Battle lines
Defense Ministry, locals locked in new fight over Austerlitz
Re-enactors take a march around the Peace Mound memorial at the site of Napoleon’s 1805 victory in south Moravia.
By Magnus Bennett
For The Prague Post
(October 30, 2003)
Nearly 200 years after Napoleon Bonaparte won one of his greatest military victories there, opposing forces are again lining up to fight over Austerlitz.
Slavkov, as the south Moravian site of the famous battle is known in Czech, is the planned location for a 1 billion Kc ($37 million) radar station, funded by NATO as a key part of the alliance’s integrated defense system.
But after spending more than $1 million laying the groundwork for the installation, the Defense Ministry faces nearby residents’ intense opposition to the project.
The 28-meter (91-foot) radar station is due to go on the Pratzen Heights, about 800 meters from the Mound of Peace, a monument to the 36,000 men who died in what became known as the Battle of the Three Emperors. In the 1805 battle, better known internationally as Austerlitz after the area’s German name, Napoleon stunned Europe by crushing the combined forces of Austria and Russia.
The controversy has forced the ministry to push back the planned 2006 launch of the Slavkov station by at least a year and to move up construction of a second radar facility near Nepolisy in east Bohemia to meet NATO deadlines. The ministry says it needs local approval to proceed — and must have it by November of next year if the 2007 construction target is to be met. The alternative, defense officials say, is to ask NATO for another postponement or to cancel the project outright.
Such approval seems far off. The village of Sokolnice, which lies 1.5 kilometers (about 1 mile) from Slavkov, filed a lawsuit Oct. 23 seeking to derail the project, citing fears of terrorist attacks, environmental concerns and perceived health hazards.
“People are very emotional about the radar,” Sokolnice Mayor Jiri Zivotsky said. “Nobody here wants the facility.”
The government maintains there is no alternative site for the station because other potential locations have been ruled out for environmental reasons or because they fall within high-density population areas. On Oct. 24 it brought its big guns to Brno in an effort to persuade the villagers to change their minds. Defense Minister Miroslav Kostelka spoke to a meeting of mayors from 22 towns and villages in the vicinity of the battlefield but failed to sway them.
Residents are most upset that they were not consulted over the construction of the station, said Miroslav Jandora, vice president of the community-service organization Burial Mound of Peace- Austerlitz, which represents 18 local towns and villages seeking to preserve the battlefield.
“The Ministry of Defense has been working on this radar station for two years and they haven’t told anyone anything about it,” said Jandora, who also heads Project Austerlitz 2005, a group that annually re-enacts scenes from the battle.
The ministry, which said it would consider unspecified legal steps if resistance to the station continues, claims Jandora has spread false information about the proposed station in the area’s villages.
“Mr. Jandora was telling local mayors that the radar station is very dangerous for the health of children and adults,” ministry spokesman Ladislav Sticha said. “This is not the case. In the 1960s there were several Russian radars [at Slavkov], and one of them had 10 times stronger transmission signals than the one that is planned.”
But concerns persist in the area. “There is uncertainty among inhabitants about the radar and whether it can cause some health problems,” said Sokolnice resident Josef Umlasek.
Others have expressed concern over the physical impact on the historic landscape, although defense officials say the bowl-shaped facility will be only 3 meters higher than previous radar stations at the site, which the Czech military has owned for more than 40 years. Dozens of individuals and heritage organizations from around the world have sent messages of concern about the project to Austerlitz 2005.
Michael Rayner, coordinator of the United Kingdom-based Battlefields Trust, argued that the radar installation would be a desecration, marring the landscape and possibly damaging archaeological evidence relating to the battle.
“Austerlitz is considered by many to be Napoleon’s greatest victory,” Rayner said. “It seems ironic that NATO as a European-wide defense organization is choosing to ignore this. If we cannot preserve our most important battlefields, what hope is there for less-well-known battlefields, which historically may be more important for various reasons?”
Frenchman and self-described Napoleon admirer Francois Lebailly, one of many private citizens who have e-mailed comments to the Austerlitz 2005 Web site, argued that Pratzen Heights should remain free of any military installation. “Nobody in France can imagine a military site near Verdun or in Normandy, near Omaha or Utah beaches,” he wrote. “Nobody in the United States can imagine a radar station on Ground Zero.”
Jandora, who has written to NATO Secretary-General Lord George Robertson outlining residents’ concerns, said he did not accept the ministry’s argument that there is no other suitable site.
“We know of at least five other places which could be used for the radar,” Jandora said, adding that he has discussed the issue with experts at the Military Academy in Brno. “The Ministry of Defense is saying ‘no’ because it will lose a lot of money if it has to be moved.”
NATO is adopting a wait-and-see position. Alliance spokesman Robert Pszczel said that the location of any radar station is normally at the discretion of the host nation and that NATO would only be concerned if a project looked unlikely to go ahead at all.
“At this stage we have no formal grounds to be worried. The Czech Republic has taken account of various sensibilities by suggesting a change in the implementation order of the two radar stations,” Pszczel said. “We will see how it develops.”
In the meantime, Kostelka told journalists after the Brno meeting that he will continue to press his case with local residents.
“The radar is absolutely key,” he said, “for the military, the Czech Republic and its security.”
Magnus Bennett can be reached at news@praguepost.com
My comment to the Sticha´s statement:
“Mr. Jandora was telling local mayors that the radar station is very dangerous for the health of children and adults,” is absolutly untrue.
Miroslav Jandora
vice-president of the community-service organization Burial Mound of Peace- Austerlitz