(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
ORIENTERING 7. SEPTEMBER 1968
Olav Ritter's wholehearted support for the legal government of the country was known to millions of Czechs and Slovakians. His words reached a people he knew well. He studied in Prague around 1930 and was there during the Munich crisis 1938. In the years following the change of power 1948, he was also head of the UN Information Office in Prague for five years. Orientering traces:
- The Norwegian press seemed less "free" than Radio Prague. When Rider came out of Czechoslovakia with the last train before the border was blocked, he saw in Norwegian newspapers that he should have doubts that it was right to be a NATO opponent anymore:
"Of course, I haven't said anything like that," says Olav Rytter Orientering. I am as much against Norwegian NATO membership now as before 21. August. That was precisely the blockchain that NATO is expressing as a victim of Czechoslovakia. The phrase that "NATO is bringing peace" must at least be buried no. It was precisely the military argument – about NATO – that the Russians could use as a pretext to resettle Czechoslovakia. Norway and Czechoslovakia are both vulnerable countries in block politics. The strategic situation of Norway and the CSSR is similar to each other. Just as the Warsaw Alliance is Czechoslovakia's problem, so is NATO. It's important to avoid our alliance leading to an equally harsh lag for us.
- But just as obviously, those who are campaigning against NATO must discuss what has happened and evaluate the political scheme in light of the revelations the Czechoslovakia tragedy gave us. Sadly, it has now become more important than before to discuss alternatives to NATO. Furthermore, I feel that it must be a most important task to liberate Czechoslovakia from the Warsaw Pact as to get Norway out of NATO. The Rapacki plan was well advanced in the word-changing man and man in between in Prague. If Norway could step out of NATO as a leak in a neutralization of small countries between the East and the West – including Czechoslovakia – would be a lot won.
- Did you mention an alternative to NATO?
- Yes, whether it has the meanings in the campaign here were shared. I myself have a hold on armed neutrality, possibly as a transition to a Nordic neutrality relationship. And the stay in Czechoslovakia strengthened me in that. The demonstrations in Prague against the occupation developed after a quarter into a demonstration for Czechoslovak neutrality. They thought Czechoslovakia was leaking in a neutral zone, thinking of an armed neutral Czechoslovakia who had to rely on themselves. Then they could meet the enemy with weapons – not like now and in 1938 and 1939 with posters and protests. Both in 1938 and now it was the alliance policy that led them to misfortune. The many thousands who wore the mark of neutrality had a greater hope that this line could secure their freedom.
- Brought the intervention to greater sympathy for the United States?
- Did I talk to, especially younger intellectuals, the mere blow of the United States. There was a rumor in Prague that the Soviet had warned the US ahead of the intervention and the US embassy did not notify the Czech government. It was not in NATO the country sought its allies. "Our real allies are the opposition in Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, Greece, Spain – and the Liberation Front in South Vietnam. May we in exile want our closest brother-in-law, among others, Andreas Papandreou – a victim of block politics on the other side, ”one of them said.
- Dubcek gets praise in Morgenbladet.
- I asked a friend in Prague: How can it be most unwise to find a single communist here in the city when I was here in 1949, while now most everyone goes with a party mark? Are there so many more party members now? He replied: "They were probably just as many at that time, but now it is an honor to be a communist." Many of those who were formerly against the socialist system are now too – it is most unwise to find opponents of socialism in CSSR today. The new party government has managed to win people's trust. Novotny and his people couldn't do that. This makes Dubcek much more dangerous for Morgenbladet and their backers than Novotny was. Morgenbladet did not know what they were doing as little as they knew when in 1938 they would give the Nobel Peace Prize to Chamberlain for the failure in Munich – the first time Czechoslovakia was to proclaim a great power.
- The SUF criticizes the Dubcek regime, argues that it is revisionist and that it is in the interests of the technocrat middle class.
- This is not about revisionism or not, but about a people's life and soul. The Russians have the trough of genocide – I think the SUF could have chosen some more grisly time to carry posters against Dubcek through the city. I also think their analysis is wrong. The Dubcek government has led Czechoslovakia a long way towards the classless society by breaking the stalemate party and government bureaucracy. Today, there is no doubt that the Czechoslovak working class is fully and fully behind Dubcek, Svoboda, Cernik and Smrkovsky. The Labor militia, armed Communist veterans from the first years after the World War, is today fully and fully behind the new party leadership.
What about Czechoslovak impulses for Norwegian labor?
- Norwegian labor movement was able to draw rich inspiration from the new Czechoslovak party leadership that will give "socialism a human spirit", one of Dubcek's slogans. It is told from the things in Cierna that Breshnev was overly insulted at this very thing that Dubcek wanted to create a more human socialism to distinguish from socialism in Soviet. "But aren't we human then," Breshnev asked – that time.
