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The 1938 Munich Agreement left a deep mark on Czechoslovak society, more especially in the Czech part of the country. The liquidation of the 20-year-old state, and the part played in this by France and Great Britain, had a deep effect on the political thinking of a large proportion of the public. In the course of the Second World War the resistance movement both abroad and at home gradually evolved a policy for "undoing Munich". It had three main planks: the recognition of Czechoslovakia in its pre-Munich boundaries, ensuring the state's survival by orienting its foreign policy toward the Soviet Union, and carrying out socio-economic and political changes calculated to produce internal safeguards against another Munich. These internal changes involved adjustments to the party system, reforms in the ownership of the economy and, in particular, the elimination of national minorities by the expulsion of German and Hungarian citizens. The policy of redressing Munich brought Communist and non-Communist elements of the resistance closer together and was reflected in the reform programme of Czechoslovakia's post-war government.

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-10644-8_9

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