Abstract
The French Communists' official reactions to the Soviet-led military intervention by five Warsaw Pact countries in Czechoslovakia in August 1968 are generally considered to mark the first time in history that the French Communist Party decided not to show public support for an international operation by the Soviet Union. French Communist support for the Czechoslovak reform movement was not exactly straightforward; nor was subsequent French Communist condemnation of the August military intervention consistent.
The French Communist Party leaders' attitude to the Prague Spring can be reasonably described as limited support, which did not go beyond the limits of friendship with the Soviet Union. By contrast, amongst French Communist intellectuals sympathies for the Prague Spring were much more visible.
In contrast to the this enthusiasm with which these intellectuals welcomed 'Socialism with a human face' in Czechoslovakia, however, were the impressions of the French Communist Party rank-and-file who had experienced the Prague Spring in person - they perceived it as a threat to Socialism. Although the French Communist Party initially 'condemned' the intervention in Czechoslovakia, the next day its leaders moderated their negative response, expressing 'disagreement'.
Ultimately, this position had no real influence on the French Party's relations with the Soviet Union. The attitude of the French Communist Party leadership after August 1968 was therefore of a dual nature: the Party declare that it stuck to its original position of disagreement with the intervention, but that was not really manifested in their politics in practice: in fact, they maintained friendly relations with both the Soviet Communists and the 'normalized' Czechoslovak Communist Party.
But not all French Communists agreed with this stance. For many French Communist intellectuals, the official condemnation was insufficient, and they appealed for greater solidarity with occupied Czechoslovakia.