A founder (with Tomáš Masaryk) of modern Czechoslovakia, he served as Masaryk’s Minister of Foreign Affairs 1919–35, during which time he championed the League of Nations (he served as its chairman six times) and established close ties with France and the Soviet Union. He resigned as President over the Munich Agreement, and during World War II came to London as head of the Czechoslovakian government in exile (1941–45). In 1945 he returned to his country to regain the presidency, but resigned after the 1948 Communist coup.