place for their own cause — the freeing of their country from 
the Teutonic-Hungarian domination — but this is so closely 
identified with the aim of the Allies that they do not hesitate 
to place themselves unreservedly at their disposal, even 
though Vladivostok is far away from the country described 
by Shakespeare. 
Those people who disregard the present rulers of Russia 
may deem it of little importance that the Black Guards 
are reproached as anti-Bolsheviks, but it might still be in 
their disfavour if it were^ true that they aim at taking an 
intimate part in the internal politics of Russia. A few facts 
will reveal the truth of their- position at the time when this 
article is being written. 
The relations between these units and the Revolutionary 
Government were quite amicable at the time of Professor 
Masaryk's visit to Russia, May, 1917, to March, 1918. When 
the hope of reviving the struggle against Germany wUs aban- 
doned and the Brest-Litovsk. peace was signed, the Czecho- 
slovaks decided to leave the country via Siberia and proceed 
to the western front. They were granted pennits for this 
purpose by the Moscow Soviet last February, and some 
regiments started east. What happened next is not quite 
clear, but according to newspaper reports some of the Black 
Guard Regiments had a skirmish with German troops n€ar 
Kiev, others have been heard of fighting their way to the east 
at Chelabinsk. The Bolsheviks' attitude towards them has 
been openly hostile since May last, but even so late as June 
27th we hear of a message sent by Professor Masaryk from 
the United States to the Moscow Soviet, in which he urges 
them, in friendly language, not to oppose the eastward passage 
of the Czecho-Slovaks and not to confiscate their arms. 
There can, however, be no doubt of the present warlike 
attitude between the two parties, and it is probable that this 
is in a great measure due to the support given by the non- 
Bolshevik Russians to this, the only well-organised and friendly 
army in the interior of the country. Nor can it be doubted 
that the Black Guards have considered it their duty to wrest 
from Bolshevik misrule the greater part of the Eastern and 
tranV Siberian Railway routes ? It would be a mistake to 
associate them exclusively with any one Russian Party, 
Monarchic or Revolutionary, for they have given their aid 
wherever it was asked, and probably include in their ranks 
members of many different political creeds, yet whenever a 
choice had to be made, as, for instance, recently in the 
Far East between General Horvath's Monarchic Government 
at Kharbin and the restored Provisional Government of 
Vladivostok and Ormsk supported by General Alexeyeff, 
the Czecho-Slovaks rallied to the side of the latter. 
So much for their present attitude ; their future depends 
to a great extent on the attitude of the Allies, especially 
America and Japan, towards the Siberian situation. 
At present there are four chief centres of Czecho-Slovak 
ascendancy. Vladivostok (from where they move towards 
Clube), Irkutsk ; Krasnoyarsk-Tomsk, -where their number is 
reckoned between 50,000 and 60,000, and witliin which lies 
Omsk, the capital of the new Siberian Government ; the 
Don district round .Tsaritsyn, where they have united with 
some Cossacks and some Polish troops, and Kazan-Samara- 
Penza, where part of the Tatar population has given them 
support. ^ 
The Murman coast Yugo-Slav (Serbo-Croats) battalions 
also count among themselves some Czecho-Slovaks. 
It has been often discussed during the present war whether 
individual enterprise can have any bearing on the main issue. 
If we consider the case of the Czecho-Slovak detachments 
which are due almost Aitirely to Professor Masaryk's initia- 
tive which, if well used, diplomatically and strategically, 
may still act as a check to Gennan advance in the East. 
There is no doubt that ' the individual enterprise of a 
genius is now, as always, welcome and fruitful. 
