Czechoslovakia - The Soviet Impact

is now three years since the events of February, 1948, the six days of crisis in Czechoslovakia which placed the Communist Party in undisputed control of the affairs of the republic. In most spheres of this bloodless Czechoslovak October Revolution accelerated and deepened the revolution which had been launched in 1945.1 The national revolution, in the form of the expulsion of the Germans, has not, as some predicted, been reversed. The new policy of Slavonic co-operation, it is true, has, except for the new relationship of Czechs and Slovaks within the state, faded into the background as a result of the clash with Yugoslavia and the rapprocehment with Eastern Germany. The economic and political revolutions have been extended, taking Czechoslovakia further along the road to socialism and a Communist state. A social and intellectual revolution is now under way, penetrating and transforming every corner of Czech and Slovak life. Unhampered by civil war or foreign intervention, the Czech and Slovak Communists have been able to effect these changes at a much more rapid pace than did the Russian Communists and have accomplished more of their objectives in three years than the latter did in a decade. In 1918 Masaryk and Benes had oriented the new Czechoslovakia on western examples. The republic had been an outpost of western ideas and until Munich, a line of French defence in Central Europe. Munich had put an end to its defensive function and delivered a profound shock to the western orientation in general. Now, since 1948, Gottwald, the Communist leader, now President, has oriented the new Czechoslovakia on the eastern model. The republic has become a westerly outpost of Soviet ideas and of Soviet defence in Central Europe. Czechoslovakia is now fully embarked on the LeninistStalinist path towards the ultimate goal of socialism and communism. For the first time, an experiment in establishing a communist state is being made in a state with experience in democracy and with a background profoundly different from that of Russia, China or any other state now under Communist rule. How far has the Soviet way of life been copied or duplicated in Czechoslovakia? How far have Soviet patterns been adapted and modified in their application to vastly different conditions? How far have