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Czechoslovakia's Struggle for the Future
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14623 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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5 / 1988 |
3,497 Words |
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Jiří V. Kotas
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After the string of deaths in the Kremlin between 1982 and 1985 and Mikhail Gorbachev's ascent to party leadership in March 1985, a paradox of unforeseen proportions appeared. The Czechoslovak communists, always the most faithful followers of the Soviet line, started to hint that not everything Soviet should be blindly copied in Czechoslovakia and betrayed increasing nervousness about the unclear notions of even glasnost and perestroika. Another unprecedented occurrence is the big demand in Czechoslovakia for Soviet newspapers; specific issues of Pravda of Izvestia (previously totally neglected pieces of paper) that reported on the progress of current Soviet reform debates remained mysteriously unavailable. Also, television antennas allowing the reception of Soviet programs disappeared from the market. (Almost everybody in Czechoslovakia understands Russian, due to years of obligatory training.) The extremely orthodox and aging Czechoslovak leadership, insecure and knowing that its own political survival depended solely on Moscow's support, started a slow process of a barely perceptible realignment of party leaders into two camps.
On one side are the veritable neo-Stalinists in the Central Committee Presidium (Gustáv Husák, Miloö Jakeö, Alois Indra, Vasil Bilak, Antonín Kapek). On the other are those party leaders (Lubomír ätrougal, Jozef Lenárt, Peter Colotka) with a more fluid set of ideas, who are more vocal in stressing the need for reform, and who once (in 1968) temporarily sided with reformers.
Glasnost's first victim?
It became increasingly evident during 1986 and 1987 that Husák--a living embodiment of Czechoslovakia's worst Brezhnevism--was increasingly unacceptable to the new Soviet leadership. Moscow, however, was cautious not to send any premature or wrong signals to Czechoslovakia; Gorbachev's official Czechoslovak visit in April 1987 was, on the surface, still a mechanical exchange of niceties between two communist bosses.
Gorbachev was greeted in Prague and at all stops of his Czechoslovak journey by unprecedented crowds. For the general public, it was a relatively safe way of expressing total disagreement with nearly two decades of Husák's rule. Rumors about the possible recall of Soviet troops and other equally unfounded illusions circulated widely, and although Gorbachev certainly did not meet Dubček in secret, as was reported in some Western press releases, he clearly indicated that the Soviet leadership would not attempt to stop some changes.
In May 1987, shortly after Gorbachev left Czechoslovakia, two special congresses of regime-approved actors and writers convened. Such criticism of the Czechoslovak situation as expressed during the proceedings certainly had not been heard in Czechoslovakia since the closing days of the 1968 experiment. Censorship was criticized, along with the spiritual emptiness and pretense of the regime. Anyone who has followed Czechoslovak developments after 1968 would confirm that such open criticism augurs a potential new crisis, a new polarization, and some new possibilities. Regime actor Miloö Kopecký became an instant star of the public debates after saying, in effect, that all those whose time has passed should leave the political scene. His unusually critical words were extensively reported (although with some omissions) by Rudé právo and by other tightly controlled papers. The reportage was immediately seen as a sign that a slowly unraveling campaign
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