Reformer Alexander Dubček Becomes First Secretary, Launching the Prague Spring of 1968

Source: BPB

Alexander Dubček was elected First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia on January 5th, 1968.   Dubček's reform movement allowed for a loosening of the press restrictions, and within a few months resulted in the resignation of the President, Antonín Novotny.

In this context, the Prague Spring of 1968 was born.   The conditions of a ground-swell of freedom, rejection of the Soviet government apparatus, and self-motivated collaboration was described in Colin Ward's "Anarchy in Action," and was also remembered by Milan Kundera in his novel, "The Unbearable Lightness of Being".

Only six months later, the Prague Spring was brutally crushed by the force of Soviet tanks, in August 1968.