"I experienced it as an investigator sometime in 1982, 1983, at the time when I was serving as a senior instructor of the club at the Western Military District in Tabor, I was in charge of the cinema, the library. I was part of the, excuse me, wild hogs, when you went somewhere to check something and solve problems. I remember very well at one time we were sent, I think to Louny to the regiment, it was in February, 1983 or 1982, I don't know. There was some exercise and most of the regiment went for the exercise. And we went to check the back detachment, what was left. Whether the soldiers were guarding the ammunition dumps, whether what was going on was going on. We came with General Tuzar, he was the head of the civil protection of the Western Military District, such a nice gentleman, Jarda Tuzar. We arrived in Louny, and what I saw exceeded my expectations and my experience in Benesov. I'll describe the situation. As a culture person, I was given the task to go and check the cleanliness of the infirmary. No doctor went with us, I came to the infirmary, and I should point out that it was February and minus ten or twelve degrees. The windows in the infirmary were out of their frames because they had to be painted. There was a guy standing over some of the patients' beds on a step stool and he was painting the ceiling with white paintbrush, and it was dripping down. I could see it today, I couldn't believe it, I couldn't believe it. I stopped everything, they had to put the windows on immediately. The head doctor, a graduate who stayed behind, said he had orders that before the regiment came back from training they had to paint and repaint the windows. I told him that the patients might get pneumonia. And he said they'd hold out. That was just the infirmary. Others went to check on ammunition, ammunition depots. Soldiers were sitting around fires. We also checked the quarters where a pipe had burst in the wall. There were stalactites hanging from the ceiling, an incredible condition, and nobody minded, nobody was responsible for it. Everyone was on a training exercise. General Tuzar reported to Camp and Vesely told him that we must not leave until everything was sorted out and put in order. So I went to see Tuzar and in quotes I said to him, he was a nice guy, 'I don't see this happening so fast, so the first thing I ask is that I be assigned an apartment here in Louny.' But it wasn't just Louny, it was Slany, there were dozens of military units like that where there were problems that were not secured and there were such atrocities."
"First of all, you saw that most of the people who lived in Svobodarna were dissatisfied. Some even had families, but they didn't get an apartment, so they cursed. There were relationship issues between officers, there was a lot of drinking. Sometimes there was even a man who went to the army and among the soldiers for completely different reasons, because he liked boys and not girls. The army is a breeding ground for that. I, too, have been harassed. Guys tried to get away with it, but either they were on drill, or they had to go to the barracks, or they were late getting out of the barracks. And when they got out of their town and crew, they were happy. I dare say that among them were mostly those who wanted to leave. There weren't officers among them who were burning for the army, how beautiful and excellent it was, but it was a mess in their opinion and commanded by stupid assholes. Nota bene, they themselves were assholes for the soldiers of the basic service. They knew they were in a double bind that was hard to escape from, for many the escape was alcohol. There were those who left this world voluntarily, sad things. Every one of those young second lieutenants, especially the DDŠ, now I don't mean the engineer lieutenants, so they were trying to get an apartment, get a girlfriend somehow, start a normal life, which was not possible for young guys anyway. You were ready to go anywhere at a whistle, no questions asked, and you couldn't even protest. Because the commander said to you, 'It's an order, if you want a prosecutor, think it over.'"
"Look, I'll give you the example of Benesov. There were a lot of new second lieutenants there, they came after school, Liptovský Mikuláš, Vyškov. In Benesov, guys who were platoon or company commanders, but they were college students, lieutenants. Platoon commanders were in quotation marks chimney balls, they were terribly unhappy about it, and many were willing, wanted to do a crime to get out of the army. I knew these guys, I lived with them in the liberty barracks in Benesov. I know who said what and how they felt about it. A good third of them wanted to get out of the army at any cost. They wrote applications, they wanted to transfer, they wanted to get out. I knew at least two or three people who committed crimes and got tried and locked up for six months. It was worth it to them. That was bad. These people went to work in the morning, came back to the hostel in the evening, made scrambled eggs for dinner, had a beer or got drunk at the Arma. They were looking for girls where they could satisfy their passions, we were young guys, it was quite normal. I have to say, quite a few people became alcoholics. When these guys realized they were going to be in this their whole lives, after a year they were looking for a way out. I was in a slightly different situation, I got out after a year of horror in the motor battalion and I worked in the library, I was a cultural and educational worker. It was a kind of liberation for me."
"The very first month I was in Benesov, a guy in the guard shot himself. Before we got to him, because I had an assistant warden, somebody stole his shoes off his feet, just terrible. Afterwards, when the funeral was over, the boy's mother came and called us murderers. So I gave her the letter she sent to the boy, found it in his bedside table. The mother described to the boy how his love was getting married, how she had a beautiful wedding, how it suited her, and how she shouldn't make a big deal about it, that she'd picked someone else. Only the boy was in the army, the boy loved her, and he couldn't take it. It was horrible, it's like, when I think about that, I get soft. But the war brought situations like that, and there were more of them. On the other hand, I remember in Tabor, when I was serving there, Colonel General Veselý shouting to the cinema hall, 'Is General Vacek here?' I guarded the doors of the cinema hall as a senior culture instructor. Vacek stood up: 'Here, the commander of the First Army, General Vacek.' - 'Tell us, Vacek, how many deaths you had in this training period in the Army of Pribram!' Vacek said the number, I think about seventeen, because there was a big car accident. The guys who were in the deck of the V3S, so many got killed. He said it and Vesely looks at him and says to him in front of all three hundred people in the cinema hall, I'll never forget it, 'Vacek, you had more casualties than Svoboda at Dukla.' Nobody dared to laugh. And Veselý said: 'Well, look, Lieutenant Finger here, standing at the door, when he learns the ranks of the generals, because he doesn't know them yet...' He knew why, I made a mistake about him, '... so he may as well replace you in office.' I was ashamed, I stood like a hard 'Y'. Vacek was silent."
They recognized they were being led by stupid assholes. And they themselves were assholes to ordinary soldiers
Tomáš Finger (right) in the first half of the 1970s as a second lieutenant serving with a motorized artillery battalion in Benešov near Prague. He is in the training area with sergeant Miroslav Šantrůček, later a teacher at the University of Agriculture in Prague
Tomáš Finger was born on 20 July 1954 in Kutná Hora and grew up with three sisters. His father and grandfather were in Germany during the Second World War. His father fled home after the bombing of Dresden in February 1945, and in May he experienced the uprising against the Germans in Prague and their lynching after the liberation of the city. After the communist takeover in 1948, he lost his job at the tax office and worked as a laborer. The family lived near the barracks of the 1st Civil Protection Regiment in Kutná Hora. Tomáš Finger was trained as a mechanic of motor cars and locomotives, but he longed for a high school diploma, so he enrolled in a two-year officers‘ school. In 1974, he joined the motorized artillery regiment in Benesov near Prague as a second lieutenant and specialist in automotive and tank technology. He was interested in culture, so after a year with the unit he began to take care of it. As a soldier by profession, he studied art and culture at the Klement Gottwald Military Academy in Bratislava and passed the rigorous examination there. He received the degree of Doctor of Social Sciences (RSDr.). In addition to Benešov, he served, for example, in the 1st Civil Protection Regiment in Kutná Hora or at the headquarters of the Western Military District (WMC) in Tábor. Especially at the beginning of his military career he got to know the difficult life of young commanders, many of whom tried to leave the army, some of them even at the cost of crimes. Sometimes they even resorted to suicide. At the ZVO headquarters, Tomáš Finger met a number of generals, including Colonel General František Veselý. For most of his career as an officer, he devoted himself to culture. Yet, before 1989, he discovered the dismal state of the Czechoslovak People‘s Army. After the Velvet Revolution, during which the communist regime collapsed in November 1989, he remained in the army. In January 1990, he became the commander of the Army Art Ensemble, a position he held until its abolition in 1995. He retired to civilian life and started his own business. He brokered contracts for construction companies and, most importantly, started doing business in Albania. He made high profits and became acquainted with many Albanian politicians. In the Czech Republic, he was involved in top-level football, among other things he was instrumental in organising the Czechoslovakia-Brazil football internationals. He and his wife raised four daughters. He was briefly divorced in 2023 and lived in Kolín.
Tomáš Finger (right) in the first half of the 1970s as a second lieutenant serving with a motorized artillery battalion in Benešov near Prague. He is in the training area with sergeant Miroslav Šantrůček, later a teacher at the University of Agriculture in Prague
Tomáš Finger (right) in the first half of the 1970s as a second lieutenant serving with a motorized artillery battalion in Benešov near Prague. He is in the training area with sergeant Miroslav Šantrůček, later a teacher at the University of Agriculture in Prague
Oldřich Finger, Tomáš Finger's father, worked in Germany during the Second World War on the railway. On the right of him is his father, the grandfather Bohumil
Oldřich Finger, Tomáš Finger's father, worked in Germany during the Second World War on the railway. On the right of him is his father, the grandfather Bohumil
Tomáš Finger (second from left) in 1975 as a second lieutenant in the Western Military District in Tábor, Colonel General František Veselý is standing to the right of him
Tomáš Finger (second from left) in 1975 as a second lieutenant in the Western Military District in Tábor, Colonel General František Veselý is standing to the right of him
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
