Radola Gajda
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Radola Gajda | |
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Major General (Czechoslovakia) | |
Unit | Czechoslovak Legion |
Commands held | Siberian Army |
Battles/wars | World War I Russian Civil War |
Radola Gajda, born as Rudolf Geidl (14 February 1892 – 15 April 1948) was a Czech military commander and politician.
Early years
Geidl's father was an officer in the
Legions
Immediately after his capture, Geidl switched sides and was commissioned as a captain in the Montenegrin Army. Having some experience as an apothecary, he pretended to be a physician.[1] Following the collapse of the Montenegrin Army in 1916, Gajda escaped into Russia where he joined a Serbian battalion as a physician.
At the end of 1916 the battalion was destroyed and Gajda joined the
During the evacuation of the Legion in May 1918
After the capture of
His career with Kolchak was less successful—the
Military career in Czechoslovakia
After arriving in Czechoslovakia in early 1920, Gajda was given a pension and the rank of General, but was not assigned a command. In November 1920 he was sent to study military theory at the École supérieure de guerre in France. He also studied agriculture at the Institut Technique de Pratique Agricole.
Gajda returned two years later. On 9 October 1922, he was given command of the 11th Division in Košice, Slovakia. His involvement in the cultural life of the region soon endeared him to the locals. On 1 December 1924 he was named Deputy Chief of the General Staff in Prague under General Eugène Mittelhauser, head of French military mission in Czechoslovakia.[1] Gajda became a rival of Mittelhauser and Mittelhauser's predecessor Maurice Pellé.[3] In this capacity, Gajda worked successfully to limit the influence of the mission, which was brought to an end in 1926. On 20 March 1926 he became Acting Chief of the General Staff. In his position he backed up former legionnaires against former loyalist Austrian officers.[citation needed]
Under pressure from president
Politics
Still a young man of 34, Gajda decided to turn to politics. At the end of 1926 he took part in the founding of the National Fascist Community (Czech: Národní obec fašistická, NOF), modeled on Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party and became its leader on 2 January 1927. In 1929 the party took several seats in parliament. In 1931 Gajda was briefly imprisoned and stripped of military rank due to a prior scandal.
During the night of 21–22 January 1933, the Židenice Mutiny broke out in
The NOF was somewhat successful in the 1935 elections and Gajda obtained a seat in parliament, which he was to hold until 1939. At this time, the NOF had a strong anti-
During March 1939, the Czechoslovakian political scene was in state of turmoil. Several coups were attempted, one in anticipation of making Gajda the new head of state. These amateurish coups ended in fiasco and several days later the remaining Czech lands were
Gajda was marginalized during the occupation and abandoned politics. He occasionally assisted the
Last years
In April 1947 he was brought to trial for "propagation of Fascism and Nazism", for which the prosecutor requested a life sentence. Gajda's guilt was far from clear and the resulting sentence of two years allowed him to leave prison shortly thereafter. Penniless and forgotten, he died several months later.
See also
Footnotes
- ^ "NS R S 1929-1935, PS, 110. sch ze, st 7/7 (6. 3. 1931)". Archived from the original on 2011-05-24.
- ISBN 978-80-87173-47-3.
- ^ a b Milan Nakonečný: Zneuctěný a zapomenutý hrdina Archived 2008-05-30 at the Wayback Machine (PDF) (in Czech)
References
- The Czech Fascist Movement: 1922-1942 by David Kelly (Columbia University Press, 1995, ISBN 0-88033-327-8)
- ISBN 0-13-089301-3)
- "Radola Gajda of Czechoslovakia" by Joseph F. Zacek in East Central European War Leaders: Civilian and Military edited by Bela K. Kiraly (Columbia University Press, 1988, ISBN 0-88033-140-2)
- "The Would-Be Führer: General Radola Gajda of Czechoslovakia" by David Kelly in Issue 12.3 of The Journal of Slavic Military Studies
- Antonín Klimek and Petr Hofman: "Generál Radola Gajda, vítěz, který prohrál" (General Radola Gajda, the winner who lost), 1995, ISBN 80-7185-033-0, excerpts.
- Jiří Fidler: "Generálové legionáři" (Generals of the legion), 2001, ISBN 80-7242-043-7
- Milan Nakonečný: Zneuctěný a zapomenutý hrdina (PDF) (in Czech)
External links
- the biggest database—photos, articles, informations (in Czech)
- Detailed biography, photos (two pages) (in Slovak)
- Biography (in Czech)
- Newspaper clippings about Radola Gajda in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW