THE RISE and FALL of COMMUNISM in EASTERN EUROPE Also by Ben F Owkes Anti /Rom the Same Publishers

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THE RISE and FALL of COMMUNISM in EASTERN EUROPE Also by Ben F Owkes Anti /Rom the Same Publishers THE RISE AND FALL OF COMMUNISM IN EASTERN EUROPE Also by Ben F owkes antI /rom the same publishers COMMUNISM IN GERMANY UNDER THE WEIMAR REPUBUC The Rise and Fall of Communism in Eastern Europe Second Edition Ben Fowkes © Ben Fowkes 1993, 1995 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 2nd edition 1995 978-0-333-65108-7 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London \vIP 9HE. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First Edition 1993 Second Edition 1995 Published in Great Britain by MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire R021 6XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN 978-0-333-65106-3 ISBN 978-1-349-24218-4 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-24218-4 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 I 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 96 95 Contents List of Plates vii Preface ix List of Abbreviations xi Introduction to the Second Edition xvii 1 Introduction 1 2 The Seizure of Power: The Northern Tier 6 3 The Seizure of Power: Hungary and the Agrarian South 28 4 High Stalinism 52 5 Eastern Europe after Stalin 76 6 The Quiet Years, 1957-68 106 7 Czechoslovakia in 1968: Climax and Defeat of Reform Communism 118 8 The Brezhnev Years: Dithering at the Top and Revolt from Below 142 9 The Premature Revolution: Poland 1980-81 157 10 Decline and Fall 170 Appendix: Statistical Tables 198 Notes 203 Index 220 v List of Plates 1 The atmosphere ofthe 1947 elections in Poland. The headquarters of the Warsaw Committee of the Polish Worlcers' Party, guarded by submachine guns (Ringier Bilderdienst, Zürich) 2 The seizure of power in Prague, Febrwuy 1948. Two lony-loads of People's Militia disembarlcing (paul Popper Ltd) 3 Hungarian insurgents on the way to Budapest at the end of October 1956 (Rolf Gilhausen, Hamburg) 4 AtriumphantDub&karrivesatK~iceafterbismeetingwithBrezhnev, 2 August 1968 (Eupra and Orlon Publishing Group Ltd) 5 The limits of modemisation. An ox-drawn cart still in use in Moravia in the 1960s (Professor W. V. Wallace) 6 Thenewurbanlandscape. High-riseflats in Warsaw (WilliamEchikson) 7 Thecontinuing backwardness ofagricu1ture inPoland. Fannerplough­ ing near Lublin in 1980 (Chris Niedenthal, Warsaw) 8 The face of dissent. Jacek Kuron in fu11 flow at Warsaw University, 1976 (Chris Niedenthal, Warsaw) 9 The Ursus Tractor Factory, near Warsaw, at a standstill during the strike over free Saturdays, January 1981 (Sipa-Prcsse, Paris) 10 The mysterious General Jaruzelski, sandwiched between bis allies: General Hoffman, GDR, and General KuIikov, USSR (Sipa-Presse, Paris) 11 Presiding over decline: A Warsaw Pact meeting of 1986. Zhivkov (Bulgaria) Ceau§Cscu(Romania),Husak(Czechoslovakia),Gorbachev (USSR), ~ (Hungary), Jaruzelski (poland), Honecker (GDR), (William Echikson) Vll Preface History books are written about events, structures or a combination of the two. This book is about events. In that sense it is marked by the circum­ stances of its birth. I was induced to write it by the tremendous and rapidly unfolding spectacle of the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe: a series of events par excellence. Who could remain unmoved by the fall of a system which had seemed such a permanent feature of the world's polit­ icallandscape? Who could faH to see the significance of the event, of the transitory occurrence, of the critical instant, in such a situation? . So it seemed in 1989. Not any longer. The event has lost its importance. The political crises in present-day Eastern Europe are, and will continue to be, superficial phenomena. Events will once again, as in the interwar years, 'pass across the stage of history like fireflies', to use BraudeI' sexpression, barely denting the surface. The important movement will be that of the deeper structure, a structure by no means motionless, but rapidly evolving. Then will be the time for a structural analysis of communist Eastern Europe. Today even the preliminary studies are lacking for this important task. I hope in the meantime that I have provided a clear guide to the successive crises which have shaken Eastern Europe during the communist epoch without altering, until the end, the fundamental structures put in place after the Second World War. One comment should be made here about the political terminology I have used. Political expressions like 'left' and iright' tend to appear with their signs reversed in the communist context. For instance, it is difficult to find an appropriate word, without misleading connotations, for thorough­ going opponents of the communist system. People who in the West might weIl have been labeIled 'right-wingers' or 'conservatives' turn up in the East under the description 'progressives' or 'radicals '. Such at least is their self-image. I have tried to avoid attaching labels of this kind, but where I have they should be understood within the context of the Soviet bloc. I have tried in general to avoid using political shorthand, except where the alternatives would be unbearably circumlocutory. There are many good books on aspects of communist Eastern Europe. I have drawn freely but I hope not too uncritically on the information they provide, and my debts are recorded where appropriate in the notes at the end of the book. What has been missing so far, and what the present work attempts to supply, is an overall study of the period from a historical point ix x Preface of view. Tbe book that comes nearest to this is Joseph Rothschild's excel­ lent Return to Diversity, but, firstly, his bias in terms of content is strongly towards the Second World War and its immediate aftermath, and, secondly, he is concerned with continuities rather than crises. I would therefore see my work as complementary to his. Finally, I should like to acknowledge two debts of gratitude. One is to my current and former students, particularly Jim Browne, Bülent Gökay and Norman Laporte for inspiring me to undertake this task; the other is to the institution where I work, the University (formerly Polytechnic) ofNorth London, for permiuing me two months of study leave. May 1992 BEN FOWKES List of Abbreviations AK Annia Krajowa: Horne Anny (Poland) AVH Allamvedelmi Hatosdg: State Defence Authority (Hungary) AVNOJ Antifasisticko vece narodnog oslobodjenja Jugoslavije: Anti­ Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia Avo Allamvedelmi Osztdly: State Defence Departrnent (Hungary) BCP Bulgarian Communist Party CBKP Centraine Biuro Komunistow Polskich w ZSSR: Central Bureau of Polish Communists in the USSR CC Central Committee CDU Christlich-Demokratische Union: Christian Democratic Union Ceskomoravskd Kolben Danek: The Kolben Danek (Engin­ eering) W orks of Bohemia and Moravia CMEA Council of Mutual Economic Aid (Comecon) CPCz Communist Party of Czechoslovakia CPSU Communist Party of the Soviet Union CPY Communist Party of Yugoslavia CRZZ Centralna Rada Zwigzkow Zawodowych: Central Council of Trade Unions (Poland) eS SR Ceskoslovenskd Socialistickd Republika: Czechoslovak So­ cialist Republic DBD Demokratische Bauernpartei Deutschlands: Democratic Peasants' Party of Germany DiP Doswiadczenie i Przyszlosc: Experience and the Future (Poland) DISZ Dolgozo Ijjusdg Szövetsege: Federation of Working Y outh (Hungary) xi xii List of Abbreviations DWK Deutsche Wirtschafts-Kommission: German Economic Commission DZV Deutsche Zentralverwaltung: German Central Administration FJN Front lednosci Narodu: Front of National Unity (Poland) GDR German Democratic Republic GOM Gminny Osrodek Maszynowy: Communal Machine and Trac­ tor Station (Poland) HCP Hungarian Communist Party HDF Hungarian Democratic Forum HSWP Hungarian Socialist W orkers' Party HWP Hungarian Workers' Party JZD lednotne Zemidilske Druistvo: Unified Agricultural Co­ operative (Czechoslovakia) KAN Klub Angaiovanych Nestran{kü: Club of Committed Non­ party People (Czechoslovakia) KKP Krajowa Komisja Porozumiewawcza: National Coordinating Commission (of Solidarity) KOR Komitet Obrony RobotnikOw: Workers' Defence Committee (Poland) KPD Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands: Communist Party of Germany KPN Konfederacja Polski Niepodleglej: Confederation for an Inde­ pendent Poland KPP Komunistyczna Partia Polski: Communist Party of Poland KRN Krajowa Rada Narodowa: National Council of the Homeland (Poland) K231 Club of Those Imprisoned under Article 231 (Czechoslova­ kia) KSR Konferencja SamorZ{ldu Robotniczego: Conference of Workers' Self-Government (Poland) List of Abbreviations xiii KSS Komitet Samoobrony Spolecznej: Social Self-Defence Com­ mittee (Poland) LCY League of Communists of Yugoslavia LDPD Liberal-Demokratische Partei Deutschlands: Liberal Demo­ cratic Party of Germany MADOSZ Magyar Dolgozok Orszdgos Szövetsege: Hungarian National Workers' Federation (Romania) MEFESZ Magyar Egyetemi es Foiskolai Egyesületek Szövetsege: Fed­ eration of Hungarian University and College Associations MKS Mirdzyzakladowy Komitet Strajkowy: Interfactory Strike Com­ mittee (Poland) MKZ Mirdzyzakladowy Komitet Zalotycielski: Interfactory Found- ing Committee (Poland) NDF National Democratic Front (Romania)
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