Lessons from Lidice

The Memorial to the Children Victims of the War, Lidice, Czech Republic

There have been many meditations, studies and first-hand accounts around the catalysts for extraordinary acts of physical and moral courage. In the end, what drives the most selfless acts is love.

There is a grass field with a gentle slope outside of Prague. A village called Lidice once stood there. Lidice became world famous in 1942 when the world learned what happened there. The Nazis wiped it off the face of the earth and killed every man, woman and child who lived there. Most of the children would die by gas at the Chelmno extermination camp. There were no Jews in Lidice. Adolf Hitler personally ordered the destruction of the village and the salting of the earth as revenge for the assassination of Reinhardt Heydrich, referred to as the “Butcher of Prague.”

Heydrich was the principal architect of the Holocaust. He was assassinated by a team of Czech and Slovak commandoes who parachuted into their occupied homeland from Allied planes that departed from London. They came to kill Heydrich, a ruthless war criminal and sociopath. They accomplished their mission.

The men of Lidice were lined up by the SS. They gave the village priest an opportunity to live by walking away. The priest chose to die with his flock. He was murdered with his parishioners. The children of Lidice are memorialized in a monument that marks the evil and murder that stole their lives at the hands of the SS. It is among the most haunting monuments I have ever seen.

The Czech and Slovak paratroopers were hunted by the Gestapo and SS. They were betrayed by one of their own – a man named Karel Curda, who would be hung after the war for his treachery and treason.

The paratroopers hid in the crypt and loft of Sts Cyril and Methodius church in Prague. They were given sanctuary by the Orthodox bishop, who would be martyred for his love and courage.

The paratroopers killed scores of SS as they fought to their last rounds and to the death. None were captured alive. Thousands of innocent people were murdered to avenge the life of the man, who six months earlier, had chaired the 90-minute meeting in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee, where the Final Solution was sanctified by Nazi law.

When the war ended, there was a Czech village that was liberated and briefly occupied by the American Army in 1945. The people of Susice watched the American Army depart and return to lines set in faraway summits. The Red Army took their place and snuffed out freedom for the next 45 years.

Before that happened – before the Russian jackboot fell – the people enjoyed a brief moment of freedom. They mourned the countless victims of Nazi murder, but they honored the acts of courage, sacrifice and death in the name of freedom.

Today, the Ukrainian Defence Forces are the Czech commandoes. Courage is present in this moment as it was then. President Zelensky has demonstrated that all of the elements of strength, fortitude, love and wisdom necessary to defeat evil are very much present in Ukraine. Those virtues must be seen, lauded and celebrated. That is why the United States and the global alliance for freedom and democracy that she leads must arm Ukraine for the long-term struggle that has already begun to fade in the consciousness of the weary American people.

There are two ways to win a fight. The first requires bringing an opponent to submission. The second requires exhausting an opponent until they lose the ability to tell the difference between being unable and unwilling to fight.

Exhaustion is Putin’s plan. His military is corrupt, brutal, criminal and incompetent. The Russian Army is a poorly led collection of thugs that is larger than that of their opponent. The Russian Army has found its footing. The combination of long-range artillery and the immorality to target civilians with it is turning the tide of war in Putin’s favor.

This war in Ukraine will last much longer than a Netflix scripted series or a new season of cultural dreck from Mark Burnett. Russia must not win this war. This will require a serious and sustained commitment by the United States to make sure Ukraine has the military, weapons, training, technology and intelligence to break the Russian aggressor, humiliate Putin and destabilize his gangster state. Of course, the Chinese are always watching. The strong words of western leaders are always commendable in the early hours. It tends to be the middle and twilight hours where grit, perseverance and commitment are found wanting. These hours are troublesome for many Western politicians who have come of age believing a crisis is something that is bad for them, not necessarily their nation or the world.

The United States has been the bulwark against global tyranny for more than 80 years. There is no other choice. The United States of America must remain the most powerful nation in the world for as far as the eye can see. World peace, stability and prosperity are utterly dependent on American power. This means the United States must remain the world’s preeminent power on land, at sea, in the air, in space and in cyber space. It means that the United States must be the dominant economic, innovative, exploratory, scientific, medical, research and entrepreneurial power on Earth. It means the United States must constantly lead a global alliance of free nations who believe that the rule of law, democracy, human rights and freedom are elemental bedrock requirements of a just society.

There will always be a challenge to democracy because power is foundational in any society. The attainment of power and the costs involved in taking it are at the root of so much suffering in the world. This has always been so.

Courage is what is required to defend freedom. Without it, freedom is extinguished.

The Nazi party was born out of grievance, resentment, inflation, a shattered economy, hate and lies. It took more than a decade for the spell-binding orator and antisemite to lead the party from the Beer Hall to the Reichstag. It took six months for the Nazis to extinguish democracy after they took elected power in 1932. It took 10 more years after that before the meeting took place to plan the murder of every Jew in Europe.

What was special about 1942?  Simple: the Nazis were winning.

They did everything they said they would do and more. There was no lack of imagination about what happened by 1945, when a shattered world was briefly at peace. It takes a long time to forget. We forget at our peril. At the beginning, the loss of freedom leads to places that are twisted beyond any depraved imagination. When people become the law, great evil follows. All around us are the reminders. Yet, the ball keeps rolling along.

The American role in the world is indispensable. It should combine idealism, humility and pragmatism. Without America, the powers that rise will be hostile to something that is at the core of the imperfect American experiment – human beings.

Democracy is what keeps all of us free from the jackboot. There is always someone willing to bring it down on the heads of children. Lidice is a reminder of what happens when the darkness doesn’t break, and the sun can’t rise.