Final Word from Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Rachid Khalil, a Syrian-Czech Kurd, told Týden magazine that Donald Trump's decision to pull out of northern Syria and to allow Turkey to attack the Kurds was treachery, like a knife in the back. Nearly 80 years ago, Edvard Beneš used similar words to describe Franklin D. Roosevelt's identical texts to him and to Adolf Hitler on Sept. 26, 1938. Although Beneš made no mention of it at the time, he said on May 20, 1942, that he considered FDR's intervention to be a stab in the back and the "last heavy blow." Czechoslovakia was not proposing to attack Germany, Beneš said, so he should not be put on the same level as Hitler. FDR did indeed get the peaceful agreement he sought, and it came to be known as the Munich Agreement. Czechs, such as Karel Schwarzenberg, who are still angry that Beneš capitulated to Hitler after being hung out to dry by FDR, probably think that the Kurds should stand firm now in northern Syria, after being stabbed in the back by Trump. [ Czech Republic Delano Igor Lukeš Lukes Czechoslovakia between Stalin and Hitler accord ]