Soviet Intervention in Czechoslovakia, 1968: Anatomy of a DecisionIn this new edition of his highly acclaimed work, Jiri Valenta adds his assessment of Soviet military decisionmaking in the 1980s to his earlier analysis of decisionmaking and crisis management in the Soviet bureaucracy and Warsaw Pact. Comparing the events of 1968 to the Kremlin's very different reaction to reforms now under way in Czechoslovakia and the rest of Eastern Europe, Valenta shows that Soviet politics were never simple. The USSR's foreign policy response to the "Prague Spring," he contends, was the result of a complex political process conditioned by bureaucratic inertia, coalition politics, and East European pressures. |
Contents
Soviet Foreign Policy Decisionmaking and the Czechoslovak | 1 |
Rational Policy Paradigm BureaucraticPolitics Paradigm Organizational Actors | 27 |
Linkages and Pressures | 40 |
Negotiations | 71 |
The Bureaucratic Tugofwar | 93 |
Pressure of the Bureaucrats Responsible for Ideological Affairs The Pressure of | 118 |
An Anatomy of the Decision | 123 |
Conclusions | 154 |
Search for a Political Solution through Diplomacy and Pressure Shared Images | 192 |
Notes | 213 |
A Bibliographic Note | 241 |
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Common terms and phrases
advocates Alexander Dubček antireformist coalition August 17 August 20 Bilak Bratislava Bratislava Declaration Brezhnev bureaucratic Central Committee Chervonenko Čierna and Bratislava Čierna nad Tisou Čierna-Bratislava counterrevolution CPSU Czech Czechoslo Czechoslovak Communist Party Czechoslovak crisis Czechoslovak issue Czechoslovak leaders Czechoslovak leadership Czechoslovak Presidium Czechoslovak reformism debate delegation democratic developments in Czechoslovakia Dubček Dubček's leadership East European East German Eastern Europe Foreign Affairs Gomułka Hungarian Hungary ideological internal interventionist coalition interview July June Kádár Kolder Kosygin Kriegel Listy maneuvers military intervention Minister Mlynář Moscow national security negotiations noninterventionist Party Congress Poland Polish Politburo member Ponomarev Prague Spring Pravda pressure Radio reformist reports Rudé právo Secretary session Shelest situation in Czechoslovakia slovak slovakia Smrkovský socialist countries Soviet decision Soviet decisionmakers Soviet foreign policy Soviet leaders Soviet leadership Soviet military Soviet Politburo Soviet politics Soviet Union Suslov Tigrid tion troops Ukraine Ukrainian Ulbricht USSR vakia Warsaw Letter Warsaw Pact West Germany
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Page 244 - Stalin's top lieutenants, a member of the Politburo and Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party, A. A.