JUDr. Jakub Sviták

“On day, the searcher was at the pond in the settlement of Rybník. He would just lie there sunbathing. He was wearing boxer shorts, and in the bag next to him he had a radio, a pistol with two magazines and some food. And some unfamiliar fellow had been passing by. Instead of reporting him, he went to ask him what time it was. It was some Pole who wanted to escape. He would pull out a gun, shoot him twice in the stomach and he would start running towards the frontier. The Pole didn´t know that he was a searcher, a soldier. He didn´t look like one. He had hair down to his shoulders, was dirty and unshaven, he had to pass a tramp. On that day it was me who served as an Operational Officer. The wounded soldier would crawl to the radio and report what had happened. Immediately, an operation started in the frontier zone. We would man the frontier right to the demarcation line and the patrol would come with dogs and would start chasing the Pole. Meanwhile, he would cross the fence into the area where SUPi were. After the second patrol would come and they would see him being torn apart by SUPi, they would sit on a bumper and wait. As they knew already that he had shot their friend. In the end they would bend the fence and force them to retreat. And they would arrest the Pole, but he wouldn´t move much as he would die soon after. The helicopter was already on its way to pick the soldier. They took him to the military hospital, and it took a hell lot of time to put him back in shape, but he survived.”

“A soldier in plain clothes would have been going to České Budějovice on a passenger train. In České Budějovice, he would ask cashiers at the train station – who were the Frontier Guard Helpers – whether there was anyone suspicious buying tickets to Lipno for example. He would get on the train and take a look on them. In Velešín, patrolmen in uniforms would get on, they would inspect the individual and if they would find him suspicious, they would take him to the frontier company base. In a brute manner, the people were interrogated for forty-eight hours there. Beating was a common thing. After my first interrogation I decided I would never do such a thing. If they didn´t prove them anything, after forty-eight hours they had to let them go. They would made them sign a paper stating that they received a fair treatment and were fed. If they didn´t sign, they were released only to be arrested again. Me and my wife we had a two-room flat in a semi-detached. The remaining part was empty and that was the place where the interrogations took place. Detained people were separated. What used to be a bathroom, a toilet and a closet now served as a holding cell. There was concrete floor and barred windows with no glass so they couldn't cut themselves. Even in the winter, the window couldn´t be closed. And the closet for example was 1.3m per 90cm. If the individual wasn´t being interrogated, he would be locked there. There wasn´t even a chair.”

“There were four dogs in kennels and to each side there was a pen made of wire mesh. Each pen might be about 350 meters long, stretching across the woods towards the demarcation where it ended. And you had these two funnels stretching in both directions. And when a signal would come from the signal wall, an Operational Officer would press the button, the bulb in kennels would light up, the buzzer would buzz and, depending on the direction they should run, a door held by an electromagnet would spring open. Then the dogs would run by the fence and if they would pick up a trail, they would follow it. If the alarm would be started by wildlife or maybe a partridge would sit on the wires, and so they would find nothing, the dogs would run to the end and then they would circle the fence back to kennels. Meanwhile, a patrol would arrive with a dog handler who would put them back into kennels praising them for their performance. And they would wait for the next signal. And if someone would be there they would go after him. One would have a muzzle and the rest would go for real. As if there would be an intruder or intruders and all the dogs would sink their teeth in them, the handler wouldn´t stand a chance finding them in the frontier woods. And the dog with the muzzle would just bark and pester and the handler would follow the sound so he would find the dogs and make them retreat. When I had to energise the SUPs I wouldn´t take just a bite sleeve but the whole protective gear. I would wear reinforced trousers and a suit, gloves and a metal mesh balaclava to protect my face. I would enter the gate to their section and lock it behind me and at given time the dogs would be released. They would go after me right away and would drag me for forty-five minutes maybe. They were so vicious that even the handler struggled to keep them at bay. They just had to give you proper biting before they would let you go.”

“In 1969 my parents took precautions and they took me and my brother to our grandmother in Rosice. But I drove away to Brno on a bike. I had my camera with me which I had bought recently and I wanted to take photos in case something would happen. And I had been running with the protesters being chased by the militia men from the Svobody Square to Zelený Trh, from Zelený Trh to the Rudé Armády Square – now the Moravské Square – and then back to the Svobody Square again. But I wasn´t demonstrating, I was taking photos. I was fourteen years old; I was a schoolboy. And in the 9. Května Street – today the Rašínova Street – there was a bathhouse and opposing it there has been a small shop operating till today; and there I was caught by three policemen, they crushed my camera and as I opposed, they would beat me with a baton so I had to sleep on my stomach till September. And I couldn´t tell my parents as I hadn´t been allowed to go to Brno.”