Since December of 2010, when pro-democracy and pro-freedom demonstrations started in Tunisia, and then spread to Egypt, Libya and other places throughout the Arab world, the movement has been called “the Arab Spring.” It is, I suppose, a reference to the Prague Spring of 1968.
But it makes me wonder how many people remember that, while the Prague Spring was a heady moment, it was also a failure.
While Alexander Dubcek talked of “socialism with a human face,” the Soviets and their Warsaw Pact allies were readying an invasion that crushed the Prague Spring in August of 1968. Freedom did not come to Czechoslovakia until November of 1989, over 21 years later.
I hope the Arab Spring turns out better.
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