Though writers and artists grow bolder and begin to challenge the censors, the Party continues to maintain control. In 1962, Communist hard-liners persuade Khrushchev to visit an exhibition of modern art, hoping it will shock him into restoring tighter censorship. Censors stifle free speech in other parts of the Soviet Empire. Still facing a problem of food supply, Khrushchev orders the Soviet people to grow corn. But in 1963, the harvest fails.
Wheat has to be imported from America.
Soviets lose patience with Khrushchev. To many, his actions abroad seem clownish and irresponsible. Stability is restored in the Soviet Union but unrest is stirred in the Empire. In January 1968, Alexander Dubcek is appointed First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. By February 1968, Dubcek begins to implement reforms to Communism.