CLOSE UP ON THE CZECH CRISIS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP70B00338R000300190059-1
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 25, 2005
• Sequence Number: 59
• Publication Date: September 4, 1968
• Content Type: OPEN

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September 4, 1968 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD ?SENATE
YARBOROUGH, CARLSON, MURPHY, and
Byrn) of Virginia.
I feel that it is most important that
these ifungs, be provided at this time, and
I urge the .Senate to move to make them
Mr, .,p0sident, today, in accordance
. JOT, eilate procedures, both Senators
itre fa-okF and MUNDT filed notice of in-
- tee,t to Offer amendments dealing with
kpacted area funds, including the sup-
. plrOmental appropriation for fiscal year
'Thar amendments relate directly to
iftie appropriation Contained in amend-
Tikuit No, 928. Senator RISICOEE'S amend-
Olit deals specifically with the Revenue
Ara Expenditure Control Act of 1968. In
addition to the 1968 act, Senator MuNrer's
amendment also deals with the anti-
deficiency statutes.
In view of the notices filed today, and
because I believe the Senate should have
the full benefit of a thorough discussion
on all approaches to this very important
matter, it is not my intention to ask for
action on amendment No. 928 today. I
shall withhold the amendment from fur-
ther action until such time 9.s the other
two amendments have been presented to
the Senate and the Senate has had the
benefit of hearing all these approaches
to the problem.
Mr. RIBICOFF. Mr. President, I fully
support the effort to make available to-
our federally impacted school districts
the money that was withheld from them.
Furthermore, in accordance with rule
XL of the Standing rules of the Senate,
I hereby give notice in writing that it is
my intention to move to suspend para-
graph 4 of rule XVI for the purpose of
proposing to the bill (HR. 18037),
making appropriations for the Depart-
ments of Labor, Health, Education,
and Welfare, and related agencies, for
the fiscal year ending June 30, 1969, and
for other purposes, the following amend-
ment:
On page 16, line 5, before the period insert
a colon and the following: "And provided
further, That (1) the additional amount of
890,965.000 appropriated, under the heading
'School Assistance in Federally Affected
Areas' in the Second Supplemental Appro-
priation Act, 1968, for payments to local
educational agencies for the maintenance
and operation of schools as authorized by
title I of the Act of September 30, 1050
(Public Law 874, Eighty-First Congress), as
amended, 20 U.S.C. ch. 13, shall remain avail-
able for obligation until October 31, 1988;
and (2) the limitations, and requirements
for effectuating such limitations, contained
In sections 202 and 203 of the Revenue szei
Expenditure Control Act of 1988 with respect
to total expenditures and lending authority
and total new obligational and loan authority
shall be inapplicable to obligational author-
ity herein, heretofore, or hereafter enacted
for the fiscal year 1969, or by the Second
Supplemental Appropriation Act, 1968, and
to expenditures pursuant to any such obli-
gational authority, for payments to local
educational agencies for the maintenance
and operation of SC110018 as authorized by
title / of the Act of September 30, 1950 (Pub-
lic Law 874, Eighty-First Congress), as
amended. 20 U.S.C., ch. 13."
This amendment will extend to Oc-
tober 31, 1968, the availability of the
appropriation of $91 million made by the
Second Supplemental Appropriation Act
for payments to federally impacted
school districts.
It will also exempt from the expendi-
ture and obligational authority limita-
tions or the Revenue and Expenditure
Control Act of 1968 the $91 million pro-
vided by the second supplemental of
1968 and for any funds provided for im-
pacted areas for fiscal year 1969. This
will prevent any reductions made by the
Revenue and Expenditure Control Act of
1968 from being applied to expenditures
and obligational authority for carrying
out title I of Public Law 874. It will,
moreover, exclude the Public Law 874
amounts from the aggregate expenditure
and the appropriation ?ceilings so that
the preservation of Public Law 874
funds are not at the expense of .other
programs.
Congress voted this money once be-
cause- we felt an obligation to fully fund
those schools which had a high concen-
:Craton of Federal dependents including
i the children of military personnel.
The schools counted on this money to
-nay teachers, to buy textbooks, and to
Orshuse other materials. But now it an-
pears the,Wacted schools program has
become part if -.this $6 billion budget cut.
We can not letthi happen. Educa-
tion of our young is nvestment for
the future. Education is on f our great
priorities. Saving money her s a false
economy. In the long run it w be the
most expensive kind of economy.
Connecticut's share of the $90. mil-
lion supplemental appropriation at
was withheld from the federally s -
pacted school districts across the
tion is $646,000. Thirty-nine Conneetic
communities are affected. All have a hig
concentration of federally employed par-
ents. This is not only a question of
budgeting and financing it is a question
of children and their education.
The Public Law 874 program is a most
important source of Federal aid to pub-
lic education. It Is not hard to appreci-k
ate the difficulties faced by school disl
tricts which drew up their budgets 1"
the spring of the year for the comi
school year expecting to receive the
entitlements provided them by the on-
gress and then learn well into thy' new
school year that they would recei e only
80 percent of what they had an cipated.
kg
Efficient school programs sim can not
be run that way. Educationa programs
can not be dropped nor 6achers. let go
In midyear without at- cost of tax-
payers' dollars, ell as the cost of
educationaTin5Portun1ties of our children.
Education is an investment in our fu-
ture. It is one of our great priorities.
Budget cuts in this area make no sense
at all.
But we must do more than make avail-
able to these school districts the money
that Congress already has voted. We
must also make sure this situation does
not occur next year.
That is why my amendment exempts
the federally impacted school program
from future budget cuts required by the
1968 tax bill, in addition to extending
the deadline for allocating current funds
to the school districts.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. What is
the pleasure of the Senate?
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr.
President, I suggest the absence of a
quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk
will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk pro-
ceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr. Presi-
dent, I ask unanimous consent that the
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without
objection, it is so ordered.
RADIATION HAZARDS
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr. Presi-
dent, I ask unanimous consent to have
printed in the RECORD a statement pre-
pared by the Senator from Alaska IMr.
BARTLETT] entitled, "Experience Abroad
In Regulating Medical and Dental Use of
Ionizing Radiations."
There being no objection, the state-
ment was ordered to be printed in the
RECORD, as follows:
EXPERIENCE ABROAD IN REGULATING MEDICAL
AND DENTAL USE OF IONIZING RADIATIONS
Mr. BARTLETT. Mr. President, H.R. 10790, the
Radiation Control for Health and Safety Act
of 1068, which has been reported by the Sen-
ate Commerce Committee and is being con-
sidered by the Labor and Public Welfare Com-
mittee, will give to the Secretary of Health.
Education, and Welfare sorely needed author-
ity to set performance standards for elec-
tronic products that emit X-rays and similar
radiations.
One fact that stands out in the record of
hearings before the Senate Commerce Com-
mittee in 1967 and again this year, and also
In the hearings held in the other body, is that
most of today's man-made exposure to X-
radiation comes from medical and dental
X-ray machines. Many competent witnesses
testified that the means are now at hand to
reduce this exposure while still providing the
physicians and dentists with the diagnostic
information that they need. Throughout the
hearings this committee has recognized the
great- value of medical diagnostic radiology.
We recognize also that the needs of patients
and advances in medical knowledge may well
call for an increase in various forms of medi-
cal radiology, and we realize that much indi-
vidual suffering would follow any unneces-
sary curtailment of these uses of X-rays. But
because of the fact that medical uses of X-
rays seem likely to further increase, it be-
comes all the more necessary to assure that
exposure of patients in each case is kept to a
minimum. One vital means to that end is the
setting of performance standards for the
design and manufacture of medical and den-
tal X-ray equipment.
A logical question at this point is to ask
what experience there may be with govern-
ment regulation of exposure to X-rays in
medicine and dentistry. There exists a body
of relevant experience in the Ministry of
Health in England. I would draw attention
to this experience.
In 1957, in keeping with the Radioactive
Substances Act, a Standing Advisory Com-
mittee prepared a code of practice for the
protection of persons exposed to ionizing
radiations. Part of this code dealt with use
Of X-rays for diagnosis and therapy. While
the code VTRS intended primarily to protect
machine operators, it did lay down rules of
protection which included technical require-
ments for the X-ray equipment and its in-
stallation.
The Ministry of Health updated this code
iA 1964 to include consideration of patients,
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nto
,epteer 4, 1968
aRD_sENA
and to show this new emphasis, retitled it
the Code of Practice for the Protection of
Persona against Ionizing Radiations arising
from Medical and Dental use. This revised
code applies to the use of X-rays arising
from all forms of medical and dental prac-
tied. It is based upon recommendations of
the Ministry's Medical Research Council and
recommendations of the International Com-
mission on Radiological Protection.
Once again, this cede lays down technical
standards for X-ray equipment used in
diagnosis and therapy. For example, It
touches upon the issue of fitting the size ot
an X-ray beam to the size of the X-ray film
being used. This question came up before
the committee during our hearings when the
National Center for Radiological Health testi-
fied about its efforts to perfect an automatic
collimator for this purpose. There is at
present no government requirement that
medical X-ray machines have such equip-
ment. Four years ago the British code
specified:
"All X-ray apparatus must be equipped
with adjustable beam-limiting devices or
cones to keep the useful beam within the
limits of the X-ray film selected for each
examination.... The film selected should be
as small as possible consistent with a good
result."
The committee heard much testimony
about fitting dental X-ray machines with
cones to limit exposure to patients. Pour
years ago this British health code specified:
"Localising cones must be employed with
all dental equipment. Such cones must pro-
vide the maximum practicable focus-skin
distance and the minimum practical field
size."
Unlike the situation in the United States
Where regulation of ionizing radiations is
split up among different federal and state
agencies, this British health code in one
place deals with medical and dental expo-
sure from all sources of radiation, whether
X-ray machine, natural or artificial radio-
active materials.
Of special interest to the committee is the
provisions of the Ministry's code of practice
that sets out protection for the patient,
which in this country Is left exclusively to
the professional judgment of the radiologist
and physician. The British code opens with
the frank acknowledgement that there is
reason to avoid unnecessary radiation:
"Patients exposed to radiation for diagnos-
tic or therapeutic purposes may be subject
to some personal hazard, and the direct or
indirect irradiation of their gonads (testes
and ovaries) may constitute a hazard to
future generations. Consequently it is im-
portant to carry out only these radiological
examinations and treatments that are
strictly necessary and in doing so, to avoid
all unnecessary irradiation."
Concerning techniques of diagnostic radi-
ography, the code specifies that in every case
the dose given should be the minimum nec-
essary for the purpose. Considerable reduc-
tions can be achieved, it states, by strict
limitation of field size and by adequate
shielding of the gonads. The code calls for
use of the fastest films and screens consist-
ent with satisfactory diagnostic results and
for use of automatic timers.
Mr. President. my point in bringing this
code of practice to the attention of the Sen-
ate is to show that the Secretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare will not venture
into unknown territory as be uses the au-
thority assigned to him in HR. 10790, the
Radiation Control for Health and Safety
Act of 1968. There is experience that can be
looked at and analyzed. There is evidence
that regulation of X-ray machines and other
sourees of ionizing radiation for medical and
dental use can be accomplished without
freezing the technology of the industries
that supply them. The company that de-
signs and makes X-ray equipment with at-
tention to safety will not be burdened, but
rather will be relieved of possible unfair
competition by thoee who are tempted to
take short cuts in design or to skimp in
manufacture. And the performance stand-
ards; to be set by the Secretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare will aware the
public, who are In no position to know for
themselves, that new X-ray equipment sold
in Interstate commerce is designed and made
to minimize possible radiation exposure to
radiation workers, patients and the public
alike.
ORDER OF BUSINESS
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr.
President, I ask unanimous consent that,
notwithstanding rule VIII. I may be per-
mitted to proceed out of order.
The PRESIDING OFFICE.ii. Is there
objection to the request of the Senator
from West Virginia? The Chair hears
none, and it is so ordered.
C,ULLO
CLOSE 'UP ON THE CZECH CRISIS
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mn Pres-
ident, the arrival of Russian tanks and
men in Prague in late August thrust the
United States into the center of an-
other major international crisis, with
effects not yet fully discernible. The po-
litical and moral issues as related to our
national aspirations and international
commitments, are certain to be discussed
here in Congress.
I have collected a number of news-
paper articles and editorials which ap-
peared during the eventful last 2
weeks of August in leading newspapers
In the British Isles, where I happened to
be during the Invasion period. These
provide close-up views of the Czech
crisis. Of added value, I believe they
offer an opportwrity to weigh the think-
ing of our own Western allies on the
Czechoslovakian crisis.
It will be noted that the Irish Inde-
pendent, Dublin, Ireland, In its August
22 editorial, "Jackboots From the East"
graphically stated the issue:
The world heard of Ruasia's invasion of
Czechoslovakia with shudders of horror that
have not lessened since the first Soviet para-
trooper flew into a country not his own, in
defence of a creed be barely believes In.
The Sunday Times, London, England,
took the long view of "The Problems
That Tanks Can't Solve," in an August
24 full-page analysis of Czechoslovakia,
Its Intellectual aspirations, economic re-
form, and Slovak nationalism. Pointing
out that the Russian military victory
over the Czechs was easy, it opened its
dissection of the situation by stating:
The two peoples of this beleaguered coun-
try, the Czechs and the Slovaks, are caught
up with the Russians and the Germans in Fs
contest of nationalities and economic forces
that scarcely seems resolvable. At least,
every time there Is an attempt at resolution,
in 1938, 1948 or 1968, the product is blood-
shed and violence.
And Americans who have persistently
advocated disarmament as the only sure
road to world peace might wish to con-
sider the words of the London, England,
Da11!, Express, Opinion published on
Saturday, August 24. Under the title,
"The Best Answer to Bullies," It stated:
The Czech leadei a journey to Moscow to
plead their cause. As one humiliation after
another is heaped on them, for the British
people there is a grim object lesson. I. e
that must not be ignored. Fo
kind of treatment a nation
it cannot defend itself.
The Sunday Telegram, Lo
land, on August 25, projected
of British governmental help
the face of the Czech crisis w
well be E. description of the
here in our own U.S. Congress.
tonal, "This Picture and That
as its premise:
Parliament meets tomorrow to paget'li
Britain's name, against an intelanna,
crime it cculd not prevent and can
ing to reverse.
Particularly important, and cerWn
to be a factor in future United States-
West German relations. is the develop-
ment of s, feeling that the U.S. Govern-
ment, because of its own commitment in
Vietnam, directed. that warnings of the
Impending invasion of Czechoslovakia be
"played down." In an article carried by
The Sunday Times, London, England, on
August 25, entitled "Early Warning on
the Invasion Was Ignored." Antony
Terry reported from Bonn, West Ger-
many:
Angry intelligence officials here allege that
a general "play it down" order from the
U.S. Government, because of Vietnam, re-
sulted in vital early warnings of the im-
pending Czech invasion being ignored by the
West, and that an early leak of Soviet in-
tentions on Czechoslovakia, they argue,
might have mobilised world opinion and
made the Russians draw back at the last
moment.
The reporter further stated:
There are also increasing demands for an
independent European nuclear force and for
a strengthening of West Germany's ground
defense ar d early warning system.
I recommend these, and a selected
group of related British newspaper arti-
cles and editorials on the Czechoslovak-
ian situation, to the Members of this
body for consideration. I ask unanimous
consent that these newspaper editorials
and articles be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the material
was ordered to be printed in the RECORD,
ELS follows:
IFrom the Irish Independent, Aug. 22, 19681
JACK/300TE Tawas THE EAST
The world heart_ of Russia's invasion of
Czechoslovakia with shudders of horror that
have not lessened since the first Soviet para-
trooper flew into a country not his own,
in defense of a creed he barely believes in.
From the biggest to the smallest free nr,tion
in the woild comes news of protest and con-
demnatior. couched in?quite often?angry
words. The Soviet Union risked earning the
hate of the world (and she knew this) by
stamping on a small nation; the risk was
fatal and she has added another reason to
existing ones why we must regard her rilers
with contempt and loathing.
If these may seem futile words and of little
help to the Czechcslovaks, let it be remem-
bered that they are applied to a country
which has claimed to have unlocked the
secrets tbst will dissipate the threat of "im-
perial aggression" and bring peace to the
working people of the world. They are a re-
minder that for the 50 years of its existence.
Moscow hes preached drivel and forged new
chains wherever she has gone. By now, even
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September 4, 1968
CONGRESSIONAL RECORD ? SENATE
the Most dyed-in-the-wool admirer must
recognise that the last imperial power on
earth has acted like those Mongol hordes of
old who raided Moscow when tribute was
late or little.
The Czechs have done their bit for truth
and decency. The 10,000 people who, accord-
ing to one report, massed yesterday between
Russian tanks and the broadcasting station
in Prague had their priorities right, and
showed their understanding of the Commu-
nist mind; they were defending, not an ad-
ministrative building, but freedom of speech
itself; they knew that their atation would
no longer be trustworthy once it was lost
to the Soviets?who cannot handle or cope
with the truth. Soviet Communism and de-
ceit, are partners to death.
Of course the Czech leaders were right
when they said, their armed forces had not
- been told to resist. Heroics would say some-
thing else, but the Czechs have weighed all
in the balance and remembered, no doubt,
a Hungary left to bleed. They must also be
keeping in mind the effect on the world of
the second invasion on Czechoslovakia in 50
years. It is here we can do something for the
peaceless people of that country?something,
? Indeed, which has already been started by
the Minister for External Affairs, Mr. Aiken,
Every Irishman will agree wholeheartedly
with him that the Security Council should
call on the aggressors to withdraw at once
from the territory they Beizeci in violation,
as the Czechs put it in their last few state-
ments, of the principles of international law.
Ireland has made a name for itself at the
United Nations and its efforts bore ? fruit
when the agreement on the non-proliferation
of nuclear arms was signed. That this initia-
tive was noticed and admired in distant parts
is clear from a recent report by our Political
Correspondent who is with the Taoiseach in
the Far East. If, then, we have accumulated
any capital in International circles it should
be spent now in aid of the Czechs; we have
nothing else to give them but our sym-
pathy, and that is not enough.
At this stage it would be an exercise in
frustration to probe the motives behind the
Russian Invasion. The stated reasons are not
good enough; the Czech National Assembly
(the Dail, in a form) has repudiated the
Russian announcement that aid was asked
for. In the long run we are left with the
certain fact that the Russians are afraid of
liberalisation spreading throughout Eastern
Europe and into their own territories. But
In the past such reckless adventures have
been the results of divided counsels, and
therefore frightened ones, at the top. A simi-
lar situation could be in the making in the
Soviet Union now.
At the moment there are reports coming
in from Czechoslovakia of anti-Russian dem-
onstrations, and of some shooting. The world
will watch the Russians and their spineless
allies (who would have thought that Hungary
end Poland, both raped in the past by the
Russians, would have found common
ground?) to see that murders such as Nagy's
and Pal 1VIalater's in Hungary will not be
perpetrated on the Dubceks and Svobodas
of Czechoslovakia. There are no limits to the
senseless destruction of a bear on the
rampage.
'Prom. the London Sunday Times, Aug. 25,
1966]
CzEcilosLOVAICLA: INTELLECTUAL OPERATIONS,
ECONOMIC REFoRM, AND SLovAK NATIoNAL-
18M--?TIIE Paonexaes TIMT TANKS CAN'T
SoLVD
(Military victory was easy. But for the Rus-
sians, Or any new Government, complex eco-
nomic, political and social issues remain. Dr,
Z. A. B. Zeman, whose authoritative history
of the crisis is to be published soon by Pen-
guin, defines the problems.)
The two peoples of this beleaguered coun-
try, the Czechs and the Slovaks, are caught
up with the Russians and the Germans in
a content of nationalities and economic
forces that scarcely seems resolvable. At least,
every time there is an attempt at resolution,
in 1938, 1948 or 1968, the product Ls blood-
shed and violence.
The Soviet tanks that ground into Prague
(ono of the squares, incidentally, is called
in commemoration of the second world war,
the Square of the Soviet Tank Crews) solve
nothing. The Russians can force the people
to submit. Men can be found In Prague to
whom the Moscow brand of "socialism" is ac-
ceptable. But the growths and tensions which
caused, the rise and fall of Alexander Dubeek
will continue in some form. They spring,
after all, from things as ineluctable as the
European history since 1017-19, and as ir-
resistible as the appetite of a modern econ-
omy for computers and plastic mouldings;
the Russian memories of twenty million war
dead, and the demands of Czech Intellectuals
to write the truth as they see it, from argu-
ments about the accents of the politicians
in Prague to arguments about the price of
Russian oil on the world market.
The way these tensions developed tells us
much about the limited set of options that
the Russians now face in dealing with them.
The birth of Czechoslovakia occurred at a
moment, when both Germany and Russia
had simultaneously retreated into defeat and
confusion, leaving a power-vacuum in Cen-
tral Europe: that is to say, the birth oc-
curred at the Versailles Peace Conference
after the iirst world war. It might be argued
that but for this vacuum the conference
would not have been able to assemble a new
country out of the Bohemian, Moravian and
Slovak fragments of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire which had been destroyed in the
War.
Certainly the resurgence of these great
powers has been too much for the Czecho-
slovak Republic in each case: first Germany
In 1938, and now Russia in 1968.
Awkwardly for great powers, however, this
cobbled-up republic remains the home of
two stubbornly durable nationalisms. The
Czechs, the people of Bohemia and Moravia
in the West, canna under the Austrian or
German-speaking part of the Austro-Hun-
garian Empire; and in the nineteenth cen-
tury they Were supposed to forget their pe-
culiar language and traditions, and turn into
Germans, Par from doing so, they actually
rebuilt their culture.
INDEpENDENCE
- Similarly the Slovaks in the east, who canoe
under the Hungarian side of the empire, were
expected to turn into Hungarians. Some did,
but a fierce independence remained.
It is of ten said that the tough, slightly
primitive Slovak peasants have little in com-
mon with the sophisticated townsfolk of in-
dustrialised Bohemia and Moravia: Indeed,
their languages differ, and the tough Slovaks
feel a kind of magnified version of the Scots'
distaste for the over-privileged English,
The tension between them, after all, was
one of the major reasons for the loosening
-
up of Party discipline in the last two years.
But still, if the twentieth century has taught
these two small peoples anything, it is that if
they do not look after each other, no one
else will.
The trickiest problem the Russians now
face is probably that of dealing with the
CzeeheSloVak economy. Very largely, this is
still the economy of the Czech part of the
country: building on its pre-war develop-
ment, this is easily the most advanced eco-
nomy in the Communist bloc except for Must
Germany. But a prime underlying cause of
the Czechoslovak ferment of the past two
years has been the realisation that under the
regime of the old-style party this economy
can develop no further. (The force of this
realisation, together with the thrust of
Slovak nationalism and the revolt of the
Czech intellectuals made a combination
which the old-guard Novotny regime could
not hold off.)
S 10247
Probably more important than any of
the explosive political novels and essays
which have appeared in the last two years
has been a rather technical work called
"Civilisation at the Crossroads." This is the
work of Radoven. Richta, of the Philosophical
Institute of the Academy of Sciences and a
commission of economists, sociologists,
physicists and other scholars set up to moo-
amino the impact of the scientific and tech-
nological revolutions on society. Its effect,
among other things, was to demolish Khrush-
cheves famous optimism about the ease with
which the capitalist economics would be
"over-taken,"
The argument of Civilisation at the Cross-
roads was that Czechoslovakia was about to
enter a scientific-technological industrial re-
volution of the kind that is well under way
in most developed Western countries?but
that it could be impeded or altogether de-
elected by low-quality industrial management
in Czechoslovakia, It Is said that the "ad-
ministrative-directive" system of manage-
ment, with its bias in favour of old-fashioned
heavy industries, could not cope with the new
challenge. (In Czechoslovakia the quality of
management has not been rained by the
tradition that jobs in the administrations of
nationalised industries have frequently been
rewards for Party hacks.)
Rialta and his colleagues Calculated that
automation in machine industries in Czecho-
slovakia was three to six times less developed
than hi the IT S. The production of com-
puter equipment?the highest form of auto-
mation?Was where the worst discrepancies
occurred. They calculated that production of
"cybernetic systeme" was 50 times lower
than the U S, and 10-15 times lower than
England, Prance or Sweden. Czech industries
produced ?three to four times less plastic
materials than America or West Germany,
and the textile industry was far behind in
line of artificial fibres.
The gap between the capitlist and socialist
"systems" seemed to be lengthening: at this
rate, overtaking the capitalist system-would
take "about twenty or thirty years, or more."
Claiming that the potentialities for ortho-
dox heavy Industry had been exhausted in
1959 In Czechoslovakia, "Civilisation at the
Crossroads" demanded rapid expansion into
science-based industries, arguing that the
Whole system of jerky economic advance-
ment had been replaced by continuous and
universal change?and that the permanent
revolution would take place in science, not
politics.
PRICE or on.
The infuriating thing for the Czechs was
the knowledge that unlike Poland, Hungary,
Bulgaria or the Soviet Union itself, they had
the concentration of industrial capital and
educational resources to break through into
a new prosperity?but were not doing so. One
economist calculated that the average indus-
trial Wage in Czechoslovakia was 1,448
crowns, compared to 2,260 in Prance, 3,560
in West Germany, 4,170 in Britain and 10,400
in America.
Also, the more the Czech economists
looked at the details of their economic ar-
rangements with the Soviet 'Union, the less
they liked them. Pushed towards Eastern
trade both by political direction and by the
problems of competing in the West with an
unreconstructed economy, they found them-
selves being turned into a workshop for
processing Russian raw materials at little
benefit to themselves. To find, then, that the
Russians preferred .to shop for advanced
equipment, in the West?on grounds s of
quality?Made it even worse.
Pressed by the desires of their own peo-
ple for some economic relief, Russian nego-
tiators have driven tough bargains with their
Communist partners. The Czechs resent, for
instance, their oil agreement in Russia: un-
der which, by their figures, they pay eighteen
roubles a ton till 1974, which is exactly twice
the highest amount the Russians charge the
Italians and the Japanese.
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Antonin Novotny, the Stalinist functionary
who clung to power until Dubcek removed
him early his year, apparently believed that
he could allow economic reform to begin
without any risk that it would spread into
the political sphere. Particularly for some-
one accustomed to the compartmentalisation
of a Stalinist State, it was an understandable
mistake. But Novotny's mishandling of the
Slovak nationality issue was altogether more
inept.
Ilia crucial blunder occurred at what was
supposed to be a celebration just one year
ago this month. The Slovaks were celebrating
the fiftieth anniversary of their high school,
and of the Matica, an organisation which
looks after Slovaks abroad. The existence
and energy of the Matica is a testimonial to
the powerful national feelings of the Slovaks:
as a people, they still feel that they are en-
titled to a separate government within the
Czechoslovak state, and that they will never
get a fair deal from Bohemian Prague with-
out it.
Novotny's speech at Turcaresky Sr. Martin
said flatly that the nationality problem had
been solved, and that the Slovaks were best
off inside the centralised national framework.
The speech was totally unsuitable for a
Slovak national celebration. There was worse
to come.
After his speech. Novotny talked to Vasil
Blink, then one of the secretaries of the
Slovakian Communist Party. Beak said that
the Matica building was too small; Novotny
suggested that Its papers should be trans-
ferred to Prague, and that anyway the For-
eign Institute should look after both Czechs
and Slovaks living abroad.
It wits a bureaucrat's answer, devoid of
political sensitivity, and it infuriated /Mak
(no wild man, as his willingness, last week,
to co-operate with Moscow shows). He asked
Novotny, rather loudly, how dare he make
such an offensive suggestion. The President
and his wife called up their car, and left the
celebration early.
The set-up of Communism in Czechoslo-
vakia gives an indication of the lop-sidedness
of the nationality arrangements. There is
a national (Czechoslovak) Communist Party,
and there is a specialised Slovak Communist
Party. But there is no specialised Communist
Party for Bohemia and Moravia: presumably
because dominant Czechs like Novotny' saw
themselves as Incarnating the national spirit
of the two peoples simultaneously. But, of
course,' the Slovaks did not agree: possibly
the ineptitude with which Novotny handled
them was exacerbated by his economic and
cultural troubles in Bohemia; anyway, in the
latter half of 1968 organised demands began
to come from the Slovak party branches for
the removal of Novotny.
Novotny, last autumn, trundled out the
standard counter to Slovakian contrariness:
the charge of -bourgeois nationalism," which
had been used. in show trials in the 19505. It
did not work, any more than the cumbersome
device of trying to shroud the nationality of
leading Party figures, and the attempt to de-
velop in official mouths a kind a "mid-Mo-
ravian" accent which would approximate to
both languages at once.
It was a question of time before an op-
ponent to Novotny arose in the Central
Committee of the Caechoslovak party. The
right man was sure of support by the Slovaks
as well as the discontented economic re-
formers.
THE SICK WORDS
Economics and nationalism are mighty
social forces, but the role of cultural develop-
ment cannot be ignored: especially among
the Czechs, the revival of whose nationalism
in the nineteenth century was very much an
intellectual revival, centered around creative
writers and historians. Two novels which ap-
peared last year, suddenly smashing the tra-
dition of safe, mechanical politically inert
literature, indicate what is happening.
The authors are Milan Kundera, who
wrote The Joke, and Ludvik Vaculik, who
wrote The Axe. Both are Moravians in their
forties. former working journalists and mem-
bers of the Communist Party. In The Joke,
a young student is ruthlessly persecuted in
early Stalinist Czechoslovakia for making a
political joke ("Optimism is the opium of
the people. Long live Trotsky I"). The in-
jured man sets out, many years later, to
revenge himself by humiliating the wife of
the man he held responsible for his persecu-
tion. He finds revenge useless: the woman.
who married as part of "party discipline," has
separated from her husband, and even beat-
ing her is pointless, because she is a mas-
ochist.
The Aire is narrated by a successful Prague
journalist who knows "the hard work of
writing something that will be published
and yet leave part of my honour untouched."
The story is stocked with characters who
have rejected Czech society, like the coun-
tryman who says "this era favours the
stupider half of man. Let it do so, but with-
out me,"
The journalist writes an article about a
young girra suicide of uncertain morals: a
doctor giving evidence to an investigating
committee perjures himself when describing
the condition of the body because "she was
much more a virgin than those bastards were
the elected representatives of the people."
When Vaculik's journalist gets into trouble
for writing about the case, he declines to be
defended on the grounds of his impeccable
working-class origins, saying he will have no
more of the act of "self-terrorisation" that
the party expects of its members "That's all
the Czech invention is: we terrorise our-
selves so democratically that there's no one
left to assassinate."
DRAB openeasia
The effect of this sardonic realism among
the drab optimism of most Prague publish-
ing was staggering. This kind of writing has
appeared more and more frequently in the
past two years: fully politically committed,
and healing the relationship between word
and object. ("Killing of words," wrote
Miroslay Holub in May, 1908, "precedes the
killing of people." Democracy, Holub
thought, was "a very sick word in
Czechoslovakia.")
The Fourth Writers' Congress was the
arena the Novotny regime chose for its
ideological counterblast. Jiri Hendrich, one
of Novotny's most loyal henchmen, made
opening and closing speeches declaring the
need for hewing to the party line?but they
were ignored because of the stream of liber-
tarian speeches in between. (Not that they
were specifically pro-Western in the main.
A. J. Liehm, while criticising the political
pressures on writers in Czechoslovakia,
pointed out that writers in the West were
subject to commercial pressures which could
also be crippling.)
"Assuming," said Ludvik Vaculik, "that
none of us was born for the sake of being
governed easily, I suggest the Union of
Writers takes the initiative, possibly together
with the Union of Journalists and ask the
Cesechoelovak Academy of Sciences for an
expert revision of the constitution, and de-
mand If necessary its revision." He said: "We
have accomplished social revolution?and
the problem of power continues. Though we
have taken the bull by the horns, and we are
holding him, somebody goes on kicking our
backsides all the time."
The impact of these writings, and these
words, on the Czech consciousness was hardly
something from which there could be a going
beck--either for the readers or the writers.
For Ludvik Vaculik, it developed to author-
ship of the Two Thousand Words manifesto,
published and 'signed by a large group of
intellectuals just before the talks with the
Russians; and last week to election to the
clandestine Central Committee of the
Czechoslovak Connnunist Party to replace
men seized by the Russians.
The three forces that anted against No-
votny, and for the break-up of the old bu-
reaucracy, could coalesce behind Dulecea: a
Slovak, with a flexible attitude to economic
reform, art unimpeachable record of resist-
ance to Germany?he was wounded, and his
brother !Oiled, in the Slovak resistance--and
"clean hands"?he had the reputation of
having stood aside from the persecution of
writers under Novany.
Although their degree of overtness will
depend on the degree of Soviet control in
the future, these interlinked forces will con-
tinue to exist: particularly the question of
the economy. The Russians may feel that
they can tolerate a run-down Czech economy,
but It may well be that if someone in the
Communist bloc does not solve the prcblem
of moderaisation, their own economic goals
will become harder to attain. So far, the
Russians have made no visible attempt to
understand the situation in Czechoslovakia.
The situation there over the past year was
complex and needed careful reporting and
interpret ition. It has been withheld from the
Russian people, and possibly from their gov-
ernment as well.
Why did the Russians invade, seventeen
days after the Bratislava meetings? may
be pointless to speculate on whose voice was
decisive in the Rremlin, but there can be
little doubt of -the immediate reascn for
the timing.
The Slovak party congress was to open
tomorrow, and the Czechoslovak congress on
September 9. Jueging by the way votes had
gone in the regions, the "conservatives" re-
maining in the :antral committee and the
other tcp party posts had little chance of
survival. Last week was the last chance of
intervention.
The optimism of the Dubcek faction in
Czechosentakla about Russian intentions
springs n good part from the way they inter-
preted Brezhneve attitude when he visited
Prague at December, 1967. He seemed under-
standing, and gave little sign of willingness
to exert himself on Novotny's behalf.
But at the grass-roots level the Czecho-
slovak and Russian Communists have two
different kinds of political and national ex-
perience. More often than not the Russian
party faced conditons of exile, underground
woe- and persecution. When it came to power
in 1917 it had vast, almost unthinkable prob-
lems to solve. It always placed discipline
above all other virtues.
The Czechoslovak Party operated from
1922 until 1938 as a legal, parliamentary
party, and during the war years it faced
problems also faced by other anti-Nazi
groups It might be said that the Czecho-
slovak party, having tried the Russian model
for 20 years and got itself into a difficult
position largely of its own leaking, decided
to try its older tradition.
But the Russ anti are suspicious of Czecho-
elovak.a's western traditione, and tend to
overestemate their political significance. In
May, one of their newspaper; called Thomas
Masaryk, a sinister plotter involved in the
attempt to assassinate Lenin. It infuriated
the Czechs, uho had just "rediscovered"
Maser es.
The historical validity of the charge, pre-
sumably based on the presence of a few of
Masetryka Czech troops in ac tion against the
Bolsheviks immediately after the Revolution,
is not particularly relevant. The point is that
the Russians see the great Czech hero as a
man involved in one of the most troubled
episodes of their troubled history.
And from the Russian viewpoint, the prob-
lem of whether they, or the Germans, domi-
nate Central Europe has yet to be solved.
Beinad their propaganda about "revanch-
Ism" and "Imaerialism" lie; comprehensible
foreign policy: twice in this century the
Russians have had to face an onslaught
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from the centre of Europe. Only they know
how many people they lost in the last war?
twenty million or more.
SOV/ET DEFENSES
Obviously, they are bitterly resentful of
the idea of having to alter their arrange-
ments in Eastern and Central Europe just
because?as they see it?a few economists
and politicians in Prague have caught sight
of the bright lights of Western Europe.
Apparently, they were somehow fooled into
thinking that the arrival of Soviet tanks
would bring the truly loyal population flock-
ing to support the Russian cause. Even their
somewhat inflexible political intelligence
must by now be disabused of that idea.
Czechoslovakia has often been called "a
bridge between the East and the West." It
was not a description which appealed to Jan
Masaryk, the gay, tragic son of the founder
of the Czechoslovak Republic?the man who
was found lying dead under his bathroom
window one month after the Communists
seized total power in 1948.
"I don't want Czechoslovakia to be a
bridge for anything," he used to say. "What
happens to a bridge. In wartime, the first
thing that happens is you get blown up. In
peacetime, the bullocks walk across and
drop dung all over you." At the moment the
Russians are finding the bridge difficult to
"blow." But the danger will not go away
'while Europe remains divided.
[From the London, England, Daily Express,
Aug. 24, 1968]
THE BEST ANSWER TO BULLIES
The Czech leaders journey to Moscow to
plead their cause. As one humiliation after
another is heaped on them for the British
people there is a grim object lesson. It is
one that must not be ignored. For this is
the kind of treatment a nation can expect
if it cannot defend itself.
Is Britain herself as strong as she can be
in an age in which the certainty of retalia-
tion is the only safeguard against aggres-
sion?
She has, it is true, nuclear forces under
her control.
Unhappily, Britain's nuclear force is not
strong enough to be, beyond dispute, a cred-
ible deterrent.
When Parliament meets on Monday, then,
the Government must announce that?as a
beginning?another nuclear missile sub-
marine will be built without delay. And that
the existing four Polaris-type submarines
will be converted to carry the vastly more
advanced Poseidon missile battery.
The four nuclear submarines we have at
present do not provide a sufficient margin of
safety because we can count on only one
being on patrol at any one time. A fifth
warship would effectively double the fleet at
sea. And double the power of the deterrent.
The original aim of five submarines should
be reached with all speed. For then, at any
moment, at least 60 targets would face im-
mediate retribution.
Arguments of economy are of secondary
importance. In fact, Britain today is spend-
ing a smaller proportion of her national in-
come on defence than in the Edwardian era.
A Polaris-type submarine costs some ?50
million. That is about one third of one per
cent of what the Government spends an-
nually. And look what it buys:?
Security against aggression. Real in-
dependence for our people.
America has carried, virtually alone, the
burden of defending the West.
It is unacceptable that we should place
on our friends the obligation of risking
their own destruction to secure our safety.
We must be ready to defend ourselves.
As soon as practicable the nuclear fleet
should be built up to eight Polaris sub-
marines to provide us with the effective
sinews of self-defence.
This is the best answer we can give, with
the dreadful image of Prague before us, to
the bullies who are tempted by weakness.
[From the London Sunday Telegraph,
Aug. 25, 1968]
THIS PICTURE AND THAT
Parliament meets tomorrow to protest, in
Britain's name, against an international
crime it could not prevent and can do noth-
ing to reverse. It is right, nevertheless, that
the ideal of freedom and the principle of na-
tional sovereignty should thus be solemnly
upheld by all parties in the highest council
of the nation.
But there is another item on the order
paper, the Nigerian civil war. Czechoslovakia
may no longer be "a faraway country of
which we know little," yet it is behind the
Iron Curtain. Nigeria, on the contrary, is still
open to Western influence. Moreover, it owes
its frontiers, its federal structure and, in-
deed, its very existence to the British Parlia-
ment itself. Is it not the plain duty of our
elected representatives to offset their un-
avoidable impotence on one plane with a full
acceptance of their responsibilities on an-
other, where their deliberations can still have
some effect?
The final Federal assault on the Ibos
trapped in the rump of Biafra may not yet
have begun. Nevertheless, the advance from
Port Harcourt can only be a prelude to it. In
political terms, General Gowon has failed
more miserably than the tyrants of the
Kremlin. They have begun to recruit their
political puppets after a two-day exercise,
whereas he has found none after 13 months
of bloody fighting.
We may avert our eyes from the slaughter
that will accompany the final stages of the
Biafran tragedy. We shall not, however, be
able -to ignore the aftermath. No experienced
British administrator ever supposed that Ni-
geria could exist against the will of its lead-
ing tribe; and no serious student of Africa
ever supposed that the West Coast could es-
cape anarchy if Nigeria disintegrated. Yet
these are the probable results of the war that
has been sustained by a British decision to
continue to supply arms to "a sister Govern-
ment of the Commonwealth."
The immediate challenge is still the saving
of civilian lives, now threatened by renewed
fighting as well as by starvation. By this time
it must be clear to the most gullible that this
objective never rated very high with the com-
batants of either side, even if Colonel Ojukwu
has at last agreed in principle to accept
re-
lief by surface routes. When fighting Biafra
becomes occupied Biafra the essential horror
will remain.
Colonel Adekunle, leader of today's assault,
declares he wants to see "no Red Cross, no
World Council of Churches, no Pope, no mis-
sionary and no U.N. delegation," adding for
good measure: "We shall shoot at everything,
even things that don't move."
He can talk like that because the British
Government has, in practice, washed its
hands of the whole affair, in order, presum-
ably, to preserve on paper the Commonwealth
myth. It would be better to turn that myth
into a reality by intervening to restore a
minimum of order and humanity to a conti-
nent relapsing into savagery.
The Russians are using their strength to
prevent a country in their sphere of influence
from climbing upwards towards civilised free-
dom. We deplore this in vain if we are not
ready to save a country in our own sphere
from plummeting downwards into barbarous
repression.
[From the London, England, Sunday Times,
Aug. 25, 1968]
CZECHOSLOVAKIA REPORTS PROIV/ BONN?EARLY
WARNING ON THE INVASION WAS IGNORED
(By Antony Terry)
Angry intelligence officials here allege that
a general "play it down" order from the 'U.S.
Government, because of Vietnam, resulted
in vital early warnings of the impending
Czech invasion being ignored by the West.
They are demanding from West Germany's
Chancellor Kiesinger that in future their
warnings and predictions of developments in
Eastern Europe should not be deliberately
put on ice because of global Washington pol-
icy moves. An early "leak" of Soviet inten-
tions on Czechoslovakia, they argue, might
have mobilised world opinion and made the
Russians draw back at the last moment.
The West German intelligence Service, un-
der its new dynamic young chief, General
Gerhard Wessel, was among the first to pre-
sent conerete evidence to the Bonn Govern-
ment and NATO countries that the Warsaw
Pact "manoeuvres" were an elaborate cover
for the full-scale invasion plan. Their de-
tailed advanced information, obtained partly
through the German network of agents in
Warsaw Pact countries, dovetailed with re-
ports from U.S. Intelligence, obtained from
"spy in the sky" satellites.
FORCES EARMARKED
General Wessel reported three months ago
that non-Czech Warsaw Pact troops were
being trained and earmarked for the inva-
sion. The figure given at the time was 10,000
to 12,000 troops from various Soviet bloc
countries, which were named as planning a
first-stage crossing of the Czech border.
By the end of May, most of the Bonn Gov-
ernment leaders, including the heads of the
Defence, Interior and Foreign Ministries, as
Well as Chancellor Kissinger himself, had
been warned of the plan. Only the Foreign
Ministry, under Socialist chief Willy Brandt,
expressed doubts that the Russians would
"risk going that far."
On May 24, the only attempt to "leak" the
news was made by the West German Gov-
ernment's official spokesman, Herr Diehl ap-
parently without the knowledge of Chancel-
lor Kiesinger, at a Press Conference in Bonn.
This statement was later officially denied in
Bonn and Herr Diehl was reprimanded. It is
said here that this denial, which described
his statement as "irresponsible and panic-
creating talk, was made at U.S. request.
So, although the news was out, it made no
impact.
However, information received by early
August ended all doubts that the Russians
would invade with massive forces?the only
question was when. The information passed
on to the U.S. and other NATO allies was
that the Russians would delay moving in
until immediately before the Czech Com-
munist Party Assembly, scheduled for Sep-
tember 9. The delay had been due to disa-
greement between the "hawks" and the
"doves" inside the Kremlin.
But things began coming to a head on
August 18, through the Czech ambassador in
Moscow, Vladimir Koucky, an old-time "hard
liner" of the anti-Dubcek minority inside
the Czech Communist Party's Central Com-
mittee.
Koucky, who was to be recalled to Prague
because of his views?and who was in touch
with Oldrich Svetska, editor of the party
newspaper Rude Pravo and since named as
one of the alleged Prague "quislings"?
warned General Yebichev, senior political
commissar of the Red Army, that Mr. Dub-
cek's move to summon an emergency meet-
ing of the Central Committee on the follow-
ing Tuesday was a final sign that the Czech
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Communist Party leaders had "sold out to
Right-wing elements" and were set on an
anti-Soviet course.
MILITARY MEET
In fact, the Czech party meeting was de-
signed to legalize the reforms introduced by
the Dubcek Government and establish a new
liberal charter for the Czech Communist
leadership and its members.
But the information garnered by West
German Intelligence shows that Koucky's
move in Moscow was followed at once by
urgent consultations among Soviet Military
leaders. Gen. Yebichev and the Soviet De-
fence Minister, Marshall Ivan Grechko, met
the supreme Commander-In-Chief of the Red
Army, Gen. Yakubovsky, and all three went
to see Mr. Brezhnev.
The result was an order to speed up the
"prophylactic" invasion. According to the
Bonn Intelligence reports?which, again,
were immediately forwarded to Nato?the
arguments by Koucky which finally con-
vinced the Kremlin leaders were that Mr.
Dubcek secretly planned to sidetrack the
undertakings he had given at the Cierna and
Bratislava meetings, that the Czech Party
leaders had made secret and dangerous con-
tacts with the West through "Illegal and
anti-Soviet channels," and that they were
planning to accept economic aid from West-
ern countries on a 'scale that would create
problems for Comecon, the Soviet bloc equiv-
alent to the Common Market.
It was Noucky's role that gave the Rus-
sians the tenuous btu valuable excuse to talk
of "influential Czech Party circles," having
asked them to intervene to save Czecho-
slovakia.
As for the current situation, the latest
information from. the West German InteW-
gence Service is that only about half the 23
Warsaw Past divisions assembled for the in-
vasion have actually entered the country.
The remainder are still bivouacked, in readi-
ness, along the Czech borders.
Most of these troops are Russians, but
there are also two East German divisions,
three Polish divisions and rather less than
one division from Bulgaria, which was flown
in as recently as last Saturday.
Bonn Intelligence officials claim that their
advance news of the Soviet build-up and
probably invasion spearheads, was confirmed
by sensitive electronic listening devices along
the West German border with Czechoslo-
vakiaJdevices with a range sufficient to scan
the area up to the Soviet frontier and some
way beyond.
Yet the only time the Russians took action
against this electronic probing was on the
actual night of the invasion, when a massive
jamming operation blacked out the devices.
TELEPHONE THREAT
Frustration at the invasion warnings going
unheeded led General Wessel, at one stage,
to threaten to telephone Chancellor Kies-
Inger direct, to stress the seriousness of the
reports. A further outcome now Is that West
German military and political circles are to
mount a campaign inside NATO for tighter
control of military planning intelligence by
the European countries and for better co-
ordination to prevent their intelligence in-
formation being blanketed by any similar
American "hold down"o rder in the future.
There are also increasing demands for an
independent European nuclear force and for
a strengthening of West Germany's ground
defences and early warning system.
[From the London Sunday Times, Aug. 25,
19881
CZECHOSLOVAICIA NICHOLAS TOMALTH REPORTS
THE DEEP SCHISMS OPENING I'N WORLD COM-
MUNISM?TIM COMMUNISTS' GREAT CRISIS
o FarrH
Pravda was aghast. As the discordant crit-
icisms of hitherto obedient foreign comrades
poured into Moscow the official voice of So-
viet Communism plaintively declared:
"It is difficult to understand the inco-
herent position adopted by the leaders of
some Communist Parties who are showing a
lack of confidence in the actions of healthy
forces in Czechoslovakia and sister countries.
Perhaps they have been disorientated by Im-
perialiat propaganda, and have not under-
stood the nature of the situation."
If Pravda found such "incoherence" diffi-
cult to understand, its meaning was all too
clear outside Russia. Perhaps, historically,
the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia will be
remembered even more for its effect on world
Communism than on the country itself. The
concept of Communism as a mammoth in-
ternational ideology, overwhelming patriotic
loyalties, may have been finally killed off.
There was a second radical consequence.
Since Wednesday morning a romantic ideal-
let searching for a new belief might look to
anarchy, to pure Marxist-Leninism, to Trot-
sky, to Che Guevara or even to Pekin. He
could no longer look to Moscow for a Com-
munist Truth which, like Catholic Truth,
has been so dramatically eroded by doubt.
From now on, Marxists can only be prates-
tants.
"Yes, you can talk of a crisis of faith," one
stalwart British Communist observed, "Our
bloody Russian Vatican has done precisely
the same as Rome. First they seemed to offer
some kind of liberalisation. Then, as we be-
gan to take them seriously, they kicked us
in the 'teeth.
"But there's one important difference be-
tween the Communist Party and the Catho-
lic Church, When the Pope condemned the
Pill he knew that hie followers would bash
away at sex regardless. In our crisis the fol-
lowers will bash away at the party."
INGENIOUS
Those is endless variety in the way each in-
dividual national party is striving to estab-
lish independence without agnosticism.
Analysis of their shifting positions is a de-
manding exercise in Marxist theology.
Perhaps the most ingenious formulation
of all came from Stalinist Albania whose
Parte, taking the Chinese line, was obliged
to condemn both the Dubcek liberalisers and
the Moscow revisionists.
Before the Invasion, the Albanian official
party paper Zen t Popullit managed a blanket
condemnation of everyone involved: "The
cliques that have come to power, or will
came, are pawns in the hands of the Soviet
revisionists and the CB. imperialists. An in-
ternational Manta is acting with a free hapd
in Czechoslovakia," (Such picturesque abtise
was only rivalled in imagination by the
Lebanese Communist Party, which blamed
"an elite of Jewish intellectuals," and the
Beirut newspaper which lyricised about Rus-
sian "freedom tanks.")
Since the Invasion, the Albanians have be-
come the only Communist Party actually to
urge the heroic citizens of Czechoslovakia to
use armed resistance against the Red Army
Mans. But they do not praise Dubeck.
China, whose only previous comment on
the situation had been the reprinting of Al-
bania's strictures. on Friday issued a violent
denunciation of Russian intervention as a
Fascist move, reminiscent of Hitler. But
again, of course, there was no support for
Dubeck.
North Vietnam did not follow this line.
Military and economic support froM Russia
and East Germany is so important to her
that promptly on Thursday Radio Hanoi de-
clared that it was with "the noble aim of re-
sponding to an appeal from reliable elements
in the Czechoslovak Party to defend the so-
cialist regime" that the Warsaw Pact armies
had marched in. Logic did not force Hanoi
also to approve of the noble aim of the
American forces to support reliable elements
in Saigon.
Cuba, unlike Hanoi, had the ideological so-
phistication to remain officially silent for
several days, while their leaders wrestled with
the rival demands of their principles and
Russian economic aid. By Friday Cuba had
responded to the purse strings.
It would be only natural for many ir the
Cuban leadership secretly to gloat over the
troubles. Czechs, and particulerly Slovaks
have always resented the economic aid that
Socialist solidarity abliged them to send their
allies. Cubans have in their turn always re-
sented what they saw as the selfishness of
richer Eusopean Socialist States; Che Gue-
vara opeiny attacked the Russians and other
about this in 1965.
In the Capitalist west, preciona few parties
rallied to the Russians. Some Latin Ameri-
can countales, such as Chile, fell into line.
The tiny rump of the American Communist
Party, presumably still living in Stalinist iso-
lation, tanned a statement "regretting' the
intervention but conceding It was "neces-
sary." So, for no explicable reason, did brave
little Luxembourg.
Otherwise, the silly Westerners to succour
Russia were the Illegal and exiled parties
such as Spain, Greece and Wsst Germany.
These, dependent on Soviet support, could
hardly do othervese.
DE,117NCIATION
The two most important reactions were
those of the Italian and French Communist
Parties. Each, in their characteristic fashion,
were against the Russians. But the real mes-
sages were passed in the nuances of denun-
ciation.
Of them the most complex, and interesting
to students of Communist dogma and theto-
ric, was that of the Italians. As the largest,
and most practised in Jesuitical logic of all
European parties this was hardly surprising.
But they only just outdid the French. In an
intricate ideological gavotte the Italians
started soft ane. moved hard, while the
French started hard and moved soft.
The Italians had two special circumstances
to cope with. First, their Secretary-General
Luigi Longo was away on "holiday" in Mos-
cow. Second, sec:et news of the impending
invasion reached several important party offi-
cials in Italy by eight o'clock on Tuesday eve-
ning, fully three hours before the actial at-
tack was launched and six hours before So-
viet ambassadors began to inform the rest
of the world.
Italian Communists firmly deny that Sig-
nor Longo, conveniently near the source of
information, passed any message. It therefore
may be that experienced party men made in-
spired eeductions from the Moscow meeting
of the Central Committee.
Another complicating factor was that the
senior party man at the drafting of the Ital-
ian statement was Pietro Ingrao, leader of
the extreme Leftwing of the party.
This, perhaps, is the reason why the key
phrase in the Italian denunciation of the
Russian invasion expressed mere "grave dis-
agreement." which Communist theologians
regard as significantly less tough than the
"surprise and reprobation" of the French.
On the way hcme Longo stopped off at Paris
for talks with the French Comraunists.
Everyone thong-at this must result either in
Longo--hot wit'a Moscow explanatioas--ral-
lying the French to Russia's side, of a con-
certed hostile action by both parties. In fact
his visit achieved neither. The French dis-
covered him, to their surprise, to be more
militantly anti-Russian than they. Be found
them having second thoughts,
Waldeck Rochet, leader of the French Corn-
munisas, argued that an early meeting of all
European Communist parties could only lead
to a total break with the Russians. It would
be far better to keep "lines of brotherly
friendship" open in the hope of inf uencing
Russian policy.
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Longo was disappointed, and did not try
to hide it, He concluded a statement made
after the meeting by saying: "For the mo-
ment no common or collective initiative is
planned." When he got to Rome, he endorsed
his Italian colleagues' statement with such
enthusiasm that textual theologians judge
that he hardened the Italian attitude.
Meanwhile, back in Paris, the French were
moving faster in the opposite direction. After
a four-hour meeting the Central Committee
of the party issued its re-think on the matter.
"Reprobation," of the Russian action moved
down the scale to "disapproval." There was
now a long preamble which accused "forces
hostile to socialism" of being active against
Czechoslovakia.
The French slide was understandable. The
whole business hit their party harder than
any other in Europe. It could not have come
at a worse time, just when?after their poor
showing in the last French election?they
were trying to sell a new image, that of
a dynamic party of the left which had re-
vitalised its policies in the light of the
Revolution of the Imagination which the
students forced upon it in May.
Like the Italians, the French party had
spoken well of the developments in Czecho-
slovakia. More than that, they let it be
known that M. Rochet, on a visit to Moscow,
in July, had warned the Russians that any
intervention would have grave dangers to
international Communism.
Such a flexible and progressive line was
excellent propaganda. What no one knew, of
course, was that M. Rochet had received
definite assurances from Moscow that there
would be no interference with Dubcek and
therefore the party's stand was somewhat
less spectacular than it seemed.
AS the French Maoists, already in the
streets of Paris, declared on their huge
banners: "Revisionism, imperialism: same
interests, same methods."
MORAL PROBITY
- The British Communists were at the same
time formulating their home-bred denuncia-
tion. Not for them Continental "reproba-
tions" or "grave disagreements." King
Street, with spendid British moral probity,
"deplored" it all.
British reaction could fairly be said to
have begun at the moment Assistant Secre-
tary Reuben Felber heard the news over
his radio at breakfast.
"We could have got a statement out be-
fore lunch," says Felber. "Except that it was
damn difficult to get it cleared by essential
committee members. As it was the French
and the Italians beat us to it, basically be-
cause their leadership is more centrally or-
ganised and more easily available."
When the statement eventually appeared
in the early evening it had still not been seen
by John GoIlan, the Party Secretary, who
was up a Scottish mountain, and Jack Wod-
dis, head of the international section, who
was holidaying abroad. Nevertheless, draft-
ing was an almost routine matter for the
eleven out of 14 committee members who
were contacted: the British party already
had a clear policy line on the Czech liberal-
isation.
Gollan arrived back from his mountain
on Thursday, and that evening was on tele-
vision emphasing the fragmentation more
forcibly than a British Communist leader
has ever done before. "There is no such thing
as an organised international Communist
movement," he told his interviewer Alistair
Burnet. "Each party is independent and
sovereign and the differences between them
are natural."
The party doesn't fear mass resignations, as
in 1956 over Hungary. The "deploring" state-
ment ensured that. And such is the rigor
mortis of hard-line supporters that both
they and the leadership will probably move
slowly back to their tacit loyalty to Moscow.
The serious political damage, party workers
admit, will be from "seepage," a passive de-
cline in the already dwindling support.
More dramatic is the reaction of the official
party's youth branch. The Young Communist
League. Twelve of them were outside the
Soviet Exhibition on Wednesday, belabouring
every Hus,sian in sight. "I found myself
shouting 'Nazi Swine' at every one I saw,"
said one. "I think all of us were sick to the
very pit of our stomachs."
To seek less official opinkon on the situa-
tion from British CP members is more diffi-
cult. Generally, middle rank members are
pointedly avoiding comment. But the more
militant of the younger members, both of the
YCL and the party proper plan a call for
an even larger meeting than the 42-member
executive council which met yesterday. They
want to summon an Emergency National
Conference of the entire party to seek a
really strong protest against the Russian
action.
A BETRAYAL
One man, at least, was not afraid to speak
out. Will Paynter, General Secretary of the
National Union of Mineworkers, for in-
stance.
"The whole business," he said, "can only
be seen as a disgusting betrayal of all the
principles of the international Communist
movement. Its result will be an enormous
destruction of faith in an ideal."
Paynter, and two other members of the
Miners' executive committee had agreed to
visit East German miners on September 16.
Last Thursday he wrote to the East Ger-
mans to say it was cancelled.
But if any scholar wanted final evidence
of the curiously British flavour of unofficial
reactions, he need only turn to the Scottish
Highlands, last bastion of progressive eccen-
tricity, where Scots poet Hugh McDiarmid,
the only Briton to join the Communist Party
at the time of Hungary, declared his un-
swerving support for the fraternal Russian
tanks,
"For weeks the British Press has tried to
drive a wedge between the Czechs and the
Warsaw Pact powers," he declares. "As a re-
sult there was real danger of a cotinter-
revoluntionary movement there. The Rus-
sians have felt that, just as they realized firm
action was needed to stop Fascist infiltration
in Hungary. I'm for them whole-heartedly.
"No, I'm not going to resign from our
party because the leadership has taken a
hostile line to the Russians. Such differences
of opinion are always permissible amongst
Communists. We are the most democratic of
organizations."
Mr. Dubeek and his countrymen would
have been most reassured to hear it.
HOW THE NATIONAL COMMUNIST PARTIES REACTED
TO RUSSIA
Hungary, Czecho-
1956 slovakia, 1968
Minority Communist Parties in
capitalist countries:
Britain Pro Anti.
France Pro Do.
Italy Pro Do.
Austria Pro Do.
Holland Pro Do.
United States Pro Pro.
Belgium Pro Anti,
Luxembourg Pro Pro.
Illegal Communist Parties
in exile:
Spain Pro (1)
Greece Pro Pro.
West Germany Pro Pro.
Ruling Communist Parties:
Rumania Pro Anti.
Yugoslavia Pro Do.
Albania Pro Do.
Bulgaria Pro Pro.
Hungary Pro Do.
East Germany Pro Do.
Poland Pro Do.
China Pro Anti.
Korea Pro Pro.
North Vietnam Pro Do.
,Mongolia Pre Do,
Cuba (2) Do.
I Not available.
Not in power.
S 10251
[From the Cork (Ireland) Examiner,
Aug. 22, 1968]
Alsr ABOMINABLE INVASION
The myth of co-existence, that facile
dOctrine which saw nothing incompatible in
a civilised accommodation between Com-
munism and democracy, was finally exploded
yesterday when Soviet Russia headed the
power grab of Czechoslovakia. The midnight
marauders who seized hold of an erstwhile
ally because its people opted for a measure
of democratic freedom have acted in the very
best Stalinist tradition. In advance of action
they lied, they dissembled, and they threat-
ened and when these failed to achieve the
desired end they cast aside evpry vestige of
civilised behaviour and applied the weapon
of brute force. This is the Communism of
1945, 1948, and 1956, and its re-emergence
now is proof positive that the successors of
Stalin and Khrushchev are of the same
tyrannical mentality which counts freedom
as a crime and sovereignty, as a bourgeois
concept to be despised.
Five countries took part in this abomin-
able invasion? five countries which profess to
be civilised and to have proper regard for
all the accepted standards of international
behaviour. Time and again they have sub-
scribed to and offered testimony to the in-
violable rights of independent states. They
have been the first to profess righteous in-
dignation at real or fancied infringements
of these rights by other states. By skilful
propaganda they persuaded the world that
the darker side of Communism had dis-
appeared for ever and that they were amongst
the foremoSt of the peacemakers. There are
five such countries but only one, Soviet
Russia, that matters. This crime was con-
ceived in and directed from Moscow with the
automatic endorsement of the other Jackal
states which make up the Warsaw alliance.
Its commission exposes the chief instigator
for what it really is, a wolf which has dis-
carded its sheep's clothing to bring a new
dark age to Europe.
In the larger sense the fate of Czecho-
slovakia has already been decided. The
attempt to break free from bondage has been
frustrated and it stands helpless before
invaders who having taken the irrevocable
step of flouting every canon of civilised be-
haviour, will not hesitate to behave still
more brutally in order to consolidate what
they have gained. The Czechs did not resist
and who is to say that in their isolated cir-
cumstances they were unwise? But there is
the aftermath which must be a period of
terrible trial for a defenceless people. At the
very least their constitutionally elected lead-
ers will be overthrown, the new-found free-
doms will disappear, and the country will be
handed over to puppets who will do the will
of Moscow. This is the least that will happen
and it will be sufficient to throw Czecho-
slovakia into the kind of prison it knew, first
in 1939 at the hands of the Germans and
again in 1948 at the hands of the Russians.
But what if the people resist, what if the ?
people decide to fight for their lives instead
of submitting once again to that familiar
captivity.
This is the tragedy which the free world
is now being forced to witness without be-
ing able actively to intervene on behalf of a
people threatened with political extermina-
tion anfi the very worst evils of a police
state. It will be said that Czechoslovakia is
a Communist state and that this is a Com-
munist quarrel in which outsiders cannot
interfere. Up to a point this is true but it
fails to take into account one great fact of
life in that country. That fact is that out of
a population of 16 millions only 1,4 million
are members of the Communist Party. The
peaceful revolution of the past seven months
Was not made by the elite of party members,
although some of these were in the fore-
front of the new liberal thinking, but by
the great mass of the people who gave un-
mistakeably proof that their desire was for
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001 t
959.-e1
,Nepmber,14, 19'68
democratic freedom. And, as far as they are
cancerned, this has not been a Communist
euarrel but the struggle to break free from
Communism. Now that they have entered
their hour of greatest trial the world simply
cannot stand Idly by while they are punished
by their oppressors.
Possibly not for the reasons given the na-
tions of the West are now on the alert. As
they see it the crisis has only begun and no
one can foretell how it is likely to develop.
They must, therefore, be ready to move and
one eventuality which could compel active
intervention would be a popular uprising
in Czechoslovakia. Twelve years after the
event the consciences of freedom loving na-
tions are troubled by the failure to come to
the rescue of the Hungarian people. A sec-
ond such failure would constitute an in-
dictment of such magnitude that Russia
and her allies would acquire a concept of
power which would point an arrow at the
heart of world order. It may be that democ-
racy will not be put to the test, that Czech
freedom will be snuffed out without resist-
ance, but should it be otherwise a gallant
people must not be allowed to be crushed
when timely aid would avert that tragedy.
It is not enough that Russia and her con-
federates in this crime should be condemned
by world opinion; they must be made to see
that crime of this order will not be tolerated.
(From the London, England, Sunday Tele-
graph, Aug. 25, 19681
SOVIET FEAR IN UKRAINE
(By Gordon Brook-Shepherd)
Fear of a spreading disaffection inside the
Soviet Union itself?above all of separatist
agitation in the Ukraine, which actually bor-
ders on Czechoslovakia?is thought in the
West to have been the final spur which
pushed the Soviet leaders over the brink.
Though contingency plans to invade
Czechoslovakia were first made at least three
months ago, the Kremlin's final decision to
march seems to have been a hurried one,
taken last Sunday or even last Monday, only
24 hours before the blow was struck.
It is thought that warnings uttered by Mr.
Petr Shelest, who is First Secretary of the
Ukrainian Communist Party as well as a
favourite member of the Soviet Communist
Party's Central Presidium, led to the "doves"
among his colleagues being finally silenced.
Mr. Shelest is believed to have been echoing
In Moscow the urgent pleas sent by Herr
'Ulbricht, the East German leader: "Stop
Dubcek or I cannot guarantee the outcome at
home."
Trouble in East Germany would be bad
enough for the Kremlin but trouble in the
Ukraine could prove catastrophic. With its
population of nearly 46 million, it is by far
the largest of the 15 Soviet Republics.
It is also the seat of one of the deepest-
rooted nationalist movements inside the
Soviet Union, with strong anti-Russian tradi-
tions and a language and culture of its own.
These separatist tendencies have been
steadily increasing of late and Shelest him-
self has been leading the battle to suppress
them. Exactly as in Czechoslovakia, the agi-
tation has been headed by writers and intel-
lectuals.
The most recent test case was the latest
novel by Oles Honchar, head of the Ukrainian
Writers Union, which was published earlier
this year in the Ukrainian language. Called
"Sobor", its hero is eventually killed in the
struggle for a Ukrainian cathedral (the
symbol of Ukrainian culture) which is
being pulled down by the state.
Its message?a protest drawn from the his-
torical past against an inhuman present?
was too dangerous to be Ignored. Shelest or-
dered his Communist youth groups to burn
copies of it in the streets of Kiev, and plans
to get it translated into Russian were blocked.
Finally, as recently as May 31, eight of the
nine secretaries of the Ukrainian Writers'
Union (including Honchar) were summoned
to Shelest in Kiev and given a warning. He
had already appointed one of his Committee
Secretaries Fedor Ovcharenko, to carry out a
"cultural purge" in the Ukraine.
Thousands of Ukrainian emigrees live In
the West, Including a large colony in England.
They called on the British Government at a
meeting in London yesterday to stand up
against Communist tyranny.
(From the Sunday Telegram, London,
England, Aug. 25, 1968)
WHAT DID You DO, Dimer?
We are in no two minds about the Red
Army shooting its way into Prague, but what
must we think about the Red Army dancing
and singing next month in the Albert Ilan?
This is an important question for a genera-
tion accustomed to regard post-Stalinist
Russia and its "Communist camp" as an
entity subject to outside influences and ca-
pable of a gradual liberallaation. Cultural and
personal contacts, we had come to think,
could do no harm and might do good.
The rape of Czechoslovakia, and even more
the emergence of a groundswell of resistance
against It, should cense us to think again.
The Soviet empire is no longer a monolith to
be reluctantly accepted; it has become a
defensive tyranny, flagrantly holding down
subject peoples?in no way less repulsive
than that of Hitler's Third Reich?whose
whole future is in doubt. In these new cir-
cumstances civilised and non-political con-
tacts can only confirm the tyranny; they
cannot modify or undermine it.
Let us not assume too easily that an
evil equilibrium will eventually be restored
behind the Iron Curtain. The Czechs may
never abandon their passive resistance, nor
may the rest of the subject nations maintain
their passivity.
This is a fundamentally different situation
from what has been developing in recent
years. The seeds of imperial disintegration
are beginning to sprout. British businessmen
seeking Russian trade, ballet or music lovers
seeking Russian culture, or even simple
tourists seeking Russian holidays, cannot
carry on as if nothing is happenhig. For the
time being, at any rate, Anglo-Soviet cultural
exchanges are as out of place, as obscene,
as they would have been between neutral
States and Nazi Germany at the climax of
the liberation of Europe in 1945.
Admittedly, the members of the U.S.S.R.
State Symphony Orchestra are not personally
responsible for the fate of Mr. Dubcek. But
it is the very normality of these contacts,
against a background of revolutionary ab-
normality, that now constitutes a scandalous
offence. They give the impression to our Rus-
sian guests that we are a friendly, decent
people, which we are. But at this juncture we
have the right and duty to be an angry people
as well.
"What did you do, Daddy, when the Red
Army rolled into Prague?" At least let nest
the answer be "I bought a ticket to watch
the Red Army singers and dancers performing
In the Albert Hall."
PIERCING ROSSIA'S NAKED SKIN
Why don't we care? was the title of an
article I wrote on this page five weeks ago,
when the big bear and the little Bohemian
lion were having their first fraternal tussle.
Though the issues at stake and the dangers
ahead, both for Britain and the whole of the
free world, seemed crystal clear even then,
the protestors of Britain were not protesting,
the open-air orators were not prating, and
the Labour Government?as always when
anything happens to threaten its courtship
of the Kremlin?studiously looked the other
way.
Now that the inevitable has happened in
Prague (though admittedly in an incredible
way) we have rediscovered our voices and our
consciences. The professional protestors,
ranging from Tariq Mi to Pat Arrowsmith,
have hoisted the Czechoslovak pennant above
their Vietnam banners. The Labour party has
remembered the things it was suppesed to be
fightng for 30 years ago, and at Hyde Park
today the wheel turns full circle with Mr.
Grossman?a :eader of the anti-Hitler agita-
tion ha the Czech crisis of 1938?speaking up
at last against Hitler's spiritual End func-
tional successors in Eastern Europe.
More important than all this, the ordinary
people of Britain are themselves amused, and
angry letters demanding protest action of
some sort are pouring into newspaper offices.
What failed to stir the nation as a dark pro-
spect has profoundly an even darker real-
ity. The question is no longer why we don't
care eut what can be achieved now that we
do?
Hoe; can Britain and the West most suit-
ably show their resentiment at Russia's ac-
tion; and what good, apart from belatedly
purging our political souls, would any retalia-
tion do?
Already one can detect the sounds of flan-
nel beginning to flap again along Whitehall.
The same advisers who told the Poi eign Sec-
retary. Mr. Stewart, not to provoke the Rus-
sians and all would be well are now presum-
ably warning him about the cisngers of
"empty gestures" and "counter-productive"
measures.
Action never was the business of bureau-
crats. But it is, or used to be, the business of
politieians. It is time the present Govern-
ment took sufficient time off from its nervous
absorption with the economic crisis to realise
that, or it will betray what is left of its man-
date from the electorate.
The challenge of this latest crisis will be
with us for long weeks and long months to
come. But the very nature of that crisis
means there is an opportunity--however
slight?for Western pressure to influence the
actual outcome. Prague 1968 is not Budapest
1956. There is no Czech Radar for the Krem-
lin to install swiftly in power. The Russians,
militarily supreme in Prague, are still politi-
cally floundering. Moreover, there is no Suez
tragedy that will enable them to gee away so
lightly with another Budapest b:oodbath.
(Vietnam, unlike Suez, Is an accepted part of
the pelitical landscape, not a sudden erup-
tion actually coinciding with an East Eu-
ropean crisis.)
The Russians themselves; are only too
aware of these differences, and underneath
all the 6 in. armour of their tanks it a naked
skin which is acutely sensitive to world
opinien. The truth is that like the Ameri-
cans and quite unlike the Chinese, French
or ottiseives) the Russians yearn to be liked
and accepted.
For 50 years we have lived under the back-
lash of their monumental inferiority com-
plex, and it is still operating today. They
are not aristocratic imperialists nor prole-
tarian imperialists but petty bourgeois ones.
The trst concern of these frightened men
(after that for their own jobs) is for respect-
ability.
It was this that prompted them to deliver
polite and disarming notes Last week in all
major Western capitals, giving advance warn-
ing of their invasion of Czechoslovaeela?like
a burglar handing in his visiting-card. It
was this that caused them to undertake a
advance lobbying operation last Tues-
day among all the Afro-Asian delegations at
the United Nations. (Indeed, according to
one report, It was the Mauritian delegate
there, after beeng approached by the Rus-
sians, who first warned our own Lord Cara-
don of the impending attack.)
In their heart of hearts the Russian lead-
ers (or at any rate some of them) know that
their present action is .diareputable. What
they want is the spoils without the odium.
It is this result we must deny them. And,
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in this particular situation, by pinning the
odium more firmly on them, we could even
weaken their hold on the spoils.
One obvious step in this direction has al-
ready been taken by Britain: a refusal, de-
clared in advance, to recognise any collection
of straw men the Russians may declare to
be the "legal" Government of Czechoslovakia.
There are other less obvious steps. The
British Ambassador in Moscow, now back in
London for "consultations," could be kept
here for a while as a mark of displeasure,
though it is pitching it too high at the mo-
ment to talk of severing diplomatic relations
altogether. Britain, in common with her
Western partners, could also boycott for the
time being any meetings involving the Rus-
sian delegations at all international organi-
sations such as the I.L.O. All semi-official
contacts with Russia?the to-ings and fro-
Ings of mayors, parliamentarians and the
like?could also be suspended. Even if nor-
mal commercial trade with Russia were con-
tinued, an immediate review could be an-
nounced of the Western strategic goods em-
bargo policy, which has been getting steadily
more liberal in interpretation during recent
years. -
Finally, if the West really wanted to try
its own hand at moral blackmail for a
change, it could threaten to review also its
entire disarmament strategy at Geneva, thus
facing the Kremlin with at least the possi-
bility that it may have to resume the ruinous
arms race if it cannot behave as the civilised
power it purports to be.
These are, all of them, governmental ac-
tions which fall short of a total severance
of either diplomatic or economic relations.
(Cultural, professional and sports boycotts
are more complicated matters which are per-
haps best left to the individual and private
bodies concerned to determine.) Such meas-
ures could never, by themselves, shift the
Russian troops out of Prague. But, by prick-
ing a sensitive Russian skin, by encouraging
such doves as exist in the Kremlin to go on
cooing and by applauding the mass of the
pro-Dubcek patriots in their firm stand, they
could have some indirect effect on the polit-
ical battle in Prague itself.
The outcome of this battle, as President
Svobodas enigmatic journey to Moscow
shows, is still completely open, even in this
initial stage. And whatever compromise is
agreed or imposed to reconcile Czech defiance
with Soviet embarrassment, the political
struggle in Prague will then only enter an-
other and equally indecisive stage, still so
finely balanced that the slightest weight on
the right side of the scales could be impor-
tant. In a situation of this unprecedented
fragility, gestures become deeds, and even
hot air has substance.
Above all, let us not be distracted from
embarking on such a calculated tactical
switch in policy by lamentations, either from
bureaucrats or politicians, that it would "de-
stroy the detente. That much-abused word is
acquiring an altogether unwholesome and
unnatural sanctity of its own. It is not a
banner which, once laid aside, can never be
picked up again. It is a diplomatic yo-yo.
which the Russians have been pulling up and
down entirely as it suits them for years. Let
the West now yank it sharply up on a short
string for a few months. We might help our-
selves, as well as the Czechs, in the process.
[From the London, England, Daily Telegraph,
Aug. 23, 1968]
TRAGEDY AND COMEDY
Russia's hopes of a quick, clean and rela-
tively "comradely" take-over in Czechoslo-
vakia, so that the whole affair might goon be
forgotten and relations with the outside
world return to normal, have gone awry.
Politically and administratively the operation
was as bungled as militarily it was efficient?
although with such superiority this hardly
merits a campaign medal. Never, in the whole
history of Russian coups, has it taken SO
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many troops so long to produce so few
stooges of such low calibre. For many hours
Czechoslovakia's real leaders were able to
denounce the aggression, while the ingenious
and courageous Czech radio and television
men were able to get the full grim story out
to the world. Even Czechoslovakia's man at
the United Nations had not been suborned or
de-credentialised in time to prevent him from
appearing as a star witness for the prose-
cution.
One reason for most of this must have
been the Kremlin's persistent and gross over-
estimation of the strength of its supporters
in Czechoslovakia, combined with a cynical
view of satellite Communist politicians. They
thought that, with such irresistible force at
their command, and with such patronage
within their gift, a presentable array of
Stalinists and quislings could be mustered
before you could say K.G.B. In addition, by
giving the Czech Assembly and Praesidium
some apparent freedom of action to appoint
a new regime, the Russians would have
gained at least some sort of case to present
to outside Communist parties and world pub-
lic opinion. Evidently there are doves in the
Kremlin who are much more concerned
about public relations than their predeces-
sors were, or than the ascendant hawks are
now.
All in vain. The velvet gloves had to be
replaced, if not yet by steel gauntlets, yet
by serviceable leather mitts. Mr. Dubcek and
his colleagues were bundled off to prison in
more familiar style. The National Assembly
delegation invited to the Russian Embassy
duly disappeared from ken?like Hungarian,
Polish and other political guests on previous
occasions. The number of Czech civilians
killed by Russian troops is growing. Some
deaths were the result of desperate acts of
heroism. Many were inflicted for mere pas-
sive resistance or even demonstrations of the
type without which no weekend in most
Western capitals is complete, but which in
this sterner context were acts of great cour-
age.
The future is obscure and dangerous. The
restraint evidently enjoined upon Russian
troops is wearing thin. Strikes are spread-
ing?giving the lie to the Russians' claim
that they came at the call of the workers.
The Czech Army Command has put out a
strict order not to co-operate with the Rus-
sians. The pathetic team of Judases which
the Russians, after 36 embarrassing hours,
at last got together is hardly more than a
laughing stock. In all these circumstances,
it should not have been necessary for Mr.
Stewart to say that Britain will not recog-
nise a puppet regime. Yet with memories so
short, and thinking so wishful, it is good
that he said it so forthrightly. The British
Ambassador should be withdrawn for a start.
Another of Mr. Stewart's forceful plati-
tudes should reverberate like a clarion. "No
country within reach can feel entirely safe."
The independent-minded Mr. Ceausescu had
already got the message and has called out
Rumania's Home Guard. If it indeed be true
that NATO took no special precautions, then
it took a chance in assuming that the War-
saw Pact array had no relevance to a possible
grab at Berlin. We have clear notice now that
the Red Army and the "hawks" call the tune
in Moscow now. Mr. Stewart, dangerously
late in the day, recognises the need for mili-
tary preparedness. In addition, the West
must not, by glossing over this unpardon-
able aggression, enable the Kremlin hard-
liners to confound the moderates by saying?
like Hitler before them: "You'll see: we al-
ways got away with it in the past, and the
democracies soon came round."
[From the Edinburgh and Glasgow, Scot-
land, Scottish Daily Mail, Aug. 23, 19681
WHO ARE THE PUPPETS?
It is not only dirty work. It is botched
work. The rape of Czechoslovakia bears all
S 10253
the marks of panic and division in the
Kremlin.
Russia had not even strung together her
puppets before invading. The quislings have
had to be herded into the limelight in the
wake of the Soviet tanks.
At the UN Mr. George Ball, the U.S. Am-
bassador, challenged the Russian envoy,
Jacob Malik, to name 'the party and Gov-
ernment leaders' who had asked the Rus-
sians for help. Malik could not reply, be-
cause Moscow had no answer.
Who are these pitiful quislings?Kolder,
Indra, Bilak? A handful of party hacks, left-
overs from the Novotny era, uneducated re-
placements who know little and care less.
DEPOSED
What do they count for against the entire
Czech Government, the loyalty of the Czech
Communist Party Congress yesterday, and the
cheers for Dubcek in the streets?
The desperate search for Czech puppets
betrays deep panic. The Russians' real pup-
pet was Novotny. And if force was to be used,
they might have duped a few gullible oafs
by coming to his aid before he was deposed.
By allowing Dubcek six months to build
support, the Russians have ensured a last-
ing Czech resistance. By withdrawing the
Red Army and then sending it in ,again, they
have added the brutality of invasion to the
misery of occupation.
Why did they let the Russian Symphony
Orchestra play music at the London Proms
by the beloved Czech composer Dvorak?
Why did they name their occupation Radio
Vltava, after the river which runs through
Prague and which provided the title for part
of Smetana's famous hymn to Czech pa-
triotism?
DEFAMED
It all shows a hamflsted insensivity which
must signal a long and bitter tug-of-war be-
tween the hawks and the doves in Moscow.
The hawks have won for the moment. If
they are not to have their way in the fu-
ture, they must be taught a firm but careful
lesson.
That does not mean stepping up the arms
race or shouting superfluous insults.
But why should we go on trading with the
Russians when we buy twice as much as we
sell? Why shoulyi they be allowed to show
their wares at trade fairs in Britain when
elsewhere they are showing only their bru-
tality?
It seems there is sadly little hope of a
lasting East-West detent under the present
Russian leadership. Should we not use what
leverage we have to influence a change in
those leaders?
[From the London, England, International
Herald Tribune, Aug. 24-25, 1968]
COMMUNISTS AND PRAGUE
Grimness settled over Prague Thursday as
the Soviet conquerors sought to consolidate
their grip on Czechoslovakia and began fill-
ing the prisons with patriotic intellectuals
and other liberals opposed to Moscow's tyr-
anny. The resistance of the great majority of
Czechs and Slovaks continued unbroken,
spiritually sustained both by the great wave
of national indignation and by the leader-
ship provided by the courageous operators
of clandestine radio stations.
It became clear, too, Thursday that the
conservative figures in the Czechoslovak
Communist party leadership had played the
role of Quislings in welcoming the invaders,
but the political weakness of these turncoats
was attested by the inability of the Soviet
occupiers to name a new Prague "govern-
ment" that might command even reluctant
popular assent.
Ag fears grew for the safety of Alexander
Dubcek and his imprisoned colleagues, the
moral bankruptcy of Moscow's policy was re-
flected in such acts as the Kremlin decision
to resume jamming of Voice of America and
other foreign broadcasts whose unhindered
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reception had been permitted since well be-
fore Shruelichev's ouster, Until their tanks
and troop carriers rumbled into Prague, the
Soviet rulers felt their case to their own peo-
ple was strong enough to meet the competi-
tion provided by Western broadcasts; now
they implicitly acknowledge it Is too weak to
withstand contradiction over the air waves.
Western criticism, of course, can always be
dismissed as "Imperialist propaganda," as
Ambassador Malik has been proving at tire-
some length at the United Nations. But the
Irrefutable judgment, even by Moscow's
standards, is the denunciation of the Soviet
assault by Communist states and Communist
parties. The largest public demonstrations
protesting against the seizure of Czechoslo-
vakia, for example, have been the gatherings
of tens of thousands of protesters in Bucha-
rest and Belgrade and in Prague itself. Presi-
dent Ceausescu of Romania has called the
Soviet invasion "a grave danger to peace in
Europe, to the fate of socialism in the world."
Yugoslavia's Communist leaders have labeled
that same violation of International law "R.
significant, historical point of rupture"
among Socialist countries. Throughout
Western Europe, Communist parties and
leaders have condemned the Soviet action.
The reality, in short, is that no act of the
Soviet government?not even the subjuga-
tion of Hungary?has ever been condemned
with such near-unanimity on both irides of
the Iron Curtain as this week's unprovoked,
brutal violation of small, defenseless Czech-
oslovakia. The Soviet leaders who made the
111-starred decision to take this move have
only themselves to blame if much of the
world today compares this week's crimes
against Czechoslovakia with earlier misdeeds
of Hitler and Stalin.
Already the Soviet Union has paid a heavy
price in prestige and world respect for this
blunder. But there Is still time to cut those
losses by evacuating Czechoslovakia promptly
and permitting the people and the duly
elected leaders of that country to decide
their own fate.?The New York Times.
[From the London, England, Sunday Times,
Aug. 25, 19681
THE REALPOLITIR OP PRAGUE
(By Frank Glles)
Comparisons between what happened in
Czechoslovakia last week and what happened
In 1948 are only superficially valid. The
Prague coup of twenty years ago, which set
the alarm bells ringing all over the free
world and led directly to the creation of
NATO, was unquestionably a Communist. So-
viet-backed conspiracy; but at least they
were Czechoslovak Communists who carried
it out. The true comparison this time is with
March, 1939, when the hapless Prime Min-
ister Bache was summoned to Berchtesgaden
and told, In effect, that henceforth his coun-
try was to be a German protectorate.
That is what the Ruasians are trying to do
to Czechoslovakia. They do not appear to be
succeeding. The measure of their failure Is
dramatically reflected in last night's reports
of a new summit meeting in Moscow. But
whatever happens, the events of last week
present a tragic and disgusting spectacle,
which has rightly drawn down upon them
the opprobrium of much of the world, non-
Communist and Communist alike. Obviously,
the men in the Kremlin weighed up the ad-
vantages and disadvantages of their decision.
That they decided as they did, knowing that
they would split the Communist world in
half and dim all hopes for an East-West
detente, anyway for a long time to come, is
a highly significant comment upon conditions
within the Soviet Union itself and in its
rigidly faithful satellites. The almost over-
whelming drawbacks to what has been done
were evidently considered preferable to let-
ting Czechoslovak "deviatlonism" take hold
and spread to Ulbricht's Germany, Gomulka's
Poland and, above all, to Brezhnev's Russia.
Whole volumes of Kreminology and its allied
sciences could not possibly convey a more
telling message than this.
What the effect of the rape of Czecho-
slovakia will be upon international relations
In general Is a good deal less clear. Indigna-
tion and revulsion at what has happened lead
naturally on to the thought that we are
back once more in the worst days of the
cold war, with the Soviet menace in Europe
again at its height and comunicatIon be-
tween East and West reduced to a frosty min-
imum. But this is not In fact necessarily
true. I am in no way seeking to justify or
excuse Soviet conduct in Czechoslovakia
when I say that despite Its enormity it has
not moved the post-war balance of power by
one centimetre.
The Russians, In a crude and intolerable
way, are trying to trample on men and
Ideas and human rights. But they are
trampling in their own backyard In a man-
ner comparable In kind, though not of course
in degree, with the American armed inter-
vention in the Dominician Republic in 1965.
The motive then was to forestall Commu-
nism, just as It Is the Soviet motive in
Czechoslovakia today to preserve it.
In a perfect world, the protagonists of na-
tional independence, whether they be Brit-
lab or Jugoslav or American, would rush to
the aid of the beleaguered Czechs in their
hour of trial. Nothing in fact is less likely.
It is not even sure whether the Czecho-
slovaks would welcome such succour. They
seem on present showing admirably able to
stand up for themselves. Nor will the United
Nations be able to do anything, except ex-
press varying degrees of Indignation. This
may be useful, but not nearly as effective, In
the context, as the indignation within the
Soviet backyard Itself.
The plain facts, however disagreeable, are
that the division of Europe and large parts
of the world Into two blocs, a division that
In essence dates back to Yalta, is still the
ruling system, which the events of Czecho-
slovakia, far from upsetting have tended to
confirm.
This, however, is the language of real-
politik, which may influence statesmen but
cannot control the movements of men's
hearts and minds. Even 11 it could be shown
that the Russians are content, as they have
been in the past, to stay in their own back-
yard, a huge wave of mistrust of their mo-
tives and intentions is likely?and with
reasons?to sweep the Western world. The
victim, at least in the short term, will be
the detente which successive Western lead-
ers, from Winston Churchill to Lyndon
Johnson, have sought as the highest prize
for statesmanship.
Who can now seriously contemplate that
lofty vision of General de Gaulle's of a Eu-
rope "from the Atlantic to the Urals"? What
man will be listened to who argues that the
Soviet threat In Europe is still minimal and
that Western troop reductions can there-
fore be safely envisaged? How can the en-
couraging growth of cultural and scientific
exchanges with the Soviet Union hope to be
sustained?
Some of these reactions will be exag-
gerated but they will be nonetheless real.
What the Russians have done is to make
the life of a dove, whether in Washington,
London. Paris or Bonn, increasingly diffIcut.
Conversely, the hawks, secure in the thought
that they have been proved right in their
suspicion of every Russian move, will be on
the wing.
In the Middle East. Soviet support for the
Arab cause and the Russian build-up In the
Mediterranean will appear even more dis-
turbing than previously; an Arab-Israeli set-
tlement, never much more than a plow
hope, becomes even more Illusory. In Asia,
even if there is no obvious connection be-
tween the events in Czechoslovakia and the
quest for peace in Vietnam, that quest must
become, where American public opinion is
concerned, more difficult. In Europe, the rea-
sonable expectation that the two Ger-
manys might learn, if not to accept each
other, at least to live and trade together,
now needs the unthinking optimism of a
Gout.
If in the Western world the hawks have
been given a golden opportunity to preen
their feathers, the Soviet decision to inter-
vene in Czechoslovakia must also have had
the same effect in the Kremlin. Last week,
the Soviet hawks carried the day. This week,
depending upon what emerges from the Mos-
cow Summit meeting, they might well be
seer, in humiliating retreat, driven back by
Czeehoslovak fortitude. This would scarcely
sweeten the .r tempers. Whatever happens,
the prospect; for expanding co-existence be-
tween East and West will have been dark-
ened.
The gloom of this forecast may yet be
belied by events. If it is not, than 'no war,
no pears"?Trotsky's formula?seems to be
about the maximum degree of consolation
which can he got out of the present situa-
tion. Yet the prevailing twilight, in which
the heroic tragedy of the Czech people flick-
ers bravely, must not be allowed to obscure
totally the prospects for East-West d?nte.
Two facts stand out: nothing that has hap-
pened has upset the balance of power; sec-
ondly, the spirit of independence and free-
dom of which the Czechoslovak episode is
an outstanding example can only flourish
in the long run in an atmosphere of detente.
At the peesent emotienal moment it is
easy and natural?as no doubt tomorrow's
debate in the House of Commons will show?
to demand a breaking-off of trade and con-
tacts with the Soviet Union and its slaves.
But apart from affording a moral thrill, the
practical effect of such a step would be mini-
mal, where et is not actually negative. Sena-
tor Eugene McCarthy's dismissal of the
Czechoslovaa drama as not a "major world
eriels"?"an invasion of France would be a
serous matter"?may be a little too cool for
the present state of feeling, although there
is hard realesm in what he said. I prefer Mr.
George Brown's thoughtful and constructive
approach in a speech at the Socialist Inter-
national last week, when he urged that, in
spite of events, the search for d?nte must
go on.
Looking at the gruesome television pic-
tures of what has been happening in Prague
and Bratislava in the last few days, it is all
toe easy to think that the ghost of Stalin
walks again. In fact, this cannot be. The
defection of Western Communist parties, the
ris-ng tide of national independence in East-
ern Europe, and the resistance of the Czecho-
slovaks, are events which speak for them-
selves and cannot be unsaid. Whether or not
the Communist leaders gather in Moscow,
the right course for the outside powers is to
remain co& and patient, and mindful that
the men in the Kremlin may last week have
made a truly historic mistake.
[From the London, England, Sunday Times,
Aug. 25, 1e681
EPIC BLUNDER?
Is Czechoslovakia the Russians' Bay of
Pigs? If Mr. Dubcek does return, It will cer-
tainly look like it. What we have seen this
week is an epic miscalculation. The Krem-
lir 's military plan went smoothly enough.
But the political plan is in ruins. The
Czechs have not submitted; puppets have
net been ersily found; the party has not de-
serted its Imprisoned leaders; the resistance
has not been silenced. Not a sir gle voice, in
fact, has been heard to support the invasion.
Every one of the half-million troops now
said to be in occupation would clearly be
needed if the Russians were to achieve their
original objective of extinguishing Dubcek-
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ism. It is now fairly clear that that objective
may have to be modified.
This to a quite astonishing situation. Oisly
six months ago Czeohaslovakia was an ap-
parently fixed part of the Soviet empire. It
has been under Moscow's heel for twenty
years. Many of its people have had only the
most fragmentary experience of freedom. The
only habit they had the chance to acquire
was that of bored obedience. Their lives were
joyless and bound by very small hopes. Now,
almost universally, they have shaken off the
worst shackles of the past. For such people,
at all their social and intellectual levels, to
achieve this in so short a time is beyond the
common range of Imagination. It is evidence
enough that the existence of the Dui:leek
regime, brief as it was, will prove to be a more
durable political phenomenon with wider
consequences, than the act of its attempted
destruction. ?
Whatever the outcome of President Svo-
boda's teaks in Moscow, this needs to be as-
serted. No language Is too rich to be applied
to the barbarity which Soviet fear and So-
viet trickery have now visited upon Europe.
No one can contemplate the familiar ap-
paratus of the Soviet secret police without
anger and sympathy on the Czechs' behalf.
But this should not go so far as to credit the
Russians With a triumph. In the short term
the job was bungled. At best it will be seen
to have landed its perpetrators with an un-
manageable problem. Just how unmanage-
able was revealed by last night's reports of
a Communist summit meeting in Moscow.
The, Communist family's affairs are badly
awry, and a family council has apparently
become urgent.
? It follows from this that Western protest
remains exceedingly relevant. People as well
as Governments can give the Czechs priceless
encouragement. They are still capable of re-
ceiving it, and the Russians are still capable
of being embarrassed by it. But it must, of
course, be based on the right premise. To
welcome Prague as a friend of the West is to
play exactly the game of the Russians. If
Mr. Dubeek's Czechoslovakia is to be la-
mented, it must be as a steadfastly Commu-
nist State. That is the whole point of his
achievement. It is also the essence of the
case against the Kremlin. The Czech experi-
ment, with its relevance for Western as well
as Eastern societies, Is a way of extending
and modernizing the Communist system.
Moreover it strengthened the possibility of
:European co-existence.
, But much more than protest has been
recommended to Western Governments and
their citizens. Various courses are being can-
vassed. One Is an immediate increase in
armies and armaments in Europe. Another is
an expansion of the British nuclear arsenal.
Yet another is an embargo on all economic
and cultural contacts with Moscow. Another
Is the election of. Mr. Richard Nixon as the
next American President.
. All these are based more or less on the
essmuption that the Cold War has reopened
will, all its rigour, and that confrontation
has replaced co-existence. But those are as-
sumptions which it is a little early to start
acting cm. It is not the brutal outrage of
this Soviet action which should he decisive
in Western counsels so much as any evi-
dence that the Kremlin intends to alter the
strategic balance between East and West.
This is discussed in an adjoining column. In
that relationship all that has so far changed
is the climate. Until more becomes clear, it
would . be unnatural to receive even the
? matchless )3olshol ballet with the cuetomary
feelings of friendship. But it would be un-
reasonable to Instantly reverse policies which
recognise that, in the nuclear age, there is
no alternative to co-existence. For if the his-
tory of the Dubeek regime suggests one truth
above others, it is that the monolith of
Eastern Europe Is more likely to be frage
merited by inner breakdown than by a rever-
sion to Implacable hostility in the West.
(Front the London, England, Sunday Tele-
gram, Aug. 25, 19081
AN EMPIRE BREAKING UR
(By Tibor Szamuely)
"Communism has now revealed Its true
face." This phrase has often been repeated
in the past few days, but it is very wide of
the mark. - ?
The Russian rape of Czechoslovakia has re-
vealed nothing whatever about the nature
or the methods of the Communist system?
nothing that had not been, known for a
great many years. Or, rather, that had not.
been known to those who wished to be in-
formed of the facts and to understand the
nature of the Communist phenomenon.
For the truth is that the Russian invasion
of Czechoslovakia, with all its brutality,
treachery, cynicism, and complete disregard
for public opinion, fits perfectly Into the
long line of acts of vicious imperialist ag-
gression carried out by the Soviet Govern-
ment over the past half-century: the inva-
sion of Georgia in 1922, the partition of
Poland and the attack upon Finland in 1939:
the annexation of the Baltic States in 1940,
the forcible Communisation of Eastern
Europe in 1944-48, the intervention in Hun-
gary in 1960.
Nor is thin a tradition which began with
the "Socialist" revolution of 1917: like Rus-
sian imperialism itelf, it goes back much
further in time; to the invasion of Hungary
in 1849 and the bloody suppresion of the
Polish revolutions of 1830 and 1863, and even
further.
In those days Russia was known as the
"Gendarme of Europo"?an object of fear
and abhorrence . for every progressive and
democratic person in the world. Today her
Government calls itself "Communist"; it
has murdered millions, both within and with-
out its borders?but solely because 50 years
ago it nationalised the means of produetion,
it has been regarded as a .beacon of en-
lightenment by our present-day perverters
of the progressive ideal.
Yet the Gendarme of Europe is what Sov-
iet Russia has remained throughout her
history. Her oppression, her barbarism, her
cruelty have never been modified or changed.
Of late, however, a new factor has ap-
peared, which is influencing Soviet policy to
an ever tighter degree; not liberalisation or
"bridgebuiding"?theso are strictly for gul-
lible foreigners?but the obvious moral, poli-
tical and economic bankruptcy of the Com-
munist system. No more talk of competing
with the West, of proving the superiority of
Communism by peaceful means: brute force
and suppression are the order of the day.
Faced with disaffection, resistance and rebel-
lion, the Soviet leaders have proved to be
weak and frightened men. And weakness and
fright make bad counsellors.
Herein lies the explanation for the meet
mishandled act of aggression in Soviet his-
tory. Panic-stricken by the agonising choice
between letting Czechoslovakia go democratic
and crushing an "allied" Communist Gov-
ernment by force, the men in the Kremlin did
what came naturally: they sent the tanks in.
It seems to be 1966 all over again. But is it?
The parrallei with the Hungarian tragedy
springs instantly to mind, Certainly the ruth-
less and deceitful methods employed by the
Russians are identical in both cases, down to
the smallest detail. One often reads that
every criminal band has its own particular
methods, which rarely vary and thus help the
police' to recognise them and track them
down. The Kremlin gangsters, too, have their
own hallmaak, and it is indelibly stamped
upon the Czechoslovak operation.
But apart from the self-same mark of the
beast, the Soviets' 1968 crime is different
from that of 1'76 in almost every aspect: in
its preliminaries, Its circumstances, its ex-
ecution, and, most probably, its outcome.
These differences, which have already resulted
in an unprecedented political fleet? for the
U.S.S.R., give reason to believe that the
effects of Prague will, be far more profound
and lasting?very possibly even catastrophic
in the long run for the Soviet empire and its
rulers,
To begin with, never before have the BUG--
Mans exhibited the present total inability to
offer some coherent explanation of their ac-
tion that might impress anyone above the
mental level of an imbecile child. In Hun-
gary's case?although, of course, there can
be no question of patification for the Rus-
sian action?the Soviets were able, by skit'
fully blending selected facts, falsehoods and
half-truths, to present a case that was at
least acceptable to many of their subjects,
to the international Communist movement,
and even to certain sections of Western Left-
ist opinion.
In Hungary, on the face of it, there had
been an armed uprising against the legal
Government; tife rebels had overthrown
Communist rule and installed a. multi-party
coalition; some Communists (mainly secret
policemen) had been lynched; the party, the
Government and the armed forces had dis-
integrated, and law and order could be pre-
sented as having completely broken down.
Other factors, too, were adroitly manipu-
lated by Soviet propaganda: Hungary had had
a Right-wing, "Facist" regime between the
wars and had been an ally of Hitler's--this
made the version of a "Fascist takeover"
sound somewhat less implausible to Leftist
ears; Hungary had been legally occupied by
the Soviet forces for the preceding 12 years;
the coincidence of Suez distracted much of
world attention front Eastern Europe; in-
judicious actions like the overheated tone of
some Radio Free Europe broadcasts offered
additional excuses to grateful Soviet propa-
gandists.
It is easy to scoff at such a tortuous
apologia; to the ordinary normal Western
mind an unprovoked attack by a Groat Power
against a email nation Is an act of aggres-
sion which nothing can explain away. But
this is to discount the vital importance for a
doctrinaire ideological movement of a sys-
tematic, factual and theoretical explanation
of its actions for the edification and spiritual
uplift of its followers.
This time the machine that had run so
smoothly for 50 years has broken down, No
Communist, whether Russian or Czech or any
other, no fellow-traveller, however deeply
brainwashed, Can accept the pathetic mouth-
Inge of Agitprop about violations of "demo-
cratic centralism" Or insults to good Czecho-
slovak comrades as justification for invasion,
rapine and murder. The Kremlin gangsters
stand naked in their infamy before the con-
temptuou.s and hate-filled gazes of their sub-
jects and their hangers-on.
The Russian oligarchs acted in blind
panic?and landed themselves in disaster.
From the beginning everything has gone
wrong (the transportation of the troops and
their Weapons overa few dozen miles without
any resistance can hardly be chalked up as a
success). The methods are those of 1956?the
results are totally different.
In 1950 the invasion began with the an-
nouncement that Janoe Nader had formed a
new GoVernroont which had called on the
U.S.S.R. for help in the restoration of order.
In 19438 the names of the mysterious
"Czechoslovak leaders" who had invited the
Russians have still not been unveiled, days
after the invasion. Unlike Hungary, where
the whole party apparatus, most of the Cen-
tral Committee, the Government -and. the
National Assembly welcomed the Russians as
their saviours from the people's wrath, in
Czechoslovakia ? no one supports the in-
vaders?not oven the People's Militia, upon
which the Russians had pinned so many
hopes.
Obviously, the Russians are looking for a
Czechoslovak. Kadar: a loyal servant un-
tainted by association With the Stalinist
past. They will find' it hard to locate one---
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,September? 4, 1968
and, even if they do, their problems will
hardly be solved. In Hungary at the time of
the intervention no Communist party
existed; it had been dissolved, and Kadar
was able to create his own party from
scratch, with no rival political organisation
In the way.
But in Czechoslovakia the party exists and
functions. It possesses properly elected
bodies, and has Just held a legally con-
stituted congress. The party is loyal to Du-
'Jacek. Unlike Imre Nagy, who had no time to
establish himself, Dubcek is the acknowl-
edged and immensely popular leader of his
nation?and Dubcek has been abducted by
the professional Kremlin kidnappers.
The local party bodies, the Government
officers, the armed forces, the diplomatic
service, the U.N. delegation: all remain stead-
fast in their loyalty. How unlike Hungary?
and what a shock to the Russians.
Intervention has blown up in the Rus-
sians' faces. Whereas in 1958 the interna-
tional Communist movement faithfully
closed ranks behind the Soviets, today every
single Communist party?with the signifi-
cant exception of North Vietnam?has
bitterly condemned their action. And
Rumania has split the Warsaw Pact itself
wide open.
What can the Russians hope for at this
calamitous Juncture? Clearly their forces are
sufficient to hold Czechoslovakia dowill in-
definitely. Equally clearly, sooner or later
some Quislings will emerge. But without the
active collaboration of the Communist party
and the central and local state administra-
tion. those will be unable to function. At the
moment the chances of such collaboration
appear remote, to say the least. Nor will the
Czechs?traditional, age-old friends of the
Russian people?ever be able to forget
August 21, 1966.
So. barring a miracle?such as the Rus-
aians' recognising their moral defeat and
withdrawing, as the British and French did
after Suez?Czechoslovakia seems destined
to remain under direct, if slightly camou-
flaged Russian military government. This
would mean an unparalleled and probably
irreparable disaster for the Communist sys-
tem and the Soviet empire.
The Communist regimes in Poland and
Hungary?particularly the latter?are too
fragile and unpopular to be able to with-
stand for long the shock of the Czechoslovak
imbroglio and the shame of participation
in this vile and perfidious act. Colonial sub-
jecte who hate their master are not good at
policing other colonies on his behalf. The
bankruptcy of Communism In Eastern Eu-
rope is now Irredeemable.
It is within Russia herself that the full
weight of this week's catastrophe will be felt
most acutely. I know from personal experi-
ence how deep was the sense of outrage
among progressive Russians in 1956. In re-
cent months, as we have learned from docu-
ments like the memoranda of the famous
nuclear physicist. Academician Sakharov,
democratisation in Czechoslovakia offered a
flicker of hope to millions of thinking men
and women in Russia. Today that flicker
has been snuffed out by their own despised
ruling clique in an act of cynical brutality
unworthy even of Hitler, without a shred of
justification.
The outside world has no idea of the ex-
tent and the depth of disillusionment among
the citizens of Russia. For many of them
Czechoslovakia will be the final straw. After
50 years of existence Communism has no
argument left to uphold its legitimacy; only
guns and tanks. Czechoslovakia has shown
that this is not enough: 1958 undermined
the Communist world system-1988 has
dealt it a blow from which It can never
recover. Communist colonial rule over half
Europe is beginning to break up.
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr. Pres-
ident, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING 01, .1.CER. The clerk
will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk pro-
ceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr. Pres-
ident, I ask unanimous consent that the
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING Olor'ICER (Mr.
Yon-No of Ohio in the chair) . Without ob-
jection, it is so ordered.
THE CASE OF MRS. SYLVESTER,
SMITH
Mr. BYRD of West Virginia. Mr.
President, I ask unanimous consent to
have printed in the RECORD an article en-
titled "The Case of Mrs. Sylvester
Smith," written by Walter Goodman, and
published in the New York Times maga-
zine of .7.ugust 25, 1988.
There being no objection, the article
was ordered to be printed in the RECORD,
as follows:
A VICTORY FOR 400,000 CHILDREN THE CASE
OF MRS. SYLVESTER SMITH
(By Walter Goodman)
SELMA, ALA.?Iv October, 1966, Mrs. Syl-
vester Smith, once-widowed, once-deserted,
34 years old and black, was notified by the
Department of Pensions( and Security of Dal-
las County, Ala., that It was cutting off pay-
ments to her family under the Aid to De-
pendent Children program. This meant a loss
of about $29 a month, more than a quarter
of the Smith household income. It also sig-
naled the beginning of a momentous test,
resolved by the United States Supreme Court
several weeks ago, of a state's power to de-
prive children of aid to which they are en-
titled by a Federal welfare program.
At a time when bureaucracy's entire ap-
proach to the poor was coming under radical
scrutiny, the Court delivered a blow to state
authorities, Northern as well as Southern,
who have been withholding Federal dollars
from residents because of race, sexual activ-
ity or other matters irrelevant to their need.
The Smith decision, beneficently affecting
more than 21,000 children in Alabama and
perhaps as many as 400.000 throughout the
country, was the first handed down by the
high court in a dispute over public welfare;
it will assuredly not be the last. Like Linda
Brown, the schoolgirl from Topeka who won
the 1954 school-integration decision, and
Clarence Earl Gideon, the Florida convict
Whose right to an attorney was upheld in
1963, Mrs. Sylvester Smith has set in motion
a dramatic change in American society.
In first giving aid to Mrs. Smith and then
taking it away. Alabama was acting as an
agent of the Federal Government, which set
up the A.D.C. program under the Social Se-
curity Act. Last year, Washington contrib-
uted more than half of the $2.3-billion paid
to same 4.2 million children around the
country. In rich states such as New York the
Federal share drops; In poor states such as
Alabama it rises. Family payments vary ac-
cording to need and number of children; in
Alabama they average around $15 a child
each month--about half the established level
of "need."
Designed to help children who have been
deprived of a parent by death, incapacity or
simply by "continued absence from the
home," A.D.C. has for years been under at-
tack from those who see it as an inducement
to immoral behavior, especially among Ne
grass. "By taxing the good people to pay for
these programs." said the esteemed Governor
Orval Faubus of Arkansas in 1959, "we are
putting a premium on illegitimacy never be-
fore known in the world." Mrs. Smith's chil-
dren met all the original requirements for
aid, but they did not qualify under one regu-
lation that Alabama, along with most other
eta-;es of the Old Confederacy and a number
in the Norta,? had added. The 3mith chil-
dren were ruled ineligible because their
mother was thought to be maintaining a
continuing sexual relationship with a "sub-
stitute father"?who, presumably, was ex-
pected to help support the chilcsen.
Mrs. Smith first applied for A.D.C. In
March, 1956, a few months after her husband
was killed "In a fight over a woman." She was
23 years old and was left with three chil-
dre 1?Ida Elizabeth, 3; Ernestine, 2, and
Willie Lewis 8 months. Aid was granted. In
January 1957, she had her fourth child, Wil-
lie' James, the son of one Lois Pullen -Willie
James was added to the A.D.C. laits in June,
1963, after Fuller left town, presumably for
New York. The Smith family received about
$87 a month until March, 1966 when Ida
ElLzabeth, 13 years old ar d unmsrried, bore
a daughter of her own and was scratched
from the budget.
That summer Mrs. Snarls moved with her
daughters and baby granddaughter from the
country town of Tyler up to Selma, where she
had found a Job as a cook and waitress in a
Negro cafe-9:30 A.M. to noon for $16 a week,
later raised to $20. (The ADZ. payments
droaped in recognition of this bounty, as
the/ had when she did some picking and hoe-
ing in the cotton fields near Tyler.) Her two
sons stayed 'as the country with their grand-
parents,- Joining the family in Selma on
weekends. Today all six Smiths are together
again in half of a weather-beaten cabin at
the end of a dirt road in one 01 the Negro
quarters of Selma. There is a neat sitting
room in wirach three people can watch TV
with only a little crowding; a bedroom al-
most completely filled by two beds! a rudi-
mentary kitchen, and a tiny space which
Mrs. Smith hopes some day to turn Into a
bathroom. For the present the family is
served by a backyard privy.
Rent is $20 a month. The monthly gas bill
comes to around $15 in the winter. Among
the other regular expenses are $5 a month
for sickness and accident insurance, $2 for
lire insurance and 60 cents for a burial so-
cleta. Mrs. Smith has no savings, and after
her court case began she found it hard to
get credit. "It's that suit you brought against
the welfare people." a salesman told her.
Oae result of the move to Selma in 1966
was that the Smiths were assigned to a new
caseworker, s. matronly young woman named
Mrs. Jacquelyn Stencil a hose record bears
Out the impression she gives of going about
her duties in an orderly way. After reviewing
the Smith dossier and noting mention there-
in of one William E. Williams, Mrs. Stencil
quentioned a third party and was told that
Mrs Smith was receiving weekend visits from
Williams, who still lived in Tyler, 45 miles
south of Selma. "When I asked who told,"
recalls Mrs. Smith, "she said, 'It was a little
bird.' I'd like to meet that little bird."
Mrs. Smith's caseworker during her years
In tae country had evidently been content to
overlook the visits of Willie Williams; Mrs.
Stencil was more fastidious. In September,
196e, Mrs. Sasuldl notified Mrs. Smith that
her aid would be stopped if Williams kept
coming around?that, after all, was the rule.
Where Mrs. Stencil speaks with piacticed re-
serve. Mrs. Smith tends to let herself go.
Where Mrs. Stencil's professional manner ap-
proaches stolidness, Mrs. Smith is restless;
some plump part of her seems always to be
on the move. She grins a lot, a biz grin that
shows off her bad teeth. Mrs. Stand il keeps
? Some form of the subatitute-rather rule
was instituted in Alabama. Arkansas, Arizona,
Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Indi-
ana, Louisiana, Maine. Michigan, Mississippi,
Missouri, New Hampshire. New Mesico, North
and South Carolina, Okh homa, Tennessee,
Texas, Vermont and Virginia.
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