Czechoslovak seafarers before 1989: Living on the edge of freedom

Czechoslovakia and the sea, 1918–1989

Before discussing the themes outlined above, it will be useful to provide a brief overview of Czechoslovakian shipping followed by an assessment of the drivers behind the development of the sector after the Second World War, and a brief history of the COSC up to 1989.

The Czechoslovak state – a landlocked territory – was a product of the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918. Through articles 363 and 364 of the Treaty of Versailles, however, the Czechoslovaks gained sea access through the German ports of Hamburg and Stettin (Szczecin). ⁵ The first Czechoslovak maritime act was authorised in 1920 under which Prague was established as the registry for all Czechoslovak vessels. Czechoslovakia was a signatory to the Barcelona Convention of April 1921 – the Regime of Navigable Waterways of International Concern – which was reflected in its own Act 267/1924 Coll. Practically, however, there was little development of Czechoslovak maritime enterprise during the interwar period: interest was restricted to a few small private ventures, the Legie (purchased by the Legiobank) and two ships of the Bata Company. ⁶ The main impetus to enter the shipping business came after the communist takeover of 1948 and was part of the larger Cold War landscape. Relations with China in particular were instrumental in its development.

Not long after the proclamation of the People’s Republic (PRC) in October 1949, China’s involvement in the Korean War meant not only a rejection of its participation in the United Nations and a deepening of its international isolation but also a greater dependence on the Soviet Union. ⁷ This also affected its development of maritime transport by restricting the overseas purchase of seagoing vessels and creating significant problems with their operation. However, from an economic point of view, without shipping, communist China remained significantly isolated at a time when its trade with the Soviet Bloc gradually expanded – in the late 1950s about fifty per cent of the PRC’s total foreign trade volume was with the Soviet Union, followed somewhat distantly by the German Democratic Republic (approximately six per cent) and Czechoslovakia (four and a half per cent). ⁸ China responded by secretly cooperating with some of the Soviet Bloc countries. This meant that the PRC would run its ships under the flag of a socialist country, formally in the ownership of that country. In the early 1950s Czechoslovakia was one of several partners embroiled in secret negotiations with China. ⁹ In 1953, after roughly two years of discussions, the Czechoslovaks and the PRC brokered a top-secret commitment to cooperate in the ownership and operation of shipping. ¹⁰ Although there is some evidence of Czechoslovak enthusiasm for cooperation, from a purely economic point of view maritime transport was not generally perceived to be a promising or effective enterprise at this time. ¹¹

As for the ‘common’ fleet, Czechoslovakia contributed only one of its own vessels to the joint venture (the Republika, purchased in 1952). In 1954, less than a year after signing the secret agreement, the Chinese bought two more ships to operate under the Czechoslovak flag, and in 1958–1959 another four. ¹² In 1959, Czechoslovakia purchased a second vessel – after Republika – that remained under state ownership, and in the same year was established Czechoslovak Ocean Shipping, an international joint stock company. The company was nothing more than an expedient: shares were never issued; decisions were based on the consent of both parties; the PRC took the profits and bore the risks; and Czechoslovakia gained a reward of about three per cent from recurrent costs (supplies for ships, repairs etc.).

The main benefit for Czechoslovakia was an outlet for its goods to the Far East at advantageous rates. We should not underestimate the significance of this, for it allowed the Czechoslovaks to build up a relatively large fleet, at least in comparison with Hungary, another landlocked country of the Soviet Bloc. In the 1980s, for example, Czechoslovakia operated twice the tonnage of Hungary; by the end of the decade this rose to three times more. It is worth noting that Hungary did not operate any bulk carriers, but only ships for general cargo. The Czechoslovak fleet of that time was characterised by bulk carriers chartered for profit. ¹³

During the early 1960s cooperation between Czechoslovakia and the PRC not only continued but intensified, in spite of the Sino–Soviet rift which saw the Soviet Union and its satellites halt economic aid to the Chinese. ¹⁴ In the particular case of maritime transport, however, Czechoslovakia continued its association with China, probably a case where ideology was outweighed by pragmatism. Export flows notwithstanding, in 1960 the Czechs owned only three ships and therefore did not have the capacity to run their own shipping business. A breach with China would mean economic loss. Awareness of this dependency, perhaps, and an assessment of the advantages brought by the COSC, most certainly, convinced the Czechoslovaks to invest in shipping. Five vessels were purchased between 1960 and 1965. ¹⁵

The eventual demise of Sino–Czechoslovak cooperation was rooted in the changing diplomatic climate, particularly the war in Vietnam. The prospect of US forces operating in Vietnamese waters (from 1965) prompted the COSC to draw up procedures to deal with possible interference with its vessels, which were manned by mixed Czechoslovak–Chinese crews. The COSC instructed its vessels to comply with any US attempts to stop them. It was informed thereafter that Chinese crew would not follow these instructions. This, then, was the core of a disagreement between the partners in which the COSC, as the operator, would bear the responsibility for any threats to crew, cargo and diplomatic relations. ¹⁶ Escalation of the dispute led the Czechoslovaks to terminate the agreement in December 1966, by which point it was felt that the initial ‘grounds for its signing had already passed’. ¹⁷ At this point in time Czechoslovakia was running six vessels; six more were made over to the PRC. This represented a good foundation from which to build a successful Czechoslovak-owned fleet. A decade later, the company operated twelve ships; and in 1989, on the eve of the Velvet Revolution, the COSC was running no fewer than twenty ocean-going vessels. ¹⁸ After 1989 the COSC was first privatised and then acquired by the Viktor Kožený’s Harvard Funds. ¹⁹ In 1998, Czechoslovakia having been divided in the meantime, the small and landlocked Czech Republic lost its fleet.

Seafaring and memory: Czechoslovak experiences, c.1959–1989

The article will now move on to investigate the history of Czechoslovak Ocean Shipping through people – through seafarers’ memories utilising oral histories. The evidential base consists of seventeen interviews conducted with Czechoslovak seafarers (sixteen from the Czech Republic, and one from Slovakia). The collection includes recordings of seafarers from all levels in the hierarchy and from all departments (deck, engine, kitchen, stewards, and a ship’s doctor). The oldest seafarer in the group was born in 1930 and had worked for the COSC for forty years. At the other end of the spectrum, the seagoing career of the youngest narrator (born in 1964) lasted no longer than six years. As mentioned in the introduction, the material has been brought to bear on four main topics: travelling, emigration, private lives, and direct experiences with the ruling regime, with an emphasis here on State Security activities among seafarers in this period.

Even today, when people from former socialist countries can travel around the world without many restrictions (the remaining ones being cost and courage), a seagoing career is still – in the Czech context – perceived to offer great scope for visiting exotic places and for experiencing adventures. What holds now was even more pronounced in the past, when opportunities for travel were severely limited. Surprisingly, very few of the subjects in this group saw the chance to travel abroad as a privilege. They considered it as an integral part of the profession. The explanation for such attitudes lies in the fact that work at sea was described as being central to their lives. The motif of Czechoslovakia as a landlocked country here again arises. Can this simple fact of geography successfully explain this apparent ‘addiction’ to life and work at sea? For a comprehensive answer, we would need the fruits of similar research with seafarers from countries with a long seagoing tradition. Attachment to both career and home also connects with attitudes to emigration. Because the subjects in this group did not emigrate, we must accept that testimony on this topic may be biased as will any conclusions reached about it. This, however, is not a reason to omit it since emigration relates very closely to the possibilities for travel, and it also reflects how the communist regime discouraged its citizens from emigrating. Seafarers who did not emigrate can provide valid and useful testimony on those mechanisms, albeit unconsciously. Moreover, they can provide some clues about how those who did choose to emigrate arrived at their decisions.

Available resources confirm that from 1968 to 1974, following the invasion by the Warsaw Pact armies, which is considered one of the most marked periods for emigration, only sixty-two seafarers (or people working in the Prague company’s headquarters) emigrated. ²⁰ This figure represents about five or six per cent of all COSC employees. Considering how easy it was for seafarers to emigrate once they were abroad, this is rather a low rate. We may well ask why it was not higher.

In responding to a question about whether they had considered emigration and why they had rejected it, the narrators mentioned that the most important reason for deciding against was the possible danger for their families and relatives who remained at home. Actually, relatives of emigrants were punished in one way or another: they had problems at work, their career might come to a standstill, or they might be fired; their children might be denied an education or else be prevented from following their chosen fields. In discussing emigration the subjects also admitted that they did not lack anything working as a seafarer – they could practice their beloved profession; they could travel; they earned enough money; they were able to get scarce or Western goods for the family. Emigration, for them, primarily would mean uncertainty. Regardless of these explanations, the narrators emphasised that they could emigrate. Thus they implicitly drew attention to their professional qualities, abilities and skills which would enable them to apply for a job anywhere abroad, even in capitalist countries with competitive labour markets. The narrators also realised that they did not need to deal with many problems that other people who lived in communist Czechoslovakia had to overcome.

Finally, concerning emigration, the seafarers held one issue dear in their remembering: the value of home. One subject even admitted that he had persuaded his wife who wanted to emigrate not to:

In short, I fabricated reasons for my wife to discourage her from emigration; I did not want to emigrate. I am telling you. I did not know why to emigrate: I had a job; I earned good money for that time. From my youth I loved the Giant Mountains; when I’m at home, I go there two or three times a week. I would lose that. ²¹

The point is that if one does not suffer materially, feels job satisfaction, and, especially, enjoys freedom of movement, then the certainties of home and friends, family roots and ties provided a strong attachment to the native country. The state and its security services, however, never understood this and failed to use it fully to their advantage. Seafarers’ desire to work on the one hand and their regard for family ties and roots on the other could be very powerful tools of control. This is reflected in the article’s title: ‘the edge of freedom’.

This mechanism could be applied to seafarers who were in the job for a long time. The COSC, however, faced persistently high staff turnover. This stemmed from two causes: not everyone could withstand hard work in difficult conditions; and some took a consciously short-term view of work at sea as a way to visit foreign countries, earn good money, or, eventually, to emigrate. Unless captivated by it, they left the profession once these objectives were fulfilled, perhaps to find work that was more compatible with family life. Policies and tools of control were really designed for this less-stable element of the workforce, or for those who were ambitious. The two main components of the ruling communist regime influencing life aboard ship – the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the State Security – will be discussed further below.

All of the major socio-political organisations were represented on ships – the Revolutionary Trade Union, the Socialist Youth Union, and the Communist Party. The activities of these organisations, mainly those of the Communist Party, were largely formal and obligatory and varied from ship to ship according to individual fervour. Communist Party membership was not a prerequisite for applying to work as a seafarer, and in some cases professionalism was preferred to loyalty to the regime. For further career advancement, however, membership was crucial. Thus a kind of ‘deal’ was often arranged – become a member of the party, and we will promote you. Consequently, promotion meant not only a higher salary but also a higher status in the shipboard hierarchy. In some cases, a higher position also brought the possibility of dealing with foreign suppliers, to get commissions from them – in short, to improve one’s financial situation in various ways.

The impact of the Communist Party’s activities on ships should not be underestimated, however. Some personal testimonies show that the party could even interfere with the ship’s hierarchy. Striking examples could occur when a shipmaster was not a party member; a shipboard party cell could decide not to inform him about its decisions, even those relating to the vessel’s operation. ²² The final responsibility for crew, cargo and vessel was the master’s, nonetheless: ‘It happened that in the party meeting the party leader or the trade union leader roasted the captain. This is absurd. This must not happen’. ²³

From the perspective of the communist regime, seafarers posed a threat because they got a chance to see how ‘real’ life abroad looked. Seafarers (and consequently their families and friends) thus found out that both capitalist and socialist countries were totally different from how they were being constructed by communist propaganda. And what is more important, they were witnesses of real politics of the Czechoslovak state, and of the Soviet Bloc more generally. On the one hand they could see how life in a democracy was; when meeting Czechoslovak emigrants (despite not being allowed to visit them) as well as other foreign workers (mainly other seafarers), they were able to judge for themselves the pros and cons of democracies. Once docked, on the other hand, they walked around and saw modern developed and advanced Western cities, with all their places of interest, shops, and transport infrastructure, but also the suburban industrial areas where ports are usually located. Here comparisons with their homeland were inevitable. Then, being at home, they could not respect official ideological discourse about differences between Eastern (Soviet Bloc) and Western (democratic) countries. This discrepancy grew even stronger when they saw how Czechoslovak ships transported weapons to Libya, Iraq and also Iran.

Because of the ‘threat’ posed by uncensored or undistorted information, controlling seafarers was considered as essential by the regime. Control was exercised in several ways. In the first instance it was exerted by the company’s management which decided who would travel abroad, when, where and for how long. It was a very powerful tool since, as discussed earlier, many seafarers considered their work as the most important thing in their lives. As we have seen, after leaving Czechoslovakia, seafarers were controlled aboard ship, politically at least, mainly through the activities of Communist Party members.

Still, these two methods of control were not sufficient; or rather, were not considered to be sufficient. Here comes into play another strong agency – the State Security (Czech: Státní bezpečnost; Slovak: Štátna bezpečnost: hereafter StB). This repressive body was established in 1945 (and dissolved in 1990) as a powerful tool for supporting the communist regime. It played an appreciable role in assuring citizens’ obedience towards the regime by all available means, not excluding violent or illegal ones. In this task the StB used not only its own employees, but also ordinary citizen-collaborators. ²⁴

Regarding seafarers, the StB considered the following threats to be the most serious: their opportunities to see life abroad and to thereby undermine the regime’s propaganda in their immediate circles and localities; the relative easiness of emigration (as noted above, this shows a distinct lack of understanding on the part of the authorities); and economic crimes, mainly smuggling and black marketeering. Information against suspects could be used coercively to compel collaboration, and the last point in particular illustrates very well the State Security’s efforts to intervene in the economy as a whole. ²⁵

Seafarers, then, had to be controlled in the interests of the state, and the involvement of the security services demonstrates how seriously the matter was taken in Czechoslovakia. All of this raises an intriguing issue: in speaking with ‘ordinary’ people today about Czechoslovak seafarers before 1989, almost everyone supposes that they must have been StB collaborators ‘by default’. Archive documents ²⁶ and other testimonies ²⁷ reveal the reality of the situation: the further away from Czechoslovakia people worked, the more difficult it was to manage a network of secret collaborators, and to reap the benefits from it in terms of intelligence and control. Moreover, due to the high turnover of seafarers, COSC’s managers in some cases downplayed the interests of the StB in favour of safe vessel operation. Remember that the chartering of Czechoslovak ships was a source of scarce foreign exchange for the national economy, and that Czechoslovak ships also transported weapons. This is not to underestimate the problem – rather I want to suggest that the topic of cooperation with the security service is actually also (and especially) a reflection of individuals’ internalised fear and internalised control mechanisms applied by the ruling regime.

From the interviews with former seafarers conducted for this study, it cannot be deduced whether any of the subjects collaborated with the StB. This is not surprising given the stigma attached to it. Instead, the interviews reveal the following: first, the interviewees did not spontaneously mention the theme of collaboration; second, when asked directly about the topic they often downplayed the scope, importance and seriousness of collaborative activities; third, none of the subjects admitted to being significantly damaged by the StB’s activities.

We may usefully ask why the subjects took a passively defensive attitude towards questions about the StB and its collaborators. It could be argued that if no-one raised the topic and no former collaborators were among the subjects (which seems very likely), then the issue is not worth pursuing in the context of this study. Oral testimony, however, can ‘tell us not just what people did, but what they wanted to do, what they believed they were doing, and what they now think they did’. ²⁸ Feelings and memories repressed or hidden in the present may tell us a lot about how seafarers perceived the activities of the StB in the past. The ‘places of silence’ in respect of collaboration may perhaps be explained by a sense of nostalgia among the narrators; by their efforts to idealise lives spent at sea and to expel troublesome memories (and surely there is a strong case for considering memories of the StB as threatening). The subjects’ evasive attitude on this topic may also have been grounded in their fear that any information supplied might be misused, notwithstanding a carefully and clearly formulated relationship between subject and interviewer. A sense of shame has to be considered here, too. Narratives marked by pride and work ethic are confronted by the fact that some of their colleagues did collaborate with the StB. Reticence today may perhaps be taken as an unconscious response to passivity in the past. Silence, then, may be a strategy of coping with this highly sensitive subject.

In addition to the evidence provided by oral testimony, an effort has been made to locate documentary material kept by the StB relating to the COSC. Though the StB archive is far from complete, the surviving documents reveal that it was mainly interested in certain types of information, namely the personal contacts of ships’ crews abroad, illegal imports of consumer goods (smuggling goods from the West and selling them on the black market), emigration, marital infidelity, and alcoholism. ²⁹ These correspond closely with the StB’s areas of interest generally in identifying and countering threats to the communist regime.

In using this material to explore the specific question of why some seafarers collaborated with the StB, mindful of the close working relationships present aboard ship, I will propose two probable explanations. The first reflects instances where a committed collaborator set out to harm somebody else. Such efforts mainly survive in the form of written denunciations of masters and senior officers – and here can be detected a certain amount of envy towards the status, conditions and wages enjoyed by them. Equally, however, the reporting of certain information (about lovers, alcoholism and other matters which were insignificant from the state’s ideological viewpoint) may be seen as displays of compliance or conscientiousness by collaborators who feared punishment or disfavour themselves. Clients of the StB could choose to pass on relatively trivial information in order to minimise the possible consequences for their colleagues.

In any case, constant complaints by StB officers that it was difficult to keep in contact with seafarers, and that COSC’s managers were concerned more about profitability than the interests of the StB, ³⁰ raise considerable doubts about the organisation’s reach into this sector. Nevertheless, the StB, together with other authorities, could decisively influence a seafarer’s clearance to leave the country for work: the ever-present threat of being denied permission perhaps led many men to internalise the regime’s control.

A seafarer’s stay at home, however, was not merely a period spent waiting for the next embarkation. It was also time he could spend with his family. Though it may sound odd, the need for security discussed above, to belong somewhere, does not correspond with how seafarers perceived their roles as husbands and fathers.

One aim of the present research, as originally conceived, was to study the COSC through the memories of seafarers’ wives and children. Unfortunately, this proved impossible. Those women who eventually were traced usually did not consider themselves important enough (in comparison with their husbands) to provide an interview. ³¹ This in itself reveals something interesting about attitudes and values within seafaring families, and perhaps within society at large. Moreover, some of these potential subjects categorically refused to be interviewed – apparently it was too painful for them to discuss the long periods when their husbands were absent at sea. ³²

This meant that the subjects of home and family, and especially absence, could only be approached through the seafarers’ own testimony. Subjects were invited to talk about life away from their families when they were working, and also about how they felt about it now. They seem to have been very difficult topics. Responses tended to be evasive or very brief. One interviewee completely ignored the question and began to talk about something else. This reluctance to discuss family life should not be taken as indifference or coldness, insofar as some statements suggest an awareness of the potential problems faced by their families:

She said to me many times: ‘Stay at home, I cannot stand it’. … She never threatened me with a divorce, never in life. Ultimately she said: ‘I’m going crazy, I cannot stand it’. But she always bore it. ³³

Interviewees offered various ways of rationalising or justifying their long-term absences from family when working at sea. In some cases they accentuated current intensive relationships with their grandchildren, implying that this compensated for past absence. Others emphasised that a male seafarer provided the family with material goods and that wife and children could (on fulfilling certain conditions) travel aboard ship with him. Both of these reasons are very important when we consider the shortage of consumer goods and restricted travel opportunities in Czechoslovakia at that time. Seafarers could import those Western goods – clothing, cosmetics, electronics – which were, to some extent, signs of luxury. And the family could visit both exotic regions and Western countries; it was a privilege.

In a way, today it is terribly sad. I could bring a JVC from Singapore, a television … and the whole family watched, and a brother-in-law and sister, all looked. JVC, remote control, high-quality image. So, they were envious. They said: ‘She was married to seafarer, she had a good time’. Something was for something. My wife had a good time. Regardless, I could bring other things. Gold from the Arab world. Cheap gold. I bought her a gold chain. Necklace, ring. And at work, everyone was watching, women colleagues, all envious: ‘She has a gold chain, from Turkey or somewhere. A gold ring’. ³⁴

Concerning the former seafarers’ general reluctance to talk about their families, two hypotheses may be advanced. First, it was not because they were unaware or uninterested in their family’s circumstances, but rather, on the contrary, because even today they feel unease or guilt about putting their careers first. Such feelings are rationalised by emphasising the all-round benefits of the job or by recourse to the ‘inevitability’ of absence. It can be said, with some simplification, that seafarers had a certain ‘advantage’ in this respect – the weak economy and strictly guarded borders of socialist Czechoslovakia provided them with a very good excuse for long-term absences from the family. Second, in respect of how they feel about it now, some seafarers left the profession because of their family’s needs. Those who remained were not worse husbands or fathers; they simply could not give up the sea. Finally, testimony on the periods spent at home reveals a mixture of emotions. Seafarers had an obligatory holiday at roughly fifty per cent pay. ³⁵ While at home there was often a disjunction between the seafarer’s free time and the continuing everyday routine of the rest of the family, at work, at school. Some tried to find temporary paid work, but this was in fact illegal. Thus, many seafarers experienced two different types of loneliness: while at sea they missed the family; while at home they missed the sea. One subject went so far as to confess that he had been afraid of people after returning home, feeling alienated when walking around the town. ³⁶ Interestingly, the fact of being back behind closely guarded borders was not spoken of as a problem.

Czechoslovak seafarers represented a small and very specific part of the population. Precise information about the number of seafarers is not available due to incomplete evidence, but it seems unlikely that the COSC ever employed more than around a thousand seafarers at any point in its history. This article therefore deals with an almost imperceptible fraction of the population. Yet, on the other hand, in the locality of their homes, these people were important channels for the transfer of information from the outside world. However, as their work at sea seems to have been the most important thing in their lives, more important than money, travelling, and often more important than family, sometimes they performed this role of information transfer rather unconsciously.