The Crimes of Khrushchev: Slovakia

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“The best way to eliminate war is the gaining of power by Communists all over the world.”
— Nikita Khrushchev, addressing the Third International Congress of Miners Unions in Poland, July, 1959.

The following consultations began at 10:30 a.m. in room 226, Old House Office Building, Washington, D.C. Committee members present: Hon. Francis E. Walter, of Pennsylvania (chairman) presiding, and Hon. Gordon H. Scherer, of Ohio. Staff member present: Richard Arens, staff director.

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The Chairman. The committee will come to order, and the first witness will be sworn.

Do you, Mr. Pauco, solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give this committee will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Mr. Pauco. I do.

The Chairman. Proceed, Mr. Arens.

Statement of Joseph Pauco

Mr. Arens. Kindly identify yourself, sir, by name, residence, and occupation.

Mr. Pauco. Joseph Pauco, Mounted Route, Middletown, Pa. My occupation is that of journalist.

Mr. Arens. Now give us, please, a word about your own personal background.

Mr. Pauco. I was born in Slovakia on February 26, 1914. I graduated from the Slovak University in Bratislava in 1942 with a Ph.D. degree, after which I worked for several Slovak newspapers. I was, in the years 1942–45, editor in chief of the daily Slovak.

In April 1945, I escaped with my wife and son to Austria, I lived for 2 years in Austria, and then for 3 years in Munich, Germany. Then, in April 1950 I came with my wife to the United States.

Since then, I have been working as an assistant editor of the weekly Jednota in Middletown, Pa.

Besides that, I am working in the Slovak liberation movement, and presently I am secretary general of the Slovak National Council Abroad.

I have written several books in Slovak and English, most of them on anti-Communist topics.

Mr. Arens. Are you a citizen of the United States?

Mr. Pauco. I am, since 1956.

Mr. Arens. By way of clarification of this record, please tell us the location and political status of your former homeland, Slovakia.

Mr. Pauco. Slovakia is a country between the Carpathian Mountains and the Danube River, bordered on the south by Hungary, on the north by Poland, on the east by the Subcarpathian Ukraine, on the west by Moravia.

In the ninth century Slovakia was an independent state, a kingdom, then ruled over by the Hungarians. It was part of the Hungarian kingdom for almost a thousand years, until 1918. Then, in 1918, Czechoslovakia was created from two lands, Bohemia and Slovakia. Slovakia was the eastern part of Czechoslovakia.

Then, on March 14, 1939, Slovakia declared herself independent. In the spring of 1945, Slovakia was overrun by the Soviets and integrated again with Czechoslovakia, which is still enslaved by the Communists.

Mr. Arens. Was Khrushchev directly involved in the enslavement of Slovakia and its people?

Mr. Pauco. It certainly is true to say that Khrushchev and the Czech Communists destroyed the Slovak Republic and, without consulting the Slovak nation or its people, imposed upon it the brutal national front.

Mr. Arens. Would you be able to give us some particulars or evidence of this?

Mr. Pauco. Indeed. Let me show you this Communist newspaper, “Práce,” printed in Bratislava, Slovakia, under the date of August 6, 1959. It published, as you can perceive, an article entitled, “Leading Role of the Communist Party in the National Uprising,” in which it states, among other things, this:

In May of 1944 Gottwald arrived at the partisan headquarters in Kijev [Kiev] to discuss with Khrushchev, then head of the Ukranian (Soviet) Government, the assistance needed for (organizing) a partisan resistance movement in the territories of (former) Czecho-Slovakia. In accordance with these discussions, segments of trained paratroops, well experienced in organizing partisan movements, were dispatched to and dropped in Slovakia in July and August (of the same year).…

This, then, was the beginning of the savage mission undertaken against the Slovak government and President Msgr. Jozef Tiso, a horror-filled action known now in Slovakia as the “August Revoit.”

Mr. Arens. What happened in this “August Revoit” of 1944?

Mr. Pauco. Soviet and Czech and other international Communists, under the direction of Khrushchev and his secret police, swooped down by the thousands out of the mountains and forests upon the helpless Slovak population, savagely and shamelessly butchering them and destroying their homes, and occupied certain strategic public centers and buildings, including military barracks, and proclaimed a violent revolution, the aim of which, according to the proclamation, was to overthrow Slovakia’s government and bind Slovakia to Communist Prague and Moscow.

The partisans terrorized Slovak villages. They categorically seized all citizens of note who had shown opposition to communism. They robbed their apartments, homes, castles, factories, places of business, warehouses. They indulged in drunken orgies and began to annoy innocent victims, torturing and killing them. Thousands of Slovaks were subjected to unspeakable tortures and inhuman torments.

Among the first victims in this wave of terror was the Slovak labor leader and Member of Parliament, Francis Slamen, who met his cruel fate in the town of Brezno nad Hronom. He was a typical Slovak laborer, one of thousands of diligent and honest Slovak workingmen, providing for his family by the toil of his hands.

Another notable victim of the partisans was a Catholic priest and Parliamentary deputy, Rev. Anthony Salat, who died in the first week of the rebellion. He was a man of noble character, and his was the stature of an earnest Slovak patriot, a brilliant popular writer, a matchless public speaker, and one of the most outspoken and determined opponents of communism.

They dragged him out of the quiet of his parish to the bridge that spans the Hron River. He begged to be allowed to make his confession, but the rabble refused him this spiritual consolation. In answer to his request they sounded off rounds of satanic laughter and piercing ridicule which alternated with salvos from their automatics, felling the good priest to the cold pavement of the bridge that he had built for the community.

But even this did not satisfy the savage “liberators.” They beset the corpse of the murdered Father Salat and robbed it. Out of his vest pocket they removed his gold watch; out of his coat pocket they took his wallet. They even knocked out several of his teeth and claimed the gold caps from his dental work. Then they hurled the brutally abused and rifled body into the Hron.

Father Anthony Salat was not the only Slovak Catholic priest done to cruel death by the partisans. Among others who perished under the violent hand of the oppressors were Fathers John Nemec, Martinka of Liptovsky Svaty Mikulas, and the seminarian Milan of Povazska Bystrica. A frightful death befell Father Seda, the pastor in Liptovsky Svaty Jan.

Singled out for sacrifice were also a number of valiant officers who chose to accept no command in the uprising. For this service to their country, Colonels Kanak and Zverin, as well as Lieutenant Colonel Klucik and First Lieutenants Frecer and Sindler, were shot to death. The distinguished General Turanec was put under house arrest in Banska Bystrica right at the outset of the putsch. Once they let loose the full strength of their partisan activities, they had General Turanec flown to Moscow, where they tortured him for his uncompromising stand against communism.

One of the major stigmas of the putsch is the concentration camp which the partisans arranged in the castle fortress Slovenska Lupca. Here they tormented and persecuted over a thousand victims, not only men, but women and children, too. The superintendent of this concentration camp was the savage Communist, Staudinger.

The housing of the prisoners was horrible. The overseer packed over 150 people into a single room. Other sections were crowded with as many persons as could possibly be forced into them. Household furnishings were removed. From the beginning, the prisoners were bedded on the bare floor; later the authorities allowed them to bring in some straw. Spies, informers, and instigators of trouble were planted among the prisoners. Hygienic requirements in this concentration camp became a thing of the past. The place was a real hell.

Inmates took sick as a result of the undernourishment, starvation, filth, and foulness that prevailed. Instead of providing medical help or relief for them, the vindictive jailer turned on them with abuse and embittered their lives still further with inhuman treatment. Even when the doctor did come into the camp, he was allowed to examine a sick unfortunate only in the presence of the commandant of the guard of national security. The physician prescribed medication for which the prisoner paid but never received. Their daily fare consisted of potatoes and cabbage.

The barbaric superintendent, a former shoemaker, on visiting the confining quarters, abused the miserable inmates by kicking them about like dogs while he cursed them fiendishly and threatened every one of them with the gallows.

An evil reputation came to be associated with Kunerad, one of the headquarters of the partisan band located near the city Zilina. Czech Karol Bacilek was the political commissar in the fortress Kunerad. Brutal in the extreme was the punishment meted out to anti-communistic fighters, and quick sentences were readily executed. It was comparable to Sklabina, headquarters of the partisans.

In the mass grave in Podsucha, there were found 80 victims of partisan ferocity. In the mass graves near Sklenne, about 200 persons met their deaths. Other mass graves were also found at Kovacova, in Pusty Hrad, in the Prievidza Valley, at Humenne, Lucivna, Bosany, Lubietova, Nemecka Lupca and Kremnicka.

During this Communist putsch, material losses in Slovakia were extremely great. The state statistical and planning office in Bratislava published in its “Statistical Handbook of Slovakia 1947” an evaluation of damage inflicted on buildings, projects, and their equipment, art objects, communications, livestock, and other ravaged properties as in excess of 114,461,000,000 crowns, or $2.5 billion. Losses in lives amounted to 70,000.

Mr. Arens. Do you have anything to add to this?

Mr. Pauco. I was in Slovakia at the time.

Mr. Arens. What happened after this “revolt”?

Mr. Pauco. Toward the end of the war in the spring of 1945 the Soviet troops, together with the integrated Czech units of General Svoboda, savagely occupied Slovakia and began the government of the so-called People’s Democracy under the control and direction of Dr. Eduard Benes. The prisons began to overflow, and concentration camps began to spring up everywhere. In the first month this “people’s democratic government” not only ruthlessly incarcerated political opponents of communism and Prague centralism, but also two of the Slovak bishops and about 120 Catholic priests. It opened up the so-called peoples’ courts, which almost daily meted out verdicts of death and frightful punishment against justice and freedom. Thirty-seven Slovaks were thusly condemned and executed for their political and national beliefs and convictions. Indeed, every person seriously interested or involved in Slovak politics or Slovakia’s freedom and self-government or independence, if not condemned outright to death, was given a life or 30-year sentence. On April 18, 1947, with the gleeful approval of Dr. Benes, Msgr. Jozef Tiso, the President of Slovakia, was executed, in spite of the pleas of the bishops of Slovakia and of the Vatican itself. The premier of Slovakia, Dr. Vojtech Tuka, was likewise executed.

Until 1948 in Slovakia there were two major political parties, the Democratic Party and the Communist Party, which outwardly decided the fate of the Slovak nation and of the anti-Communist leaders, and both of these parties acted in these matters in unison, as one in a national front. Communists, both before and after the elections, which were in May of 1946 and in which the Communists lost out in Slovakia, were assigned the leading and major positions in the so-called or quasi “Slovakia’s Autonomous Government” (called “Committee of Commissioners”). After the elections Communist Gustav Husak became the head of this “Slovak Autonomous Government,” and he filled all the key positions with his followers. Non-self rule and subservience to communism in this so-called “Democratic Party” became obvious. Indeed, already in the same year of 1946 the Democratic Party succumbed and granted its power and authority to govern to the Communist Party, in spite or the fact that the Slovak nation voted against the Communist Party and elected the Democratic Party into power.

Neither tne Communist Party nor its Slovak leaders, however, were able to enjoy this enviable position and power in Slovakia, for both Gustav Husak and his closest comrades were Slovak nationalists, who after World War II hoped for a separate Slovak Soviet Republic. The Prague rulers of the dual state initiated a secret and unscrupulous purge of the Slovak Communist leaders. The first to fall was Vladimir Clementis, the leader of Slovak Communist intellectuals. As minister of foreign affairs in the Prague, he fell into “discredit” so much that in 1952 he was purged from his office and executed. Two years later Gustav Husak was sentenced to life imprisonment, and all of his Communist fellow workers received 10 to 22 years. Zealous Communists though they were, to date not one of them has received a commutation of his sentence or “mercy.” Certain Communist leaders simply, it is alleged, “shot themselves” or “suddenly died.”

Mr. Arens. Who has the responsible leadership in Slovakia today?

Mr. Pauco. Neither the government in Prague nor Moscow, that is, no responsible Communist leader in Prague or Moscow, including Khrushchev, trusts the Slovaks, not even well-trained and Prague-and-Moscow-orientated Slovak Communists. This is evident from the fact that the Czech Communist, Karol Bacilek, the supreme secretary of the Communist Party, has the highest position in Slovakia. The second supreme position is held by the Hungarian Communist Viliam Siroky. Slovaks in the Communist administration have practically no significant positions. The individuals who do have those positions are all foreign Communists, mostly Czechs. Besides this there are thousands of Czech troops and police in Slovakia. The secret police force in Slovakia is wholly in the hands of Czech Communists.

Mr. Arens. How does the secret police force work in Slovakia?

Mr. Pauco. Already in the spring of 1945 the Czech-directed secret police force, together with the Soviet Secret Police, operating in Slovakia, seized some 30,890 hapless and innocent Slovaks and unscrupulously and cruelly carried them off to the Soviet Union, probably to the concentration camps in Siberia. In the following years this secret police force spent its time ferreting out and suppressing Slovakia’s unabating total opposition and abortive resistance movements. Almost every year dozens of Slovak patriotic leaders from anti-Communist groups or movements in Slovakia would be arrested, imprisoned, or secreted away to some prison or concentration camp, there to suffer, die, or vanish. The secret police would condemn them summarily, not only for anti-Communist political activity, but also for shielding their church or priests, or for defending and upholding or working for a free, self-ruling, and independent Slovakia.

Thus in 1946 alone this secret police force imprisoned in Slovakia almost 114,000 Slovaks. Most of these, after months and years of wasting away under Communist torment, were eventually released, but generally ruined and broken of body and spirit, usually ill and emaciated from prison or concentration-camp brutality, inhumanity, and starvation; thereafter to be continually suspected, watched, and hunted or persecuted. The rest, never to taste freedom again, would be kept imprisoned for months or years even more inhumanly, without a proper or decent investigation, much less a just trial, some miserably to perish forever from improper, indecent, brutal, and inhuman treatment or malnutrition and the like, and the other few, languishing and awaiting trial or certain death, would be summarily, often without notice, condemned and executed, sometimes even without any public announcement.

Not infrequently the secret police, with loaded arms in hand, would swoop down upon and raid private homes and apartments to terrify the occupants and ransack their possessions; or they would, unprovokedly, unjustly, and without warrant, merely break into citizens’ private dwellings and, terrifying them with their guns, search and ransack the premises; or, as it often happened, they would, with guns or bayonets in hand, burst into a church during services, insult and attack the officiating clergyman, or even rudely lay hold of him and carry him off the pulpit during his particular religious or liturgical service.

The tortures, indecencies, and inhumanities committed by these secret police upon the Slovak people in Slovakia were the same, or very similar, as those advocated and recorded in the writings and records of the GPU and NKVD.

Mr. Arens. Do you have any reports of the present activity and methods of the secret police there?

Mr. Pauco. Yes, we do have. Just recently the Slovak National Council Abroad received a trustworthy report from various Slovak political prisoners in Czechoslovakia, reliably depicting the malconditions and maltreatment variously and indiscriminately imposed upon the hapless Slovak political internees merely according to the particular suspicions and unscrupulous whims of this police force. For instance, an example in point is that of the Leopoldov, one of the severest and cruelest prisons and concentration camps to which the noblest and finest Slovak opponents of communism were and still are sent. At present several hundred of them are thus incarcerated there.

Among the prisoners in Leopoldov was Bishop Jan Vojtassak, now 82. He was ordered to strip completely and made to stand on flagstone floors for 2 hours. From time to time they were all forced to do squatting exercises. When the aged Bishop Vojtassak was no longer able to keep up with the exhausting exercise, the cruel warden shouted at him brutally, “I’ll give it to you! So your breath is running short? Get on with the drill! Squat, jump! Get on, even if it kills you!” and he cursed savagely.

Some items of personal use and value belonging to the prisoners were heaped up in a pile, and when one of the unfortunates complained that it might be difficult to find what was his later on, the guard commented cynically, “And why should you want it? You’re going to rot and die in this place, anyway.”

Most of the prisoners were housed in solitary cells. As soon as the warden knocked, however, all, even those in communal quarters, had to give an immediate response by drilling squat-jumps at once, squatting and rising at a fast rate and counting in a very loud voice. Often they were required to squat-jump an average of 300 times a day; but if the guard or keeper was in a mean mood or if a control commission arrived from Prague, the requirement was raised to from 600 to 800 repetitions. No consideration was granted to the state of health or to the age of anyone. Those who were overcome in the course of the routine and blacked out were revived with dashes of cold water. This happened more than once to Bishop Michal Buzalka.

Guards or even corridor patrols chosen by the commandant from among trusties (mostly criminals), for even the slightest cause and by their own petty authority, would arbitrarily decree “punitive rations” or “hard bed” to a prisoner for at least 14 days, sometimes even for several weeks. “Punitive rations” meant that out of his normal rations, which were already so miserly as to really amount to starvation fare, an ill-fated prisoner would receive only a scant half. “Hard bed” meant sleeping on the bare floor.

Imprisoned medics figured that normal week-day rations served to the inmates provided from 800 to 1,000 calories per day; Sunday servings offered from 1,200 to 1,400 calories—this in comparison with the minimum of 2,400 calories which a grown man doing no manual labor requires in order to maintain well being. Nevertheless, on the average one-third of the prisoners were usually assigned “punitive rations.” There was a fearful spread of anemia, malnutrition with attendant swelling of the limbs, bleeding gums generally inducing loss of teeth for want of adequate vitamins, etc. Practically one out of every three prisoners was afflicted with at least one of these ailments. Doctors were helpless.

An inmate confined to a normal cell was subjected to from 300 to 600 squat-jumps a day, depending on the temper of his guards. A prisoner “in punishment,” however, was ordered to do more than that number or squat-jumps. Besides, in a “correction block,” they also had to race from 20 to 50 times a day down the full length of the prison corridor, clad only in their underclothes; they were apportioned only half-rations and had to sleep on the bare concrete floor. At night they were often roused from sleep, and each time they had to respond to roll call and do squat-drills. Some prisoners were detained here as long as 2 or 3 months.

There were fears that the civilian population of the area might come to aid the prisoners. Intimidating tactics were set in motion. From watchtowers shots were poured into the cells of the prisoners, who had to take cover beneath their beds. The prisoners were not allowed to sleep at all. They had to strip to their underclothes, and then police dogs were driven into the rooms. No quarters were spared. Even the prison infirmary, where lay mortally sick prisoners and patients recovering from major surgery, was overrun by dogs that raced about wildly from bed to bed and on the beds. All of them, of course, were muzzle-free.

The performance of divine services, as well as the retaining or reading of religious books, has been proscribed in all penal institutions ever since 1950. Rosaries, crucifixes, and common prayer are also forbidden. Even the dying are denied the consolation of a priest, nor may a priest perform any functions for the dead. At Leopoldov the guards bury the dead in a state field on the other side of the railroad tracks, not far from the grim walls of the prison camp. No mounds mark the places of the graves; they are identified only by small stakes each with a number.

Church Holy Days, especially Christmas and Easter, are made most unpleasant for the prisoners. All year long no meat soup is served, but it was on Good Friday in 1956. Meat was also served on Christmas Eve, a day of fast and abstinence in the Catholic Church. On that day a surprise inspection team from the police patrols the quarters to ascertain that no prisoners are at prayer or reading smuggled religious instructions.

The prisoners long to receive the sacraments. All through the records of the hard years, there is not even the rumor of any defection from the faith in the prisons. On the contrary, a number of unbelievers have been converted.

Mr. Arens. Are there labor concentration camps in Slovakia?

Mr. Pauco. Indeed there are. The main ones are at Novaky, Presov, and Muceniky. Quite a few hundred Slovak political internees slave in Jachymov, the well-known uranium mine in Sudetenland. Whilst mentioning Sudetenland, let me call to your attention also the fact that when the Prague Czech-Communist regime expelled over 3 million Sudeten Germans, it forced over 400,000 Slovaks from Slovakia to work there with tne view, first, to Czechize a great portion of the Slovak population and, second, to weaken the Slovak anti-Communist opposition and resistance in Slovakia.

Mr. Arens. How are the Communists doing economically for the people?

Mr. Pauco. Deplorably. Unlike the tremendous prosperity, the high standard of living, and the wonderful life and freedom which so gloriously prevailed during Slovakia’s short-lived independence under President Msgr. Jozef Tiso’s leadership, and which the people thoroughly loved and enjoyed, today just the opposite exists. Today Slovakia’s economic life is aligned with, and conforms to, that of the Soviet Union. It is regimented in accordance with the whims of the Czech-Communist regime in Prague. It is thus that the State began one by one the nationalization of everything and is establishing complete control over everything—public and personal, economic and social, cultural and even religious life. It has established its own state factories and industries; its own utilities and commercial enterprises; its own state housing, hospitals, and sanitoria; its own state-controlled medical and other professions, trades, and classes; its own cultural, social, and recreational, even religious, activities; its own state-owned resources, forests, land and waters; and its own state-owned or controlled communal farms. Thus over 70 percent of the farms in Slovakia are already communized, that is, reduced to the kolkhoz system and farming. The Prague Government is frantically building in Slovakia arms and missile industries and a great arsenal of atom bombs.

Mr. Arens. Do the Slovak people succumb to, or believe in, the peace slogan “peaceful coexistence”? Does it influence them?

Mr. Pauco. Certainly not significantly. I spoke with dozens of Americans of Slovak origin who recently visited Slovakia and, in reply to this question, they invariably reiterated that, “The Slovak people are praying daily for war, for they cannot see any other way out of communism except through a major war.”

Mr. Arens. You say that American Slovaks visited or visit Slovakia. Were any of them prominent American citizens?

Mr. Pauco. As far as I know there were only two better known Americans, two clergymen, who were able to get in. The Prague Communist regime refused to grant visas to the others who wished to visit Slovakia.

Mr. Arens. How did the Communist regime treat these American visitors?

Mr. Pauco. Since these visitors were uninfluential individuals, they suffered no harm and nothing significant happened to them. A number of them, however, did mention to me that the Communist police and authorities kept daily tab on them and on their comings and goings, so that they were afraid to speak openly or to go everywhere that they would have loved to go, lest they involve their relatives or even themselves. They did notice a lot of official Communist anti-American propaganda over the radio and through the newspapers in Slovakia, but the Slovak people there do not seem to be affected by it; rather, they resent it.

Mr. Arens. We know you were in Vinnitsa. Is that correct?

Mr. Pauco. Yes, I was there in 1943 with the International Press delegation. I may reiterate here that I agree with the statements of my Ukrainian friends who witnessed the horrors in Vinnitsa. This visit of mine was my first shocking experience with the terrifying brutality of the Soviets: people shot through the nape. I saw hundreds of women, miserable widows and orphans, who sobbingly told me of how this horrible and shocking tragedy was perpetrated. The merciless crimes of Khrushchev in Vinnitsa are crying to heaven for vengeance.

Mr. Arens. What do you think of Khrushchev’s recent tactics?

Mr. Pauco. They are overdone and sly. Communists have always gone after their objectives well thought out and prepared. Today it isn’t necessary for them to proclaim a worldwide proletariat revolution, when so many people amongst the Western nations seem to fancy that there will be some favorable internal changes in the Soviet regime. Khrushchev shrewdly casts about his soothing slogans, and we are encouraged and satisfied. The West acts as if it had discovered that Khrushchev in this war of nerves, which he only prolongs with his travels and visits, is achieving above all that which is most important to the Soviet Union—the cracking of the backbone of the subjugated nations behind the Iron Curtain. Soviet propaganda can now contentedly publicize that the West is not concerned about these subjugated nations and that it will not fight in their behalf, for now the West only desires peace and compromise with Khrushchev.

Reports from Slovakia indicate that the talks of and with Khrushchev in the United States had equally as terrifying an effect on the Slovak people in Slovakia as did the inaction of the West in behalf of the Hungarian people in the Hungarian revolt of 1956, or equally as disgusting an effect on them as the West’s abandonment of the Tibetans last year or of the Laos today. It seems to me that it is time that the civilized world took cognizance of the fact that discussions and conferences with Communists lead nowhere and are ultimately worse than useless, indeed harmful to the West. In my opinion, the only way to deal with communism is to isolate Communist regimes economically and militarily and, at the opportune time, if need be in the moment of decision, to annihilate every Communist regime.

The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Pauco.

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The Chairman. Call your next witness, please, Mr. Arens.

Father Zubek, do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Father Zubek. I do.

Statement of Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek

Mr. Arens. Kindly identify yourself by name, residence, and occupation.

Father Zubek. My name is Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek. I live in Clifton, N.J., at 225 Ackerman Avenue. I am a religious priest, Franciscan priest, and presently a teacher of religion in Seton Hall University, Newark, N.J.

Mr. Arens. Father, give us, if you please, just a word about your own personal background, including the place of your birth and a word about your education and your early life.

Father Zubek. I was born in Slovakia on April 4, 1914, in the town of Malacky. It is close to Bratislava, in western Slovakia.

My studies consisted of elementary schooling in the same village of Malacky, then the gymnasium or high school, in Bratislava and in Skalica. I graduated from that gymnasium of Skalica on June 9, 1934. I went through my theological studies in Zagreb, in Bratislava and in Fribourg, Switzerland. I was ordained a Franciscan priest on June 26, 1938. I finished my postgraduate theological studies in October 1940, with a doctorate of theology. I was a teacher of theology in the Franciscan seminary in Zilina, Slovakia, from 1941 to 1950, when the Communists suppressed all the monasteries in Slovakia.

Mr. Arens. Please give us in your own words just a thumbnail description of what happened in your own personal life when the Communists suppressed the religious orders in Slovakia.

Father Zubek. The suppression of the monasteries and all religious orders came unexpectedly. They came to our monasteries during the night of April 13, forced entrance, gave us 5 minutes to collect our personal belongings, then put us into trucks and took us to an unknown place. This place for us Franciscan religious priests and brothers was Svaty Benedik nad Hronom.

Mr. Arens. What happened then?

Father Zubek. In those monasteries, called concentration monasteries, they tried to reeducate us as pro-Communist priests.

Mr. Arens. What do you mean by reeducate?

Father Zubek. By reeducation, I mean they gave us brainwashing. In the morning and in the evening there was always at least a short lecture about communism. They brought in Communist newspapers, such as Pravda—this means truth, but it was all lies—and we had to read editorials in it and take part in those discussions, led by a pro-Communist president or chief of the camp.

Then, they gave us a condition. After the reeducation, they demanded the oath of loyalty to the Communist regime, as the condition to reentering the public ministry.

Mr. Arens. Did you take the loyalty oath?

Father Zubek. I did not, because I considered it something against my priestly conscience.

I was looking immediately for a way to escape. We were working in the vineyards, and that particular vineyard in which we were working was close to a forest. I figured out how to get into the forest and disappear. After one week I realized those plans and escaped. This was in April 1950, and I went into hiding from that time on.

Mr. Arens. How long were you in hiding?

Father Zubek. I was in hiding for 9 months.

Mr. Arens. Then where did you go?

Father Zubek. Then I went secretly over the border to Austria.

Mr. Arens. How long were you in Austria?

Father Zubek. I was in Austria for 3 months, and then I came to Italy. I was called by my religious superiors in Rome to the central office there, to give an account of the situation concerning religious matters in Slovakia.

I applied immediately for an American visa when I was in Rome, and it was granted in 1952. I came to this country on February 21, 1952.

Mr. Arens. Now, Father, by devices which we have discussed off the record, you have current sources of information respecting the situation in your former homeland of Slovakia; is that correct?

Father Zubek. That is correct.

Mr. Arens. When did the persecution of the church in Slovakia begin?

Father Zubek. The persecution of the church in Slovakia began with the restoration of Czechoslovakia in the form of the so-called People’s Democracy, in 1945. In that year all schools were nationalized; no private schools, that is, Catholic, were permitted. Catholic periodicals were for the most part suppressed. Church properties in excess of 35 acres were expropriated. Many priests and three Slovak bishops were imprisoned by the new regime. The whole structure of the new Czechoslovakia was anti-Catholic. But in 1946 and 1947, the church in Slovakia recovered somehow from these first blows. The real trouble, a systematic persecution of the church, began when, in February 1948, the Communists seized complete power in Czechoslovakia.

Mr. Arens. What happened to the church organization in 1948?

Father Zubek. After the overthrow in 1948, the church was taken under complete control by the Communist regime. First of all, all Catholic periodicals and publishing houses, reestablished in 1946–47, were suppressed. There were over 20 Catholic periodicals and 8 publishing houses in Slovakia. Only one publishing house, the Society of St. Adalbert, was left to continue under its old, historic name. But even that one was immediately put under complete Communist control and forced to serve Communist aims. It is currently publishing the Katolicke Noviny (Catholic News), a weekly, and the Duchovny Pastier (Spiritual Shepherd), a monthly for the clergy, both edited in the pro-Communist spirit.

Mr. Arens. Why did the Communists let the Society of St. Adalbert exist?

Father Zubek. I think that it was for propaganda purposes. Since its foundation in 1870, the Society of St. Adalbert was deeply enrooted in the Catholic life of Slovakia. The suppression of this publishing house would have been too much for Slovak Catholics to swallow. Then, the Communists impudently pretend to be benefactors of the church. They try to keep up appearances of religious freedom. According to the Soviet pattern, the Communists of Czechoslovakia put into their new constitution of May 9, 1949, a paragraph about religious freedom. They did not close any church. They permitted the publication of the two aforementioned, so-called Catnolic periodicals and occasionally some books, such as a daily missal in Slovak, or the Holy Bible. But they are doing it only to boast that no harm to the church is being done. Actually, whatever they left of the church organization is under strict Communist control and must serve the Communist regime.

Mr. Arens. Were there other instances of Communist encroachments against the church?

Father Zubek. There certainly were, and very many. To proceed chronologically, I have to mention, first of all, the suppression of all Catholic societies, reestablished in 1946 and 1947. No exception, not even to preserve appearances, was made at this time.

Mr. Arens. Were some Catholic societies permitted later?

Father Zubek. Not exactly. But there was something which should eventually be qualified so. It was on June 10, 1949, when the Communists of Czechoslovakia tried to establish a Catholic pro-Communist organization under the name of the “Catholic Action.” The genuine Catholic Action was suppressed in 1948. A year later, the Communists gathered in Prague about 800 lay people and 70 priests who proclaimed themselves to be representatives of tne Catholic Church in Czechoslovakia. They established the so-called reborn Catholic Action, whose purpose was to reinstate good relations between the church and state, after the official discussions about the agreement between the church and state failed in March, 1949.

The bishops protested vehemently against this spurious organization, qualifying it an attempted schism, and prohibited Catholics from having anything to do with it. Also, the Holy See on June 20, 1949, issued a decree excommunicating all organizers, promoters, and members of this organization. Despite the opposition of the hierarchy. clergy, and faithful, the Communists still insisted on imposing their “Catholic Action” upon the Catholics, which resulted in a great turmoil throughout the whole of Slovakia. Slovakia during the summer of 1949 was on the verge of open rebellion. Hundreds of people and priests were imprisoned in this connection.

Mr. Arens. Was the Slovak clergy in strong opposition to communism?

Father Zubek. It is quite natural that the Slovak clergy, knowing the atheistic and antireligious nature of communism, was strongly opposed to it. On the other hand, the Communists were fully aware that the Catholic people of Slovakia, traditionally influenced by the clergy, were also opposed to communism as long as the influence of the clergy persisted. That was the reason why since 1948 they started to disrupt the ties between the clergy and the lay people, and to disturb the unity of the clergy itself. First of all, they began to press the bishops to conclude an agreement between the church and the Communist government. The agreement was never concluded. The negotiations collapsed on March 22, 1949, because the Communists simply wanted the bishops’ ratification of the Communist encroachments upon the rights of the church and rejected all the rightful demands of the hierarchy to guarantee the basic rights of the church.

Meanwhile, the Communists tried to get some priests to their side. Those members of the clergy who showed signs of submission were praised in the Communist press as good “patriotic priests,” though, in fact, most of them were rather mentally disturbed persons, at odds with their bishops and superiors. These priests assisted in the establishment of the so-called “Catholic Action” on June 10, 1959, and subsequently yielded to further Communist demands. But the bulk of the Catholic clergy remained loyal to their bishops and to the Holy See, and was for a long time openly opposed to Communist pressure.

Mr. Arens. Did the opposition of the clergy lessen?

Father Zubek. To some extent, yes. The reason was that the Communists, after the failure of the discussions for an agreement between the church and state and of their spurious “Catholic Action,” increased their efforts in dissolving the church organization. The critical step in this direction was the new antichurch laws of October 14, 1949.

By Law No. 217, all religious matters were put under complete control of the newly established State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs. All priests in public ministry were bound to take the oath of loyalty to the Communist regime. For any religious activity, the approval of the Bureau was required. No assignment to any religious office was possible without previous approval of this department.

By Law No. 218, after all church properties had been nationalized, the government took over the economic safeguarding of the clergy and the maintenance of church buildings. The trick of this law was that economically all priests were put at the mercy of the State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs. The salaried priests became state employees. The bishops protested against these antichurch laws. But to prevent further damage to the priests and to the church organization, they permitted their priests to take the oath and the salary, with the restriction that they do not assume any obligation which would be against Divine and Ecclesiastical laws or against their priestly conscience.

Mr. Arens. Did all the priests take the oath of loyalty?

Father Zubek. Most of the priests did. Those who did not were deposed from their posts, and most of them were imprisoned. The bishops first refused to take the oath. Three of the ten Slovak bishops were imprisoned, and on January 15, 1951, two of them were sentenced to life imprisonment and one to a 24-year term. The remaining bishops were confined to their residences and prevented from the administration of their dioceses. Additionally, three other Slovak bishops were imprisoned. Andrej Skrabik, bishop of Banska Bystrica, died on January 8, 1950, and a “patriotic priest” by the name of Jan Dechet was appointed by the Communist Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs as the administrator of the diocese. This gross infringement brought about the delicate problem of church jurisdiction. The situation in the Banska Bystrica diocese became quite confused, and a dreadful precedent was set up for dioceses where the bishop was imprisoned. To prevent a repetition of the case of Banska Bystrica, and to save the church organization as much as possible, three bishops consented to take the oath, on March 12, 1951.

Mr. Arens. Did the religious situation in Slovakia change with the taking of the loyalty oath by the bishops?

Father Zubek. To some extent, it did. In general, the open resistance of the salaried clergy to the regime lessened. But it does not mean that the salaried priests all became collaborators with the Communist regime, or pro-Communist priests and bishops. The original number of collaborators from the ranks of the clergy, about 50 all together, hardly increased. The only difference was that the collaborators became much bolder and, under Communist pressure, received quite important assignments in the church administration. Some were elected by diocesan chapters of Canons as administrators of dioceses and vicars capitularies; others were appointed as vicars general or directors of chancery offices. The Communist-sponsored activities of the salaried clergy are carried on mostly under the title of “Clergy Committees for Furtherance of Peace.” All bishops and priests who are not in prison must take part in such activities. They have to preach according to the themes prepared for them by the State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs and delivered to them through the chanceries.

Mr. Arens. Were there other important antichurch measures taken by the Communist government?

Father Zubek. Certainly, there were. One of them was the suppression of all monasteries and convents. Male religious orders and congregations were suppressed in April 1950. There were over 700 male religious priests and brothers living in 137 monasteries in Slovakia. They were taken forcibly to so-called concentration monasteries and were subjected to Communist-sponsored reeducation. If they complied with this brainwashing and took the oath of loyalty, they were sent to parishes and churches as diocesan priests. If they remained unyielding, they were sent to forced labor camps, and later, in 1957, released to manual work. Clerics and religious brothers, if they did not want to leave the religious life, went also through the forced labor camps, and eventually to manual work on their own. A similar fate met the female religious congregations. There were 3,548 religious sisters in Slovakia, living in 210 convents. The convents were suppressed in August, 1950, and the sisters were forced to leave the religious life. If they reiused, they were sent to work without any salary in forced labor camps, collective farms, or various state plants.

Mr. Arens. What happened to the Uniates?

Father Zubek. They encountered the most pitiful fate. On April 28, 1950, they were officially put out of existence. Similar to the meeting that the Communists staged for the establishment of the so-called “Catholic Action,” they organized a gathering for the return of the Uniates to the Orthodox Church. Under the Communist sponsorship, 820 delegates with a hundred of Byzantine-rite priests met at Presov and, purportedly as representatives of Slovak and Ruthenian Uniates, proclaimed the secession from Rome and the return to the Orthodox Church. Both Byzantine-rite bishops, Peter Gojdic and his auxiliary Basil Hopko, rejected the proposal to join the schism and were immediately imprisoned. There were 320,000 Uniates with 319 priests in Slovakia.

Mr. Arens. Are new priests being ordained in Communist Slovakia?

Father Zubek. Hardly any. All the seminaries were suppressed in 1950. All four religious seminaries were suppressed, together with religious orders and congregations. The diocesan seminaries, five in number, were suppressed in August, 1950. Only one seminary, that connected with the University of Bratislava, was reopened for the fall semester of 1950. But the faculty was completely changed, the unyielding professors of theology dismissed, and new, pro-Communist teachers, including a lay expert on dialectic materialism, were appointed by the State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs. The number of seminarians is very small, about 40 altogether. Ordinarily, 8 to 10 theologians per year are ordained in the new seminary for the priesthood.

Mr. Arens. Has the persecution of the Catholic Church been moderated since Khrushchev’s ascension to power?

Father Zubek. On the contrary, in the last 2 years the Communists, particularly in Slovakia, strengthened their efforts to eliminate religion from the lives of the populace. Antireligious courses, expositions, and publications have increased considerably. The antireligious fight is considered of the utmost importance, particularly in Slovakia, where religion is deep-rooted and still has a positive influence upon the anti-Communist stand of the majority of the populace.

Mr. Arens. Did these last Communist efforts have any results?

Father Zubek. No, according to all indications. Always new anti-Communists are being imprisoned in Slovakia. And those imprisoned and sentenced in many instances are not political opponents in a strict sense. Many Slovaks were imprisoned and sentenced exclusively for religious reasons. Among them were members of the genuine Catholic Action existing in the underground. There were young men imprisoned and indicted for secretly studying theology for the priesthood. There were members of a secretly founded institution, living as religious brothers. There were groups of defendants whose supposed crime was that they tried secretly to continue in their religious life, banned in 1950. One group is liquidated, but new ones spread out. It is clear that even nowadays the church is rejuvenated with her own blood. Today, as it was in the early church, the blood of martyrs is the seed of new Christians.

Mr. Arens. How do the Communists maintain this strict control of the fragments of your church which remain in your former homeland of Slovakia?

Father Zubek. The Communist control can be said to be twofold: public control and secret control of activities of the church. By public control, I mean the antichurch laws of 1949, discussed previously.

Besides, they have secret control of the church. Spies attend every ceremony. They trail priests and bishops wherever they go. I had some experience along that line myself. I was trailed before the monasteries were suppressed. I saw people shadowing me in those last months. I was also a superior of a monastery. Each individual priest did not experience this, but I, being the head of a monastery, was held responsible for all proceedings in the monastery, and whenever I left the door of the monastery I always had someone shadowing me.

The matter of spying on sermons I also know about positively, from personal experience. One spy came to me and asked about the topic of my sermon, because he had fallen asleep during the mass in which he was supposed to listen to my sermon.

It is a matter of general procedure that the Communists have their spying system for all strata of the populace. In every apartment building there is at least one spy for every few apartments. In small houses, there is at least one person who is spying on the people. What I would stress is, particularly for priests, for monasteries, there was not one but many spies looking and going around, and it was not a matter of one individual case, but it was something completely universal and general to our country from the beginning, since 1948. And I am quite sure it stays the same way; that even now there is strict control and surveillance by Communist agents of all individual bishops and priests who still enjoy some kind of freedom, namely, those who are not in prison. They are not really free, that is, but they are at least not in prison, although under strict control and surveillance.

Mr. Arens. Do you have information respecting Bishop Vojtassak?

Father Zubek. I knew Bishop Vojtassak when he was a free man. He was quite a strong personality and very much outspoken in his opposition to communism. After he was taken prisoner in 1950 and then tried in January 1951, I listened every day to his testimony as it was being broadcast on the air, in one of those monster processes they had, and his voice was almost unrecognizable. The whole testimony that he gave was so pitiful that I must say it was a completely different man than I previously knew him to be. I assume, therefore, that they used some very special methods of their own to destroy his personality so that he would testify in such a way that he showed himself as a weak man unable to defend himself.

Mr. Arens. For the purpose of this record, tell us just a word about Bishop Vojtassak, who he is and what happened to him, a word about his case, please.

Father Zubek. Bishop Vojtassak is the residential bishop of the Spis Diocese. He was very active in cultural matters of Slovakia as well as in his religious work. He was considered one of the best and most beloved bishops of Slovakia. He had difficulties with the new Czechoslovakian pro-Communist regime immediately, beginning in 1945, when he expressed his opposition to the new regime, and he was for seven months in prison at that time in 1945. Then he was released, and he continued his work as bishop of the diocese; but in 1948, when the Communists took over, he must have been under Communist surveillance quite strictly, because in the common bishops’ meetings he did not take part. His signature does not appear on several of the common statements by other bishops, so I assume that since 1948 he was put aside by the Communists. But he was still not imprisoned until the summer of 1950, and in 1951 he was sentenced to 24 years of imprisonment.

Mr. Arens. What was the offense charged against him?

Father Zubek. It was a made-up offense charged by the Communists. the usual thing: treason, sabotage, espionage for American imperialists, and similar charges, completely without any grounds, without any foundation.

Mr. Arens. Father, based upon your firsthand observations and experience with communism in action, as distinct from the communism that is portrayed by its propagandists and apologists, can the free world coexist with communism?

Father Zubek. No, sir. They have proved so many times that they are completely unreliable, that for them the end is the good of the Communist Party, and benind it, world domination is what they have in their minds. For that purpose, they would do anything. If the cold war does not achieve it, then they will use other tricks. One of these tricks, I think, is the “coexistence” that they are propagandizing now. But coexistence in their minds, as I know the Communist structure, Communist trickery, means that they want to take over through infiltration and through cheating other people, putting them into a kind of sleep or napping. Appeasement is what they want on the part of America, and through that appeasement they hope to achieve their aims, which they were unable to achieve through the cold war. That is my opinion. I don’t think there can be any good result from the free world going along the lines of Communist propaganda for coexistence.

The Chairman. We thank you very much, Father Zubek.