Czech Invasion Was ‘Incorrect,’ Gorbachev Says

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Friday praised the 1968 reform movement in Czechoslovakia as a politically correct attempt to “democratize and humanize” socialism, and he criticized the Warsaw Pact invasion that ended it as wrong.

“There was the Prague Spring, which I, and not only myself, but the Soviet leadership and many people, fully support because it was a process of the democratization of society and its humanization,” Gorbachev told a news conference at the end of his visit to Italy.

“It was relevant then, and it is relevant now.”

In a crucial policy statement in Prague, Czechoslovakia’s Communist leadership Friday labeled the 1968 invasion “unjustified” and said the decision behind it was wrong. (See story on A6).

In going much further in his approval of the “Prague Spring” movement than any Soviet leader had before, Gorbachev again underscored his support for the new reforms now under way not only in Czechoslovakia but also throughout most of Eastern Europe.

However, he stopped short of outright condemnation of the Soviet-led invasion that ended the reforms, although other Soviet political leaders have begun to describe it as a crime that should now be denounced.

The invasion in August, 1968, was based on “an incorrect understanding” of the developments in Czechoslovakia, Gorbachev said. But, he added, it has to be understood in the context of the Cold War confrontation between East and West at that time.

“Political methods available to the Soviet government and others were not utilized fully,” he said, recalling the heightened tensions in Central Europe then. “The context of events in Czechoslovakia and elsewhere reflected to some extent the abnormal development of international relations then.

“The arms race was picking up momentum, confrontation was going on, the ideological struggle was very acute, each side was pronouncing anathemas on the other,” he explained.

“And changes of the type in Czechoslovakia perhaps did not produce a fitting response. . . . At times, those events in Czechoslovakia took on an acute character, and not without interference from both sides.”

The invasion remains a politically sensitive question for Moscow because it involves the legitimacy of many Soviet actions, at home as well as abroad, relations with other socialist countries and the current developments in Eastern Europe.

Gorbachev has apparently resolved in his own mind the correctness of the “Prague Spring,” some of whose slogans, such as “socialism with a human face,” he now uses. But he told the news conference, “I do not think now is the time to analyze the whole situation in Czechoslovakia then.”

In the view of influential Soviet legislators, however, Moscow should admit its responsibility in halting the reform process, not only in Czechoslovakia but in the rest of Eastern Europe as well--strengthening hard-line, conservative leaderships there and plunging most of the countries into two decades of rigid and unrelenting political conformity from which they are only now emerging.

The 1968 invasion and its aftermath, Gorbachev implied, should be a lesson for both East and West as the socialist countries go through new reforms. He renewed his call for an all-European conference, including the United States, to develop a political and economic framework for the Continent in the coming century.

“This need (for a conference next year) is dictated by the pace of change in Europe and the world,” he said. “We are already in constant contact and dialogue, and this allows us to manage these events. . . .

“But we need to give new substance to European institutions, to make the Warsaw Pact and NATO more political than military. . . . We need to think of new structure for our relations, new organizations, so that changes strengthen and do not weaken our security.”

The Soviet president also urged the West to approach the question of German reunification cautiously.

“The borders of Europe that we currently have, including two German states, are the result of a certain historical period,” he said, adding that Europe must now “reckon with these realities.”

“What happens further is something that interests all of us, but let time tell, let history decide. This is not a question of immediate international importance, and it is wrong to speak of reunification in this way, for it would only complicate the situation.”

But Gorbachev’s theme throughout his visit to Italy, as in previous visits to Britain, Finland, France and Germany this year, was one of great change in Europe.

“Things are truly changing, and in the most radical way,” he said. “People are having an impact on politics. They are demanding that politicians act in accordance with sentiments of the times.

“People everywhere want change, and if anyone thinks that they want changes only in one region, they are very much mistaken.”