Günter Bischof - The Prague Spring and the Warsaw Pact Invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968

In TASS correspondence from Bonn on the event that was also at the center of the Foreign Ministry report of 16 April, this information was relayed in a tone that might be called anxious rather than neutral:

From 31 March to 10 April the “Czechoslovak Days” took place in Frankfurt am Main. They were organized by the German-Czechoslovak Society that is based in the FRG…. At the opening of the “Czechoslovak Days,” the director of the Institute for Politics and Economics in Prague, Prof. Šnejdarek, delivered an address. According to the Frankfurter Allgemeine , Šnejdarek has been active over the past few years as covert promoter of a gradual raprochement between the German and the Czechoslovak viewpoints. The subject Šnejdarek chose for his address in Frankfurt was the Munich Agreement. Commenting on the address, the Frankfurter Rundschau writes: “He went so far as to say that the Czechs thought the statements of Brandt and Kiesinger on the Munich Agreement sufficient.” Politically speaking, this of course means turning over an entirely new leaf. 24

An interview of the head of the Economics Department of the same Prague Institute, Karl Tauber, with the radio station Deutschlandfunk was linked by the DPA to the following day. In it, Tauber “advocated a speeding up of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Czechoslovakia and the FRG” and also referred to the ČSSR’s “interest to obtain loans from the FRG.” He also noted certain reservations on the Czech side: “Tauber declared that what Czechoslovakia was waiting for before diplomatic contacts could be established was a clear and unequivocal statement that the Munich Agreement was invalid from the beginning. In addition, it was desirable for the Federal Republic to turn over a new leaf in its attitude to the other part of Germany.” 25

There is no doubt that this bit of news had the potential to alarm those who read it in the USSR. Czechoslovakia could potentially go down the road of Romania, particularly as the “reservations” that were quoted were extremely weak. The Romanian analogy, incidentally, was extremely topical with regard to the ČSSR at the time and was frequently discussed in European circles. A characteristic example is taken from a conversation between the Soviet ambassador to Austria, Boris Podtserob, and his Czech colleague Pavel Novotný on 26 February 1968. The transcript contains the following passage:

Austria’s political leaders evince considerable interest in their talks with Novotný in the changes that have recently taken place in the Czechoslovak party leadership. They seem to assume that changes are unfolding in Czechoslovakia that will result in the country taking up a position comparable to Romania. This, however, will not be the case, said Comrade Novotný, as Czechoslovakia will abide by its course of lasting friendship and close cooperation with the USSR and the other Socialist countries. 26

The publication of “Apropos Foreign Politics” by Šedivoj in Literární noviny of 18 April 1968 and “Should We Negotiate with the FRG?” by Henzel in Lidová demokracie of 24 April bore witness to changes in exactly the direction that Podtserob’s interlocutor had ruled out as impossible. The more detailed assessment of these articles in the files of the Soviet embassy undertaken for Moscow’s information was already couched in a deliberately disapproving tone. 27

It was not only on the level of theoretical disquisitions of individual journalists that a new course was steered on the basis of unilateral activities that had not previously been discussed with the Warsaw Pact allies. Developments at the ČSSR-FRG border made headlines in the Western media, from where the news gradually seeped through to the Soviet decision-makers through TASS, that is, through nonpublic channels. On 3 April, the Reuters News Agency, citing the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior, reported that “today Czechoslovak soldiers have removed the triple barbed-wire barrier at the West German border.” This was followed by an “expert” explanation: the border installations “have become redundant as a new barrier is being erected about a kilometer further inland on Czechoslovak territory.” 28After a two-week silence, the ČTK News Agency, citing Práce , came up with its own version:

As we have gathered from the commanding officer of the border police in the region of Chodský, repair works on the barrier are underway at those sections of the barrier that have either been damaged over time or that have been moved too far inland. There are several stretches where the triple barrier is too far away from the actual border, so much so that the intervening space is being used for agriculture or forestry…. Instead of the barrier that has now been removed new ones will be built at the border that are technologically up-todate and more effective. 29

The contradiction between the two versions—the first one claimed that the barrier was going to be moved farther inland, whilst according to the second, more authoritative one it was a matter of making the barrier identical with the border—was not difficult to notice. It necessarily led to the conclusion that until such time as the “other barrier was being built” there would be no barrier at all. It was precisely this (logical) reasoning that led to Aleksei Kosygin’s well known letter to the first minister of the ČSSR, Oldřich Černik, in which he stated that “owing to the overindulgence of the Czechoslovak authorities involved, the borders of Czechoslovakia are virtually open.” 30

This accusation was repeated in a more pointed form in the note of 20 July sent by the Foreign Ministry of the USSR to the ČSSR embassy, which stated that “the situation at the Western borders of the ČSSR has not only not improved after the receipt of the Czechoslovak side’s answer but work at the border has actually slowed down.” 31In the reply to this note, the Czechoslovak embassy in Moscow duly denied this accusation, adding that “the new Czechoslovak government has introduced a number of measures since May in order to ensure a stricter border management regime also for foreigners.” The note cited as proof above all that “during the recent maneuvers of the Allies, members of the Warsaw Pact High Command, with Soviet Marshal Ivan Yakubovskii at the head, visited a border post” and had “voiced their satisfaction with the measures, efforts and means that were being deployed in the defense of the Czechoslovak border.” 32

It would be tempting to accept the Czech line of argumentation if it were not obvious that the Western borders of the ČSSR had indeed been “open” in 1968, which was, in fact, due to the visa regulations that were in force. The ČSSR’s reply to the Soviet note, incidentally, gave an answer to a question that had not been asked by stating that the issue of visas to “members of the Armed Forces of NATO countries” had been stopped. This measure, however, was insufficient to rebut the charge referring to the possibilities that “were immediately exploited by imperialist intelligence services, particularly of the FRG and the U.S. These services sent spies and ‘diversants’ to the ČSSR, who were outwardly indistinguishable from ordinary tourists, in order for them to engage in subversive activities against the leadership in Czechoslovakia as well as against that in other Socialist countries.” 33

It is conceivable that the Soviet side did not want to be painted as a sponsor of the Iron Curtain or to reveal information it had received through secret channels. However, it did not take long for openly accessible information to emerge. In addition to the episode mentioned above concerning Porsch’s query that was commented on by Der Spiegel , there was an article three days later in the Neue Rhein-Zeitung of 7 August entitled “Queuing up for Visas to Czechoslovakia.” It stated, among other things, that the ČSSR Military Mission in West Berlin was “literally being flooded with visa applications.” Because these applications were processed inside one day, the result was that “in the first seven months of this year, more than 152,000 visas have been issued to German citizens.” This article also soon found its way into the TASS Report. 34