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

None of these efforts, however, proved successful in derailing the Prague Spring. As Brezhnev and other leaders increasingly realized that an internal crackdown was not going to materialize, the high-level debate in Moscow moved toward consensus. The Soviet Politburo tentatively decided at its meetings on 22 and 26/27 July to proceed with a full-scale invasion sometime in mid-to late August if the situation in Czechoslovakia did not fundamentally change. When the Soviet Politburo reconvened in an expanded session on 6 August to review the latest developments, no one any longer really expected that military action could be averted. Although a few participants voiced reservations about the potential costs of an invasion—especially if, as Defense Minister Andrei Grechko warned, the incoming troops encountered armed resistance—the Politburo reached a consensus on 6 August to proceed with military intervention in Czechoslovakia unless Dubček took immediate, drastic steps to comply with Soviet demands. 24This consensus did not yet signify an irrevocable decision to invade, but it did mean that Brezhnev and other Soviet leaders had essentially abandoned hope that “anything more can be expected” of Dubček.

As the time for military action approached, Brezhnev made one final attempt to pressure Dubček to reverse course. The strain of the crisis was beginning to take a serious toll on Brezhnev’s health, but he was still determined to exhaust all other options before resorting to military action. 25Although he confided to his aides that he was deeply worried about “losing Czechoslovakia” and “being removed from [his] post as General Secretary,” he also was concerned that an invasion would exact high political costs of its own. 26He and other Soviet leaders were in the Crimea during the second week of August, but he kept in close touch with Dubček by phone throughout that time. Brezhnev also maintained contact with Dubček via the Soviet ambassador, Stepan Chervonenko. In a phone conversation with Dubček on 9 August, Brezhnev tried to compel the KSČ leader to act. Brezhnev emphasized how “dire” the situation had become, and he urged Dubček to live up to “the conditions we jointly approved and agreed on [at the beginning of August after holding bilateral negotiations] in Čierna nad Tisou.” 27In a follow-up telephone conversation four days later, Brezhnev was far more aggressive and belligerent, accusing Dubček of “outright deceit” and of “blatantly sabotaging the agreements reached at Čierna and Bratislava.” 28The Soviet leader warned that in the “entirely new situation that has emerged” the USSR “would be obliged to consider adopting new, independent measures that will defend both the KSČ and the cause of socialism in Czechoslovakia.”

Soon after the phone conversation on the 13th, Brezhnev sent an urgent cable to Chervonenko ordering him to meet with Dubček as soon as possible to reemphasize the “extraordinary gravity” of the situation and the need for immediate action. 29Chervonenko did so that same evening, but his efforts, too, were of no avail. The failure of these different contacts seems to have been what finally spurred Brezhnev to conclude that “nothing more can be expected from the current KSČ CC Presidium” and that a military solution could no longer be deferred. 30From then on, the dynamic of the whole situation changed. Brezhnev, during his break in the Crimea, had been conferring with other senior members of the CPSU Politburo and Secretariat, most of whom were vacationing nearby. 31Ad-hoc sessions of the Politburo were convened on 13, 14, and 15 August to discuss appropriate responses. Brezhnev and his colleagues acknowledged that a military solution “would be fraught with complications,” but they all agreed that any delay in acting “would lead to civil war in Czechoslovakia and the loss of it as a socialist country.” 32

On 17 August, with all the top leaders back in Moscow, the Soviet Politburo convened and voted unanimously to “provide assistance and support to the Communist Party and people of Czechoslovakia through the use of [the Soviet] armed forces.” 33No one on the Politburo expressed doubt about the decision. The following day, at a hastily convened meeting in Moscow, Brezhnev informed the leaders of East Germany, Poland, Bulgaria, and Hungary about the decision. 34Similar briefings were held in Moscow on 19 August for the members of the CPSU Central Committee, for the heads of union-republic, regional, and municipal party organizations, and for senior government officials. After the briefings on the 19th, the CPSU Politburo convened for several hours to review the military and political aspects of the upcoming operation. 35Detailed presentations by Defense Minister Grechko and the chief of the Soviet General Staff, Marshal Matvei Zakharov, provided grounds for optimism about the military side of the invasion, but the political preparations received less scrutiny. Although most of the Politburo members expressed confidence that the “healthy forces” in Czechoslovakia (a group of KSČ hardliners who secretly conspired with the Soviet Union before the invasion) would carry out their plan to seize power, a few Politburo members seemed more skeptical about “what will happen after our troops enter Czechoslovakia.” 36

Over the next day, Soviet officials and military commanders kept in close touch with their East European counterparts. Unlike in 1956, when Soviet troops intervened in Hungary unilaterally (after turning down offers of help from Romania, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria), Brezhnev was determined to give the invasion in 1968 a multilateral appearance. Combat soldiers from Poland, Bulgaria, and Hungary and a liaison unit from East Germany took part in the invasion, which began at 11:00 p.m. (Moscow time) on 20 August.

The Soviet High Command went to great lengths to make sure that the incoming forces would not encounter any armed resistance. When the first Soviet troops crossed the border, Marshal Grechko phoned the Czechoslovak national defense minister, General Martin Dzúr, and warned him that if Czechoslovak soldiers fired “even a single shot” in resistance, the Soviet Army would “crush the resistance mercilessly” and Dzúr himself would “be strung up from a telephone pole and shot.” 37Dzúr heeded the warning by ordering all Czechoslovak troops to remain in their barracks indefinitely, to avoid the use of weapons for any purpose, and to offer “all necessary assistance to the Soviet forces.” 38A similar directive was issued by the Czechoslovak president and commander in chief Ludvík Svoboda after he was informed of the invasion—in more cordial terms—by Ambassador Chervonenko shortly before midnight. 39Neither Dzúr nor Svoboda welcomed the invasion, but both of them believed that armed resistance would merely result in widespread, futile bloodshed. The KSČ Presidium and the Czechoslovak government also promptly instructed the army and security forces not to put up active opposition; and the Soviet commander of the invasion, General Ivan Pavlovskii, issued a prepared statement in the name of the Soviet High Command urging Czechoslovak soldiers to remain in their barracks. 40As a result of all these appeals, the Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops faced no armed resistance at all.

Soviet airborne forces and KGB special operations personnel spearheaded the invasion, and they were followed within a few hours by nearly 170,000 regular Soviet troops. (In subsequent days, nearly 300,000 more Soviet soldiers moved into Czechoslovakia, bringing the total to around 450,000-500,000.) Within hours, the Soviet-led units seized control of Czechoslovakia’s transportation and communications networks and surrounded all the main Communist Party and government buildings in Prague and other cities. Soviet troops then began methodically occupying key sites (including military bases and airfields) and setting up new communications and broadcasting facilities. In the early morning hours of 21 August, Soviet commandos from the elite Taman division, accompanied by KGB officers and Czechoslovak State Security forces, entered the KSČ Central Committee headquarters and arrested Dubček and the other KSČ Presidium members who had supported the Prague Spring (except for Prime Minister Oldřich Černík, who had been arrested earlier at his office in the Government Ministers’ building). 41Soon after Dubček and the other KSČ officials were spirited away, the whole of Czechoslovakia fell under Soviet military control.