x EYE-WITNESS REPORTS FROM HUNGARY ;

Landlords,

officers

were all coming back

Under the heading “The last
days of the Nagy government”
the Budapest Nep Szabadsag,
organ of the Hungarian Soc-
ialist Workers’ party printed
this account of the struggle i
Hungary in its November 9
issue.

BUDAPEST

This is an account compiled
from eyewitness reports of
what ‘went on in the parlia-
ment building in the last days
of Imre Nagy’s government.

First there came workers’
delegations, and peasants who
brought food for the capital,
and intellectuals. One after
another they presented to
members of the government
the just demands of the work-
ers, peasants, intellectuals and
youth.

in the last few days of last
week the number of these dele-
gates fell away. On the other
hand the number of other
delegations tended to increase.

To be exact, they were not
delegations because nobody
had sent them.

Instead of people dressed in
workers’ clothes, there appear-
ed people dressed in officers’
uniforms recently taken out
of mothballs, fur coats and
‘fur-lined overcoats.

The corridors of parliament
were filled with heel-clicking
former landowners, sharehold-
ers and Horthyist officers.

These crowded the ante-
rooms of the ministers and
penetrated their offices. Then
appeared those politicians
who, although calling _them-
selves smallholders, had in
fact been expelled from the
Smallholders’ party.

They began discussing such
things as whether 100 or 200
acres of land should be given
back to landowners whose
land had been nationalised be-
cause of collaboration with
fascism.

Former factory owners and
Shareholders calling them-
selves Social Democrats ar-
rived to discuss whether fac-
tories employing 100 or 150
workers should be de-nation-
alised and returned to their
former owners.

Later on Horthyist officers
dominated the corridors and
one or two of them felt so cer-
tain of themselves that they
wanted to arrest President Ist-
van Doby and Deputy Prem-
ier Sandor Ronai at machine
gun point.

Old titles such as “your ex-
cellency” and; “your grace”
flew through the air.

The increasing number of -

representatives of reaction in
the cabinet, who did not con-
sider their main task the re-
storation of order but restoring
their old parties in their old
positions, vigorously support-
ed by these old acquaintances.

Honest people in the gov-
ernment looked on _ helpless-
ly. Zoltan Tildy himself said

he would have to resign from
his position in the government
because he could not look on
what his own pay was doing
in the interests of reactionary
forces.

A young officer of the Zrin-
yi Millitary Academy said:
“What would our parents say
if we to!d them we are not
wanted any more in the army
and our places are now being
taken by Horthyist officers?

“It is not position and rank
that we want. We were never
afraid and are still not afraid
of manual ~work, but we do
not want to, and will-not trans-
fer the commanding posts from
the hands of the workers and
peasants to Horthyist offic-
ers.”

This is a sad but authorita-
tive picture of the events in
parliament at the end of last
week.

In the light of the murder-
ous White Terror that was un-
folded in the capital and prov-
inces, it makes it clear that the
break-up of Imre Nagy’s gov-
ernment and the formation of
the Hungarian Revolutionary
Workers’ and Peasants’ gov-
ernment, as the only possible
road out of anarchy and con-
fusion to the restoration of or-
der was unavoidable.

Kenya jails
are still full

NAIROBI

After a four-year British
military campaign against
African resistance, the civil

administration in Kenya will
take over responsibility for
law and order, it was announc-
ed last week.

Sir Evelyn Baring, Kenya’s
governor, said the Kenya War
Council would stay — and so
will the commander-in-chief,
Lieut. General Sir Gerald
Lathbury.

During four years emerg-
ency 13,000 people have died.
Of these; 10,519 belonged to
the Resistance; the others were
civilians and members of the
“security forces.”

fix Evelyn admitted that
42,400 Africans were being
held in jail, 34,000 of then’
without charges.

Gangs of whites, dressed up
as Africans, will continue to
be used as spies and provoca-
teurs, Sir Evelyn indicated in
his speech to the legislative
council.

He also announced plans for
keeping thousands of leaders
of Resistance away from their
own people by sending them
to a remote settlement on the
Tana River, which they will
be forbidden to leave. Hund-
reds more will receive “more
stringent conditions.”

‘Fascists debated i
about shooting me |

tin

[Charlie Coutts, for the past three years-English editor.of the magazine World: You iis

Budapest, telephoned this report of his experiences in Hungary to London last week that
conctus.ons are drawn from what he himself saw during three weeks of bitter confi
began with peaceful demonstrations and ended with crushing of what became a coll

LONDON
Budapest is a scarred and battered city, for the tragedy is that Soviet troops |
had to fight not only open fasci8t troops but thousands of youngsters and stucen™
who sincerely believed they were under arms to defend Hungary. sds
That fascist troops existed I know from first-hand experience, because J ia
taken by a group of 20, who debated whether to shoot me or not — because I es

revolution. |

or might not have been a
British Communist.

So let me put it straight —
I know very well that hund-
reds of the finest young people
in Hungary were in the fight-
ing. But the group who held
me were fascists.

This is the position in
Budapest now as I see
zt:

If Imre Nagy and other
former government lead-
ers now in the Yugoslav
embassy are really pat-
riots, now is the time to
prove it.

An appeal from them
to resume work and then
carry on the struggle
around political differ-
ences would speed enor-
mously the full return

to normal life in Hungary.
This is Thursday (November
15), and there are many signs
that people are returning to
work and speeding up every-
day activity; but it is still very,
very slow.

On Monday (November 12)
workers went to offices and
factories for the first time.
Trams and buses and railways
began to operate, but the ma-
jority of factories were at a
standstill.

Of course, there were ob-
jective difficulties — thous-
ands lived so far from their
work that they could only get
there in time to start out on
the way home.

In many places there is
neither enough fuel or aw
materials. Some places spent
hours discussing the new wage
scales, and in two offices I
visited no one could decide
who was in charge — the old
director or the newly elected
workers’ council.

But behind all these reasons
lies the fact that the slogan,
“No work until the Russians
go home and Imre Nagy back
as prime minister,” holds mass
support, and it neutralises
thousands of honest workers
who fear that continuation of
the present position will lead
to national suicide.

The terrible danger is that
the workers are still unled.
The new United Workers’ So-
cialist party is in the popular
mind still.associated with the
era of Stalin and Rakosi (for-

mer secretary of the Hungar-

ian Working People’s party).

In the ferment and bitter-
ness of the past few weeks
peop'e have forgotten that
Kadar and the other govern-
ment and party leaders were
in the forefront of the strug-
gle against Rakosi and Gero
(successor: to Rakosi as sec-
retary of the Hungarian
Working People’s party).

Forgotten too, are the enor-
mous social gains of people’s
democracy. They are tem-
porarily overshadowed by the
worst features of the policies
that led to disaster.

Even now the majority do
not understand why the Kadar
government called for the help
of Soviet. troops. The fear of
danger of fascism did not loom
large in people’s minds.

The White Terror was con-
ducted in the name of being
against Security men in dis-
guise. In this way hundreds
of the finest workers, both
Communist and otherwise,
were murdered.

On the surface there appear-
ed to be a development of de-
mocracy. All kinds of’ politi-
cal parties were springing up.
People who got together and
drew up demands were going
to the printers and bringing
out newspapers in the name
of “the Hungarian people” or
“the armed youth.”

The main parties like the
Social Democrats or the Ag-
rarians were of course more
serious, but for all that their
main concern was the secur-
ing of cars, apartments and
district offices rather than
how to get together in the
national interest.

By Saturday, November 3,
one could say that the events
had. passed out of the hands
of the youth and students who
first began this struggle with
the aim of an independent,
democratic and socialist Hun-
gary.

True, in Dunapentele (for-
merly Sztalinvaros) the revo-
lutionary council, elected by
the overwhelming majority of
workers, had passed a resolu-
tion saying: “We were the first
socialist city in Hungary and
We must stay that way.”

True, too, that the vast ma-
jority of the people had simi-
lar sentiments, but there were
no organized forces to lead

them. ;

The \ Working People’s Pa '

was demoralised an

to exist. +e

onl
In these cireumstane™ of
could see the full orim

those who had redue cay” q

party to a bureaucracy
able of political action, ;
must also add the crime ;

. . Ss Ww. 10
Soviet Communist ‘3 moral

i i the
in the past given readet®

support to those same

Emigres were ae an
back from West Germ rinked

Austria. They quickly ~ 35.”

: n
up with those forces, 6V&™

side the government, ‘i ligui

dation of leading army md
ers,- Communists and © 4 ;
crats. od tha

It has to be understood "1,
reaction was the onl¥ oun
organised force in the © poy

try. In the absence oO” they

class jete

neutrality and free *
would hate served ther’ ide
pose and been throw? go:

Why couldn’t oi Naé. pirst
ernment preven "eat
because the honest pation
it were so confused they
and nationalism e they
could not foresee » tO yes
were opening the 40°
action.

Second, inside the
ment itself reaction was

cover!”
£0" gle

ready ‘taken its place an pire :

in fact, directing eveMt, gov

ly, because even }_ ee
ernment had wante@ | way
feat reaction there W? d
to do it. : me

No organised u
forces existed. ve and
wanted arms had war

no one could tell nae |
(i 4

leading or what W
ing. itua
Faced with such 2 5: wh?

jeaders nie
Kadar and those ine sil

decision must aS
believe it was 5
sible one in the irom it oe
Even if it meant v6 re
political end, they nce ob e
to call for the pe oF eet
viet troops to 81V° A eeied
needed to explain a 5 in de
bilize the working

fense of socialism. — P

NOVEMBER 23, 1956 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE ==