This volume of interviews, essays, diary excepts, and scholarly analyses was originally published in the Czech Republic and is here smoothly translated by various hands. It provides a stimulating body of information about Russians’ views of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Pazderka (Czech journalist and scholar) has gathered a remarkable range of material, including testimony of high-ranking Soviet military and low-level soldiers and of a broad range of dissidents, former officials, and journalists. Some contributions argue that the intervention prevented a third world war; others reveal the sense of shame and outrage felt by some intellectuals, artists, writers, and students. Pazderka’s interviews are especially revealing, and the scholarly articles provide depth and context. Overall the contribution of the book is to show that the impact of the invasion among Russians was more profound than previously appreciated and that it represented, in the judgment of many included here, a significant turning point in the Cold War. It effectively shows how information about the invasion was available within Russia. The book includes numerous evocative and revealing contemporaneous photographs. Explanatory notes identify individuals not well known to Anglophone readers.



Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty.

Choice Reviews

The Prague Spring of 1968 and its violent suppression by the Warsaw Pact tanks was initially viewed as just a family squabble within the Soviet bloc. It seemed to be of little concern to others. But Josef Pazderka and his co-authors have brilliantly exploded this myth. They show that the invasion was a breaking point in the history of the Cold War. The specter of Soviet tanks unleashed by the Kremlin to crush a mild reform effort demonstrated to millions of Russians that communism was unimprovable. It would have to be rejected for people to regain their right to pursue happiness.

Igor Lukes, Boston University

One of the leading Czech journalists, Josef Pazderka is an authority on Russia who has now produced a meticulous, evenhanded look at the Soviet participants and observers of the USSR’s 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia. From army privates to generals, dissidents to top officials, their previously under-reported experiences and perceptions provide valuable understanding of a wrenching event for his country and major episode in Cold War history that remains highly relevant to the geopolitical confrontation in Europe today.

Gregory Feifer, Harvard University