Fifty years ago: Moscow crushes the Prague Spring - archive, August 1968
In the night of
August 20 1968 Soviet tanks and troops invaded Czechoslovakia in an effort to
stop the so-called Prague
Spring. For four months, under the leadership of Alexander Dubček,
the country broke free from Soviet rule, with the government allowing freedom
of speech and removing state controls over industry. Dubček claimed he
was offering ‘socialism with a human face,’ but the Soviet Union viewed
developments as tantamount to counter-revolution. Czechoslovakians did not
fight the invading Russians but instead stood in front of the tanks, with some
putting flowers in the soldiers’ hair. The reforms were curtailed, hard-line
communists retook positions of power and Dubček was deposed in April 1969.
Guardian Editorial:
Jackboots again over Eastern Europe
22 August 1968
Czech youngsters holding a Czechoslovak flag stand atop an overturned truck
as other Prague residents surround Soviet tanks in Prague, 21 August 1968.
Photograph: Libor Hajsky/AFP/Getty Images
Anger, horror, and
contempt – these certainly; but most of all a feeling of deep sadness. After 50
years communism still means, in Soviet eyes, the rule of the tank and the
jack-boot. And after a decade in which, all over the world, hopes had risen
that civilised relations between nations might at last become the rule, the
Russian leadership has retreated into its old imperialism. The aim of the
reformist movement in Czechoslovakia was
simple. It was to bring elementary civilities and freedoms into the Socialist
way of life. “The Communist Party”, wrote the Czechoslovak
Praesidium in one of its historic rejoinders, “depends on the voluntary support
of the people. It cannot enforce its line by orders, but by the work of its
members and the truth of its ideals. It cannot impel its authority, but must
constantly acquire it by its actions.”
Prague Spring
Prague spring 1968 - Warsaw Pact tanks in Praha (French Audio)
Prague Spring 1968
The Prague Spring of 1968
But the Russian
leaders and their pitiable satraps saw in this idealism a menace to their own
positions, which are maintained not by consent but by power. In spite of their
agreement, only just over a fortnight ago, to allow the Czechs and Slovaks
their own mode of development, they have resorted to the same treachery which,
twelve years ago, put down the movement for colonial freedom in Hungary.
Hungary at that time had renounced the Warsaw Pact and was on the way to a
two-party system. How much less justification is there now for action against a
country which has constantly professed its loyalty to the Soviet Union.
Support of the
people: The Russians’ excuse for invasion is as contemptible as the deed. It is the
excuse first suggested in May by General Yepishev, the political head of the
Red Army, who was later taxed with it by the newly freed press in Prague. He
proposed that the Army should heed an appeal from a group of “loyal Communists”
to go to their aid. Yesterday’s statement by Tass used this formula. “Party and
Government leaders,” it said, had requested military assistance. The last act
of “Rude Pravo” before it fell once more under Russian censorship was to
publish the Praesidium’s denial of this specious excuse. No doubt in time we
shall be told who these “leaders” are; but Mr Stewart was quite correct last
night to announce that Britain would continue to recognise the Government which
existed until yesterday morning. No one can doubt that the Government had the
support of the people. The brave, eager, and idealistic young people of
Czechoslovakia, who had not yet learned to accept the fatalism of their
fathers, and who had so visibly relished their sudden release from the deathly
conformism of so many years, are once again today in a police State. It is a
tragedy beyond description.
Audio-visuals of some major events of 1968
Anti Vietnam-war Demonstrations (1968)
Vietnam War protest in Washington
European anti-Vietnam War Protests
Anti-Vietnam War Demonstration In New York & San Francisco (M. Luther King addresses crowd in New York & Mrs Luther King speaks at rally in San Francisco) [No audio, nos. of still images].
Anti-Vietnam War Demonstration In Berlin
Tet Offensive
Tet Offensive War Footage
Vietnam War - Tet Offensive
Prague Spring
Prague spring 1968 - Warsaw Pact tanks in Praha (French Audio)
Prague Spring 1968
The Prague Spring of 1968
Polish Crisis
March 1968. The last exodus of Polish Jews
Paris, May 1968: The Student Revolt
"All Power to the Imagination"
Mexico Olympics
1968 Massacre at Tlatelolco (01:09 - 03:22)
NYRW
1960's Women's Liberation Movement - A PBS Documentary Trailer
Why did feminists protest against the Miss America pageant in 1968?
Martin Luther King
MLK Assassination and Watts Riots - 1968
MLK Assassination and Watts Riots - 1968
Martin Luther King - Assassination and Aftermath- CBS News Special Report April 5, 1968
https://www.c-span.org/video/?443015-1/martin-luther-king-assassination-aftermath
