[Stephen]

The Slovak uprising was not the same as the Warsaw rising, the Warsaw rising was aimed at the Germans and the Soviets and there had been no talks before the rising between the Polish resistance and the Soviets. The Soviets knew the Slovak rising was coming and there had been talks on co-operation between the Soviets and the London based Government. There was a problem as the Slovak army did not want to go over to the Soviets or to be disarmed by them and the London Government wanted the Slovak army to become the nucleus of a new Czechoslovakian army, clearly this would not accord with Soviet thinking.

There was also a partizan force in Slovakia under the control of the Slovak National Council a communist front organisation and partizans who took their orders from the Central Ukrainian Partizan Staff. It seems that the forces taking their orders direct from the Partizan Staff intensified activities in August and brought on an appeal from the Slovak Government to Germany for help. These military attacks occured without liason between the communist partizans and the Slovak army which was unprepared and asked London to curtail this activity.

On August 31st the deputy commander of the East Slovak Corps flew to the Soviets while the commander of the Corps went over to the Germans.
A panzer division attacked the Corps on August the 31st and within 24hrs the Corps was no more. Garrison troops in other parts of the country did not join in the rising and this meant the failure of the London Government to organise military forces of their own the partizan war that followed was largely communist controlled.

The Czechoslovakian 1st Army Corps which had been formed on Soviet territory was commanded by a General who was a London officer and as the Corps was moving into Slovakia the Soviets had him replaced with a communist. They thus ensured that the new Czechoslovakian army was a communist army.

Taken from "The Road To Berlin" by John Erickson.