Hungarian and Czechoslovakian Uprisings

Hungary 1956

Why was there opposition in Hungary?

Hungary became communist in 1947 with its harsh leader Rakosi. The Hungarian people hated the restriction put upon them by the government such as no freedom of speech but they also lived in constant fear of the secret police and they resented the presence of thousands of Soviet troops and official in Hungary. Some areas even had Russian street signs, schools and shops and worst of all, Hungarians had to pay for the Soviet forces to be in Hungary.

In June 1956 a group within the communist party opposed Rakosi. Rakosi appealed to Moscow for help. He wanted to arrest 400 leading opponents but Moscow refused.The Kremlin ordered Rakosi to retire for "health reasons".

However the new leader Gero was no more acceptable to the Hungarian people. On the 23rd October, a huge student demonstration resulted with the huge statue of Stalin being pulled down in Budapest. At this, the USSR allowed a new government to be formed under the reformist Imre Nagy. Soviet troops that had been there since the war began to withdraw and Hungarians started to create thousands of local councils to replace Soviet power. Thousands of Hungarian soldiers defected from the army and took the weapons with them.

Nagy government began to make plans. They wanted free and fair elections, create impartial courts, restore farmland to private ownership, withdraw of…