We Russians are different from Europeans. We are a different civilization. And it becomes noticeable in everything. Including how we…occupy.

The entry of troops of the countries participating in the Warsaw Pact into Czechoslovakia in 1968 is an absolutely justified operation. We did not allow chaos in a friendly country and the destruction of our defensive belt. This is the first. Secondly, the same thing happened in Czechoslovakia (with a slight correction) as in Ukraine in 2014.-m. And thirdly, order and security in Czechoslovakia were provided not only by Soviet troops, but also by the military contingents of some countries of the Warsaw Pact. Including the troops of the GDR.
How did the Germans and Russians behave? What was the difference?

About this material that was sent to me by a reader of the resource website Victor Dmitrievich Bychkov. These are the stories of one direct participant in these events. He continues the theme that was opened by my story about the book I read by Yuri Galushko "Czechoslovakia-68. View of a Soviet officer from the past to the future.

Regarding Czechoslovakia and the events of 1968 that took place there.

These are my youthful memories. In 1968 I was in the 8th grade. And I remember well how we acutely experienced the events taking place there with our friends, how we felt sorry for the deceived Czechs, and were ready at any moment to move there to help. Already at the beginning of winter, somewhere in December, the elder brother of my comrade, Anikin Vladimir, returned from the army, who participated in the events that took place in Czechoslovakia.
At first, he said almost nothing, but gradually we started talking to him. A small company of young men gathered, mostly they were close friends of the one who had returned from the army, I sometimes got there as a friend of my younger brother. There was home-made light wine, but the main thing is that we all eagerly listened to the stories of an eyewitness who had already been abroad, and even participated in such historical events. He asked not to tell anyone from his stories. However, I remember very well what he said then.

So the first thing is how he got there. He served urgently in Ukraine, at a military airfield, in some kind of airfield service. They were mainly involved in airfield security and simple things like maintaining the runway in proper order, fixing aircraft under the guidance of technicians, etc. One evening they were alerted, personal weapons, helmets, ammunition, etc. , loaded into transporters, and they flew. The soldiers noticed that in addition to ammunition and weapons, quite a lot of ammunition and other things were loaded on board. They didn’t know where they were flying, everyone thought that these were exercises.

They flew for a long time. As soon as they sat down, they quickly started unloading. The fact that this is already abroad was not understood immediately, only after dawn.

Paratroopers with their equipment were unloaded from other planes, who quickly left, and the soldiers of the narrator's unit behind the airfield near the forest and the stream pitched tents, equipping a tent city. There was a small town not far from the airfield, to which they sent armed patrols with officers. On the opposite side of the airfield there was a small air terminal and several other low airfield buildings. In the morning, the airfield employees came and looked with surprise at the soldiers, planes, etc. Need to say,
that our planes flew in quite often, they brought mainly paratroopers with equipment and other things, who quickly left.

The brought ammunition was stored right next to the runway. There were also tents in which our army airfield authorities, a communications center, etc. were located. Everything was mine.
By the middle of the day, the first signs of rejection and unfriendliness of the local population began to appear. The youth especially tried.
They shouted curses, showed all sorts of obscene gestures.
By evening, two motorcyclists drove onto the runway, who rushed along the runway, drove up to the planes, threw stones and bottles into the air intakes, windows of the aircraft cabins, etc. .. The soldiers were ordered to force them out of the strip without using weapons and force. This was done with difficulty.
Another problem is water. At first, water was collected for the kitchen and other household needs from a fairly clean stream, but soon this could not be done, because. the local population began to go and deliberately shit in the stream upstream, throw sewage, dead dogs, etc. there. Trips to the town for water were also unsuccessful - if they started to draw water somewhere, it quickly ended. Moved to another place and there the same picture. The water was turned off very quickly and in a coordinated manner. In general, water was already going to be transported by aircraft. It was also tight with firewood for the kitchen - they mostly drowned in broken boxes of cartridges, and zinc with cartridges was stacked. Airport employees did not let soldiers into the airport, use the toilet, etc. , and the soldiers had to run into the bushes on the other side of the lanes, which caused laughter from local residents and airport employees. They tried to dig a hole for a toilet for military personnel, but from the airport someone came the local chief and did not allow this to be done. Say, you can’t dig anything and that’s it. It was difficult to patrol the area around, and the town. The local population very quickly became impudent in expressing their hostility, especially the youth. They threw stones, sticks, shouted. But there was a strict order: not to use weapons and physical force, to endure everything, to show friendliness.

The situation was heating up, and this, of course, would eventually lead to bad consequences. Our soldiers would run out of patience.
Moreover, many patrols were sent and there were not enough officers for all, and often two soldiers walked without an officer. On the second day, two patrol soldiers disappeared altogether and were never found. Everyone understood that they were most likely killed and buried somewhere.

And then the Germans showed up. And the situation began to change radically. By the afternoon of the third day, a column of the German army arrived. As Volodya, who was on patrol and was just in the center of this town on the square, said, it was like in a movie about the Great Patriotic War. First motorcyclists with machine guns, then a column. Ahead and behind armored personnel carriers with machine gunners at the ready. In the center of the column is a senior officer in a car, accompanied by other officers. The column entered the square, parts of it dispersed along the streets near the square. A senior officer and his entourage got out of the car.
The elder looked around the area and the surroundings, consulted the map. Then he indicates where the headquarters will be, next to the future headquarters - a house for himself. Immediately he gives a command to his officers, showing where the units will be placed. Before that, the soldiers were sitting in cars, there was no movement, everyone was waiting. As soon as the commands were received, the work began to boil. The soldiers quickly vacated houses for headquarters and for housing for a senior officer, the rest were also engaged in accommodation under the guidance of their commanders. How were they liberated at home? It's very simple - they expelled local residents from there.

A respectable man was quickly brought to the elder, presumably the local mayor, and some other representative personalities. The eldest of the Germans briefly explained to them, or rather indicated what should be done. Since there was no smell of discussion, the local authorities did not even think of objecting, but only dragged on in front of the Germans. Moreover, the Germans all spoke German to the locals, without bothering to translate, and they understood them perfectly. The Germans behaved in a very businesslike way.
A German officer approached our patrols, saluted, and asked in Russian who they were and where their unit was located. He explained that they needed to contact the leadership of our unit. The soldiers answered, after which the officer saluted and went to report to the elder. The senior officer, accompanied by motorcyclists with machine guns, went to the location of our unit. The soldiers do not know what the senior officers were talking about, but, apparently, our commander complained about the situation with the water. Somewhere in the evening, after two or three hours, such a picture was visible. The Czechs quickly pulled the water supply to the location of the unit, metal pipes were laid directly on the ground or slightly dug. They also made wiring for several cranes, where they were indicated, they worked very quickly. Since then, clean water has always been in abundance. In addition, the Czechs began to regularly bring chopped ready-made firewood in the required quantity, i.e. and this problem was also quickly resolved.

By evening, events took place at the airfield that radically changed the attitude of the locals towards our presence. The fact is that it was possible to call at the airfield from different sides, it was not fenced. Only on one side, in the direction from the airport to the city, there was a fence.And that one is from cattle, because there was pasture. And that same local youth used it. They flew in on motorcycles, threw bottles, stones and other things at the planes, laughed at the soldiers who tried to force them out of the runways. They threw the same thing at the soldiers, and they received injuries and bruises, but they could not do anything. And on the evening of the third day after the appearance of the Germans, a car drove into the runways, in which four youths rushed around the runway, drove up to the planes, etc. .. The order to force them out did not give anything. However, this time the hooligans went far - they hit two soldiers with a car, seriously injuring them. The Czech airfield staff watched with laughter what was happening, with great joy meeting every successful feint of the youths and especially their run over the soldiers. And soldiers with weapons could not do anything with these youths - after all, they were not allowed to shoot.

But then, unfortunately for these youths, a German patrol drove up to the airfield on two motorcycles with machine guns. The Germans quickly understood everything. The youths, seeing the German patrol, rushed to flee along the outer lane. Behind them, or rather along a parallel strip, one motorcycle rushed. Having driven away, so that it was impossible to catch someone random, the machine gunner knocked out the car with one burst. He immediately shot two fellows sitting in the front seats. The car stopped. Two sitting behind jumped out and rushed to run.
The machine gunner fired two short bursts along the ground to the left and right of the runners. One stopped, raised his hands and walked back, the second continued to run away, trying to dodge. This caused the machine gunner to laugh, and he cut him off with a short burst, then walked from the machine gun over the already lying one with two more bursts. The second, standing with raised hands, the German beckoned to him shouting "com, com." He went like a drunk, sobbing loudly. Our officer sent soldiers, and they pulled out of the burning car two dead people who were sitting in front. Walking with raised hands and sobbing youth, the German showed where to go.
Having brought him closer to the airport, he put him on his knees, hands behind his head and stood nearby with a machine gun at the ready. The youth sobbed loudly all the time and asked for something. But the German did not pay any attention to this.
From the second patrol motorcycle they reported on what was happening to their superiors. The Czech airport staff no longer laughed and silently watched what was happening. Soon a car arrived with a German officer and two soldiers. The officer got out of the car, listened to the report of the senior patrolman, turned around and went to the nearest downed our soldier, lying on the landing strip in blood, in the place where he was shot down. He was already being treated, bandaged, put on splints, and he was moaning loudly. The officer approached, looked, saluted our officer who approached and said, pointing at the soldiers’ machine guns: “you need to shoot.” He obviously did not understand why weapons were not used in such an obvious situation. He turned and walked towards the kneeling youth. As he approached, he unfastened his holster on the move. Approaching about three meters, he shot him in the forehead, after which he calmly put the pistol back and gave a command to his soldiers.
His soldiers ran to the airport and hid there. It soon became clear why. They literally kicked everyone who was there to the site in front of the airport. When an officer approached there, the soldiers were already driving the last ones out.
On the side and behind the officer, one of the patrol motorcycles with a machine gun drove up, and the machine gunner held the whole crowd at gunpoint, silently and very cautiously looking at the officer and the machine gunner. It also seemed to us that now they would put down from a machine gun those standing in front of them. But the officer made a short speech in German, which those rounded up in front of him sullenly accepted. He probably told them who's boss
and how to behave.

After that, they ran very quickly to the airport, and everything began to stir. A fire engine rushed in, putting out the tanned car, and then dragged it from the landing. Soon a tow truck took her away. Then three local policemen arrived, with whom the German officer also had a brief conversation. The junior policemen loaded the corpses into a truck and left, while the senior policeman was taken with him by a German officer. In general, the Germans acted with such absolute confidence in their rightness and the correctness of what they were doing that all the locals involuntarily obeyed them implicitly.

After all that had happened, no one from the locals had ever come close to the airfield, except for those who worked there. In addition, an excavator arrived two hours later, and an elderly excavator asked where the Russians should dig. So the side roads and paths leading to the airport were blocked, after which a large pit was dug for a soldier's toilet, which the Czechs had not allowed to do before. Now none of the locals objected. I must also say that after that our soldiers and officers were allowed to freely enter the airport and generally everywhere. At the same time, they tried ... as if not to notice. Attempts to somehow misbehave at the airport, etc. was also no more.

And one more consequence. The next day, a team of Czech carpenters arrived and, under the leadership of a German non-commissioned officer, quickly built a rather high and solid tower on the road leading from the town to the airport. Convenient staircase, roof, double walls on the tower itself, overlapping boards, sandbags between the walls - protection from bullets.
Mounts for machine guns, a powerful searchlight on the turret. Convenient, everything is visible and everything is shot through. A barrier was also installed there and next to it a booth made of boards with glass windows, which was very convenient, especially in bad weather. Our soldiers hardly used the tower, but it was visible far away and had a very disciplining effect on the locals. Such a classic German tower.

About a week later, a group of young people, 20-30 people, came to the airfield from the grazing side, with posters “Russians go home”, with a loudspeaker into which they shouted all sorts of calls to “get out the invaders”. We approached from the side, from the side of the airport, but not very close to the runway, and did not approach the tents. The duty officer at the checkpoint sent a soldier to the tower to see if there were many of them, if there was anyone else behind them, in general, to look around.
So, as soon as the protesters saw that the soldier began to climb the tower, they immediately ran away, leaving part of the posters on the spot. Maybe they thought they were going to shoot.

Another episode I remember, which Volodya Anikin told about. With the arrival of the Germans, the situation changed dramatically. The local population was very respectful of the Germans and German patrols, fulfilled their slightest requirements. In general, it never occurred to the Czechs that one could argue or disagree with the Germans. Especially if you treat them with disrespect. And the German patrols spared no cartridges. No one dared to throw a stone at them or pour mud over them, etc. In response - instantaneous fire to kill, indiscriminately why this happened. Therefore, our patrols tried to get a German soldier in the company or even go along with the German patrol. The Germans treated this favorably. They clearly enjoyed the role of law enforcement officers.
And then one day a patrol, in which Volodya and a Russian sergeant, senior patrol, were sent to patrol the streets on the outskirts of the town. Going there, they made a detour and passed through the streets where the Germans lodged. There, near one of the houses, German soldiers were clustered, cackling merrily.
It must be said that the German soldiers, despite their discipline, had many more freedoms than our soldiers. They had more free time, they could go somewhere on their own time, etc.

Approaching our German colleagues, ours tried to somehow communicate, say or understand something. The Germans knew that Russian soldiers were often offended
local, and they were clearly flattered by the role of some sort of protector. At the very least, the German soldiers immediately realized that our soldiers had to patrol the outskirts on foot and wanted to have a German in the company for cover. I must say that the Germans usually patrolled on two motorcycles with sidecars with machine guns. Machine gunners were always at the ready...
One young soldier volunteered with ours, who immediately ran away and reported this to his non-commissioned officer, who, smiling knowingly, released the soldier. And here they are, three of them, trying to communicate. The German knows some Russian words, a lot of gestures of facial expressions, all three are fun and interesting. They are already walking along the very outskirts, along the suburbs, where everything already looks more like summer cottages. On the left is a solid fence, and then a mesh one. The German turned to a solid fence and began to relieve himself. (In general, German soldiers did not hesitate to celebrate their needs, especially small ones, almost everywhere in the city). Well, Volodya and the sergeant went a little further ahead, where the mesh fence already began. Here, from behind the fence, from the bushes, a stone flies and hits the back of our sergeant. Our patrols did not pay attention to such stones, and getting a stone on the back was a common thing. But now the German sees it, the Russian soldiers are already catching up. And the one who threw, did not see the German because of the solid fence. The reaction of a soldier of the GDR is instantaneous - he rips off the machine gun and releases the entire horn from the belt like a fan through the bushes.
Volodya says that we are standing dumbfounded with the sergeant. The German reloads his machine gun and is about to shoot some more. Volodya said that, without agreeing with the sergeant, they ran up to the German and took the machine gun from him. He resignedly gave it away, but fervently said something to them and pointed to the bushes from where the stone had flown. He clearly did not understand why the Russians did not shoot and behave so strangely.

Behind the bushes are some summer buildings, such as a plywood gazebo or something else.
From there, crying is heard. The German shows with the passion of a hunter that, they say, where the game is sitting, and it must now be punished. And our soldiers are dragging an ally away. He tries to explain something, but he is taken away and quickly. And only when the German calmed down, and moved far enough away, did ours give the German a machine gun. For us, it was wild, said Volodya Anikin, to shoot combat in the village. And besides, giving out two horns of live ammunition, we were strictly warned that it was impossible to shoot under any circumstances. Die, but don't shoot. Why then give live ammunition, why send it somewhere? And the Germans, apparently, did not report for cartridges, and therefore they were not spared.

And some more observations of Vladimir Anikin:

“The Germans ate in restaurants that were turned into soldiers' canteens for lunchtime. The Czechs brought fresh vegetables, fruits, fresh meat, greens, etc. for them. .. Our patrols saw it well. Whether the Germans paid for this we did not know, but they ate much better against us. We are mostly porridge and stew.
Soup borsch - also with stew. There was no variety or variety. But here's what we've learned to do. There, they had quite a lot of deer and roe deer roaming through the fields and forests, which were little afraid of people. Once they saw how a German truck stopped and an officer sitting in the cab, taking a machine gun from a soldier, shot a deer, which the German soldiers dragged into the back and left. An example has been provided.
We asked the German soldiers for cartridges and shot deer. They quickly butchered, took away the meat. The machine gun from which they shot was quickly cleaned. If they asked who failed, they said that the Germans. What will you take from the Germans? They do what they want. Of course, many of the officers guessed, or maybe they knew, that we were shooting, but such welding and such explanations suited everyone. So we ate venison.
Another reason why it was beneficial to be friends with the Germans is that they went to any pubs, where a separate table was always immediately provided for them, even if the pub was overcrowded. They ordered beer, and the beer there was very good, and after drinking, they left without paying. We didn’t have Czech money, but the Germans may have had it, but they didn’t pay. And why - in front of them the Czechs already bent.

About the German organization of business. Again, our patrols, which stuck out in the center of the city, saw that every morning the local mayor was stretched out waiting for a senior German officer in front of his house. He went to his headquarters in the morning. Sometimes he gave instructions to this mayor, sometimes he led him and someone else to his headquarters. Those. there was a clear vertical of power, and everyone knew what he had to do. First, everything that the Germans need, and then mind your own business. Therefore, in Prague, of course, it was necessary to let the Germans in first. Firstly,
the Czechs would not strongly oppose and provoke them. And if someone twitched, the Germans would have explained with great pleasure that this was not necessary, it would be worse for themselves.
For a police mission, the Germans are perfect. They know how to occupy and what to do with the occupied. Our army is not ready for this. Fight, yes. Win - yes. And to occupy and bend the occupied is not for us. So if the Germans were the first to be allowed into Prague, this would only strengthen the friendship of the peoples. Everyone would be fine. And the Czechs would be happy to remember now the Germans in Prague and their "European Ordnung".

In November it became very cold in the tents. Soldiers caught cold. A senior German came with his officer, who spoke Russian well,
and, talking with our commander, he said that it was impossible to live in tents. If he wants everyone to live together and be always at hand, he must take a local school. When our commander began to say that where the children would study, the German replied that let the local authorities deal with the problem of teaching local children, this is their business, and he must take care of his soldiers. This is all our signalman, who was present there, told. But our people still continued to live in tents, many were sick.”

At the end of November, Volodya was transferred to the Union and, in speed, was fired into the reserve. He already served for several months, but he understood that the situation was very difficult, he pulled the strap resignedly.
Volodya also told what the "soldier's" radio brought. But I convey only what he saw personally, with his own eyes. But what the "soldier's" radio brought in largely coincided with what he personally saw. The Czechs treat our soldiers badly, there are many provocations, sometimes with grave consequences for our soldiers, with injuries and even death. And the nobility of our soldiers only made them laugh. And the Czechs fear and respect the Germans. Although for the Germans they are second rate.
The German occupation is familiar to them, understandable, etc. And no matter how anyone bent and raped them, the “Russians” are still to blame for everything.
In 1970 I finished school and left to study. I haven't seen Vladimir since then and I don't know where he is. Almost half a century has passed, and much has changed in our lives. If he is alive - good health to him, but if he has already left - rest in peace. Surely you can find other participants in these events. Their memories would help to complete the picture of what was happening then in Czechoslovakia. A film would be good and truthful to shoot about it. Now, after all, few people remember these events.

Viktor Dmitrievich Bychkov

| The participation of the USSR in the conflicts of the times cold war. Events in Czechoslovakia (1968)

Events in Czechoslovakia
(1968)

The entry of troops into Czechoslovakia (1968), also known as Operation Danube or the Invasion of Czechoslovakia - in waters of the Warsaw Pact troops (except Romania) to Czechoslovakia, started August 21, 1968 and ending reforms of the Prague Spring.

The largest contingent of troops was allocated from the USSR. The united group (up to 500 thousand people and 5 thousand tanks and armored personnel carriers) was commanded by General of the Army I. G. Pavlovsky.

The Soviet leadership feared that if the Czechoslovak communists pursued an internal policy independent of Moscow, the USSR would lose control over Czechoslovakia. Such a turn of events threatened to split the Eastern European socialist bloc both politically and military-strategically. The policy of limited state sovereignty in the countries of the socialist bloc, which allows, among other things, the use military force, if necessary, received the name "Brezhnev's doctrine" in the West.

At the end of March 1968 The Central Committee of the CPSU sent classified information about the situation in Czechoslovakia to party activists. This document stated: “... recently, events have been developing in a negative direction. In Czechoslovakia, actions by irresponsible elements are on the rise, demanding the creation of an "official opposition" and showing "tolerance" to various anti-socialist views and theories. The past experience of socialist construction is incorrectly covered, proposals are put forward for a special Czechoslovak path to socialism, which is opposed to the experience of other socialist countries, attempts are made to cast a shadow on the foreign policy of Czechoslovakia, and the need for an "independent" foreign policy. There are calls for the creation of private enterprises, the abandonment of the planned system, and the expansion of ties with the West. Moreover, in a number of newspapers, on radio and television, calls are being propagated for “complete separation of the party from the state”, for the return of Czechoslovakia to the bourgeois republic of Masaryk and Benes, for the transformation of Czechoslovakia into an “open society” and others ... "

March 23 in Dresden, a meeting was held between the leaders of the parties and governments of six socialist countries - the USSR, Poland, the GDR, Bulgaria, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, at which the Secretary General of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia A. Dubcek was sharply criticized.

After the meeting in Dresden, the Soviet leadership began to develop options for action against Czechoslovakia, including military measures. The leaders of the GDR (W. Ulbricht), Bulgaria (T. Zhivkov) and Poland (W. Gomulka) took a hard line and to a certain extent influenced the Soviet leader L. Brezhnev.

The Soviet side did not rule out the option of NATO troops entering the territory of Czechoslovakia, which carried out maneuvers code-named "Black Lion" near the borders of Czechoslovakia.

Given the current military and political situation, spring 1968 The joint command of the Warsaw Pact, together with the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces, developed an operation code-named "Danube".

April 8, 1968 the commander of the airborne troops, General V.F. Margelov, received a directive, according to which he began planning the use of airborne assault forces on the territory of Czechoslovakia. The directive stated: Soviet Union and other socialist countries, true to international duty and the Warsaw Pact, must send their troops to assist the Czechoslovak people's army in the defense of the Motherland from the danger looming over it. The document also emphasized: “... if the troops of the Czechoslovak People's Army treat the appearance of Soviet troops, in this case it is necessary to organize interaction with them and jointly perform the assigned tasks. If the ChNA troops are hostile to the paratroopers and support the conservative forces, then it is necessary to take measures to localize them, and if this is not possible, to disarm them.

During April - May Soviet leaders tried to "reason" Alexander Dubcek, to draw his attention to the danger of the actions of anti-socialist forces. At the end of April, Marshal I. Yakubovsky, Commander-in-Chief of the Joint Armed Forces of the countries participating in the Warsaw Pact, arrived in Prague to prepare exercises for the troops of the Warsaw Pact countries on the territory of Czechoslovakia.

May 4th Brezhnev met with Dubcek in Moscow, but it was not possible to reach mutual understanding.

May 8 in Moscow A closed meeting of the leaders of the USSR, Poland, East Germany, Bulgaria and Hungary took place, during which a frank exchange of views took place on measures to be taken in connection with the situation in Czechoslovakia. Even then there were proposals for a military solution. However, at the same time, the leader of Hungary, J. Kadar, referring to, stated that the Czechoslovak crisis cannot be resolved by military means and a political solution must be sought.

At the end of May the government of Czechoslovakia agreed to conduct exercises of the troops of the Warsaw Pact countries called "Shumava", which took place June 20 - 30 involving only the headquarters of units, formations and signal troops. WITH 20 to 30 June For the first time in the history of the military bloc of the socialist countries, 16,000 personnel were brought into the territory of Czechoslovakia. WITH July 23 to August 10, 1968 on the territory of the USSR, the GDR and Poland, the rear exercises "Neman" were held, during which troops were redeployed to invade Czechoslovakia. On August 11, 1968, a major exercise of the air defense forces "Heavenly Shield" was held. On the territory of Western Ukraine, Poland and the GDR, exercises of the signal troops were held.

July 29 - August 1 a meeting was held in Čierná nad Tisou, which was attended by full squads The Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia together with President L. Svoboda. The Czechoslovak delegation at the talks basically acted as a united front, but V. Bilyak adhered to a special position. At the same time, a personal letter was received from a candidate member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia A. Kapek with a request to provide his country with "fraternal assistance" from the socialist countries.

IN late July preparation was completed military operation in Czechoslovakia, but a final decision on its implementation has not yet been made. August 3, 1968 A meeting of leaders of six communist parties took place in Bratislava. The statement adopted in Bratislava contained a phrase about collective responsibility in the defense of socialism. In Bratislava, L. Brezhnev was given a letter from five members of the leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia - Indra, Kolder, Kapek, Shvestka and Bilyak with a request for "effective assistance and support" in order to wrest Czechoslovakia "from the imminent danger of counter-revolution."

In the middle of August L. Brezhnev called A. Dubcek twice and asked why the personnel changes promised in Bratislava were not taking place, to which Dubcek replied that personnel matters were resolved collectively, by a plenum of the Central Committee of the party.

August 16 In Moscow, at a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, a discussion of the situation in Czechoslovakia was held and proposals for the introduction of troops were approved. At the same time, a letter was received from the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. August 17 Soviet Ambassador S. Chervonenko met with the President of Czechoslovakia L. Svoboda and informed Moscow that at the decisive moment the president would be together with the CPSU and the Soviet Union. On the same day, the materials prepared in Moscow for the text of the Appeal to the Czechoslovak people were sent to the group of "healthy forces" in the HRC. It was planned that they would create a Revolutionary Workers' and Peasants' Government. A draft appeal was also prepared by the governments of the USSR, the GDR, Poland, Bulgaria and Hungary to the people of Czechoslovakia, as well as to the Czechoslovak army.

August 18 A meeting of the leaders of the USSR, East Germany, Poland, Bulgaria and Hungary took place in Moscow. Appropriate measures were agreed, including the appearance of the "healthy forces" of the HRC with a request for military assistance. In a message to the President of Czechoslovakia, Svoboda, on behalf of the participants in the meeting in Moscow, one of the main arguments was the receipt of a request for assistance by the armed forces to the Czechoslovak people from the “majority” of the members of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and many members of the government of Czechoslovakia.

Operation Danube

The political goal of the operation was to change the political leadership of the country and establish a regime loyal to the USSR in Czechoslovakia. The troops were to seize the most important objects in Prague, the KGB officers were to arrest the Czech reformers, and then the Plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the session of the National Assembly were planned, where the top leadership was to be replaced. At the same time, a large role was assigned to President Svoboda.

The political leadership of the operation in Prague was carried out by a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU K. Mazurov.

The military preparation of the operation was carried out by Marshal I. I. Yakubovsky, Commander-in-Chief of the United Armed Forces of the Warsaw Pact countries, but a few days before the start of the operation, Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces, Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, General of the Army I. G. Pavlovsky was appointed its leader.

At the first stage, the main role was assigned to the airborne troops. air defense troops, Navy And rocket troops strategic purpose were put on high alert.

TO August 20 a grouping of troops was prepared, the first echelon of which numbered up to 250,000 people, and the total number - up to 500,000 people, about 5,000 tanks and armored personnel carriers. For the implementation of the operation, 26 divisions were involved, of which 18 were Soviet, not counting aviation. The troops of the Soviet 1st Guards Tank, 20th Guards Combined Arms, 16th Air Armies (Group of Soviet Forces in Germany), 11th Guards Army (Baltic Military District), 28th Combined Arms Army (Belarusian Military District) took part in the invasion. district), the 13th and 38th combined arms armies (Carpathian military district) and the 14th air army (Odessa military district).

The Carpathian and Central Fronts were formed:
☑ Carpathian Front was created on the basis of the administration and troops of the Carpathian military district and several Polish divisions. It included four armies: the 13th, 38th combined arms, 8th Guards Tank and 57th Air. At the same time, the 8th Guards Tank Army and part of the forces of the 13th Army began to move to the southern regions of Poland, where Polish divisions were additionally included in their composition. Commander Colonel General Bisyarin Vasily Zinovievich.
☑ central front was formed on the basis of the administration of the Baltic Military District with the inclusion of the troops of the Baltic Military District, the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany and the Northern Group of Forces, as well as individual Polish and East German divisions. This front was deployed in the GDR and Poland. The Central Front included the 11th and 20th Guards Combined Arms and the 37th Air Armies.

Also, the Southern Front was deployed to cover the operating group in Hungary. In addition to this front, the operational group Balaton (two Soviet divisions, as well as Bulgarian and Hungarian units) was deployed on the territory of Hungary to enter Czechoslovakia.

In general, the number of troops introduced into Czechoslovakia was:
☑ USSR- 18 motorized rifle, tank and air airborne divisions, 22 aviation and helicopter regiments, about 170,000 people;
☑ Poland- 5 infantry divisions, up to 40,000 people;
☑ GDR- motorized rifle and tank divisions, up to 15,000 people in total (according to publications in the press, it was decided at the last moment to refuse to send parts of the GDR to Czechoslovakia, they played the role of a reserve on the border;
☑ of Czechoslovakia there was an operational group of the NNA of the GDR of several dozen military personnel);
☑ Hungary- 8th motorized rifle division, separate units, a total of 12,500 people;
☑ Bulgaria- 12th and 22nd Bulgarian motorized rifle regiments, with a total number of 2164 people. and one Bulgarian tank battalion, armed with 26 T-34 vehicles.

The date for the entry of troops was set for the evening of August 20 when the meeting of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was held. On the morning of August 20, 1968, a secret order was read to the officers on the formation of the Danube High Command.

Commander-in-Chief was appointed General of the Army I. G. Pavlovsky, whose headquarters was deployed in the southern part of Poland. Both fronts (Central and Carpathian) and the Balaton task force, as well as two guards airborne divisions, were subordinate to him. On the first day of the operation, to ensure the landing of airborne divisions, five divisions of military transport aviation were allocated at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief "Danube".

Chronology of events

At 10:15 p.m. August 20 the troops received a signal "Vltava-666" about the beginning of the operation. IN 23:00 August 20 in the troops intended for the invasion, a combat alert was announced. Through closed communication channels, all fronts, armies, divisions, brigades, regiments and battalions were given a signal to advance. At this signal, all commanders were to open one of the five secret packages they kept (the operation was developed in five versions), and burn the four remaining in the presence of the chiefs of staff without opening. The opened packages contained an order to start Operation Danube and to continue hostilities in accordance with the Danube-Canal and Danube-Canal-Globus plans.

In advance, "Orders for interaction on the Danube operation" were developed. White stripes were applied to the military equipment participating in the invasion. All Combat vehicles Soviet and allied production without white stripes was subject to "neutralization", preferably without firing. In the event of resistance, stripless tanks and other military equipment were to be destroyed without warning and without commands from above. When meeting with NATO troops, it was ordered to stop immediately and not to shoot without a command.

Troops were sent in 18 places from the territory of the GDR, Poland, the USSR and Hungary. Parts of the 20th Guards Army from the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany (Lieutenant General Ivan Leontyevich Velichko) entered Prague, which established control over the main objects of the capital of Czechoslovakia. At the same time, two Soviet airborne divisions were landed in Prague and Brno.

IN 2 am August 21 At the airfield "Ruzyne" in Prague, advanced units of the 7th Airborne Division landed. They blocked the main objects of the airfield, where Soviet An-12s with troops and military equipment began to land. The capture of the airfield was carried out using a deceptive maneuver: a Soviet passenger plane flying up to the airfield requested an emergency landing due to alleged damage on board. After permission and landing, paratroopers from the aircraft captured the airport control tower and ensured the landing of landing aircraft.

At the news of the invasion, the Presidium of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia immediately gathered in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in Dubcek's office. The majority - 7 to 4 - voted in favor of the Presidium's statement condemning the invasion. Only members of the Presidium Kolder, Bilyak, Svestka and Rigaud spoke according to the original plan. Barbirek and Piller supported Dubcek and O. Chernik. The calculation of the Soviet leadership was on the preponderance of "healthy forces" at the decisive moment - 6 against 5. The statement also contained a call for an urgent convocation of a party congress. Dubcek himself, in his radio appeal to the inhabitants of the country, urged citizens to remain calm and prevent bloodshed and the actual repetition of the Hungarian events of 1956.

TO 4:30 am August 21 the building of the Central Committee was surrounded by Soviet troops and armored vehicles, Soviet paratroopers broke into the building and arrested those present. Dubcek and other members of the Central Committee spent several hours under the control of paratroopers.

IN 5:10 am August 21 a reconnaissance company of the 350th Guards Airborne Regiment and a separate reconnaissance company of the 103rd Airborne Division landed. Within 10 minutes, they captured the airfields of Turzhany and Namesht, after which a hasty landing of the main forces began. According to eyewitnesses, transport planes landed at the airfields one after another. The landing party jumped off without waiting for a complete stop. By the end of the runway, the plane was already empty and immediately picked up speed for a new takeoff. With a minimum interval, other aircraft began to arrive here with troops and military equipment. Then the paratroopers on their military equipment and captured civilian vehicles went deep into the country.

TO 9:00 am August 21 in Brno, paratroopers blocked all roads, bridges, exits from the city, radio and television buildings, telegraph, main post office, administrative buildings of the city and region, printing house, railway stations, as well as headquarters of military units and military industry enterprises. ChNA commanders were asked to remain calm and maintain order. Four hours after the landing of the first groups of paratroopers, the most important objects of Prague and Brno were under the control of the allied forces. The main efforts of the paratroopers were aimed at seizing the buildings of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, the government, the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff, as well as the buildings of the radio station and television. According to a predetermined plan, columns of troops were sent to the main administrative and industrial centers of Czechoslovakia. Formations and units of the allied forces were deployed in all major cities. Special attention given to the protection western borders Czechoslovakia.

At 10 a.m. Dubcek, Prime Minister Oldřich Czernik, Speaker of Parliament Josef Smrkowski (English) Russian, members of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia Josef Spacek and Bohumil Szymon, and head of the National Front Frantisek Kriegel (English) Russian. KGB officers and employees of the StB who collaborated with them were taken out of the building of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, and then they were taken to the airfield in Soviet armored personnel carriers and taken to Moscow.

By the end of the day on August 21 24 divisions of the Warsaw Pact countries occupied the main objects on the territory of Czechoslovakia. The troops of the USSR and its allies occupied all points without the use of weapons, since the Czechoslovak army was ordered not to resist.

Actions of the HRC and the population of the country

In Prague, protesting citizens tried to block the movement of troops and equipment; all signs and street signs were knocked down, all the maps of Prague were hidden in the shops, while the Soviet military only had outdated wartime maps. In this regard, control over radio, television and newspapers was belatedly established. "Healthy forces" took refuge in the Soviet embassy. But they could not be persuaded to form a new government and hold a Central Committee Plenum. The media has already managed to declare them traitors.

At the call of the President of the country and the Czech Radio, the citizens of Czechoslovakia did not provide an armed rebuff to the invading troops. However, everywhere the troops met the passive resistance of the local population. Czechs and Slovaks refused to provide Soviet troops with drink, food and fuel, changed road signs to impede the advance of troops, took to the streets, tried to explain to the soldiers the essence of the events taking place in Czechoslovakia, appealed to the Russian-Czechoslovak brotherhood. Citizens demanded the withdrawal of foreign troops and the return of party and government leaders who had been taken to the USSR.

At the initiative of the Prague City Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, clandestine meetings of the XIV Congress of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia began ahead of schedule, on the territory of the plant in Vysochany (a district of Prague), however, without delegates from Slovakia who did not have time to arrive.

Representatives of the conservative-minded group of delegates at the congress were not elected to any of the leadership positions in the HRC.

Side losses

There was practically no fighting. There were isolated cases of attacks on the military, but the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of Czechoslovakia did not resist.

According to modern data, during the invasion, 108 citizens of Czechoslovakia were killed and more than 500 wounded, the vast majority of civilians. On the first day of the invasion alone, 58 people were killed or mortally wounded, including seven women and an eight-year-old child.

The largest number of civilian casualties was in Prague near the building of the Czech Radio. Perhaps some of the victims were undocumented. Thus, witnesses report that Soviet soldiers fired on a crowd of Prague residents on Wenceslas Square, as a result of which several people were killed and injured, although data on this incident were not included in the reports of the Czechoslovak security service. There are numerous testimonies of the death of civilians, including among minors and the elderly, in Prague, Liberec, Brno, Kosice, Poprad and other cities of Czechoslovakia as a result of the unmotivated use of weapons by Soviet soldiers.

Total from August 21 to September 20, 1968 the combat losses of the Soviet troops amounted to 12 dead and 25 wounded and injured. Non-combat losses for the same period - 84 dead and dead, 62 wounded and injured. Also, as a result of a helicopter crash near the city of Teplice, 2 Soviet correspondents were killed. It should be noted that the surviving helicopter pilot, fearing that he would have to bear responsibility for the accident, fired several bullets at the helicopter from a pistol, and then claimed that the helicopter had been shot down by the Czechoslovaks; this version was official for some time, and correspondents K. Nepomniachtchi and A. Zworykin appeared, including in internal KGB materials, as victims of "counter-revolutionaries".

August 26, 1968 near the city of Zvolen (Czechoslovakia), an An-12 crashed from the Tula 374 VTAP (c / c captain N. Nabok). According to the pilots, the plane with a load (9 tons of butter) during landing approach was fired from the ground from a machine gun at an altitude of 300 meters and, as a result of damage to the 4th engine, fell, not reaching the runway for several kilometers. 5 people died (burned alive in the resulting fire), the gunner-radio operator survived. However, according to Czech archivist historians, the plane crashed into a mountain.

Near the village of Zhandov near the city of Ceska Lipa, a group of citizens, blocking the road to the bridge, impeded the movement of the Soviet T-55 tank foreman Yu. I. Andreev, who was catching up with the column that had gone ahead at high speed. The foreman decided to turn off the road so as not to crush people and the tank collapsed from the bridge along with the crew. Three soldiers were killed.

The losses of the USSR in technology are not exactly known. In parts of the 38th Army alone, in the first three days, 7 tanks and armored personnel carriers were burned on the territory of Slovakia and North Moravia.

Known loss data armed forces other countries participating in the operation. So, the Hungarian army lost 4 soldiers dead (all - non-combat losses: accident, disease, suicide). The Bulgarian army lost 2 people - one sentry was killed at the post by unknown persons (while a machine gun was stolen), 1 soldier shot himself.

Further developments and international assessment of the invasion

IN early September troops were withdrawn from many cities and towns of Czechoslovakia to specially designated locations. Soviet tanks left Prague on September 11, 1968. On October 16, 1968, an agreement was signed between the governments of the USSR and Czechoslovakia on the conditions for the temporary stay of Soviet troops on the territory of Czechoslovakia, according to which part of the Soviet troops remained on the territory of Czechoslovakia "in order to ensure the security of the socialist community." October 17, 1968 a phased withdrawal of part of the troops from the territory of Czechoslovakia began, which was completed by mid-November.

IN 1969 in Prague, students Jan Palach and Jan Zajic set themselves on fire a month apart in protest against the Soviet occupation.

As a result of the introduction of troops into Czechoslovakia, the process of political and economic reforms was interrupted. At the April (1969) plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, G. Husak was elected first secretary. The reformers were removed from their posts, repressions began. Several tens of thousands of people left the country, including many representatives of the country's cultural elite.

On the territory of Czechoslovakia, the Soviet military presence remained until 1991.

August 21 representatives of a group of countries(USA, Great Britain, France, Canada, Denmark and Paraguay) spoke in the UN Security Council demanding that the "Czechoslovak question" be brought to the session of the UN General Assembly.

The representatives of Hungary and the USSR voted against. Then the representative of Czechoslovakia also demanded that this issue be removed from consideration by the UN. The military intervention of the five states was condemned by the governments of four socialist countries - Yugoslavia, Romania, Albania (which withdrew from the Warsaw Pact in September), the PRC, as well as a number of communist parties in Western countries.

Possible motivations for the deployment of troops and consequences

By official version Central Committee of the CPSU and ATS countries(except Romania): The government of Czechoslovakia asked the allies in the military bloc to provide armed assistance in the fight against counter-revolutionary groups that, with the support of hostile imperialist countries, were preparing a coup d'état to overthrow socialism.

Geopolitical aspect: The USSR prevented the satellite countries from reviewing the unequal interstate relations that ensured its hegemony in Eastern Europe.

Military-strategic aspect: Czechoslovakia's voluntarism in foreign policy during the Cold War threatened the security of the border with NATO countries; before 1968 Czechoslovakia remained the only ATS country where there were no military bases of the USSR.

Ideological aspect: the ideas of socialism "with a human face" undermined the idea of ​​the truth of Marxism-Leninism, the dictatorship of the proletariat and the leading role of the communist party, which, in turn, affected the power interests of the party elite.

Political aspect: the brutal crackdown on democratic voluntarism in Czechoslovakia gave the members of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU the opportunity, on the one hand, to crack down on internal opposition, on the other hand, to increase their authority, and thirdly, to prevent the disloyalty of the allies and demonstrate military power to potential opponents.

As a result of Operation Danube, Czechoslovakia remained a member of the Eastern European socialist bloc. The Soviet grouping of troops (up to 130 thousand people) remained in Czechoslovakia until 1991. The agreement on the conditions for the stay of Soviet troops on the territory of Czechoslovakia became one of the main military-political results of the introduction of troops of five states that satisfied the leadership of the USSR and the Department of Internal Affairs. However, Albania withdrew from the Warsaw Pact as a result of the invasion.

The suppression of the Prague Spring increased the disillusionment of many on the Western Left with Marxist-Leninist theory and contributed to the growth of "Eurocommunism" ideas among the leadership and members of Western Communist parties - subsequently leading to a split in many of them. Communist parties Western Europe lost mass support, as the impossibility of "socialism with a human face" was practically shown.

Milos Zeman was expelled from the Communist Party in 1970 for disagreeing with the entry of Warsaw Pact troops into the country.

The opinion is expressed that the operation "Danube" strengthened the position of the United States in Europe.

Paradoxically, a forceful action in Czechoslovakia in 1968 accelerated the arrival in relations between East and West of the period of the so-called. "detente" based on the recognition of the territorial status quo that existed in Europe and the holding by Germany under Chancellor Willy Brandt of the so-called. "New Ostpolitik".

Operation Danube hindered possible reforms in the USSR: “For the Soviet Union, the strangulation of the Prague Spring turned out to be associated with many grave consequences. The imperial “victory” in 1968 cut off the oxygen to reforms, strengthening the position of dogmatic forces, strengthening the great-power traits in Soviet foreign policy, and contributing to the strengthening of stagnation in all areas.”

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alexander Dubcek - First Secretary of the HRC (January-August 1968)

For almost eight months in 1968, the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (Czechoslovakia) experienced a period of profound change, unprecedented in the history of the communist movement. These transformations have become a natural result of the growing crisis in this relatively prosperous and developed country, in whose political culture predominantly democratic traditions are deeply rooted. The process of democratization in Czechoslovakia, prepared by the reformist forces within the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, for a number of years went almost unnoticed by most analysts and politicians of the West and East, including the Soviet leaders. They misinterpreted the nature of the political conflict within the CPC at the end of 1967, which led to the removal in January 1968 of the first secretary of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPC A. Novotny. A. Dubcek, a graduate of the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the CPSU, who spoke excellent Russian, was elected instead.

At the end of March, A. Novotny resigned from the post of president of Czechoslovakia. Instead, on the recommendation of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, the hero of the Second World War, General Ludwik Svoboda, was elected to this post, against whom the Soviet leaders also had no objections.

The fall of Novotny was not just the result of a struggle for power within the Czechoslovak leadership, but occurred for a number of reasons, including: the economic crisis of 1962-1963, which aroused the desire for economic reforms, the slow pace of the process of political rehabilitation of the repressed, the open dissent of writers and students, the awakening reformist-minded intellectual strata in the party, who began the struggle for freedom of thought and expression.

The protracted nature of the political crisis, the stubborn opposition of Novotny and his supporters to Dubcek, a series of scandalous incidents in 1968 (for example, the sensational escape to the United States of General Jan Cheyna, accompanied by rumors of a failed military coup attempt in favor of the restoration of Novotny), the weakening of censorship - all this contributed to the mobilization public support for the new leadership. Interested in reform, the HRC leaders included their pluralistic concept of socialism "with a human face" in the "Program of Action" adopted in April 1968 as the "Magna Carta" of the new leadership of Dubcek. In addition, Dubcek allowed the creation of a number of new political clubs and also abolished censorship; in the field of foreign policy, it was decided to pursue a more independent course, which, however, met the interests of the Warsaw Pact in general and the policy of the USSR in particular.

The astonishing swiftness of events in Czechoslovakia in January-April 1968 created a dilemma for the Soviet leadership. The resignation of Moscow-oriented Novotny supporters, and especially the reformist programs of the Dubcek leadership and the revival of press freedom, led, from the Soviet point of view, to a dangerous situation in one of the key countries of Eastern Europe. In addition, the leadership of a number of countries participating in the Warsaw Pact thought about the increased, in their opinion, the vulnerability of the borders and territory of Czechoslovakia, the prospect of its withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact, which would inevitably undermine the Eastern European military security system.

Potentially, the situation in Czechoslovakia could affect neighboring Eastern European countries, and even the Soviet Union itself. The Czechoslovak slogan "socialism with a human face" called into question the humanity of Soviet socialism. "Magna Carta" meant a much greater degree of intra-party democracy, granting greater autonomy to the state apparatus, others political parties and parliament, the restoration of civil rights (freedom of assembly and association) and a more resolute continuation of political rehabilitation, the restoration of national rights of ethnic minorities within the framework of the federation, economic reform, etc.

Prague. August 1968

The possibility of a "chain reaction" in neighboring socialist countries, where the social upheavals of the recent past were still fresh in their memory (GDR in 1953, Hungary in 1956), led to hostility to the Czechoslovak "experiment" not only of the Soviet, but also of East German (W. Ulbricht ), Polish (V. Gomulka) and Bulgarian (T. Zhivkov) leadership. A more reserved position was taken by J. Kadar (Hungary).

However, the Prague Spring represented a different kind of protest than the one that Soviet leaders faced in Hungary in 1956. Dubcek's leadership did not challenge the foundations of ensuring the interests of the national security of the USSR, it did not come up with a proposal to revise the foreign policy orientation of Czechoslovakia. The retention of membership in the Department of Internal Affairs and the CMEA was not questioned. Limited pluralism also did not mean the loss of overall control on the part of the Communist Party: power, although somewhat dispersed, would remain in the hands of a reformist party leadership.

From the point of view of the Soviet leadership, the events in Czechoslovakia created problems and were potentially dangerous. Having burned themselves in Hungary, the Soviet leaders for a long time could not determine their course in relation to what was happening in Czechoslovakia. Should the changes that have taken place there since January should be eradicated or simply limited? What means should be used to influence Czechoslovakia? Should we confine ourselves to political and economic actions or resort to armed intervention?

Despite the fact that the Kremlin was unanimous in its negative attitude towards Czechoslovak reformism, they did not incline for a military invasion for a long time. Some members of the Soviet leadership engaged in an intensive search for a peaceful solution to the problem. This became apparent after March 1968, when the Soviet government began to use a number of political and psychological pressures to persuade Dubcek and his colleagues to slow down the imminent change.

The Soviet side exerted political pressure on the leadership of Dubcek during various meetings and negotiations: at a multilateral meeting in Dresden in March, during a bilateral meeting of the leaders of the CPSU and the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in Moscow in May, at unprecedented high-level negotiations between the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in Čierna nad Tisou in July, in Bratislava in August 1968. The Czechoslovak delegation refused to come to the meeting of the leaders of Bulgaria, Hungary, East Germany, Poland and the USSR in Warsaw (July 1968).

The aggravation of the situation was also facilitated at first by a restrained reaction, and then by the categorical refusal of the Czechoslovak leadership to accept repeated proposals to deploy a Soviet military contingent on the territory of Czechoslovakia.

Political pressure was accompanied by psychological pressure: near the borders of Czechoslovakia, large-scale exercises ATS troops with the participation of the USSR, the GDR and Poland. Later, such a type of psychological influence was used as the presence of troops of the Warsaw Pact countries on the territory of Czechoslovakia during and after military exercises in June and July 1968.

In addition, the Soviet leadership did not rule out the possibility of applying economic sanctions against Czechoslovakia as a form of pressure. However, despite the reports that appeared at the end of April 1968 that Soviet grain supplies had been cut off, there was no real evidence of the use of economic levers.

In accordance with the principles of socialist internationalism, treaties concluded between the allies in Anti-Hitler coalition, the very fact of the creation of the Department of Internal Affairs and the CMEA countries of the socialist camp were considered the sphere of interests of the USSR.

The Soviet leadership did not interfere with the change at the beginning of 1968 of the party and state leadership of Czechoslovakia. In January 1968, instead of A. Novotny, A. Dubcek became the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, declaring the need to update the party's policy. Censorship restrictions began to disappear in the country, heated discussions about the need to liberalize economic relations unfolded. But when the new leaders of Czechoslovakia tried to proclaim and implement the reform of the country, which threatened to abandon the principles of socialism and rapprochement with the West, the leaders of the USSR (L. Brezhnev), the GDR (E. Honecker), Poland (W. Gomulka) and other socialist countries regarded this as undermining foundations of socialism. After a series of unsuccessful negotiations, on August 21, 1968, the troops of five Warsaw Pact states - the USSR, Bulgaria, Hungary, the GDR and Poland - simultaneously entered the territory of Czechoslovakia from different directions. Its President, L. Svoboda, ordered the army not to engage in battle. The first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party A. Dubcek and other leaders of the country were arrested and taken to Moscow, where "negotiations" were held with them, as a result of which proteges of Moscow came to power.

The entry of troops into Czechoslovakia, in contrast to the Hungarian events of 1956, did not lead to large losses. The picture looked ordinary when the Praguers, surrounding soviet tanks they tried to reproach innocent soldiers and officers, to start political discussions with them. However, the very fact of bringing in troops hit the authority of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact countries, contributed to the growth of dissident sentiments in the Union itself and criticism of the Kremlin in various states of the planet. The Czechs and Slovaks themselves, resigned to the state of affairs, harbored a deep resentment against the USSR, which poisoned the former warm and good neighborly relations.

At the same time, as a result of Operation Danube, Czechoslovakia remained a member of the Eastern European socialist bloc. The Soviet grouping of troops (up to 130 thousand people) remained in Czechoslovakia until 1991. The agreement on the conditions for the stay of Soviet troops on the territory of Czechoslovakia became one of the main military-political results of the introduction of troops of five states that satisfied the leadership of the USSR and the Department of Internal Affairs. However, Albania withdrew from the Warsaw Pact as a result of the invasion.

“WE HAVE TO GIVE A NEW LOOK TO SOCIALIST DEVELOPMENT…”

We must pave the way through the unknown, experiment; to give a new face to socialist development, relying on creative Marxist thinking and the experience of the international working-class movement, and with the belief that we will be able to correctly use the socialist development of Czechoslovakia, a country that is responsible to the International Communist Movement for the use of a highly developed material base, high level education and culture of the population and indisputable democratic traditions in the interests of socialism and communism.

Former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Czechoslovakia Hajek Jiri

FROM THE TASS STATEMENT DATED AUGUST 21, 1968

TASS is authorized to declare that party and statesmen The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic turned to the Soviet Union and other allied states with a request to provide urgent assistance to the fraternal Czechoslovak people, including assistance by the armed forces.

FROM A TASS STATEMENT DATED AUGUST 22, 1968

Military units of the socialist countries entered Czechoslovakia on August 21 - in all regions, including Prague and Bratislava. The advance of the troops of the fraternal countries was unimpeded... The population is calm. Many Czechoslovak citizens express their gratitude to the soldiers of the Soviet army for their timely arrival in Czechoslovakia - to help in the fight against counter-revolutionary forces.

MEMORIES OF THE PARATROOPER LEV GORELOV

In the month of May 1968, I received an encrypted message - to arrive urgently in Moscow to see Margelov. I arrive, we kissed him, he says: “We are going to the head, the Minister of Defense” ...

We arrive, we enter the office, there are cards.

Commander reports:

Comrade Minister of Defense, Commander of the Air Force Airborne Troops with the commander of the seventh division arrived at your order!

Hello! General, do you know the situation in Czechoslovakia? - to me.

Comrade Defense Minister, according to the press...

Well, here's what: you take the regimental commanders, change into a different uniform and fly to Prague. Intelligence, objects that you will take, and take these objects.

And he shows me: the Central Committee, the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Defense, bridges, a television center, a radio center, a railway station.

I speak:

Comrade Minister of Defense, the airborne division is not ready to fight in a populated area, - plucked up courage, - We don’t even have in our charters and instructions - to take, to fight in the city. We need time to prepare.

He answers:

You are a general, you think, be healthy ...

I arrive in Vitebsk, where my plane stops in Vitebsk, I transfer, I arrive in Kaunas. I didn’t have time to eat, suddenly, urgently: “In the KGB on HF ...”, - I didn’t have HF in my office, but there was ZAS. That's why...

I’m coming, Margelov: “Tomorrow, at so many hours, there will be a plane - with the regimental commanders go to Prague for reconnaissance, under the guise of diplomatic couriers, you will have packages that you must hand over there.”

We arrive in Prague, we arrive at the headquarters of the ShOV, there was such a headquarters, Yamshchikov. And there I already meet ours, about 20 generals, they are already working.

I introduced myself to him, came, show me such and such objects, so as not to look for a long time. Go. The Central Committee looked, the Ministry of Defense looked, the Council of Ministers, everyone looked, they gave cars to everyone.

I arrive in Moscow at night, I am met by Kripko - the commander of military transport aviation, Margelov. I report the situation, I reported everything.

Then they returned to Vitebsk from Moscow.

"What do we do?" - I ask the commanders of the regiments. Not a single exercise was conducted either with a company, or with a battalion, or with a regiment to take a settlement or any house.

I gathered retired veterans who once took settlements during the war. We are writing a temporary instruction on taking the house. We are withdrawing a division, regiments, and the regiments were separated, and in every city there are microdistricts.

So here we are at dawn, until people come home from work, we trained there - we worked out the capture of the settlement. And this is a different tactic: an assault detachment, a support detachment, fire support, cover squads - this is a whole new tactics for paratroopers, and for everyone. Take locality- it is necessary to create assault groups. I’ve been training for a month, they say: “The division commander has gone crazy, what is it, they took everyone out, from morning to night, before the arrival of the working class, they storm ...”

In the Baltic States, all airfields are involved, the Kaliningrad airfield, one Belarusian airfield. The division went there, to the starting areas, they stood up there. What to do, expect.

450 planes, sorties, took me to Prague, three aviation fighter regiments - in Germany, Poland covered the transfer.

And we went to Prague.

But, there is one moment. A division means artillery on vehicles, 120mm mortars on vehicles... Well, self-propelled guns, of course, and so on. But the infantry is all ... Only the commanders have radio stations. After all, the paratroopers did not have cars. Now they are on combat vehicles, but we did not have cars.

So, we landed and went, everyone knew where to go, who was in the Central Committee, who where, but how to go? And at the airfield, there are hundreds of cars, these are foreigners, they don’t close these cars, and the paratroopers all know how to drive cars, so they stole all these cars! You have seen, in the movies, how Father Makhno, here he is playing the harmonica and sitting on a cart. So they sit on these cars, stuck around them, and enter Prague.

Entered. What saved us from bloodshed? Why did we lose 15 thousand of our young guys in Grozny, but not in Prague? And here's why: detachments were ready there, ready in advance, Smarkovsky led, the ideologist, and others who opposed Freedom. They formed detachments, but they did not give out weapons, weapons on alarm - come, take weapons. So we knew, our intelligence knew where these warehouses were. We seized the warehouses in the first place, and then they took the Central Committee, General base, and so on, the government. We threw the first part of our forces into warehouses, then everything else.

In short, at 2:15 I landed, and at 6:00 Prague was in the hands of paratroopers. The Czechs woke up in the morning - to arms, and our guards are standing there. All...

At 10 o'clock, an order was received from Moscow to take the government and Dubcek to the airfield, and send them to Moscow for negotiations. All of them were taken there, but it was not the paratroopers who were already taking them out, but the armored personnel carriers of the 20th Army. I only helped to take them all out, to pull them out.

They took him to the airfield, got a transcript - leave Dubcek. Send them by plane, and leave Dubcek to address the people. I think let me go and see Dubcek. Well, you have to look, right? I come, I introduce myself to him: “Comrade General Secretary, commander of the seventh division such and such, hello!” He gets out of the car, and here is the guard, they are guarding, the deputy division commander is a colonel, the head of the guard.

He tells me....

When I told this, the Minister almost died with laughter!

He says: “Comrade General, but you don’t have a check, how about a drink? That is, 100 grams, not checks, 100 grams?”

I say: “Comrade General Secretary, we have crackers, we have dry food, we have everything I can feed you, but there is no vodka ...”

And the sergeant is standing behind, saying: “Comrade General, I have a check!”

I am proud that the operation was carried out without bloodshed. I lost one soldier there, and then later, in ordinary life.

THE LIGHT OF HOPE IS DOWN

“From the Czechoslovak point of view, the intervention was perfidious. Aggression left a deep mark on the Soviet Union. Intervention in the internal affairs of Czechoslovakia extinguished the flame of hope for the reform of socialism - the flame that flickered inside Soviet society. A dogmatic approach to society was asserted ... The decision to invade exacerbated internal divisions in both Soviet and Eastern European society. For a long 20 years, politics dominated, as a result of which the backlog of world development began to grow.

A. Dubcek - head of the Czechoslovak communists before the Soviet invasion in 1968

BREZHNEV'S NEGOTIATIONS WITH DUBCHEK (Transcript)

A. Dubcek. I, comrades, cannot make any suggestion, because I saw the last scene from the window of my office, but then your people came in with machine guns, snatched out the telephones, and that was it. There has been no contact with anyone since then, and we don't know what happened. I met with Comrade Chernik, he says that he also does not know anything, because he was taken in the same way as me. He was in the basement with the others until they figured it out. That's how we got here. We do not know what is happening, who is in control, how life is going on in the country. I would like to work with you to find a solution. I agree with you that we need to seriously think about how to help, because this is a terrible tragedy.

L. I. Brezhnev. We understand correctly, Alexander Stepanovich, that we will not interpret your message now, this will not help matters. It is important to find a real way out now, to find a solution that would, of course, not today or tomorrow, but in the future, restore the situation. That's why we understand your last words as a mutual desire with us, with all other socialist countries, to find a solution that will lead us through certain difficulties, but will lead to friendship. We want it. On this basis, we want to talk. Is that how we understand you?

A. Dubcek. Yes.

L. I. Brezhnev. Now objectively must render what is happening. The troops passed without firing a shot. The army has done its duty. Your armed forces were urged by the President and your leaders not to enter into resistance, so there were no human casualties.

A. Dubcek. I believe that one of the main steps taken by the Presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (it’s good that there was a telephone) was an instruction from our side along the line of the army and state security, the workers’ militia, was an appeal to the people that in no case should there be any rebuff, that is our desire and our call.

L. I. Brezhnev. We are telling you that there were no casualties when entering all the cities, the workers and the workers' militia did not show us resistance and do not show us to this day, they do not come out in an organized manner. But that, of course, there was an unpleasant impression under all circumstances during the introduction of troops, and that, of course, some part of the population could take this badly, this is natural.

Our people wanted to seize and master the means of propaganda, say television, radio stations and Rude Pravo. We did not touch the rest of the newspapers. There was no armed resistance. But huge crowds of people were organized at the moment our troops arrived. It turned out that ours are standing and those are standing. The radio station at this time works and scolds the Soviet power. Ours had orders not to shoot, not to beat. And so the fight went on for the whole day. And the station works, the rightists sit there and blow with might and main right-wing propaganda against the Soviet Union. Then they took Rude Pravo, and the same story, also without victims.

All sorts of demonstrations began, but without the working class, without working youth, mostly thugs. In some places there was a large crowd of people, in others a small crowd. Everything went without shooting. They killed only our sentry at night - he went on patrol, and he was killed from around the corner. In Bratislava, thugs threw a car with two of our people into the Danube. As if one escaped, the other drowned. During the capture of the radio station, a shootout took place, 13 of our people were wounded. Here are all the bloody clashes.

N. V. Podgorny. Shots fired from windows in Prague.

L. I. Brezhnev. They fired from attics, from windows in Prague and Bratislava. They blocked these houses, but no one came out of there. Prague is the busiest.

FROM THE REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE MOSCOW GK CPSU V. GRISHIN

“More than 9,000 meetings were held at enterprises and institutions, attended by 885,000 and 30,000 (people) spoke. The speakers declared their full support ... for the policy of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Soviet government ...

At the same time, in some research institutes there were protests against the measures taken by the Soviet government ... So at the Research Institute of Automatic Devices, Candidate of Technical Sciences, senior researcher Andronov, non-party, said that he did not understand who was in Czechoslovakia and on whose behalf he was asking for help of the Soviet Union, and proposed to postpone the voting of the resolution of the general meeting of the institute staff until the situation was clarified. His speech was condemned by the participants of the meeting.”

"HANDS OFF CZECHOSLOVAKIA"

At the time of the occupation of Czechoslovakia, 7 people went to Red Square. It was noon on August 25, 1968. Seven sat down at the Execution Ground and unfurled home-made posters: "Hands off Czechoslovakia", "Shame on the occupiers", "For our and your freedom."

From a letter from Natalia Gorbanevskaya addressed to the editors of European newspapers:“... Almost immediately, a whistle was heard, from all sides, state security workers in civilian clothes ran towards us ... shouting: “These are all Jews! Beat the anti-Soviet elements!” We sat quietly and did not resist. They snatched banners from our hands. Victor Finderg had his face smashed to blood and his teeth knocked out. ... We are happy that we were able to show that not all citizens of our state agree with the violence that is carried out on behalf of the Soviet people. We hope that the Czechoslovak people have learned about this.”

ALEXANDER TVARDOVSKY ABOUT AUGUST 1968

What should we do with you, my oath,

Where can I get the words to tell about

How Prague met us in 1945

And how meets in the sixty-eighth.

FROM EVGENY YEVTUSHENKO'S POEM "TANKS ARE COMING IN PRAGUE"

Tanks go through Prague
in the sunset blood of the dawn.
Tanks are coming true
which is not a newspaper.

Tanks follow the temptations
to live not in the power of stamps.
Tanks go over the soldiers,
sitting inside these tanks.

My God, how disgusting!
God - what a fall!
Tanks by Jan Hus.
Pushkin and Petofi.
…
Before I die
how - it doesn't matter to me - nicknamed,
I refer to the offspring
with just one request.

Let over me - without sobbing
just write, in fact:
"Russian writer. crushed
Russian tanks in Prague.
August 23, 1968

TWO CASES IN 68

My father was in Czechoslovakia during the events of 1968.

The Czech "resistance" went out onto the roads, blocked them with themselves, preventing the convoys with Soviet troops from passing.

So, my father told a story: a woman with a small child in her arms ran out onto a mountainous road, and the Soviet tanker, without hesitation, abruptly turned off the road. The tank flew off the side of the road, slid into a cliff and caught fire. All tankers were killed.

And here is another father's story of that period. After all, not only Soviet, but also Hungarian and German (from the GDR) units entered Czechoslovakia. In the evenings, local resistance gathered at the camps of soldiers from the GDR, bringing pots and brushes with them.

They pounded on the pots, making a terrible roar, shouting: "Get out." The "cat concert" did not give the soldiers the opportunity to sleep, put pressure on their nerves.

The Germans warned the Czechs once, twice... On the third night they posted a platoon of submachine gunners, and they fired a line through the crowd. How many people were killed or wounded, history is silent, but the Germans were not bothered anymore.

Vladimir Medinsky, "Myths about Russia"

IN 1968 WE PREVENTED A THIRD WORLD WAR

Suntsev: On August 20, 1968, we received a combat order to start Operation Danube: by the morning of August 21, our army was to make a 220-kilometer throw along the Bischofswerda-Dresden-Pirna-Pirna-Teplice-Melnik-Prague route and take up positions on the northwestern outskirts of the capital Czechoslovakia. It is important to note that the order prohibited the use of weapons to kill, except in cases of armed attack.

Culture: But were there many such cases? Today, liberal publicists persistently prove that most of our losses were "non-combat".

Suntsev: No, it was a real military conflict. Over the past years, I have been able to compile a list of those who died in those days in Czechoslovakia - today there are 112 people in it. Many died from gunshot wounds, several people died in a downed plane and helicopter. And the death of the tank crew, who refused to crush the crowd that blocked the road, and collapsed from the bridge, in my opinion, was a military loss. All these people died while performing a combat mission.

And in Prague itself, and in many other large cities - Brno, Bratislava, Pilsen - carefully trained thugs took to the streets, actively resisting the troops of the Warsaw Pact, including setting fire to our tanks, armored personnel carriers and cars. But one must understand that in the time preceding Operation Danube, anti-Soviet propaganda was actively carried out among the population in Czechoslovakia. This was done whole line organizations funded from abroad - "Club-231", "Club of non-party activists" and similar structures.

Culture: Is the role of Western intelligence services in the preparation of this resistance in the opinion of a military intelligence officer great?

Suntsev: She is undeniable. I personally took part in the search for underground printing houses and radio stations, as well as warehouses with weapons and ammunition, which were very numerous on the territory of Czechoslovakia by the beginning of Operation Danube. And it is obvious that it was possible to prepare in this way only with the help of the West. Moreover, according to available data, Western intelligence agencies by August 1968, more than 40,000 anti-Soviet armed thugs had been trained - a special strike group that was supposed to prepare an invasion of NATO troops into Czechoslovakia.

Culture: That is, it turns out that in August 1968 our troops were ahead of NATO?

Suntsev: Exactly. If we had not entered Czechoslovakia on the night of August 20-21, 1968, then literally in a few hours there would have already been troops of the North Atlantic Treaty. In turn, this would not have stopped the Soviet Union, and then the Third World War could well have begun.

At two o'clock in the morning on August 21, 1968, the Soviet An-24 passenger plane requested an emergency landing at Prague's Ruzyne airport. The controllers gave the go-ahead, the plane landed, servicemen of the 7th Guards Airborne Division stationed in Kaunas disembarked from it. The paratroopers, under the threat of using weapons, seized all the facilities of the airfield and began receiving An-12 transport aircraft with paratrooper units and military equipment. Transport An-12s landed on the runway every 30 seconds. Thus began the operation carefully designed by the USSR to occupy Czechoslovakia and ended with the so-called. The Prague Spring is a process of democratic reforms carried out by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia under the leadership of Alexander Dubcek.

The operation to capture Czechoslovakia, which was called the "Danube", was attended by the armies of four socialist countries: the USSR, Poland, Hungary and Bulgaria. The GDR army was also supposed to enter the territory of Czechoslovakia, but at the last moment the Soviet leadership was afraid of the analogy with 1939 and the Germans did not cross the border. The main strike force of the grouping of troops of the Warsaw Pact countries was Soviet army- these were 18 motorized rifle, tank and airborne divisions, 22 aviation and helicopter regiments, with a total number, according to various sources, from 170 to 240 thousand people. About 5000 tanks alone were involved. Two fronts were created - the Carpathian and Central, and the number of the combined group of troops reached half a million military personnel. The invasion was, according to the usual Soviet habit, presented as help to the fraternal Czechoslovak people in the fight against counter-revolution.

No counter-revolution in Czechoslovakia, of course, and did not smell. The country fully supported communist party, since January 1968, which began political and economic reforms. In terms of the number of communists per 1,000 people, Czechoslovakia ranked first in the world. With the beginning of the reforms, censorship was significantly weakened, free discussions took place everywhere, and the creation of a multi-party system began. The intention was to provide complete freedom words, meetings and movements, establish strict control over the activities of security agencies, facilitate the possibility of organizing private enterprises and reduce state control over production. In addition, it was planned to federalize the state and expand the powers of the authorities of the subjects of Czechoslovakia - the Czech Republic and Slovakia. All this, of course, worried the leadership of the USSR, which pursued a policy of limited sovereignty in relation to its vassals in Europe (the so-called "Brezhnev doctrine"). The Dubcek team was repeatedly persuaded to stay on a short leash from Moscow and not strive to build socialism according to Western standards. Persuasions did not help. In addition, Czechoslovakia remained a country where the USSR was never able to place either its military bases or tactical nuclear weapon. And this moment was, perhaps, the main reason for such a military operation so disproportionate to the scale of the country - the Kremlin Politburo had to force the Czechoslovaks to obey themselves at any cost. The leadership of Czechoslovakia, in order to avoid bloodshed and the destruction of the country, took the army to the barracks and provided the Soviet troops with the opportunity to freely dispose of the fate of the Czechs and Slovaks. The only kind of resistance the occupiers faced was civil protest. This was especially evident in Prague, where unarmed residents of the city staged a real obstruction to the invaders.

At three o'clock in the morning on August 21 (it was also a Wednesday), Prime Minister Chernik was arrested by Soviet soldiers. At 4:50 a.m., a column of tanks and armored personnel carriers headed for the building of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, where a twenty-year-old resident of Prague was shot dead. In Dubcek's office, the Soviet military arrested him and seven members of the Central Committee. At seven in the morning, the tanks headed for Winohradska 12, where Radio Prague was located. Residents managed to build barricades there, tanks began to break through, and shooting at people was opened. That morning, seventeen people were killed outside the Radio building, and another 52 were injured and taken to the hospital. After 14:00, the arrested leadership of the HRC was put on a plane and taken to Ukraine with the assistance of the President of the country, Ludwig Svoboda, who, as best he could, fought against the puppet government of Bilyak and Indra (thanks to Svoboda, Dubcek was saved and then transported to Moscow). A curfew was introduced in the city; in the dark, soldiers opened fire on any moving object.

01. In the evening, European time, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting in New York, at which it adopted a resolution condemning the invasion. The USSR vetoed it.

02. Trucks with students holding national flags began to drive around the city. All key objects of the city were taken under the control of the Soviet troops.

03. At the National Museum. The military equipment was immediately surrounded by the inhabitants of the city and entered into conversations with the soldiers, often very sharp, tense. In some areas of the city, shooting was heard, and the wounded were constantly being taken to hospitals.

06. In the morning, the youth began to build barricades, attack tanks, threw stones at them, bottles of combustible mixture, tried to set fire to military equipment.

08. The inscription on the bus: Soviet cultural center.

10. One of the soldiers wounded as a result of shooting at the crowd.

11. Mass sabotage actions began throughout Prague. In order to make it difficult for the military to navigate the city, the citizens of Prague began to destroy street signs, knock down signs with street names, house numbers.

13. Soviet soldiers broke into the Church of St. Martin in Bratislava. First they fired at the windows and the tower of the medieval church, then they broke the locks and got inside. The altar, the donation box were opened, the organ, church supplies were broken, paintings were destroyed, benches and the pulpit were broken. The soldiers climbed into the crypt with burials and broke several tombstones there. This church was robbed throughout the day, by different groups of military personnel.

14. Units of the Soviet troops enter the city of Liberec

15. The dead and wounded after the military assault on the Prague Radio.

16. Unauthorized entry is strictly prohibited

19. The walls of houses, shop windows, fences have become a platform for merciless criticism of the invaders.

20. “Run home, Ivan, Natasha is waiting for you”, “Not a drop of water or a loaf of bread to the invaders”, “Bravo, guys! Hitler", "USSR, go home", "Twice occupied, twice taught", "1945 - liberators, 1968 - occupiers", "We were afraid of the West, we were attacked from the East", "Not hands up, but head up!" , “You have conquered space, but not us”, “The elephant cannot swallow a hedgehog”, “Do not call it hatred, call it knowledge”, “Long live democracy. Without Moscow” are just a few examples of such wall-mounted agitation.

21. “I had a soldier, I loved him. I had a watch - the Red Army took it."

22. On the Old Town Square.

25. I remember a contemporary interview with a Prague woman who, on the 21st, went out to the city with her university friends to see the Soviet military. “We thought there were some terrible invaders there, but in fact, very young guys with peasant faces were sitting on armored personnel carriers, a little scared, constantly grabbing their weapons, not understanding what they were doing here and why the crowd reacted so aggressively to them. The commanders told them that they had to go and save the Czech people from the counter-revolution.”

39. A homemade leaflet from those that they tried to distribute to Soviet soldiers.

40. Today, at the building of the Prague Radio, where on August 21, 1968 people who defended the radio station died, a memorial ceremony was held, wreaths were laid, that morning broadcast from 68 was broadcast, when the radio announced the attack on the country. The announcer reads the text, and shooting in the street is heard in the background.

49. At the site of the National Museum, where a monument to self-immolated student Jan Palach is erected, candles are burning.

51. An exhibition is arranged at the beginning of Wenceslas Square - they show on the big screen documentary about the events of the Prague Spring and August 1968, there is an infantry fighting vehicle with a characteristic white line, an ambulance of those years, there are stands with photographs and reproductions of Prague graffiti.

57. 1945: we kissed your fathers > 1968: you shed our blood and take away our freedom.

According to modern data, during the invasion, 108 citizens of Czechoslovakia were killed and more than 500 wounded, the vast majority of civilians. On the first day of the invasion alone, 58 people were killed or mortally wounded, including seven women and an eight-year-old child.

The result of the operation to displace the leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the occupation of the country was the deployment of a Soviet military contingent in Czechoslovakia: five motorized rifle divisions, with a total number of up to 130 thousand people, 1412 tanks, 2563 armored personnel carriers and operational-tactical missile systems "Temp-S" with nuclear warheads. A leadership loyal to Moscow was brought to power, and a purge was carried out in the party. The Prague Spring reforms were completed only after 1991.

Photos: Josef Koudelka, Libor Hajsky, CTK, Reuters, drugoi