In 1956, Jan Beneš was recruited to the paratroop unit and served his obligatory military service. In the end of this service, in 1958, he was arrested and sentenced to 25 months for undermining of combat moral of the troops, interference with political education of the troops, illegal arming, and stealing military underwear. He served this sentence mostly in uranium mine Bytiz in Příbram region. This experience was a real eye-opener for a young son of a career officer. Jan Beneš wrote Second Breath, a book about this communistic concentration camp, in 1963. Ideological Department of the ÚV KSČ (Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia) banned its publication in 1964. Finally it was published in the United States by Orion Press N.Y. in 1969.