Operation Anthropoid
Quick answer: What was Operation Anthropoid?
Operation Anthropoid was the May 27, 1942 attack on Reinhard Heydrich, the SS general ruling occupied Bohemia and Moravia and chair of the Wannsee Conference. Czechoslovak sergeants Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš, trained by Britain's SOE, ambushed his open Mercedes on a curve in Prague's Libeň district. Germany retaliated brutally, including destroying the village of Lidice.
Reinhard Heydrich liked to ride to work with the top down. He was the SS general running occupied Bohemia and Moravia, chair of the Wannsee Conference that turned the murder of Europe's Jews into a timetable, and head of the security apparatus behind the Gestapo. Hitler called him the man with the iron heart. Within months of arriving in Prague, he'd raised industrial output and smashed the underground. By spring 1942 he refused an escort car, believing the Czechs couldn't touch him. On May 27, as his open Mercedes slowed on a tight curve in Libeň, Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš stepped out. They were Czechoslovak sergeants trained by Britain's SOE, dropped into their occupied country five months earlier. John tells the attack and the terrible German retaliation, including the destruction of Lidice. Some victories cost what they cost, he writes, and the benefits arrive forty years late. In the crypt where the men made their last stand, their photographs hang on the wall. The oldest was thirty.
Why it matters for leaders: Courage sometimes means accepting a terrible cost for a future you will never see; the remembering is our part.
Q: Where did the paratroopers make their last stand?
A: In the crypt of the Church of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Prague, now a memorial whose walls still carry bullet scars.
Q: Why did Heydrich ride in an open car?
A: He believed a closed car and escort would signal weakness to the Czechs, and refused an escort car.
Read the full essay on Substack → https://heroespath.substack.com/p/operation-anthropoid
By John Fenzel, founder and CEO of Heroes' Path Foundation