Czechoslovakia and Prague Spring

• Declining Economy in Czechoslovakia:

  • 1960s - economy was in serious decline and there was a fall in the living standard

  • Soviets forced them to send over all the raw materials they produced

  • stopped the production of consumer goods

  • 1962-63 - national income fell

  • blamed the Communists
• Political Changes in Czechoslovakia:

  • Novotny was a harsh Communist who ruled strictly and was slow to

  make changes and reforms

  • 1967 - protests led to his leadership being challenged by political reformers

  • Jan 1968 - Brezhnev replaced Novotny with Dubcek (more popular)

  • supported more freedom introduced the Prague Spring Reforms

  • people saw a chance for change under the new leadership
• In January 1968 Dubcek’s government announced a plan for a new model of socialism.
• It would reduce state control over industry and allowed freedom of speech. This revolution was called the Prague Spring.
• Dubcek was arrested and taken away to Moscow where he signed an agreement that meant the country had to return to its old ways of ruling.
• Dubcek’s reforms were seen as a threat by the Soviet leader, Brezhnev.
• In August 1968 Brezhnev received a letter from hard-line members of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party. The letter helped justify an invasion of Czechoslovakia.
• On 20th August 1968, 500,000 Warsaw Pact Troops invaded Czechoslovakia. Dubcek was arrested and sent to Moscow.
• The Czechoslovakians did not fight the Soviet troops, instead they stood in front of tanks and put flowers in their hair.
• Brezhnev installed a new Soviet supporter as the new Czech leader.

  47 anti-communists were arrested. America and Britain were horrified.
• The Soviet Union announced that they would not allow any one

  country to reject Communism even if it meant a third World War, this

  became known as the Brezhnev Doctrine.
• Brezhnev Doctrine:

  • 1968 - gave the Soviet Union the right to invade any country that threatened their security

  • justified his actions in Czechoslovakia

  • sent out a message to all members of the Warsaw Pact
• Superpower Relations:

  • invasion temporarily worsened relation

  • protested against Soviet actions

  • USA offered no military support

  • communists did lose some support
• Czechoslovakia:

  • demonstrations against the Soviet Union continued to April 1969 - one student set fire to himself

  • Dubcek forced to resign

  • replaced by a strict Communist leader, Gustav Husak

  • reverted back to a strict Communist regime
• • China did not like the Soviet actions in Czechoslovakia and condemned them as too forceful.

  • Romania and Yugoslavia, who had refused to help the Soviets invade, began to take more independent actions against the Soviet Union.

  • Albania left the Warsaw Pact for good in 1968.