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Salient: Victoria University of Wellington Students' Newspaper. Volume 31 Number 19 August 6, 1968

alliance weak

alliance weak

In the short term, though, how effective such political planning will be depends on the political viability of the Government implementing it—and of course its ability to resist Soviet pressure. The alliance between the planners and Slovak regionalism is of dubious strength—regional growth is not always compatible with effective planning, New Zealanders know-while the third element in the coalition, students, have stated that the regime's maximum programme their minimum one. Soviet pressure on this unstable coalition can only accentuate its instability; the regime's political and economic programme, which already goes far beyond that of Yugoslavia or Poland, is still regarded widely as inadequate; probably only a worker-student coalition, as in 1956 Hungary, would have the determination to press through to the end the changes now proposed and the tenacity to disregard external pressure for 'moderation'. This group has every interest in common with the middle levels of the bureaucracy which found itself in total opposition to the Novotny regime and which in various degrees gives the planners and Slovak regionalists their support outside the Communist Party. What started as a coup d'état inside the Party apparatus, though, must become a major social movement outside a discredited and unrepresentative party; the alliance between various social groups which would automatically constitute itself if the Soviet Union were to invade Czechoslovakia as it did Hungary must be formed now if such an invasion is to he effectively deterred. Not only the Rakosis but the Imre Nagys must be purged from the State apparatus if the lesson of 1956 is to be learnt: "democratisation" the bringing about of democracy, must become "democracy". These objectives must be achieved by the "strikes, boycotts and demonstrations" called for in the July Manifesto of 70 denounced by Dubcek as a threat to the "democratisation" process. This is all the more urgent as Soviet manoeuvres become more threatening and Dubcek's Politburo meets with the Russians in an atmosphere where concession and capitulation may appear the lesser evil. "The fate of the Czechoslovak revolution remains to be decided." said Petr Pithart on Prague Radio in May "More than one important battle remains to be fought. But for God's sake. let us not even have even a suggestion of the tragic history of Yugoslavia or of Budapest in 1956, I ask our genuine friends abroad—please do not let us be forced to choose again between these possibilities."

—Owen Gager