Office of the Historian

860F.24/10–2444: Telegram

The Chargé to the Czechoslovak Government in Exile (Schoenfeld) to the Secretary of State

London, October 24, 1944—8 p.m.
[Received October 24—7:11 p.m.]

Zecho 19. Foreign Minister Masaryk states Czechoslovak Government is concerned by recent news from Slovakia. He says the rising there is going badly and it is not excluded that it may be “liquidated”. He has accordingly been directed by his Government to appeal to the United States Government for help in the form of supplementary supplies for the Slovak forces in Slovakia.13

He states that if the following supplies could be provided, the situation would be materially improved:

  • Fifty to 100 mortars 80 mm with 200 rounds ammunition each; One hundred medium machine guns with 3000 rounds ammunition each;
  • Five hundred Bren guns14 with 3 rounds ammunition each;
  • One thousand tommy guns with 1000 rounds ammunition each;
  • Two hundred bazooka with 50 rounds ammunition each;
  • One hundred flame throwers with reserve of fuel;
  • Three thousand anti-tank mines;
  • Five hundred anti-personnel mines;
  • Ten thousand hand grenades;
  • One thousand explosives with the necessary fuses and other accessories;
  • Twenty thousand field dressings;
  • Five thousand doses of anti-tetanus serum.

Masaryk adds a similar appeal is being addressed to the Soviet and British Governments.

[Schoenfeld]

[In a letter to President Eduard Beneš of Czechoslovakia, dated October 28, 1944, President Roosevelt marked the anniversary of Czechoslovak independence by saluting the uprising inside Czechoslovakia. For text, see Department of State Bulletin, October 29, 1944, page 497.]

  1. For a brief description of Allied military assistance to the Slovak uprising, see Jozef Lettrich, History of Modern Slovakia (Frederick A. Praeger, New York, 1955), p. 213.↩
  2. Type of small, automatic rifle.↩