The life story of the Czechoslovak politician Gustav Husak is quite instructive. His rule was famous for the so-called “normalization”, that is, the elimination of the consequences of the Prague Spring reforms. Gustav Husak was a Slovak nationality and the son of an unemployed. Life lifted him to the pinnacle of power. He became the President of socialist Czechoslovakia, an almost permanent leader of the Communist Party of the country. Being a reformer in his youth, he began to repress dissatisfied in the sixties of the last century. He himself resigned when he realized that his time was over.
Early biography: Gustav Husak in his youth
The future Czechoslovak politician was born on the territory of Austria-Hungary, in Posonykhidegkut (now Dubravka), January 10, 1913. At 16, he already became a member of the communist youth group. This happened while studying at the Bratislava gymnasium. And when he entered the law faculty of Comenius University, he already became a member of the Communist Party. There he quickly made a career, moving each time to a higher level. In 1938, the party was banned. When the Second World War broke out, Gustav Husak, on the one hand, was often engaged in illegal communist activities, for which he was repeatedly arrested by representatives of the fascist government Josef Tiso, and on the other, was friends with the leader of the Slovak ultra-right, Alexander Mach. Some sources claim that this is why he was released after several months of detention. In 1944, he became one of the leaders of the Slovak National Revolt against the Nazis and their government.
Gustav Husak after the war
The young promising politician immediately began his career as a statesman and party functionary. From 1946 to 1950, he actually played the role of Prime Minister, and thus, in 1948, participated in the liquidation of the Democratic Party of Slovakia, which won 62 percent of the vote in the forty-sixth year. But in 1950 he became a victim of Stalinist purges and during the reign of Clement Gottwald was convicted of nationalist views and sentenced to life imprisonment, spent six years in Leopold prison. Being a convinced communist, he considered such repressions against him a misunderstanding and constantly wrote tearful letters about this to the party leadership. Interestingly, the then leader of the HRC, Alexander Novotny, refused to pardon him, telling his comrades that "you still do not know what he is capable of if he comes to power."
Leader career
During the de-Stalinization, Gusak Gustav was rehabilitated. His sentence was quashed and reinstated in the party. It happened in 1963. Since then, the politician has become a big opponent of Novotny and supported the Slovak reformer Alexander Dubcek. In 1968, during the Prague Spring, he became the Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia, responsible for reform. When the Soviet Union expressed sharp dissatisfaction with the policies of the new leadership, Gusak Gustav was one of the first to call for caution. He began to speak skeptically about the possibilities of the Prague Spring, and during the military intervention in Czechoslovakia of the Warsaw Pact countries he became a participant in the negotiations between Dubcek and Brezhnev. Suddenly, Gusak led that part of the members of the HRC, who began to call for a "rollback" of reforms. In one of his speeches of that time, he asked a rhetorical question about where Dubcek’s supporters were going to look for friends who would help the country cope with the Soviet troops. Since then, Gusak has been nicknamed the pragmatic politician.
Ruler of Czechoslovakia
With the support of the USSR, the politician quickly replaced Dubcek as leader of the HRC. He not only turned back the reform process, but also expelled all liberal-minded from the party. In 1975, Gusak Gustav was elected President of Czechoslovakia. During the twenty years of his reign, the country remained one of the most faithful to the policies of the Soviet Union. In the first years of his tenure, Gusak tried to calm the angry people of the country, raising economic prosperity and avoiding massive and open repression. At the same time, human rights in Czechoslovakia were more limited than, for example, in Yugoslavia during the time of Broz Tito, and in the field of culture his policy can even be compared to what was in Romania under Nikolai Ceausescu. Under the banner of stability, the country's secret services constantly arrested dissidents such as members of the Charter 77, as well as trade union leaders who tried to organize strikes.
Gander in the era of "perestroika"
The older, the more conservative became the Hero of the Soviet Union Gusak Gustav (he received this award in 1983). True, in the seventies of the twentieth century, he returned to the party those who were expelled after the Prague Spring, although they were obliged to publicly repent of their "mistakes." In the 80s. in the Politburo, which he headed, the struggle began over whether to carry out reforms like the Gorbachev’s. For the Czechoslovak "perestroika" spoke in favor of Prime Minister Lubomir Strougal. Gusak remained neutral, but in April 1987 he proclaimed a program of reforms that were supposed to begin in 1991.
