you reap what you sow

Discussions on alternate history, including events up to 20 years before today. Hosted by Terry Duncan.
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rob
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Joined: 01 Apr 2002, 06:00
Location: california,usa

you reap what you sow

#1

Post by rob » 05 Apr 2002, 01:18

I don't know if this would provide any comfort to the expelled Sudeten Germans, but had the Benes government merely expelled say, the top Nazi leadership out of the Sudetenland and offered the Sudeten Germans the option of staying in their homeland, the left-wing would never have won their narrow majority of the vote in the Czech elections of 1945. I believe that the Communists and Socialists won a combined vote of about 53%. Had the Sudetens also been allowed to vote, it is probable that the vast majority of their votes would have gone to non-leftist parties and thus it is likely that non-Socialists would have won a majority of the seats in the Czech parliament. As Soviet forces had left the country, such a government would have had a good chance of success, similar to what happened in Finland, and unlike what happened in Hungary, where the continual occupation of Hungary led to the communists taking over. Czechoslovakia might have achieved a Finnish style situation in which they did nothing too anti-Soviet in foreign policy but were allowed an internal democracy.

Abel Ravasz
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#2

Post by Abel Ravasz » 05 Apr 2002, 21:09

Could be rob, but my answer is no. Those elections were indeed firmly controlled by the Soviets and there are rumours of the communists getting a much lower percentage indeed in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. Don't think that hungarians, czechs and slovaks opted for being citizens in a communist state :)

Abel


Gwynn Compton
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#3

Post by Gwynn Compton » 06 Apr 2002, 12:54

If history has taught us anything, even "Democracy" can be subjected to the barrel of a gun.

rob
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Location: california,usa

#4

Post by rob » 06 Apr 2002, 19:57

I agree. However, I thought that the Soviets had in fact evacuated their army from Czechoslovakia by the time the 1945 elections were held, unlike Hungary, Poland etc.. Thus, according to my scenario Czechoslovakia missed an opportunity to pull a Finland and escape communism.

Abel Ravasz
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Posts: 402
Joined: 31 Mar 2002, 22:46
Location: Hungary/Slovakia

#5

Post by Abel Ravasz » 06 Apr 2002, 23:55

I don't know if they still had the army in Czechoslovakia but they were pressuring the authorities in the ways of diplomacy. They were threatening with coming again which would in fact be quite uncomfortable for the czechs and slovaks :D

Abel

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