Supermarine Spitfire. European Users, part three. Czechoslovakia, part two.

 

At the end of summer 1945 the Czechoslovak Squadrons of the Royal Air Force (RAF) returned en masse from Great Britain to Czechoslovakia.
At that time this force consisted on three squadrons equipped with the Spitfire Mk.IXe, which in the Czechoslovak designation of military aircraft types, the Spitfire was given the number 'S-89', coming from the Czech word stihaci which means 'fighter'. The Spitfires were no re-numbered and kept their original RAF registrations.
After their arrival in Czechoslovakia the squadrons were reformed following the Soviet organizational doctrines into air divisions (letecká divize), each of them with two air fighter regiments (stihaci letecký pluk) each regiment corresponding to a RAF squadron. The Spitfires were kept in active service until the very late 1940s when the communist coup d'état took place in 1948 and the new government imprisoned all wartime Czech pilots and forced the acquisition of Soviet fighters to replace the Spitfires, namely the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 which was also manufactured locally under the designation of S-102.
In the meantime, Spitfires were also employed by the Military Aviation Academy (Letecka Vojenská Akademie) and many were also transferred the Militia Aviation (Bezpecnostní Letectvo - a policial gendarmerie corps). Under this command the Spitfires received civilian registrations, all of them starting with the code 'OK-'. 
Single fighters were transferred for experimental purposes to the research center (Vedecký Letecký Ústav) based at Letnany airport, close to Prague. For this purpose, they received individual tactical markings. 
As stated previously, most units operated the type until late 1947, with the exception of the Military Aviation Academy, which operated the type until 1948. The Spitfires were kept in storage until late 1948 when they were sold to Israel.

In total there were three Letecká Divize (numbered as 1, 2 and 3) and a total of six fighter regiments, 10 and 12 Stíhaci Letecký Pluk, under 1 Letecká Divize, 4 and 5 Stihaci Letecký Pluk under 2 Letecká Divize and 7 and 8 Stihaci Letecký Pluk under 3 Letecká Divize.

Sources:
1st AJ-Press - Monografie Lotnicze 40 - Supermarine Spitfire Part 3 (translated)
2nd https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Supermarine_Spitfire_operators#Czechoslovakia