Ing. Major General Bohuslav Dvořák

* 1960

  • "On the other side of the shore in Frymburk, the [border] zone was already starting, where the entry was only required by permit, so we couldn't go there either. I have such a beautiful memory, it was when I was studying at the Military Air Force High School in Košice. We were with a friend for Easter because there was still snow. There, on one northern slope, which was already in the zone, we were cross country skiing, we had a wheelie. Then we spent an hour with the border guards and explained that we were really from Frymburk, that we didn't want to defect. The piquant part was that we were looking at our native houses across Jarov."

  • "When you drive through a village where houses are destroyed, shot up. When you jump at the road because you need to go to the toilet, and you see that where I wanted to pee, there is a mine, the so-called pineapples. Of course, it was broken ground. When you flew a helicopter over it, you realized again how amazing and beautiful the nature is there. The Una and Sana rivers in the valley, which were there, the waterfalls, which we also had the opportunity to see from the helicopter. You think a little about it, I think as humans in general, if what concerns the development and the shift, if we are still not only stepping on the spot. It's just that we have better technology, but unfortunately the way of thinking and solving conflicts remains the same as it was back in the Middle Ages."

  • "Firstly, we were deployed at the post on Zhůří, which is a short distance from Horská Kvilda. There we had two Mi-24 helicopters, which aimed precisely at those slow-flying targets, at our later colleagues, with whom we slowly flew around the border or sometimes hung against each other. We only had borders, stakes, and we were a hundred meters apart." - "Why were those helicopters on combat alert?" - "To protect the airspace. After all, it was one of those measures against the overflight of helicopters from Germany or Austria to our territory at the time."

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    Praha, 23.06.2022

    (audio)
    délka: 02:14:04
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We have to learn all our life

Bohuslav Dvořák in 2022
Bohuslav Dvořák in 2022
zdroj: Post Bellum

Bohuslav Dvořák was born on May 8, 1960 into a teaching family in the South Bohemian village Kaplice. He spent his childhood in Frymburk on the banks of the Lipno reservoir. After finishing primary school in 1975, he joined the Prague vocational school Motorlet (formerly Walter), which produced aircraft engines. His love of flying led him to the army. While still at the vocational school, he applied for a membership in the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ). After graduation, he went to Košice to the Military Air Force High School. After four years, in 1983, he successfully completed his studies and began serving in the Czechoslovak People‘s Army (ČSLA) at the airport in Pilsen-Bory with the detached 4th Squadron of the 51st Helicopter Regiment (later the 11th Helicopter Regiment). He remained there until 1993. From 1986 he worked as a section commander, two years later as a deputy commander of a helicopter flight. In 1990, he moved with the unit to Pilsen-Líně airport. Three years later, he left to head the staff of the 3rd Tactical Air Corps, where he worked until 1997. In 1995, he completed the three-month Officer‘s Command Course in Henlow at the Royal Air Force. In 1997, he went to Bosnia and Herzegovina as part of the Stabilization Force international peacekeeping mission (SFOR) under the patronage of the North Atlantic Alliance. He served in the Banja Luka area of the International Southwest Division, where he was a commanding officer in charge of a helicopter unit. After returning to the Czech Republic, he worked as a senior inspector of the staff of the Air Force Headquarters. Two years later, in 1999, another operational deployment awaited him, this time in Albania, when the war in Kosovo was raging. He participated in the AFOR mission, which was a humanitarian operation of the North Atlantic Alliance. From June 1999, he worked at the NATO ACE Mobile Force Land Immediate Reaction Command. In the years 2002 to 2004, he held the position of the Chief of Air Force in the Air Force Department of the General Staff Section of the Army of the Czech Republic. Between 2004 and 2005 he studied in the United States of America at the Air Command & Staff College in Alabama. At the turn of 2006 and 2007, he spent six months in Afghanistan as a member of the International Security Support Force mission. His workplace became the Kabul airport, where he held the position of commander and ensured its operation and security. In 2012, he attained the rank of the major general. Until 2014, when he ended his active career as a soldier and helicopter pilot, he had functioned as the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Army of the Czech Republic. During his professional life, he received many awards, including the Army of the Czech Republic I., II. and III. degrees or medals for service abroad ISAF (International Security Assistance Force). In 2022 he lived in Hostivice.