Shattered Hopes, Broken Promises, and Executions from Neglect
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SHATTERED HOPES, BROKEN PROMISES, AND EXECUTIONS FROM NEGLECT THE HUNGARIAN REVOLUTION AND THE UN Second Part Few post-World War II historical events have had the same impact and reverberations as the 1956 Hungarian Revolution had both inside and outside the country. The first part of the present study (published in the previous issue of JCWS) and the research behind it, significantly based on recently declassified and other archival documents, focused on a special aspect of the international response to the Revolution, the United Nations` efforts to deal with the critical and urgent events during the Revolution and in the year after. This part’s focus is the tragic consequences of the Revolution, including trials, imprisonments, and executions that continued years after 1956. The limitations of the UN is rarely discussed, particularly by those of us that steadfastly believe in the mission of the UN, even though this silence had implications for dissidents and others throughout the world who stand up to dictatorial regimes. Studying these issues will not weaken the UN, but will make it stronger and more effective in the future. 1. Devoted readers In spite of all the controversies included in the process of establishing the SpecCom, in taking testimonies and then in writing the Report the final outcome was a great achievement.1 It became a detailed chronicle of the Revolution with the explanation of its background, its effect and its influence. The Report was translated into several languages, prefaced by important politicians, distributed in hundreds of thousands of copies and still serves as a unique documentation of history. Some of the most attentive readers and analysts of the Report were the Hungarian communist authorities – mainly in the Foreign Ministry2 and officers of the intelligence services.3 Once the Report was published, it was immediately translated into Hungarian and printed in numbered copies for distribution only to senior members of the nomenklatura. At the same time, each chapter of the Report was assigned to different ministries or to the relevant authorities,4 while experts on international law started to work on the legal justifications for rejecting the Report and proving the “propaganda character” of the UN document. The intelligence services attacked what they interpreted as the “espionage executed by the UN Committee”5 and by unmasking and denouncing the “criminals and traitors” who by their “false testimonies were misguiding the international community.”6 The amount of energy invested into the process of attacking the Report and the complexity of efforts was enormous. It proved, even if indirectly, how important the UN was to the Kádár government. While 1 the UN’s authority was questioned, its representatives prevented from entering Hungary, and the UN Charter constantly disregarded and even violated, once an official document was prepared and published, it was taken extremely seriously. Prime Minister János Kádár personally controlled the process of work that was discussed at length at the highest level in the Politburo.7 Deadlines were set for responses from the relevant ministries well before the UN General Assembly (hereafter GA) session, so an overall response could be prepared prior to the UN GA formally discussing the Report. The Foreign Ministry`s Department of International Organizations submitted a one hundred forty six page analysis to prove the “fictional” character of the text (“Andersen`s Tale” was a mild expression of their dissent).8 From the Ministry of Defense to the Ministry of Interior, all authorities involved or referred to, submitted their counter-arguments. A team of international law experts were assigned to work out the legal basis of the rejection of the UN investigation, headed by the communist scholar Gyula Eörsi.9 Besides referring to precedents of UN actions and interpreting the Charter to suit their own purposes, they also focused on the laws of the relevant member countries preparing the Report, and referred to controversial legal practices of Western democracies, mainly but not exclusively, with their colonies. Very harsh wording was employed to defend Hungary’s right to its autonomy, paradoxically threatened by the UN Report and not by the Soviet invasion. In addition to rejecting the right of the UN to interfere with Hungary`s internal matters, each aspect of the work was questioned. The main point was that SpecCom used unusual methods as only “criminals” were questioned about their “crimes.”10 For the communist authorities, all witnesses testifying before SpecCom were criminals for participating in the Revolution, for illegal border crossings, or for the testimonies themselves, which were considered high treason. The three “open” witnesses were all “convicted criminals” according to Hungarian propaganda, as they all had been condemned and spent years in prison during the early 1950s. 11 Even if these early accusations against them had been fabricated and the sentences later declared unlawful, their subsequent rehabilitation could not happen as it was not applicable for those who had left Hungary. Furthermore, the other witnesses testifying and providing their own names, or later identified by the Hungarian authorities, were individually accused of different crimes, from looting to war crimes and from murder to undermining the constitutional order12. The members of the SpecCom also became targets as being partisan and having prejudices against the People`s Republic.13 Once the different texts were received, summarized, carefully edited, and stylistically reviewed, they were approved at the very highest levels both of the Party and of the Government;14 however, the Hungarian government’s reply was only made public after the Soviet government first issued its harsh rejection of the Report.15 There were several errors in the Report from which communist propaganda could profit, yet these were not often referred to, since the action of the UN, not just its Report, was the primary target of communist anger. It was, however, embarrassing that the ÁVH (State Defense Authority) was mistaken for the ÁEH (State Control Bureau) in the Report and the dates of the earlier Prime Minister Ferenc Nagy were confused with the years in office of Imre Nagy. Several inaccuracies were mentioned by the Western embassies in Budapest16 and were only partially corrected. Bang-Jensen also advised the Rapporteur of several inaccuracies, such as the reference to the legality of the revolutionary government also the legal bases of the invitation of the Soviet troops. It was also of major importance, as Bang- Jensen suggested, that the Defense Minister Pál Maléter had not been arrested by Soviet military 2 officers, as stated in the Report, but by KGB personnel, which surprised the Soviet military officers who were negotiating with Maléter under a „white” flag. However, corrections were not made. It became easy to undermine the credibility of the Report by referring to inaccuracies. Lists of corrections were supplied by Bang-Jensen several times (as he had a broader overview of the testimony, having been involved from the interviewing of many potential witnesses and the pre-selection of witnesses through review of the final drafts of the SpecCom report). His reservations and suggestions remained unanswered and often even unnoticed, and there were reasons to think that this may not have been purely accidental.17 Having the support of the Soviet Army and effective control over the country, the serious fear of the communist authorities was that the consequences of the Report might be catastrophic for the Hungarian political leadership. They tried to avoid this unwanted development. Firstly, the foreign policy of the regime started an extensive campaign to convince mainly third-world non-aligned nations that events in Hungary had been orchestrated by the imperialists, among them those colonial powers against which they were or had been fighting.18 Furthermore, little Hungary (also quite poor then) suggested to non- aligned nations that their receipt of possible future Soviet economic assistance would be tied to their future vote at the UN in this regard.19 The Hungarian diplomacy offered to trade favors in voting in international organizations and focused on specific concerns of the relevant countries (such as the question of Kashmir for India or fishing rights for Iceland) to strengthen their arguments. Embassies in the Western democracies were also ordered to attack the Report, often with the help of the local communist parties in launching propaganda campaigns on behalf of the Hungarian government (and with financial support by the USSR).20 Besides the diplomatic efforts and the legal attack against the Report, the Hungarian government also launched a very carefully conceived, planned and organized “spontaneous” campaign against the UN inside Hungary by all sectors of the population.21 It was very difficult for anyone to abstain-- bishops and rabbis, peasants and workers (tens of thousands from Csepel Island, once a revolutionary hotspot),22 intellectuals, teachers and writers (once the instigators of the Revolution), scientists, sportsmen, and women’s federation representatives were all put under serious pressure and even under duress to provide a “broad” protest against the Report.23 Thousands of cables were sent to the UN Secretary General from Hungary, representatives of the protesters were filmed handing over to the Minister of Foreign Affairs fat folders filled with signatures of