Skutečně nebyla alternativa? Československo-sovětská aliance v souvislostech

This study examines the origins of the Czechoslovak-Soviet Treaty, concluded on 12 December 1943 in Moscow, as well as its consequences – both for the further development of Czechoslovakia and for the formation of the new shape of the international system. It also reflects on the realistic alternatives that were open to the main architects of Czechoslovak foreign policy, led by President Edvard Beneš, in the midst of World War II. Drawing on archival material and edited documents from several countries, the author debunks many of the myths and deterministic judgments that surround this issue to these days. He concludes that the treaty was not a necessity but a free choice, and that even in the context of other strongly pro-Soviet actions and statements by the Czechoslovak leadership, it became a Soviet tool for disciplining Czechoslovakia and its leaders at the end of the war and in the early post-war period in the field of foreign policy, but also with overlaps into domestic affairs.