Word: czechoslovakia
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After imploring the people to remain calm, Svoboda introduced the Central Committee's choice to take over Dubček's post as Party First Secretary: Gustav Husák, 56. In a short speech, Husák promised that Czechoslovakia would not return to the Stalinist repression of the 1950s, but he also stressed that he would allow no recurrence of the recent anti-Soviet riots that brought the Russians once more to the verge of crushing the country by force. "Some people imagine that freedom has no limits, no restrictions," he said. "But in every orderly...
Careful Balance. As part of a major overhaul of Czechoslovakia's governing apparatus, the 190-man Central Committee also abolished Dubček's old 21-man Presidium. It was replaced by a new eleven-man Presidium, whose membership reflected the careful balance of the new political arrangement. Only two outspoken liberals remained, Svoboda and Dubček, who was given the largely honorary position of President of the new federal National Assembly. The hero of the liberals, former National Assembly President Josef Smrkovský, was dropped from the ruling group after his own admission of errors, which...
...daily strain of coping with Soviet demands; they believed that toward the end he had allowed the country to lapse into a dangerous period of drift and indecision. A tough Husák, they hoped, might be able to bargain more skillfully with the Russians and more effectively protect Czechoslovakia's interests...
Even so, Dubček's ouster represented the culmination of a tragedy for Czechoslovakia. Dubcek had not sought to overthrow Communism; he wanted only, in his words, "to give it a human face" by removing needless abuses and brutalities. For a time, it seemed as if the tall, soft-spoken Slovak might succeed. Channeling a groundswell of discontent among both intellectuals and workers against the Stalinist regime of President and Party Boss Antonin Novotny, Dubček in early 1968 managed to overthrow the old order and institute the most far-ranging reforms and freedoms that had ever...
...Czechoslovaks experienced an exhilarating release from 20 years of police-state repression. New laws were enacted that granted rights ranging from freedom of the press and speech to the privilege of traveling abroad and emigrating. Artistic and political expression bloomed, and the country pulsed with hope and excitement. But Czechoslovakia's new ebullience frightened the Soviet and other East Bloc leaders, who feared that their own people would demand similar reforms. At a Warsaw Pact summit meeting in Dresden in March 1968, East German Boss Walter Ulbricht reportedly waved his arms ominously over the other Party leaders, warning...