ABSTRACT
This chapter presents how Communism became established in the region and examines its principle characteristics. It shows that the Czechoslovak leadership sought to reach any early compromise with the Soviet Union and orientate Czech post-war policy towards cooperation with the USSR. Communists began with the majority party in Slovakia, the Democrats, then turned to the National Socialists and the Socialists, who were to be pressured into a merger with the Klement Gottwald Communists and President Benes and Foreign Minister Jan Masaryk, son of the state's first President. Foreign Minister Hayek argued that Manifesto gave aid and comfort to hardliners and Soviet leadership by providing them with arguments against the Czechoslovak leadership. Communism had not abolished national sentiment and conflicts. Certainly, differences between Czechs and Slovaks had not disappeared. In Slovakia, there were arrests of Hungarian intellectuals in 1982 and facilities for Hungarian minority were reduced.
