The Czech Legion 1914-20

By David Bullock

The Czech Legion was not just a single military unit, but a volunteer army that fielded up to 100,000 troops on the Allied side on all three main fronts in World War I (1914-1918). Since only the defeat of Austro-Hungary and Germany offered any hope of Czech national independence, they were amongst the most motivated and steadfast of the Allied forces in France, the Italian Alps and Russia. In one of the most colorful and extraordinary episodes of the 20th century they fought their way across Russia in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution, captured the Russian national gold reserves in Kazan, and used this as a bargaining chip to force the Bolsheviks to allow them to return home, in an epic journey closely followed by the Western press. The Legion played a central part in the foundation of the Czechoslovakian nation with the leaders of independent Czechoslovakia - Masaryk, Benes and Stefanik - all emerging from the Legion's ranks. Today the Legion is recognized as the founding fathers of Czech nationhood and are idolized by the US Czech community as a result.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Feb 21, 2012
• ISBN: 9781780964584

Reviews for The Czech Legion 1914-20

[jcbrunner · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Osprey's Men-at-Arms series is in need of a face-lift. It needs as many color illustrations as the more recently launched series and it needs more pages. Given the exotic topic, the author is forced to cram too many topics into too few pages. The (rather few) Czechs fighting on the Western front for the Allies should either have been accorded their own title, so that much more space could have been allocated to the Czech anabasis, the wild journey of 60.000 Czech soldiers who, from fighting alongside the Russians on the Eastern front, became short term players in the Russian Civil War and ended up fighting alongside the Japanese in Russia's Far East. While there is no shortage of books about this episode in Czech, modern French and English accounts are rather scarce. This booklet is thus highly welcome and has benefited from much Czech support (the military museum in Prague features splendid exhibits from the Czech anabasis). Hopefully, this crazy episode in both Russian and Czech history will receive a book-length (or even cinematic) tribute soon. In the mean time, this Osprey does yeoman's service.