Word: reformist
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Reassuring Words. While the Soviets were trying to create at least a modicum of government over the recalcitrant Czechoslovaks, the destiny of the nation's reformist vision of Communism was being debated behind closed doors in both Prague and Moscow. Dubcek and Cernik were flown off to Moscow in a Soviet military jet. The Czechoslovaks at first broadcast reports that Dubcek had been killed, but that was cleared up in one of the many weird, almost unreal vignettes of the week. Dubcek's mother marched in to see the local Soviet commander in Bratislava, demanding to know what the Russians...
...Europe. It was this opposition, the prospect of profoundly splitting the already splintered Communist world, that was a big factor in the outcome of the Russian-Czechoslovak confrontation. In a memorable turn of events, Russia last week backed down on nearly all its demands of Alexander Dubcek's reformist regime in Czechoslovakia (see following story...
...Dubcek politely declined. Instead, he offered to meet separately in Prague with each one of the Communist leaders. Dubcek feared going to any meeting where the other leaders might join in browbeating him, was especially wary of being lured out of the country at a time when his reformist regime seemed in peril. After Dubček's refusal, the other bosses obviously decided that they had reason enough to meet by themselves...
Above all, the reformist leadership has so far refused to permit the emergence of a genuine opposition party to the Communists. A political organization of liberal nonCommunists, K.A.N., has already signed up more than 20,000 members but takes care to describe it self as a club rather than a party. K.A.N.'s rallies at times take place despite police bans, but the club's sober leaders know that if they overstep the bounds, they may force the government to crack down...
What is most impressive is not their secret motivation to have the System fail, but naive hope that it would succeed, and the extent of their depression and disillusion when their early reformist hopes were frustrated...