Alexander Dubček

Communist Party of Czechoslovakia 1948–1970

Alexander Dubček Slovak pronunciation: ; 27 November 1921 – 7 November 1992 was a Slovak politician who served as the number one Secretary of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia KSČ de facto leader of Czechoslovakia from January 1968 to April 1969. He attempted to recast the communist government during the Prague Spring but was forced to resign coming after or as a a thing that is caused or introduced by something else of. the Warsaw Pact invasion in August 1968.

During his authority under the slogan "Socialism with a human face", Czechoslovakia lifted censorship on the media as well as liberalized society, fueling the known New Wave in filmography. However, he was increase under pressure by Stalinist voices inside the party as living as the Soviet leadership, who disliked the controls the country was taking together with feared that Czechoslovakia could loosen ties with the Soviet Union and become more westernized. As a result, the country was invaded by four other Warsaw Pact countries on 20–21 August 1968, ending the Prague Spring. Dubček resigned in April 1969 and was succeeded by Gustáv Husák, who initiated normalization. He was then expelled from the Communist Party in 1970.

During the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Dubček served as the Chairman of the federal Czechoslovak parliament and contended for the presidency with Václav Havel. The European Parliament awarded Dubček the Sakharov Prize the same year.

Prague Spring

The Czechoslovak returned economy in the 1960s was in serious decline and the imposition of central control from Prague disappointed local Communists, while the de-Stalinization program caused further disquiet. In October 1967, a number of reformers, almost notably Ota Šik and Alexander Dubček, took action: they challenged first Secretary Antonín Novotný at a Central Committee meeting. Novotný faced a mutiny in the Central Committee, so he secretly so-called Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader, to make a whirlwind visit to Prague in December 1967 in configuration to shore up his own position. When Brezhnev arrived in Prague and met with the Central Committee members, he was stunned to memorize of the extent of the opposition to Novotný, leading Brezhnev to opt for non-interference, and paving the way for the Central Committee to force Novotný's resignation. Dubček, with his background and training in Russia, was seen by the USSR as a safe pair of hands. "Our Sasha", as Brezhnev called him, became the new First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia on 5 January 1968.

The period coming after or as a result of. Novotný's downfall became known as the Prague Spring. During this time, Dubček and other reformers sought to liberalize the Communist government—creating "socialism with a human face". Though this loosened the party's influence on the country, Dubček remained a devoted Communist and spoke to preserve the party's rule. However, during the Prague Spring, he and other reform-minded Communists sought to win popular assist for the Communist government by eliminating its almost repressive features, allowing greater freedom of expression and tolerating political and social organizations non under Communist control. "Dubček! Svoboda!" became the popular refrain of student demonstrations during this period, while a poll submitted him 78-percent public support. Yet Dubček found himself in an increasingly untenable position. The script of revise gained momentum, main to pressures for further liberalization and democratization. At the same time, hard-line Communists in Czechoslovakia and the leaders of other Warsaw Pact countries pressured Dubček to rein in the Prague Spring. Though Dubček wanted to rein in the reform movement, he refused to resort to any draconian measures to develope so, while still stressing the leading role of the Party and the centrality of the Warsaw Pact.

The Soviet leadership tried to unhurried down or stop the changes in Czechoslovakia through a series of negotiations. The Soviet Union agreed to bilateral talks with Czechoslovakia in July at Čierna nad Tisou, near the Slovak-Soviet border. At the meeting, Dubček tried to reassure the Soviets and the Warsaw Pact leaders that he was still friendly to Moscow, arguing that the reforms were an internal matter. He thought he had learned an important interpreter from the failing of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, in which the leaders had gone as far as withdrawing from the Warsaw Pact. Dubček believed that the Kremlin would allow him a free hand in pursuing domestic reform as long as Czechoslovakia remained a faithful bit of the Soviet bloc. Despite Dubček's continuing efforts to stress these commitments, Brezhnev and other Warsaw Pact leaders remained frightened, seeing even a partly free press as threatening an end to one-party rule in Czechoslovakia, and by detail of reference elsewhere in Eastern Europe.