Czechoslovakia: Silent Observance

For Czechoslovaks—and for much of the world—Aug. 21 will live forever in infamy. On that day two years ago, Soviet tanks rolled into Czechoslovakia and crushed the country’s promising Springtime of Freedom, which was led by Reformer Alexander Dubček. The first anniversary of that event was marked by three days of violent anti-Soviet demonstrations in Prague and a dozen other cities. Last week, on the second anniversary of the Soviet invasion, the dispirited Czechs did not bother to protest.

“What would it change?” shrugged a young mechanic from Kladno. In Prague, some Czechs placed flowers and candles on the grave of Jan Palach, the student who burned himself to death on Jan. 16, 1969, in protest against the invasion. The flowers and candles were removed by the authorities.

For its part, the government of Party Leader Gustav Husák declared a day of thanksgiving to the Soviet Union and the other Warsaw Pact nations for saving the country from the counter-revolutionists by their invasion. Throughout Czechoslovakia, the government called meetings to push that theme. At a parade in Karlovy Vary, celebrating the conclusion of the largest joint Soviet-Czechoslovak military maneuvers ever held, even old President Ludvik Svoboda, once an ally of Dubček’s, mouthed a party slogan: “With the Soviet Union forever, and never otherwise.”

Resisting the Ultras. Under the circumstances, the quiet observance of the anniversary was the wisest course for the Czechoslovaks. Though Husák is a stern hardliner, he is nonetheless determined to prevent the country from sliding back into the reign of police terror that characterized the pre-Dubček days. The peaceful anniversary may help Husák convince the Soviets that he has the situation under control and that his program of “normalization” is almost completed. This would enable him to resist the demands of the Czechoslovak Ultras, who want a return to even stricter political controls and show trials for the liberal leaders, including Alexander Dubček, who is thought to be somewhere in Slovakia.

On the day of the anniversary, Husák was in Moscow, where he attended a summit meeting of the Warsaw Pact leaders. At the close of the five-hour conference, it was Husák who thanked the Soviets on behalf of the Warsaw Pact leaders present for calling the conference. He also hailed the renunciation-of-force treaty between West Germany and the Soviet Union, which was described in the conference communiqué as a step toward “relaxation and normalization.” Since the Bonn-Moscow pact has been signed, nothing appears to stand in the way of a similar treaty between Bonn and Prague—as long as the Czechoslovaks properly conceal their enthusiasm for opening up contacts with the West.