Dark Anniversary

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32068, 16 August 1969, Page 12

Dark Anniversary

As the first anniversary of the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia approaches the observers are calculating the chances of protest being expressed once again in violence. Czechs and Slovaks have not settled into a passive and tolerant acceptance of the old order. The people are as bitter to-day as they were when the Russian tanks crossed Czechoslovakia’s frontiers and made brutally clear Moscow’s intention to root out and destroy every sign of Mr Dubcek’s liberalism. In the eight months in which, after the invasion, he remained the Communist Party’s First Secretary, Mr Dubcek strove courageously to preserve the substance of the reforms he had introduced, notably those of freedom to speak and criticise. The inevitable end came in mid-ApriL after a meeting of the party’s Central Committee, when he was reported to have asked to be relieved of his post, and was replaced, quite obviously on instructions from Moscow, by the Slovak party leader, Dr Husak. A statement announcing the reconstruction of the Government said that the party was determined to “ normalise ” the country’s economic and political life and its relations with the Soviet Union and other socialist countries. The conditions prevailing to-day testify to the determination of the Czechoslovaks to have nothing to do with “ normality ” of this sort Industry and agriculture are running at a level so low as to threaten Czechoslovakia with bankruptcy. Farmers and workers are sticking to their post-invasion resolve not to work for “ them ” —the Russians. Dr Husak’s purge of reformers has included union leaders who were thought to support a go-slow policy. The purge has been ruthless. Those suspected of liberal leanings within the party, in the universities, in journalism, and among the writers, have been got rid of. Czechoslovakia is being bled dry of its patriots. Since the invasion, an estimated 40,000 Czechs and Slovaks, most of them intellectuals, have left the country. Mr Ulbricht tried to check a similar exodus from East Germany by building the wall blocking escape to West Berlin. In May, President Svoboda betrayed the alarm felt in Prague by offering an “ amnesty ” to, those willing to return or who were able to have their absence “ legalised ”. The offer is to remain open until September 15. So far it has had little or no eft'.ct in remedying the shortage of skills from which both society and the economy are suffering. President Svoboda, the tool of Moscow, is in no position to guarantee the exiles immunity from arrest by the Russian secret police. The tragedy of Czechoslovakia is a continuing one; and the worst may yet be to come. The current warning to the “ enemies of “ socialism ” clearly reflects alarm in Moscow, as well as in Prague, that August 21 will be the occasion for patriotic demonstrations. Leaflets urging some form of special commemoration of the invasion have been widely distributed; strikes are a likely result. No-one in Czechoslovakia accepts Moscow’s story that the Czechs and Slovaks were the victims of reformers in league with foreign imperialists; and Czechoslovak hopes have been raised by the Russians’ reluctance to crush liberalism in Rumania. What is certain is that Mr Brezhnev will be no less anxious than Dr Husak to get this dark anniversary safely over.