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Czechoslovakia was the first country seized by the NAZIs. It was liberated by the Allies, but fell into the Soviet ares of control. A soviet inspired coup
imposed a Stalinist state (1948). After the 20th Party Congress (1956), the capricious nature of Stalinist terror was regularized, but Czechoslovakia and the other Soviet Eastern Europeans satellites contunued to be governed as a police state, strictly controlling people's lives. Fear gradually diminished and social and artistic freedoms increased in Czechoslovakia during the 1960s. This led to increasing discussion of political freedom. The Prague Spring (Pražské jaro) refers to a brief period of political reform and liberalization began in Czechoslovakia (1968). It is a term first coined in the West, but adopted by the Czechs themselves. It in part refers back to the Springtime of Peoples--the Revolutions of 1848. Czech Communistl leader Alexander Dubcek who came to power January 5, 1968 initiated a series of liberal reforms. Dubchek replaced hard-line leader Antonin Novotny as First Secretary of the Czech Communist Party. Dubcek was a relatively unknown Slovak Communist. Dubchek and his associates Novotny loyalists. Novotny finally resigned (March 28, 1968). Ludvik Svoboda who had served as Defense Minister became the new Czech president. A new government under Oldrich Cernik was appointed (April 8). Dubcek argued along with Western European Communists believed that Communism was not synonmamous with repressive police state rule. The Sovietswere unsettled by both the directon and speed of the reform program. In the end, the Soviet settled the debate--with Red Army tanks. The Prague Spring ended with and the invasion of 650,000 Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops (August 20, 1968). Only Romania refused to join the Soviets. There was only minimal resistance. Dubcek was arrested and transported to Moscow.
Hitler threatened the Czechs with military action on several occassions after Munich. Finally he called elderly President Dr. Emil Hacha to Berlin (March 14). There after midnight Hitler haranged him. Then Göring offered a mocked applogy for having his bombers destroy Prague, but said it would be a good lesson to the British and French. Hacha fainted and had to be revived. He telephoned Prague ordering that there should be no resistance. Göring and Ribbentrop bullied him into signing a paper asking for German interbention. [Black, p. 512.] Thus independent, democratic Czechoslovakia became the NAZI Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Hacha told the Czech people on the radio, "I have entrusted our country to the Fuhrer and have been promised his trust." The Wehrmacht crossed the border and occupied Bohenia and Moravia in one day (March 15). This was a total violation of the Munich Agreement. Slovakia had succeeded the day before and became Hiler's most slavish puppet state. Hungary with Hitler's approval seized Ruthenia. All of Czechoslovakia was now in the NAZI orbit. The Czechs would pay a terrible price. They would be Hitler's last bloodless victory. They would not, however, be his last stunning victory.
Hitler ordered the Wehrmacht to seize the rest of the country (March 1939). Here Hitler step over another milestone, for the first time he seized control of non-Germans. NAZI policies varied depending on the area of Czecheslovakia (the Sudetenland, Bohemia and Moravia, and Slovakia). We note that some Czechs were forcibly removed from the Sudentenland, but we have few details at this time. NAZI policies in Bohemia and Moravia were much more begin that later implemented in Poland, but vecame more secere as the occupation progressed, especially after the appointment of Teynhard Heydrich as Governor. The Czechs as the first occupied country, were the first to be drafted for forced labor in Germany. The Czech arms industry played an importan role in the German war effirt. Hitler convinced that the Czeches were being treated to lightly, appointed Reinhard Heydrich to replace the first NAZI governor. His assasination by British-trained patriots resulted in horendous reprisals by the SS.
Czechoslovakia was liberated by the Allies. The Soviets entere from the east and the Amerucans from the West. The country fell into the Soviet area of control as agreed at Yalta.
A soviet inspired coup imposed a Stalinist state (1948).
After the 20th Party Congress (1956), the capricious nature of Stalinist terror was regularized, but Czechoslovakia and the other Soviet Eastern Europeans satellites contunued to be governed as a police state, strictly controlling people's lives. Fear gradually diminished and social and artistic freedoms increased in Czechoslovakia during the 1960s. This led to increasing discussion of political freedom. Novotny permitted token reforms (early 1960s). They did not meet the desires of the increasingly liberal CCP or the Czech people. Discontent only increased. A key factor here was the slow pace of the economic reforms. It was becoming increasinly clear to even Party members tht Communism was impeding not promoting economic growth. Amony youth, cultural liberalization was a major concern. And the Slovaks within the Party wanted greater autonomy. for their republic.
The Prague Spring (Pražské jaro) refers to a brief period of political reform and liberalization began in Czechoslovakia (1968). It is a term first coined in the West, but adopted by the Czechs themselves. It in part refers back to the Springtime of Peoples--the Revolutions of 1848. Most Czechs for the time forgot that the 1848 Prague Spring was extinuished by a Russian Army. The Prague Spring began with the removal of Novotny from the party leadership (January 1968) and then from from the presidency (March 1968).
These steps in the Czech leadership were taken without clearance from Moscow. The Soviet KGB of course kept files on many Czechs, but primarily they relied on Státní Bezpečnost (State Security--StB). StB was thecsecret police organization that the Soviets began training and began operating even before rhe 1948 coup which formally ended democracy in Czechoslovakia. The KGB primarily depended on the StB to monitor the Czech Communist Party as well as disidents.
The KGB tained the StB in police state procedures, forcing confessions by means of torture, including the use of drugs, blackmail and kidnapping. After the 1948 coup these practices were perfected as the StB worked with Soviet advisors.
The StB adopted he same actions used by the KGB and other secret police groups in the Soviet empire. The StB tapped telephones, surveiled residences, monitored mail, and searched homes without any legal contraints. If suspected individuals could not be found committing actual offenses, they were simply arrested for 'subversion of the republic'. This sort of action was required because Czechoslovakia like tge Soviet Union and other Cimmunist countries had liberal constitutions which purported to gurantee a range of political liberties. Neither the KGB or the Stb realized what had happened with the Prague Spring, because it came from the CCP, brought about by many individuals who were not well known. We do not yet have details on the STB's relations with the reformers and role in the Prague Spring and resuklting Soviet invasion.
Little known Czech Communistl leader Alexander Dubček came to power (January 5, 1968). He proceeded to initiate a series of liberal reforms. Dubchek replaced hard-line leader Antonin Novotny as First Secretary of the Czech Communist Party (CCP). Dubcek at the time was a virtually unknown Slovak Communist.
First Secretary Dubček and his associates during Spring 1968 gradually moved out Novotny loyalists. Novotny finally resigned (March 28, 1968). Ludvik Svoboda who had served as Defense Minister became the new Czech president. A new government under Oldrich Cernik was appointed (April 8). Dubcek argued along with Western European Communists that Communism was capable of reform and not synonmamous with repressive police state rule. Dubček and his associates took took a series practical steps to institute widespread political, social, and economic reforms. These were domestic matters. The reformers, however, went furher. They wanted politico-military changes in the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact and Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON). The leadership carefully affirmed its loyalty to socialism and the Warsaw Pact, but wanted to develop expanded relations with all countries of the world regardless of their social systems--this meant the Capitlist West. The reformers adopted a comprehensive program (April 1968). Their program included the outline for a modern, humanistic socialist democracy that would guarantee, among other things, freedom of religion, press, assembly, speech, and travel. It was essentially the beginningb of a Western European style democracy. Dubcek told Czecks that it would give socialism 'a human face'. For 20 years of Communist police state rule, the Czech people, like people throughout Eastern Europe, had been shut out of their own government. Veryvquickly the population began to take interest in government, Dubček emerged as popular national leader.
The Soviets were unsettled by both the directon and speed of the reform program. Soviet officials decided that it would be necessary to interven. The Soviets organized a meeting with the Warsaw Pact satellite countries to give their intervention an international aura. The leaders meeting in Warsaw urged Dubchek to "anti-socialist" programs (July 15). A report appearing in Pravda claimed U.S. arms had been found in Czechoslovakia. Unlike East Grmany, there were no Soviet troops posted in Czechoslovakia in 1968. The Soviets demanded the right to post troops on the country's western border. Czechoslovakis had a border with both East and West Germany. Dubchek assured the Soviets at a Warsaw Pact meeting held in Bratislava that Czechoslovakia would continue to honor its Warsaw Pact obligations (August 3).
The final straw for the Soviets was the decession of the CCP to reorganize on a new democratic basis. The CCP issued new statutes ending "democratic centralism" (August 10). Democratic centraliam was the kind of euphenism popular behind the Irin Curtain to cover the reality of Communist policecstates. It was what George Orwell was parroding in Animal Farm. Democratic centralism was of authoritarian control or in essence Soviet-style Communist orthodoxy. The immediate impact was to great significan new rights to the minor political parties that were members of the National Front. Essentially the reformers were surrendering the dictatorship of the CCP. This was one step too much for the Soviets. They understood clearly what democracy would lead go in their empire. Dubček like Gorbechev after him does not seem to have fully understood that Communism and democracy were imcompatable. Brezhnev and the people around him did.
First Secretary Dubček's assurances about remaining in the Warsaw Pact did not allay Soviet fears. They inderstood clearly that real democracy in Czechoslovakia would bring the end of Communism in that country and fundamentally change the country's client state status. In the end, the Soviet settled the debate--with Red Army tanks. The Prague Spring ended with and the invasion of 650,000 Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops (night of August 20, 1968). Czechs along the border awoke to awoke to the sound of clanking tanks sounds. They rolled past on the way to Prague and other cities. The Czech Army did not resist. People in Prague began to panic as the tanks and other armored vehicles entered the city in overwealming force. The Czech people at firce understood what was happening. Even the Soviet soldiers and other tankers understood. Only Dubček and his associates along with a few high-ranking Soviet officers and officials knew what was underway--the full-scale invasion of Czechoslovakia. The Czechoslovak Government immediately declared that the troops had not been invited into the country and that their invasion was a violation of socialist principles, international law, and the United Nations Charter. Most of the invading militry force was Soviet. To imprive the optics of the operation, the Soviets wanted the operation to appear to be a Warsaw Pact and not a purely Soviet action. Thus there were small contingents of Polish, East German, Hungarian and Bulgarian troops deployed, mostly well away from Prague. The Communist officials in those countries were more than willing to comply. They understood that their population generally wanted their own Prague Spring and that their regimes would be endangered if the Prague Spring was not immediately and forcibly extinguished. Only Romania refused to join the Soviets. There was only minimal resistance. General Secretary Brezhnev was determined to firmly establish who was in control of Eastern Europe. Clearly the Czech military had no ability to stand up to such a force and the invasion was all but bloodless in stark contrast to the 1956 Hungarian Uprising. There was passive resistance such as taking down road signs. Soviet tankers in Prague were confronted by unarmed youths pleading with them to no avail. Soviet tanks rumbling through the streets of Prague would be an enduring emblem of Soviet control of its Eastern European empire.
There was widespread condemnation from the international community. This even included some Western European Communists. It was not lost on the Europeans that the very same Czechs were the first victim of NAZI aggression. One of the few international leaders to support the Soviets was Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.
Soviet authorities secretly transported Dubček and other leading reformers to Moscow. In a previous generation he would have ben sumarily shot. He was not.
The Soviets informed him of what they expected of Czechoslovakia. A disheatened Dubček complied, presumably because he knew that resistance would only result in bloodshed. They were forced to sign a treaty that permitted the "temporary stationing" of an unspecified number of Soviet troops in Czechoslovakia.
The Soviets then returned him to Prague. Dubček told thec Checkn people on television that the 'talks' in Moscow had been 'comradely'. He was still the First Secretary of the Party. Dubček dutifully followed Soviet instructions. He announced that the reforms were ending. In fact they were being repealed. While the Checks did not resist the Soviets openly, there was substantial passive resistance. The Soviets found it difficult to find compliant Czech leaders to replace Dubček. Dubček and his associates were reinstated, but forced to operate within strict limits imposed by Moscow. He was then moved moved aside with a temprary posting as ambassador to Turkey (April 17, 1969). was replaced by another Slovak, Gustav Husak. Dubček and many of his allies within the party were stripped of their party positions. Purging the CCP was a process that lasted until 1971. In the process the CCP membership was reduced by almost one-third. Dubček was finally recalled to be expelled from the Party and quietly retired.
Soviet Propaganda had insisted over and over that it was a democratic modern state. Communis parties operated freely in Western Europe with some success. Many Europeans by the 1960s despite clear evidebce to he contrary such as the Berlin Wall that the Soviet Union had changed and that there was little difference between the Soviet Union and the Inited States.
The Prague Spring was a rude awakening. The Soviet Union had demonstrated that they were unwilling to even contemplate any members of the Soviet Empire implementing democratic reforms or exiting the Warsaw Pact. The Soviet tanks rimbling through the cobbel-stoned streets of Prague which had earlier seen NAZI tanks reaffirmed to most Europens that the people of Eastern Europe were held in the vast Soviet empire purely by military force and denied bith democracy and basic hunmman rights. General Secretary Brezhnev and his Politboro colleagues decided that the propaganda downside was a small price to pay for maintaining Czechoslovakia in the Soviet empire. They saw with some clarity that it was necessary to guaeantee the subject state of its Eastern European clients. There is no doubt that of Czechoslovakia became a democratic country, it would only be a matter of gime before another country, almost certainly Poland, would do the same. Maintaining Communism in Eastern Europe required Soviet tanks. The Soviets used the Czech intervention to formulate the Brezhnev Doctrine. The Soviets claimed that the Soviet Union the right to intervene to prevent the transition of a socialist state into a captalist state. This intself was a contradiction of Markest doctrine which stated that the evolution of countries from capitalism to socialism was inevitable. Maex did not forsee the need for Soviet tanks to maintain socialism. Ironically at the time Marx and Engles wrote the Communist Manifesto, Russian soldiers had entered eastern and central Europe (including what would become Czechoslovakia to put down an earlier generation of reformers (1848). The Soviets in the 1980s invoked the Brezhnev in both Afghanistan and Poland. Both were to have major domestic political consequences to the previously quiesent Soviet population.
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