In January 1939, negotiations between Germany and Poland broke down. Hitler scheduled an invasion of
Bohemia and
Moravia for the morning of 15 March. In the interim, he negotiated with the Slovak People's Party and with the
Kingdom of Hungary and its representatives for the
Hungarian minority in Slovakia to prepare the dismemberment of the Second Czechoslovak Republic before the invasion. On 13 March, he invited
Jozef Tiso to Berlin, where he offered Tiso the option of proclaiming the Slovak state and seceding from Czecho-Slovakia. In such a case, Germany would be Slovakia's protector and would not allow the Hungarians to press on Slovakia any additional territorial demands. If the Slovaks declined, Germany would occupy
Bohemia and
Moravia and disinterest himself in Slovakia's fate—in effect, leaving the Slovaks to the mercies of the Hungarians and the Poles (Poland had claimed the Slovak
Spiš territory since the
Polish-Czechoslovak War). During the meeting,
Joachim von Ribbentrop passed on a false report saying that Hungarian troops were approaching Slovak borders. Tiso refused to make such a decision himself, after which he was allowed by Hitler to organize a meeting of the Slovak parliament ("Diet of the Slovak Land"), which would approve Slovakia's independence. On 14 March, the Slovak parliament convened and heard Tiso's report on his discussion with Hitler as well as a declaration of independence. Some of the deputies were skeptical of making such a move, but the debate was quickly quashed when Karmasin announced that any delay in declaring independence would result in Slovakia being divided between Hungary and Germany. Under these circumstances, Parliament unanimously declared Slovak independence, and Tiso was appointed the first Prime Minister of the new republic. The next day, Tiso sent a telegram (which had actually been composed the previous day in Berlin) asking the Third Reich to take over the protection of the newly minted state. The request was readily accepted. Meanwhile, Czechoslovak President
Emil Hácha was summoned to a meeting with
Adolf Hitler and
Hermann Göring during the early hours of 15 March, and informed of the imminent Nazi invasion plan. Here, Hácha was threatened with aerial bombardment of Prague unless he signed a document accepting the capitulation of the Czechoslovak Army and the foundation of a
Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia under the protection and supremacy of the
German Reich. After possibly suffering a heart attack, Hácha finally succumbed to these threats and signed the document, without consulting parliament. On the morning of 15 March, German troops entered Bohemia and Moravia, meeting no resistance. The Hungarian occupation of Carpatho-Ukraine did encounter resistance but the Hungarian army quickly crushed it. On 16 March, Hitler went to Czechoslovakia and from
Prague Castle proclaimed the new
Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Independent Czechoslovakia collapsed in the wake of foreign aggression, ethnic divisions and internal tensions. Subsequently, interwar Czechoslovakia has been idealized by its proponents as the only bastion of democracy surrounded by authoritarian and fascist regimes, this is called the
Czechoslovakia myth. It has also been condemned by its detractors as an artificial, Czech-dominated and unworkable creation of intellectuals supported by the great victorious powers of the
First World War, notably the
French Third Republic and the
British Empire.
Interwar Czechoslovakia comprised lands and peoples that were far from being integrated into a modern nation-state. Moreover, the dominant Czechs, who had suffered political discrimination under the Habsburgs, were not able to cope with the demands of other nationalities. After the
Second World War, Czechoslovakia was re-established and regained almost all of its territory, with the exception of
Subcarpathian Ruthenia, which was annexed by the
Soviet Union, and the small portions of territory of
Slovakia annexed by
Poland. == References ==