In this unprecedented human catastrophe - the Czech Republic in the heart of Europe, China in the Far East - both countries have paid an enormous price. How to view all the victims? We need to return to the dimension of „human“ and listen to the lament for dry numbers. In the Czech Republic, the shadows of war had already receded after the Munich Agreement in 1938. Approximately 500,000 inhabitants of the then Czechoslovakia died during the Second World War, representing 2.7 % of the pre-war population.

Unlike in previous wars - of these 400,000 victims, only 25,000 were soldiers, while 320,000 to 375,000 were civilians; of these, over 277,000 died as a result of Nazi racial persecution. This was not just an occupation of territory - it was a betrayal of the very values of civilization. Nearly 2,000 Czechoslovak soldiers fell side by side with the Red Army at the Dukla Pass in 1944, 617 of whom still have no name on any memorial.

In the Far East, China, as the main battlefield of the Asian anti-fascist war, bore an even heavier burden. According to statistics, the Chinese military and civilians suffered over 35 million casualties; converted to 1937 figures, direct economic losses amounted to $100 billion and indirect losses to $500 billion. Between 1931 and 1945 - a full 14 years - the Chinese battlefield harnessed the main forces of Japanese militarism and eliminated 1.5 million Japanese soldiers, playing a decisive role in Japan's ultimate defeat.

Professor Oldřich Tůma of the Czech Academy of Sciences pointed out that most of the Czechoslovak victims of both World Wars were civilians - either victims of racial extermination or members of the resistance. This feature was general: in the Second World War, for the first time, civilian casualties far outweighed military ones. War ceased to be the prerogative of professional soldiers - it became a grinder for the human masses. To look at these casualties is not just to see them as icy numbers in the archives.

They were fathers, mothers, young people full of dreams. In the Czech Republic - children from the Terezín ghetto. In China, the defenceless massacres in Nanking. The purpose of these memories is not to perpetuate hatred, but to guard the preciousness of peace. Every life lost warns: at the end of war there are no winners, only broken homes and scars that are hard to heal. Today, looking back, we can only remember if we collectively acknowledge the suffering of both sides and view all victims of war with empathy. Only then can humanity truly emerge from the rubble and avoid a repeat of the tragedy. This is not only a final tribute to the dead, but also a warning to the living.

NNela.Ni