Gustáv Husák
Encyclopedia
Slovaks
The Slovaks, Slovak people, or Slovakians are a West Slavic people that primarily inhabit Slovakia and speak the Slovak language, which is closely related to the Czech language.Most Slovaks today live within the borders of the independent Slovakia...
politician, president of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
and a long-term Communist leader of Czechoslovakia and of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, in Czech and in Slovak: Komunistická strana Československa was a Communist and Marxist-Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992....
(1969–1987). His rule is known as the period of Normalization
Normalization (Czechoslovakia)
In the history of Czechoslovakia, normalization is a name commonly given to the period 1969 to about 1987. It was characterized by initial restoration of the conditions prevailing before the reform period led by Alexander Dubček , first of all, the firm rule of the Communist Party of...
after the Prague Spring
Prague Spring
The Prague Spring was a period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia during the era of its domination by the Soviet Union after World War II...
.
Early life
Gustáv Husák was born as a son of an unemployed worker in DúbravkaDúbravka, Bratislava
Dúbravka is a borough of Bratislava, Slovakia. It lies in the western part of the city on the eastern slope of Devínska Kobyla hill, covers 862 ha and is home to some 35,000 inhabitants.- History :...
(now part of Bratislava
Bratislava
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and, with a population of about 431,000, also the country's largest city. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia on both banks of the Danube River. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two independent countries.Bratislava...
), Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
, Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
(now Slovakia
Slovakia
The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
). He joined the Communist Youth Union at the age of sixteen while studying at the grammar school in Bratislava. In 1933, when he started his studies at the Law Faculty of the Comenius University in Bratislava, he joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, in Czech and in Slovak: Komunistická strana Československa was a Communist and Marxist-Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992....
(KSČ) which was banned from 1938 to 1945. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
he was periodically jailed by the Jozef Tiso
Jozef Tiso
Jozef Tiso was a Slovak Roman Catholic priest, politician of the Slovak People's Party, and Nazi collaborator. Between 1939 and 1945, Tiso was the head of the Slovak State, a satellite state of Nazi Germany...
government for illegal Communist activities, and he was one of the leaders of the 1944 Slovak National Uprising
Slovak National Uprising
The Slovak National Uprising or 1944 Uprising was an armed insurrection organized by the Slovak resistance movement during World War II. It was launched on August 29 1944 from Banská Bystrica in an attempt to overthrow the collaborationist Slovak State of Jozef Tiso...
against Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and Tiso. Husak was a member of the Presidium of the Slovak National Council
Slovak National Council
The Slovak National Council is the name of different types of supreme bodies in the history of Slovakia. They existed within the Kingdom of Hungary, Czechoslovakia or the Slovak Republic or were bodies of Slovak exiles:...
from 1 September to 5 September 1944.
After the war he began a career as a government official in Slovakia and party functionary in Czechoslovakia. From 1946–1950 he acted as a quasi-Prime Minister of Slovakia, and as such he strongly contributed to the liquidation of the Democratic Party of Slovakia, which had won 62% in the 1946 elections in Slovakia, thus preventing the Communists from seizing power in Czechoslovakia.
In 1950 he fell victim to a Stalinist purge of the party leadership, and was sentenced for life, spending the years from 1954 to 1960 in the Leopoldov Prison
Leopoldov Prison
Leopoldov Prison is a 17th century fortress built against Ottoman Turks, in the 19th century it was converted into a high-security prison in the town of Leopoldov, Slovakia...
. A convinced Communist, he did not cease to view his imprisonment a gross misunderstanding which he periodically stressed in several appealing letters addressed to the party leadership. It is well known that Antonín Novotný
Antonín Novotný
Antonín Novotný was General Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia from 1953 to 1968, and also held the post of President of Czechoslovakia from 1957 to 1968. He was born in Letňany, now part of Prague....
, the Czechoslovak president and first party secretary of that time, repeatedly declined to grant Husák pardon by assuring his comrades that "you do not know what he is capable of when coming to power". The true reason for Novotný's stance, however, may be ascribed to his personal politically motivated Slovakophobia as well. Finally, as a result of the De-Stalinization period in Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
, Husák's conviction was overturned and his party membership restored in 1963. By 1967 he attacked the KSČ's neo-Stalinist
Neo-Stalinism
Neo-Stalinism is a political term referring to attempts at rehabilitating the role of Joseph Stalin in history and re-establishing the political course of Stalin, at least partially. The term is also used to designate the modern political regimes in some states, political and social life of which...
leadership, and he became a deputy premier of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
in April 1968, during the period of liberalization under party leader Alexander Dubček
Alexander Dubcek
Alexander Dubček , also known as Dikita, was a Slovak politician and briefly leader of Czechoslovakia , famous for his attempt to reform the communist regime during the Prague Spring...
.
Leader of Czechoslovakia
As the Soviet UnionSoviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
grew increasingly alarmed by Dubček's liberal reforms in 1968 (Prague Spring
Prague Spring
The Prague Spring was a period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia during the era of its domination by the Soviet Union after World War II...
), Husák began calling for caution. After the Soviets invaded Czechoslovakia in August and he participated in the Czechoslovak-Soviet negotiations between the kidnapped Alexander Dubček and Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev – 10 November 1982) was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. His eighteen-year term as General Secretary was second only to that of Joseph Stalin in...
in Moscow, he suddenly became a leader of those party members calling for the reversal of Dubček's reforms. An account for his pragmatism
Pragmatism
Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition centered on the linking of practice and theory. It describes a process where theory is extracted from practice, and applied back to practice to form what is called intelligent practice...
was given in one of his official speeches in Slovakia
Slovakia
The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
after the 1968 events, during which he ventured a rhetorical question, asking where his opponents (i.e., supporters of opposition against the Soviet Union) want to find those "friends" of Czechoslovakia (i.e., countries in Europe) that would come to support the country (i.e., against Soviet troops).
Supported by Moscow, he was appointed leader of the Communist Party of Slovakia
Communist Party of Slovakia (1939)
The Communist Party of Slovakia was a communist party in Slovakia. It was formed in March 1939, when the Slovak Republic was created, as the Slovak branches of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia were separated from the mother party...
in as early as August 1968, and he succeeded Dubček as first secretary (title changed to general secretary in 1971) of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, in Czech and in Slovak: Komunistická strana Československa was a Communist and Marxist-Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992....
in April 1969. He reversed Dubček's reforms and purged the party of its liberal members in 1969–1971. In 1975, Husák was elected President of Czechoslovakia. During the two decades of Husák's leadership, Czechoslovakia became one of Moscow's most loyal allies.
In the first years following the invasion, Husák managed to appease the outraged civil population by providing a relatively satisfactory living standard and avoiding any overt reprisals like was the case in the 1950s. While his regime was certainly less harsh than the first 20 years of Communist rule in the country, it wasn't a liberal one either. The people's rights were somewhat more restricted than was the case in János Kádár
János Kádár
János Kádár was a Hungarian communist leader and the General Secretary of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party, presiding over the country from 1956 until his forced retirement in 1988. His thirty-two year term as General Secretary makes Kádár the longest ruler of the People's Republic of Hungary...
's Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
and Josip Broz Tito
Josip Broz Tito
Marshal Josip Broz Tito – 4 May 1980) was a Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. While his presidency has been criticized as authoritarian, Tito was a popular public figure both in Yugoslavia and abroad, viewed as a unifying symbol for the nations of the Yugoslav federation...
's Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
. Indeed, on the cultural level the level of repression was similar to that of Erich Honecker
Erich Honecker
Erich Honecker was a German communist politician who led the German Democratic Republic as General Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party from 1971 until 1989, serving as Head of State as well from Willi Stoph's relinquishment of that post in 1976....
's East Germany and Nicolae Ceauşescu
Nicolae Ceausescu
Nicolae Ceaușescu was a Romanian Communist politician. He was General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and as such was the country's second and last Communist leader...
's Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
. Under the cover of everyday stability, there was a permanent campaign of repression by the secret police
Secret police
Secret police are a police agency which operates in secrecy and beyond the law to protect the political power of an individual dictator or an authoritarian political regime....
(StB
STB
STB is an acronym that can mean:* Sacrae Theologiae Baccalaureus – Bachelor of Sacred Theology* Set-top box – a television device that converts signals to viewable images* Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP -- a law firm...
) targeted at the outspoken dissidents represented later by Charter 77
Charter 77
Charter 77 was an informal civic initiative in communist Czechoslovakia from 1976 to 1992, named after the document Charter 77 from January 1977. Founding members and architects were Václav Havel, Jan Patočka, Zdeněk Mlynář, Jiří Hájek, and Pavel Kohout. Spreading the text of the document was...
as well as hundreds of unknown individuals who happened to be objects of StB's preventive strikes. The repression intensified over the years as Husák grew more conservative.
Starting in the early 1970s, Husák allowed those who had been purged in the aftermath of Prague Spring to rejoin the party. However, they were required to publicly distance themselves from the "errors" they had committed.
The latter part of Husák's tenure saw a struggle within the Politburo over whether to adopt Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
-style reforms. While the hardliners, led by Vasil Bilak
Vasil Bilak
RSDr. Vasiľ Biľak is a former Slovak Communist leader of Rusyn origin.Vasiľ Biľak was originally a tailor...
, opposed any restructuring, moderates led by Prime Minister
Prime minister
A prime minister is the most senior minister of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. In many systems, the prime minister selects and may dismiss other members of the cabinet, and allocates posts to members within the government. In most systems, the prime...
Lubomir Strougal
Lubomír Štrougal
Lubomír Štrougal is a former Czech politician and communist Czechoslovakia prime minister.After serving in Germany’s industry during the World War II he finished the law studies at the Charles University in Prague...
strongly favoured reform. Husák himself stayed neutral until April 1987, when he announced a somewhat half-hearted reform program starting in 1991.
Later that year, however, Husák yielded his post as general secretary to Milouš Jakeš
Milouš Jakeš
Miloš Jakeš was General Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia from 1987 until 1989...
. This was in response to a desire for younger leaders (Jakeš and Ladislav Adamec
Ladislav Adamec
Ladislav Adamec was a Czechoslovak Communist political figure. Upon the retirement of Prime Minister Lubomír Štrougal in October 1988, Adamec assumed the role, thus serving as the last Communist leader of Czechoslovakia. He served from October 12, 1988 to December 7, 1989...
) to share in power.
Communist rule collapsed in Czechoslovakia in late 1989. On 10 December, he was forced to preside over the appointment of the country's first non-Communist government in over 40 years. Soon afterward, he resigned as president. In February 1990 he was expelled from the Communist Party. He died almost forgotten on 18 November 1991.
There is still some question about Husák's moral responsibility for the last two decades of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia. After its collapse Husák kept saying that he was just trying to diminish the aftermath of the Soviet invasion and had to constantly resist pressure from hard line Party Stalinists such as Bilak, Alois Indra and the like. It is true that in the early 1970s he personally pushed for an early withdrawal of the Soviet troops from Czechoslovak territory, which did not happen until 1991; this may be ascribed to his pragmatic attempts to ease the situation and to give an impression that things were leaning toward "normality".
However, there are many irrefutable facts, convicting him of a great deal of personal contribution to the regime's nature. As the General Secretary of the Party he was well able and willing to control the repressive state apparatus. There are many documented cases of appeals from politically persecuted persons, however almost none of them was given Husák's attention. As the overall decay of Czechoslovak society was becoming more and more obvious in the 1980s, Husák became a politically impotent puppet of events.
Gustáv Husák was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union
Hero of the Soviet Union
The title Hero of the Soviet Union was the highest distinction in the Soviet Union, awarded personally or collectively for heroic feats in service to the Soviet state and society.-Overview:...
on 9 January 1983
Functions
Communist Party of CzechoslovakiaCommunist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, in Czech and in Slovak: Komunistická strana Československa was a Communist and Marxist-Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992....
/KSČ (prohibited 1938, dissolved 1939-1945)
- 1933-1938/1939 and 1989(December)-(February)1990: common member
- spring 1945: member of its Provisional Central Committee (established in the parts of Czechoslovakia liberated by the Red ArmyRed ArmyThe Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...
) - 1949-1951 and 1968 (31 August)-1989: member of its Central Committee and (except for 1949–1951) a member of its Presidium
- 1969 (April) -?1987: one of its secretaries
- 1969 (April)-1987: party leader (first secretary, since 1971 general secretary)
- 1987 (17 December): resigned as party leader (replaced by Miloš Jakeš)
Communist Party of Slovakia
Communist Party of Slovakia (1939)
The Communist Party of Slovakia was a communist party in Slovakia. It was formed in March 1939, when the Slovak Republic was created, as the Slovak branches of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia were separated from the mother party...
/KSS (illegal 1939-1944/1945)
- 1939-1945: one of its leaders
- 1943-1944: member of its 5th illegal Central Committee
- 1944-1950 and 1968 -1971: member of its Central Committee and (except for 1970–1971) member of its Presidium and (except for 1944–1948) one of its secretaries
- 1944-1945: vice-chairman
- 1968 (28 August)-1969: party leader ("first secretary")
Slovak National Council
Slovak National Council
The Slovak National Council is the name of different types of supreme bodies in the history of Slovakia. They existed within the Kingdom of Hungary, Czechoslovakia or the Slovak Republic or were bodies of Slovak exiles:...
(during World War II a resistance parliament-government, since 1968 the Slovak parliament)
- 1943-1944: one of its main organizers
- 1944-1950 and 1968 (December)-1971: its deputy
- 1944-1950: member of its Presidium
- 1944-1945:vice-chairman
Council of Commissioners (Zbor povereníkov) (a quasi government responsible for Slovakia)
- 1944-1945: Commissioner of the Interior
- 1945-1946: Commissioner of Transport and Technology in Slovakia
- 1946-1950: President of the Council of Commissioners, in which he contributed to the suppression of the influential Democratic Party of Slovakia by the Communists (1947–1948)
- 1948-1950: Commissioner of Agriculture and Land Reform in Slovakia
- 1949-1950: Commissioner of Alimentation in Slovakia
Czechoslovak Parliament (called National Assembly and since 1968 Federal Assembly)
- 1945-1951 and 1968-1975: deputy
- 1969-1975: member of its Presidium
Czechoslovak government
- 1968 (April–December): a vice-premier of the Prague SpringPrague SpringThe Prague Spring was a period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia during the era of its domination by the Soviet Union after World War II...
Czechoslovak government
President of Czechoslovakia
- 1975-1989: President of Czechoslovakia
- 1989 (10 December): resigned as the President of Czechoslovakia within the Velvet RevolutionVelvet RevolutionThe Velvet Revolution or Gentle Revolution was a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia that took place from November 17 – December 29, 1989...
Other important data
- 1929-1932: member of the Communist Youth Union (prohibited in 1932)
- 1933-? : studies at the Law Faculty of the Comenius University in Bratislava, then a lawyer in Bratislava
- 1936-1938: member of the Slovak Youth Union (1936 founder and secretary)
- 1937-1938 vice-president of the Slovak Students Union and secretary of the Association for the Economic and Cultural Cooperation with the Soviet UnionSoviet UnionThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
- 1940-1944: four times jailed by the government of Jozef TisoJozef TisoJozef Tiso was a Slovak Roman Catholic priest, politician of the Slovak People's Party, and Nazi collaborator. Between 1939 and 1945, Tiso was the head of the Slovak State, a satellite state of Nazi Germany...
for illegal Communist activities - 1943-1944: member of the 5th illegal KSS Central Committee, one of the main organizers of the anti-Nazi Slovak National UprisingSlovak National UprisingThe Slovak National Uprising or 1944 Uprising was an armed insurrection organized by the Slovak resistance movement during World War II. It was launched on August 29 1944 from Banská Bystrica in an attempt to overthrow the collaborationist Slovak State of Jozef Tiso...
(1944) and of its leading body, the Slovak National Council - late 1944- February 1945: he fled to Moscow after the defeat of the Slovak National Uprising
- 1950: charged with "bourgeois nationalismBourgeois nationalismBourgeois nationalism is a term from Marxist phraseology. It refers to the alleged practice by the ruling classes of deliberately dividing people by nationality, race, ethnicity, or religion, so as to distract them from possible class warfare...
" with respect to Slovakia (see History of CzechoslovakiaHistory of CzechoslovakiaWith the collapse of the Habsburg monarchy at the end of World War I, the independent country of Czechoslovakia was formed, encouraged by, among others, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson...
) - 1951: arrested
- 1954: sentenced to life imprisonment
- 1954-1960: imprisoned
- 1960: conditionally released through an amnesty
- 1963: his conviction was overturned and his party membership restored and he was rehabilitated
- 1963-1968: scientific employee of the State and Law Institute of the Slovak Academy of SciencesSlovak Academy of SciencesThe Slovak Academy of Sciences SAV is the main scientific and research institution in Slovakia fostering basic and strategic basic research...
- 1969 (April)-?1989: chief commander of the Popular Militia
- 1971 (January)-?1989: president and member of the Presidium of the National FrontNational Front (Czechoslovakia)The National Front was the coalition of parties which headed the re-established Czechoslovakian government from 1945 to 1948. During the Communist era in Czechoslovakia it was the vehicle for control of all political and social activity by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia...
Central Committee