Originally published in the 11th issue of "Watching Movies Midnight Show" 2017:
On June 7, 2017, the film "Assassination of the Gestapo", which reflected the "Apes" action during World War II, was released in France. In the past two years, this is the second time Operation "Apes" has been brought to the screen. What happened to the "Apes" action? Why does it become a movie subject so frequently? What are the similarities and differences between different versions of related movies and real history? Let us go back to the streets of Prague in 1942 and look at this bloody history.
Enduring screen hot spots
On May 27, 1942, in Prague, the capital of Czechoslovakia under German occupation, the Czechoslovak government-in-exile and resistance organization supported by the British forces carried out a secret operation code-named "Ape" and assassinated the German SS Admiral Lay. Inhart Heydrich. He was also the highest-ranked German officer successfully assassinated by the anti-fascist camp.
Such a legendary assassination is naturally an excellent theme of the movie. In April 1943, the famous German director Fritz Lang, who was exiled to the United States, released his film "Hangmen Also Die!" (Hangmen Also Die!). However, in order to achieve a more dramatic and thrilling effect, there are many discrepancies between this film and historical facts. In June 1943, German director Douglas Seck, who was also in exile in the United States, released the movie "Hitler's Madman" with his theme. In 1946, Czechoslovakia produced the related film "Men Without Wings" (Men Without Wings). In 1960, Czechoslovakia produced the movie "Vyssí princip" (Vyssí princip), with the theme of the German reign of terror after the "Ape" operation. In 1964, Czechoslovakia produced the movie Atentát (Assassination of Heydrich). In 1976, the American film "Operation Daybreak" (Operation Daybreak) was released. In 2011, the Czech Republic produced the movie "Lidice" (Lidice) based on the Lidice massacre in which the Germans retaliated against the "Apes" operation. In 2013, Czech produced the TV movie Kulka pro Heydricha (Kulka pro Heydricha). In 2016, the Czech Republic grandly launched the movie "Anthropoid" (Anthropoid). In 2017, the film "Assassination of the Gestapo" (HHhH) was released in France. The name of the film is derived from the historical novel "Himmlers Hirn heißt Heydrich" (Himmlers Hirn heißt Heydrich) by French novelist Laurent Binet, abbreviated as "HHhH".
So far, the "Ape" operation has been put on the screen ten times. However, many of these films are very old and lack viewing resources. For Chinese audiences, several related movies from 1976 to 2017 will be more familiar.
Handsome "demon"
The "Apes" operations that have entered the screen ten times have a grand historical background.
In 1938, Hitler's fascist Germany annexed Austria. Later, he used the pretext of protecting the Germans and demanded the occupation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. On September 29, 1939, in order to avoid involvement in the war, Britain and France sacrificed the interests of Czechoslovakia and signed the "Munich Agreement" with Germany. Hitler got his wish. In March 1939, German troops again occupied the entire territory of Czechoslovakia. Hitler divided it into two, Czechoslovakia became the "protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia", and Slovakia became the "Slovak Republic". The President of Czechoslovakia, Edward Benes, led the government and some armed forces into exile in Britain. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland and World War II broke out. Czechoslovakia officially entered the anti-fascist camp.
Before the outbreak of World War II, Czechoslovakia was the world's seventh largest industrial country after the United States, the Soviet Union, Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Italy, and its total industrial output value was even higher than that of Japan and Spain. From March 1939 to September 1941, the German diplomat Konstantin von Neulat was in charge of Czechoslovakia. Germany attaches great importance to the military industrial base of Czechoslovakia, and uses it to continuously replenish weapons and equipment for the German army. The German army could not tolerate the sabotage of the Czechoslovak Resistance. Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Gestapo, the German secret police organization, and Reinhard Heydrich, the head of the German National Security Agency, both believed that Neurath's ruling methods were too "tolerant", which led to bad results. Hitler immediately appointed Heydrich as the "President of Bohemia and Moravia". After Heydrich took office, he ruled by bloody means, and Czechoslovakia fell into terror. Heydrich was quite proud of this, often sitting in a convertible car driven by the driver and swaggering across the streets of Prague to show his confidence in the effects of the reign of terror.
In the past, movies about the "Apes" action were often told from the perspective of the anti-fascist camp. "Assassination of the Gestapo" is an unprecedented story about Heydrich's "history" in the first half of the movie. In fact, the real Heydrich is more "excellent" than the characters in the movie. He is 1.85 meters tall, handsome in appearance, and excellent in memory. As a student, he is a "good student" of "all-round development of morality, intelligence, physical education, art and labor". He is proficient in violin, piano, skiing, swimming, riding, sailing, flying, fencing and shooting. He is a track and field decathlon and modern pentathlon athlete. He has served as the chairman of the International Criminal Police Organization and the chairman of the International Fencing Organization. At the same time, his personality is extremely cruel. He commanded the "Night of the Long Knives" as the Nazi internal cleansing stormtrooper and worked out the "final solution" for the extermination of Jews, thus winning the "hard-hearted man" and "blonde beast". , "Hangman" and "Prague Butcher" and other nicknames.
In "Assassination of the Gestapo", the wife of Heydrich, Lena von Osten, also has a more detailed description, so that she will not be "out-of-the-box" like in previous related movies. As the movie tells, Osten was Heydrich’s “leader” in contacting the Nazis. After Heydrich got engaged to her, he did have an affair with the daughter of a shipyard owner before, and there was a marriage dispute. Lost his position in the German Navy. However, Heydrich got acquainted with Osten not at the prom like in the movie, but at the sailing club. Osten drowned and Heydrich saved her life. When they met, Osten was only 19 years old, not as old as the actress in the movie.
Demon killing action is on the string
Both were occupied by the German army, and resistance operations in Poland, Yugoslavia, and Greece were surging. Therefore, even though the German army could no longer tolerate the "security" in Czechoslovakia, the Allied forces believed that Czechoslovakia was "abnormally peaceful." Under pressure from the British Intelligence Department, President Benes of Czechoslovakia decided to launch an operation.
On October 20, 1941, with the approval of Brigadier General Colin Gerbins, Director of Operations of the British Special Operations Department, František Moravec, the Minister of Intelligence of Czechoslovakia, set out to prepare for Operation "Apes" with the goal of assassination. Harming Heydrich of Czechoslovakia. He selected Slovak Warrant Lieutenant Joseph Gabzik and Czech Sergeant Karel Svoboda from the 2000 Czech soldiers who had been in exile to the United Kingdom, and went to Ariseg, Scotland, to British special operations. The commando training center of the Ministry of Education. According to the original plan, the operation will be implemented on October 28, Czechoslovakia's Independence Day. However, Svoboda suffered a head injury during training, so it could only be replaced by Czech Sergeant Jan Kubis. It takes time for Kubis to complete training and prepare local fake documents for him, so the action can only be postponed.
On December 28, 1941, a "Halifax" heavy bomber of the 138th Bomber Squadron of the Royal Air Force set off from the UK with 9 paratroopers including Gabzik and Kubis. Travel to Pilsen, Czechoslovakia. However, there was a problem with the pilot’s navigation and they had to be airborne to Nehvecdy, east of Prague. The Luftwaffe had been monitoring the bomber, so it was clearly aware that the British had carried out an airborne landing and the army was conducting ground searches along the route.
After landing in Pilsen, the action team moved to Prague. In several related movies, there are scenes of Kubis's foot injury during the airborne, which is completely in line with historical facts. In Prague, the resistance organization assisted the action team, but Rajislav Venek, one of the leaders of the resistance organization, was worried that the Germans would retaliate wildly, so he strongly opposed the assassination, which is also in line with the real history. Some viewers said that this kind of leader who tries to preserve the country and the people is the "true patriot." However, I am afraid to disappoint him that this "true patriot" was arrested by the Germans on September 4, 1942, and betrayed the organization and his comrades during the interrogation.
Initially, they planned to assassinate Heydrich on the train, but during reconnaissance they found that it was not feasible. In "Dawn Attack", the action team tried to snipe Heydrich at the railway station, which is a fiction of the movie. Later, they planned to carry out an assassination in the forest where Heydrich must pass every day, and laid ropes to stop his car, but the commander, Lieutenant Adolf Opalka, ordered to stop the operation and implement the final decision. The Prague assassination plan. In "Operation "Apes"," Koubis was so nervous that he couldn't breathe and couldn't lift his gun before the action.
At 10:30 on May 27, 1941, near the Blovka Hospital in Prague, Gabzik and Kubis were waiting at the turn of the tram station. This is the way Heydrich must go every day, and detours can force his car to slow down. Joseph Varchik, also a paratrooper of the action group, stalked 100 meters north of them. Two minutes later, Heydrich's "Mercedes" 320B convertible arrived. Gabzik took out the "Stern" 9mm submachine gun, but the gun jammed. Heydrich ordered the driver, Sergeant Klein, to stop, stood up and took out a P08 "Ruger" 9mm pistol, and fired at Gabzik. In desperation, Kubis took out the No. 73 anti-tank grenade hidden in his briefcase and threw it at the car. The shrapnel produced by the explosion penetrated the right rear bumper of the car, and the horsehair fibers with the interior decoration of the car pierced Heydrich's body and also injured Kubis himself.
In "Assassination of the Gestapo", Kubis throws an imperial No. 74 grenade; in the film "Dawn Attack", Kubis throws an American Mk 2 grenade; this is not in accordance with historical facts. In the "Lidice Massacre" and "Operation "Apes"", the grenade thrown by Kubis is closer to historical facts.
The explosion blasted Gabzik and Kubis. They shot Heydrich with an M1903 "Colt" 8.13mm pistol, but did not hit. Kubis ran away on a bicycle, while Gabzik ran away on foot. Heydrich staggered out of the car. At this time, he didn't know that he was injured, and fell while trying to pursue it. He was bleeding, but he still ordered Klein to chase Gabzik, shouting: "Kill that bastard!" In the butcher's shop on the street, Gabzik shot Klein twice with a pistol. Cause serious injury. Then he took the tram to the safe house.
In both the "Dawn Attack" film and the "Assassination of the Gestapo" film, Klein was killed, only "Operation "Apes" accurately restored the butcher shop and injured Klein details. At the same time, as mentioned in the movie, the resistance group did not know that Heydrich was injured, and they thought the operation had completely failed.
A Czech policeman and a woman helped Heydrich stop a truck and sent him to the Blovka hospital for rescue. He was seriously injured on the left side of his body, and his diaphragm, spleen, lungs and one rib were damaged. Germany mobilized several famous doctors from the SS and the Czech Republic for the operation. Seven days later, he has improved. On June 3, after eating lunch, he suddenly went into shock. At 4:30 on June 4th, Heydrich died. There are various opinions on the medical causes of his death, and various arguments include sepsis, pulmonary embolism, and systemic infections caused by bacteria or poisons.
In any case, Heydrich died only a few days after his injury. In contrast, "Dawn Attack" and "Operation "Ape"" are more accurate. The plot of Heydrich's death on the same day in "Assassination of Gestapo" is a fiction of the movie.
Lidice Massacre
After a solemn funeral for Heydrich, Hitler ordered a thorough investigation of the matter and declared that he would kill 10,000 local civilians in revenge. Himmler persuaded Hitler that such a reduction in the labor force would affect military production, and Hitler gave up.
However, the German army quickly caught sight of Lidice, because there were several Czech military officers who had been exiled to Britain who lived here. On June 9, 1942, German troops surrounded Lidice and shot 173 men on the spot. Later, 11 men who were not in Lidice and 8 men related to the Czechoslovak government-in-exile were arrested and killed. Among the 203 women captured, the German army forced 4 pregnant women to abort, while the others were sent to concentration camps to do hard labor. Of the 105 children captured, the German army used gas vehicles to kill 82 people, and 6 of them died in an orphanage. In November 1949, in order to commemorate the children who died tragically in the Lidice massacre, the International Democratic Women’s Federation held in Moscow decided to make June 1 every year as International Children’s Day. This is exactly the origin of "June 1 Children's Day".
While slaughtering wildly, the German army set fire to Lidice, blasted houses one by one with explosives, and killed all of Lidice’s pets and livestock. The Germans were so frantic that they didn't even let the local graves go. They dug up the tombs, tore up the corpses, and plundered the gold and silver jewels that were buried with them. Subsequently, 100 German workers came to Lidice, modified the course of the road and river passing through Lidice, planted crops on the original site of Lidice, and erased all traces that are still visible. However, the German army's move was not to destroy the corpses, but to practice the threat of "wiping Lidice off the map." The German army did not cover up the Lidice massacre, even publicly propagating it. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was very angry about this and declared that every time the German army destroyed a village in Czechoslovakia, the British army would destroy three German villages in revenge.
After the war, Czechoslovakia rebuilt Lidice in a place overlooking the original site of Lidice. Only 153 women and 17 children returned. The only surviving adult man in Lidice was František Seidel. He killed his son by mistake, spent 4 years in prison and knew nothing about the massacre. When he was released from prison on December 23, 1942, he was surprised to find that his hometown had been razed to the ground. He is also the actor portrayed in the movie "The Lidice Massacre". However, this film is just a little bit more ingenious in the subject matter, and its performance of the Holocaust and the atrocities of the German army is not as good as the few scenes in "Dawn Attack." As a film reflecting historical facts, it may not be regarded as a success.
During World War II, two Liditzers served as pilots in the Royal Air Force. When they returned to their hometown in 1948, the Czechoslovak government under Soviet control banned them from living in the newly built Lidice because they had served in the armed forces of Western countries. Related themes include the 2001 Czech movie "Tmavomodrý svet" (also known as "Scorching Sun Changhong").
Heroes die
The Germans could not find the trace of the assassin, so they issued an ultimatum to Prague-they still could not find the assassin before June 18, and they wanted to kill more civilians. The resistance organization was worried about exposure and transferred seven paratroopers to the "Karel Borromejsky" Orthodox Church. The Czech paratrooper Karel Kurda took the initiative to inform the German army and betrayed the information of the resistance organization.
At 5 o'clock on June 17, German forces raided the residence of Mary Moravec, a member of the resistance organization. In the toilet, Mary swallowed cyanide poison and committed suicide. The Germans captured her 17-year-old son Frassimir Moravec (nicknamed "Ata") and her husband Alois Moravec, who did not know his wife had joined the resistance organization. The "Gestapo" tortured "Ata" severely, cut off his mother's head, put it in a fish tank and showed him it, and claimed that if he did not confess, he would kill his father in this way. "Ata" collapsed and confessed where the Czech paratroopers were hiding. "Operation "Ape"" is the most true restoration of this place. The reason for "Atta" in "Dawn Attack" has been dramatized, while "Atta" in "Assassination of Gestapo" is too young.
On June 18, 750 soldiers of the German SS surrounded the church. After a two-hour shootout, three paratroopers including Kubis were killed. In the cellar, four paratroopers, including Gabzik, repelled several German attacks. The Germans used tear gas and filled the cellar with water. Four paratroopers committed suicide. In fact, they only have pistols. They are not equipped with submachine guns, light machine guns and grenades as in several related movies. The German SS is actually equipped with rifles, submachine guns, general-purpose machine guns and hand grenades as they did in the movie. However, in this battle of disparity in strength, the German army paid the price of 14 deaths and 21 wounded. After the battle, Kurda came to identify the remains of Gabzik and Kubis.
At the same time, the Germans arrested the clergy in the church. The Moravian Orthodox Bishop Glazd could not bear the suffering of the congregation, and took the initiative to write to the Nazi authorities, willing to take responsibility for this. On June 27, the Germans arrested him. On September 4, in the suburbs of Prague, the Germans shot and killed 13 clergy, including him. Later, Bishop Grazd was made a martyr.
In subsequent retaliation, the German army arrested 13,000 civilians and interrogated 252 of the relatives and supporters of the resistance organization. Including Kubis’s 24 family members and their spouses, Kubis’s girlfriend Anna Marinova, Lieutenant Opalka’s father and aunt, "Ata" and his father, "Ata"'s fiancee, and fiancée. Mother and brother etc. During the interrogation, the Germans chopped off the heads of seven paratroopers, nailed them to stakes, and forced them to watch. On October 24, the Germans executed them all. An estimated 5,000 people died as a result of German retaliation against the "Apes" operation.
In "Dawn Attack", the reason for Kurda's rebellion is to protect the safety of his wife and young son. In historical facts, he did not have a wife or children, and the reason for his rebellion was greed. Kurda became a member of the "Gestapo" after he informed the case and received the pseudonym "Karl Jerholt". The German army rewarded him with one million Reichmarks and married him a German woman. After the war, the Czechoslovak government arrested him. In court, he explained the reason for the mutiny: "If you give you a million, you will do the same." On April 29, 1947, he was hanged.
In summary, the most exciting and historical version of the movies related to Operation "Apes" is the 2016 "Operation "Apes". The 2017 "Assassination of the Gestapo" is still second. This operation is not the only time the anti-fascist camp has successfully assassinated a senior figure in the German army. The Soviet guerrillas and the Polish resistance organizations have also successfully assassinated key members of the fascist German government or army. However, Heydrich was indeed the most senior German general who died assassinated by the anti-fascist camp.
The success of this operation allowed Britain and the Free French government to agree that after defeating Germany, the Sudetenland would return to Czechoslovakia, and the "Munich Agreement" would become invalid. Today, there are memorial facilities for the operation in Prague’s Cathedral of St. Cyril and Meadowd, the "Ape" Operation Museum, the Slovak National Museum, Warwickshire in the United Kingdom and Aliseg in Scotland.
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