INVESTIGATING THE MASARYK MYSTERY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200060004-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 21, 2004
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: January 23, 1970
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

P, N b l r v j C u~ i r~
Approved For Relelts4t1)W13 : CIA-RDP88-01350R00020606044t 2 is
SOOT( REVIEW
Investirlaft"ing Mica
THE MASARYK CASE
by CLAIRE STERLING
(Harper & Row) $7.95
Qn the old states of the Holy Ro-
man Empire, and in particular
Bohemia. one customary way to dis-
pose of political opponents was to
push them out or a high window. The
historic mass "Dcfcnestration of Jun Masaryk in 1942ollicial Czech inquiry that (lie death
Prague" in 1618 which marked the Jan Masaryk. Dr. Kotlar, director of was steci iental, Mrs. Sterling's re-
start of the Thirty Years War appar- ' criminal investigation, was named to! sponsc to the preposterous suggestion
ently popularized the custom. In conduct it. that Masaryk was in the habit of fight-
south-central and eastern Europe it is Fortunately-for the uncensored ing insomnia by sitting cross-legged
still remembered, and sometimes, in results of that inquiry are unlikely, on his bathroom windowsill, and,:
times of stress, revived. now to sec the light of day-Clairo',most unfortunately slipped off it, can
When, therefore, in March 1948 Sterling, an American reporter then well be imagined. The medical cvi-
Jan Masaryk, Czechoslovakia's for- working in Prague, decided to con-J dence that she offers on the subject of
eign minister and the only non-Com- duct an inquiry of her own. The Ma-;the windowsill tells a very different'
munist member of the new govern- sar.'k Case is an account of it. and more convincing story.
ment of Klement Gottwald, was She began, not very confidently, by
found dead in a courtyard of the Czer- asking herself questions. "Were there Mr.-Ambler's most recent novel is
P 1 c in Pra ue many Czechs re- enough people alive to prove anything Intercom Conspiracy.
aac g
The
.
nm
jected the official verdict of suicide., one way or another? Who, in an end i j
He had plunged 60 feet from the less procession of witnesses, was'tell by Eric Ambler
bathroom window of his apartment in ing the truth and who gained what by
a
the palace, which also housed the for. lying? Where . . . was the hard ev-
eign ministry. He was found at dawn idence of suicide or murder?"
spread-eagled on the cobblestones, Patiently and persistently ..Mrs.'
barefoot and in pajamas, dirty, his Sterling interviewed every witness she'
face contorted with fear. could find, dozens, from an obscure
Jan Masaryk was not only the son security policeman living in a Prague
ofTomasMasaryk,thereveredfound-, slum to a former secretary of Masa-
er of modern Czechoslovakia, but ryk's who had become an ordained
also a folk hero in his own right. For minister in Scotland. Of the subjects
such a man suicide was unthinkable. of these interviews, she says: "1 doubt
But others-those close to him before that any told me the whole truth, even
his death, a police doctor who exam- the part they thought they knew.
incd the body-had more cogent rca- Their testimony is encrusted with the
sons for doubt. Death and imprison- imperfections of memory, by years of
ment, or fear, soon silenced them. confinement and torture, by broken
For 20 years the case remained : careers and lives, by political ambi-?,
closed. Then, in January 1968, the I tion, vanity or old age, by a fear they
Stalinist Novotny government fell, could not dismiss even when their
and was replaced by the more demo- ? freedom was restored."
of February that year, when the cen- urprisingly, she soon discovered
sorship was lifted, until August, when that one who was knowingly not.
the Soviet invaders reimposed it, there 'telling her the truth was Dr. Kotlar..
was free speech in Czechoslovakia. Not unnaturally, she also met with;
On April 5, the DubEck government suspicion and hostility. Hcr first meet
ordered an inquiry into the death of ing with Anna Masaryk, a niece of the j
don't count on me."
Mrs. Sterling has not written a
thriller, but much of her book does
>ra have the quality of a detective story.
investigator and her professional skill
and ingenuity were well rewarded.
Her conclusion that Masaryk was
murdered seems, on the circumstan-
tial evidence she so lucidly presents, to?
" a sane person could, after reading this
I, dead man, began badly: "Are you go-
ing to write one of those cheap anti-
a vulgar r-f""
mmunist tracts?
C
. . .
o
thriller? ... Do you know anything O` s" ""S1~c
,Jabout Czech history? Hus? Ziika?
"Comenius? Are you going to say They
.,,...., Did Him In, whatever anybody tells
k you? Because if that's your game,
Approved For Release 2004/10/13: CIA-RDP88=01-35OR000200060004-4