To quote an old soc.history.what-if post of mine:
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Would Soviet military intervention even be necessary, regardless of what
Benes did? (BTW, one should remember that Benes was in poor health at the
time, and did not have long to live--a fact which no doubt had some
influence on his failure to resist.) The Communists were determined to
take the battle to the streets, and they had all the advantages there.
Besides being the largest single party, they had puppets in other
parties--e.g., the "Social Democrat" Fierlinger. [1] They had control of
the factory committees, of the security forces, and (through the "non-
partisan" Minister of Defense, Ludvik Svoboda) of the armed forces.
Benes lived long enough to justify his conduct:
"They blame me that I let them down, and I blame them, because they let me
down at a decisive moment. I was powerless without the action they
promised. When Gottwald filled the Old Town Square with bloodthirsty
militia, armed to their teeth, I waited for the rest of them to assemble
in Wenceslas Square. But I could not imagine that they so much lacked
organization, as well as decisiveness, when they should have acted. I
believed that the demonstration of unarmed students would be a signal for
a general uprising. But when no one moved, I could not allow Gottwald's
militant hordes to carry out mass massacres on the defenseless people of
Prague. Their threats had no limits."
Quoted by Zbynek Zeman and Antonin Klimek, *The Life of Edvard Benes 1884-
1948: Czechoslovakia in Peace and War* (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1997),
p. 268.
And if anyone thinks that Benes was exaggerating the ineffectiveness of
the non-Communist leaders during the crisis, Zeman and Klimek note that
"At different points in the February crisis, they were not available in
Prague. Mgr Hala and other leaders of the People's Party attended a
congress of Catholic women; Petr Zenkl, one of the ministers who had
resigned, left for a provincial town in Moravia where he was to receive
honorary citizenship. The general secretary of the National Socialist
Party, Krajina, also left for Moravia on a lecture tour; and his party
comrade, Hubert Ripka, left Prague to visit his parents. The chairman of
the Sokol organization went to the Tatra mountians in Slovakia for the
opening of the Sokol skiing championships. Jan Masaryk, stil a member of
the government, was in bed with a cold throughout the crisis, available
to no one with the exception of Mr. Zorin [the fomrer Soviet ambassador
and now Molotov's deputy]." p. 269.
Sorry, no matter what Benes does or doesn't do, this bunch is not going to
prevail against the Communists--even without a Red Army invasion.
[1] Known to his critics as "Quislinger."
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/89i8DcHfkFA/rYZVvQvOBsoJ
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(Just to clarify one thing about that post: the "National Socialist" party was Benes' party; it of course had nothing to do with Nazis.)
Incidentally, it was once believed that Stalin had wanted to use Soviet troops, but that Gottwald had assured him that it would not be necessary: "Stalin, he [Zorin] told Gottwald, insisted that the Communists should take advantage of the current crisis to stage the final confrontation. He also pointedly suggested that Gottwald should ask the Soviet government for military assistance; Soviet troops were already massed on the Hungarian border...Gottwald declined to invite in the foreign troops, making this the one instance in his entire life when he disobeyed the Soviet leader. When Zorin reminded him of the consequences of such disobedience, Gottwald explained that the presence of Soviet troops was completely unnecessary because the party was in full command of the situation, with control over the armed forces, and that Soviet intervention would significantly complicate the power confrontation both domestically and internationally." Karel Kaplan, *The Short March: The Communist Takeover in Czechoslovakia 1945-1948* (New York: St. Martin's Press 1988), p. 175. It now appears that this has it exactly reversed--it was Gottwald who wanted to use Soviet troops (at least for a demonstration on the borders) and the Soviets who turned him down!:
"The newly released documents argue against the currently widespread version, which claims that the Kremlin considered it appropriate for the Soviet Army in Hungary to move towards the frontier with Czechoslovakia or even to enter Czechoslovak territory. It is clear from the telegrams, that the Soviet leadership considered the Soviet demonstration of military might at the frontier with Czechoslovakia, which according to Zorin Premier Gottwald and General Secretary Slansky were demanding, to be inappropriate. Molotov also thought it inappropriate for Moscow to give Gottwald any orders 'along Party lines' and warned against Zorin visiting Benes without direct orders from Moscow. The Soviet Communist Party publicly expressed its position on the events in Czechoslovakia with only a commentary in
Pravda, remarking on the international 'reactionnaries' and emphasis on the inadmissibility of any compromise.
"The Editors of
Soudobe dejiny have included with Murasko's article the comments of Russian historian Leonid Gibiansky and Czech historian Karel Kaplan. Both scholars point out that even after the publication of part of the documents connected with the Zorin mission a number of open questions remain concerning the evaluation of the Soviet role in the February takeover. The Communists' opponents, including President Benes, had no idea of what decisions had been taken in the Kremlin, and so the CPCz leadership could use the Soviet threat as an instrument of political and psychological pressure. And, Kaplan argues, Moscow had no need to give Gottwald instructions emphasizing a tough, uncompromising approach, as Zorin had originally said about him, when in the meantime it became apparent that the CPCz had become master of the situation."
http://web.archive.org/web/20030709111152/http://www.usd.cas.cz/usdeng/zorin.html