František Fajtl
Lieutenant General František Fajtl (20 August 1912 – 4 October 2006) was a Czech fighter pilot of World War II. He was a British Royal Air Force (RAF) squadron and wing commander and led a group of Czechoslovak fighter pilots who formed an air regiment under Soviet Air Force command, supporting the Slovak National Uprising in 1944. He was dismissed from the Czechoslovak Air Force and was held in prison for a year and a half without a trial after the Communists came to power in 1948, and was only fully rehabilitated after the Velvet Revolution in 1989. He wrote many autobiographical books about his wartime experiences, and was an inspiration for the 2001 film ''Tmavomodrý svět'' ('' Dark Blue World''). Early life František Fajtl was born in Donín in northern Bohemia, which was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until after World War I, when it became Czechoslovakia in 1918, and now is a part of the Czech Republic. In 1933, he attended, and in 1935 graduated from, the Mil ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Toužetín
Toužetín is a municipality and village in Louny District in the Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 300 inhabitants. Toužetín lies approximately south-east of Louny, south of Ústí nad Labem, and north-west of Prague. Administrative division Toužetín consists of three municipal parts (in brackets population according to the 2021 census): *Toužetín (140) *Donín (85) *Sulec (43) Demographics Notable people *František Fajtl Lieutenant General František Fajtl (20 August 1912 – 4 October 2006) was a Czech fighter pilot of World War II. He was a British Royal Air Force (RAF) squadron and wing commander and led a group of Czechoslovak fighter pilots who formed an a ... (1912–2006), fighter pilot References External links * Villages in Louny District {{ÚstínadLabem-geo-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland became part of Nazi Germany, while the country lost further territories to First Vienna Award, Hungary and Trans-Olza, Poland (the territories of southern Slovakia with a predominantly Hungarian population to Hungary and Zaolzie with a predominantly Polish population to Poland). Between 1939 and 1945, the state ceased to exist, as Slovak state, Slovakia proclaimed its independence and Carpathian Ruthenia became part of Kingdom of Hungary (1920–1946), Hungary, while the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was proclaimed in the remainder of the Czech Lands. In 1939, after the outbreak of World War II, former Czechoslovak President Edvard Beneš formed Czechoslovak government-in-exile, a government-in-exile and sought recognition from the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Biplane
A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While a biplane wing structure has a structural advantage over a monoplane, it produces more drag than a monoplane wing. Improved structural techniques, better materials and higher speeds made the biplane configuration obsolete for most purposes by the late 1930s. Biplanes offer several advantages over conventional cantilever monoplane designs: they permit lighter wing structures, low wing loading and smaller span for a given wing area. However, interference between the airflow over each wing increases drag substantially, and biplanes generally need extensive bracing, which causes additional drag. Biplanes are distinguished from tandem wing arrangements, where the wings are placed forward and aft, instead of above and below. The term is als ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hranice (Přerov District)
Hranice (; ) is a town in Přerov District in the Olomouc Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 18,000 inhabitants. The historic town centre is well preserved and is protected as an Cultural monument (Czech Republic)#Monument zones, urban monument zone. The town is known for the Hranice Abyss, the deepest flooded pit cave in the world. Administrative division Hranice consists of nine municipal parts (in brackets population according to the 2021 census): *Hranice I-Město (14,836) *Hranice II-Lhotka (91) *Hranice III-Velká (443) *Hranice IV-Drahotuše (1,514) *Hranice V-Rybáře (25) *Hranice VI-Valšovice (135) *Hranice VII-Slavíč (298) *Hranice VIII-Středolesí (71) *Hranice IX-Uhřínov (56) Středolesí and Uhřínov form an Enclave and exclave, exclave of the municipal territory. Etymology The name Hranice literally means "border". It is sometimes called ''Hranice na Moravě'' ("Hranice in Moravia") to distinguish from other places with the same name. Geography Hr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Austro-Hungarian Empire
Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military and diplomatic alliance, it consisted of two sovereign states with a single monarch who was titled both the Emperor of Austria and the King of Hungary. Austria-Hungary constituted the last phase in the constitutional evolution of the Habsburg monarchy: it was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 in the aftermath of the Austro-Prussian War, following wars of independence by Hungary in opposition to Habsburg rule. It was dissolved shortly after Hungary terminated the union with Austria in 1918 at the end of World War 1. One of Europe's major powers, Austria-Hungary was geographically the second-largest country in Europe (after Russia) and the third-most populous (after Russia and the German Empire), while being among the 10 most populous countries worldwide. T ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bohemia
Bohemia ( ; ; ) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. In a narrow, geographic sense, it roughly encompasses the territories of present-day Czechia that fall within the Elbe River's drainage basin, but historically it could also refer to a wider area consisting of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown ruled by the List of Bohemian monarchs, Bohemian kings, including Moravia and Czech Silesia, in which case the smaller region is referred to as Bohemia Proper as a means of distinction. Bohemia became a part of Great Moravia, and then an independent principality, which became a Kingdom of Bohemia, kingdom in the Holy Roman Empire. This subsequently became a part of the Habsburg monarchy and the Austrian Empire. After World War I and the establishment of an History of Czechoslovakia (1918–1938), independent Czechoslovak state, the whole of Bohemia became a part of Czechoslovakia, defying claims of the German-speaking inhabitants that regions with German ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dark Blue World
''Dark Blue World'' () is a 2001 war drama film by Czech director Jan Svěrák, the Academy Award-winning director of '' Kolya''. The film is about Czech pilots who fought for the British Royal Air Force (RAF) during the Second World War. The screenplay was written by Zdeněk Svěrák, the director's father. The film stars Czech actors Ondřej Vetchý, Kryštof Hádek and Oldřich Kaiser. British actors include Tara Fitzgerald, Charles Dance and Anna Massey. Plot In 1950, during the Cold War, František (Franta) Sláma (Ondřej Vetchý) is incarcerated in Czechoslovakia, because of his prior service in the RAF. His recollections of the war begin in 1939, just days prior to the German invasion of Czechoslovakia. After the invasion, the Czechoslovak Army is disbanded and its Air Force has to surrender its aircraft. However, Franta and his young friend Karel Vojtíšek (Kryštof Hádek), among others, refuse to submit to their occupiers and flee to the United Kingdom to join ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Velvet Revolution
The Velvet Revolution () or Gentle Revolution () was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia, occurring from 17 November to 28 November 1989. Popular demonstrations against the one-party government of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia included students and older dissidents. The result was the end of Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, 41 years of one-party rule in Czechoslovakia, and the subsequent dismantling of the command economy and conversion to a parliamentary republic. On 17 November 1989 (International Students' Day), riot police suppressed a Student activism, student demonstration in Prague. The event marked the 50th anniversary of a violently suppressed demonstration against the Nazi storming of Prague University in 1939 where 1,200 students were arrested and 9 killed (see International Students' Day#Origin, Origin of International Students' Day). The 1989 event sparked a series of demonstrations from 17 November to late December and turned ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Communist Party Of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia ( Czech and Slovak: ''Komunistická strana Československa'', KSČ) was a communist and Marxist–Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992. It was a member of the Comintern. Between 1929 and 1953, it was led by Klement Gottwald. The KSČ was the sole governing party in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic though it was a leading party along with the Slovak branch and four other legally permitted non-communist parties. After its election victory in 1946, it seized power in the 1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état and established a one-party state allied with the Soviet Union. Nationalization of virtually all private enterprises followed, and a command economy was implemented. The KSČ was committed to the pursuit of communism, and after Joseph Stalin's rise to power Marxism–Leninism became formalized as the party's guiding ideology and would remain so throughout the rest of its existence. Consequen ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Soviet Air Force
The Soviet Air Forces (, VVS SSSR; literally "Military Air Forces of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics"; initialism VVS, sometimes referred to as the "Red Air Force") were one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces. The Air Forces were formed from components of the Imperial Russian Air Service in 1917, and faced their greatest test during World War II. The groups were also involved in the Korean War, and dissolved along with the Soviet Union itself in 1991–92. Former Soviet Air Forces' assets were subsequently divided into several air forces of former Republics of the Soviet Union, Soviet republics, including the new Russian Air Force. The "Air March, March of the Pilots" was its marching song. Origins The first military aviation branch of Russia or any of the Soviet Union's constituent states was the short-lived Imperial Russian Air Service, founded in 1912 and disbanded in 1917 with the onset of the Bolshevik Revolution and ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). Following the Allies of World War I, Allied victory over the Central Powers in 1918, the RAF emerged as the largest air force in the world at the time. Since its formation, the RAF has played History of the Royal Air Force, a significant role in Military history of the United Kingdom, British military history. In particular, during the Second World War, the RAF established Air supremacy, air superiority over Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain, and led the Allied strategic bombing effort. The RAF's mission is to support the objectives of the British Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom), Ministry of Defence (MOD), which are to "provide the capabilities nee ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fighter Aircraft
Fighter aircraft (early on also ''pursuit aircraft'') are military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air supremacy, air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield permits bombers and attack aircraft to engage in tactical bombing, tactical and strategic bombing of enemy targets, and helps prevent the enemy from doing the same. The key performance features of a fighter include not only its firepower but also its high speed and maneuverability relative to the target aircraft. The success or failure of a combatant's efforts to gain air superiority hinges on several factors including the skill of its pilots, the tactical soundness of its doctrine for deploying its fighters, and the numbers and performance of those fighters. Many modern fighter aircraft also have secondary capabilities such as ground-attack aircraft, ground attack and some types, such as fighter-b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |