Stalinism unmasked Revolution and counter-revolution in Hungary

THIS ARTICLE, which was written in the midst of the events of October 1956, does not pretend to be an exhaustive analysis of the Hungarian Revolution. On the contrary, it was written with the principal purpose of refuting the slanders and distortions of British Stalinism and defending the heroic struggles of the Hungarian workers.

Despite the victory of the Red Army there is no doubt that the Hungarian Revolution sounded the death knell of Stalinism in the same way as the abortive Commune of Paris sounded the death-knell of capitalism.

Today when Stalinism, social democracy and Pabloite revisionism are trying desperately to obscure the real significance of the Hungarian Revolution, we Trotskyists are doubly proud to publish Comrade Healys' article. It is the best contribution we can make to the Hungarian workers' struggle against Stalinism.

STALIN IS DEAD BUT STALINISM LIVES.

That is the message spelt out in letters of blood by the Hungarian people.

The labour movement of the world is rightly shocked at the brutality and ruthlessness of the Soviet armed forces. But this fact must not permit us to be taken off guard for one moment by world imperialism and its agents. Stalinist rule has always been associated with persecution and murder, both inside and outside the Soviet Union. Eden and Eisenhower have never protested when revolutionary opponents of the regime have been smashed. They helped to whitewash and justify the Moscow trials through the book and film 'Mission to Moscow' written by American exambassador Joseph E. Davies. Both the British and American governments refused asylum to the great revolutionary Leon Trotsky when he was being hounded from one country to another by Stalin's GPU.

If these gentlemen shed tears for Hungary today it is not for the workers and peasants who have borne the brunt of the fight against Stalinism but for their fascist and landlord friends.

What happened in Hungary, as we shall see, was a revolution for national independence and democratic rights. Connected with this was a series of demands passed by the trade unions.

I. Workers' councils in every factory to establish workers' management and radically transform the system of state central planning and directing.

2. Wages to be raised immediately by 10 to 15 per cent and a ceiling (about £106 a month fixed for the highest salaries.

3. To abolish production norms except in factories where the workers or workers' councils wish to keep them.

4. The 4 per cent bachelor and childless family tax to be abolished; the lowest retirement pensions to be increased; child allowances to be raised with special reference to the needs of large families.

5. Speed up house-building with the state, co-operatives and other organisations launching a powerful social movement to mass produce houses.

6. Negotiate with the governments of the : principle _of equality.

(Daily Worker", October 27).

The backbone of this movement was the demand for the witharawal or at sure uvups from Hungary.

The imperialists were against this type of revolution. On the same day, October 27, the 'New York Times'—mouthpiece of American big business-declared:

"The view prevailing among United States officials, it appeared, was that "evolution" towards freedom in Eastern Europe would be better for all concerned than "revolution", though nobody was saying this publicly!

The New York Times' again returned to this te the next day, October 28, when it declared that the problem of western imperialism is 'how to encourage the nationalist and libertarian spirit in the satellites without flaming it into a large scale revolt.' As if not to be outdone by the 'New York Times' the London Daily Worker', echoing Moscow, declared on October 25: 'Only false friends resort to the gun....

Five days previously (October 22), John Foster Dulles speaking in Washington defended the legality of the presence of Soviet troops in Poland under the Warsaw agreement.

violation of treaties, he said, 'I do not think you 'From the standpoint of international law and can claim that it would be a violation of a treaty!

Mr. Dulles was fully aware at the time he made that statement that a revolution was under way in Hungary and Hungary was also a party to the Warsaw agreement.

Hot on the heels of Mr. Dulles came R. Palme Dutt of the British Communist Party.

. 'The Soviet armed forces,' he wrote, 'were legally in Hungary by agreement under the Warsaw Pact!

('Daily Worker,' November 10.)

In a cable from Washington by its correspondent Philip _Deane, the London. 'Observer', November 11, 1956, reports that:

'High Administration sources say that the United States has tried to let the Russians know, without being provocative, that Berlin and Austria will be defended by American forces, Hungary, meanwhile, has been officially and finally abandoned to its fate!

And Basil Davidson, one of the last journalists to leave Hungary, reports that of the American financed propaganda station Free Europe Radio one revolutionary said:

'I wish I could shut its ugly mouth. It lied to us just as the Russians lied to us!

Neither the Soviet bureaucrats nor the imperialists and their representatives Palme Dutt and Foster Dulles care two hoots about the working people of Hungary. They were both, for different reasons, opposed to the revolution, and in each case supported their own particular agents and not the movement of the Hungarian people as a whole.

THE REVOLUTION BEGAN On October 23, a large group of unarmed students gathered outside the Budapest radio station and demanded that their 17-point programme of democratic demands be broadcast. After the police opened fire the government dominated by Erno Gero, a notorious Kremlin hack, promptly called for Soviet troops.

On Wednesday, October 24, Russian tanks and artillery fired on demonstrators in Budapest killing and wounding hundreds of men, women and children. It was these actions which sparked off the revolutionary armed resistance. During the next day, October 25, armed rebellion broke out. Workers on Csepel island in the Danube took up weapons against the security forces. Radio Budapest announced this as a rebellion of the working people. Absolutely no mention was made at that time that this was the work gangs and the counter revolution.

The spearhead of the whole struggle was a general strike. In cities and towns under their control the rebels set up councils of workers, soldiers and students. The first to down tools were the railway workers. They were quickly followed by workers from factories and plants. The strike was directed by a 'Central Workers' Committee.

At the same time Imre Nagy, who had previously been jailed, was installed as premier to help win back popular support.

On October 29, a parade of workers' delegations from the provinces presented its demands to the new government. They demanded the removal of Russian troops, unconditional amnesty for revolutionists and the release of all political prisoners.

According to reports, the peasants were passive at the beginning. The New York Times' on October 30 quoted some insurgent leaders who attributed the failure of the army as a whole in the early days to the fact that they were for the most part 'farm boys'. According to the same reports it (the army) had given them small arms.

These rebel leaders declared:

'The peasant is conservative by nature and therefore passive. But the workers have fought with us, even the workers from "red Csepel" which contains the biggest concentration of industry in Hungary:

By October 29 revolutionary workers' councils ad taken control in several large towns. Thes ncluded Gyor, Szombathely, Sopron and Papa Kaposvar Viszprem, Pecs, Miskolc, Szolnok, Szeksbard and Magyarovar.

On October 29 Miskolc radio station broadcast in the name of the workers' councils of Borsod Province. In another industrial town, Sopron, the streets were patrolled by groups of three:

symbolised through at by the unity bre the workers, soldiers, and students-clear proof that it was à popular revolution in which the working class occupied the vanguard positions.

Finally if there is any further doubt on this point, just read over the dispatch from the Daily Worker' (November 3) correspondent Peter Fryer, who was sent to Hungary to get the FACTS. His first job was to interview Mr., Charlie Coutts, another member of the British Communist Party, who was for three years editing 'World Youth' (paper of the Stalinist-dominated WDY) in Budapest. Here are extracts from the interview. Mr. Coutts reported as follows:

'The Hungarian uprising-the result of eight years pent-up feeling-marose from the refusal of Communist leaders to make real changes after the 20th Congress.

'The people, Mr. Coutts explained, 'did not oppose everything that happened in their country since 1945. They had wanted to build socialism in Hungary. They established the basis-but they were never allowed to build their own socialism on it.

'After the 20th Gongress of the Soviet Communist Party everyone expected there would be a complete change.

'There were some timid changes but nothing that met the needs of the situation, ; said Mr. Coutts.

In both the Communist Party and its youth organisations there were people who had not joined either on principle or because of political understanding but to advance their careers. They had joined for money and for power.

'There was no free discussion at all inside the Party. It follows from this, Mr. Coutts went on, 'that in order to maintain its position the Party leadership had to use the security police which was created in 1948.

"The Party as a whole, and Parliament of course, had no control over the security police at all. They had copied the worst features of the Soviet security police as it was under Beria!

Mr. Coutts said it was only after Soviet troops entered the fight that it became a national movement, with the two main demands 'Russki _go home' and 'Abolish the AVH (security police)'.

Mr. Coutts said that from the Thursday onwards the security police became completely isolated. Everyone's hand-including honest Communistswas against them. Much of the fighting from Thursday onwards was simply to kill off the security police.

*I have seen the hatred against them expressed in the most terrible scenes, said Mr. Coutts.

saw an AVH man clubbed to the ground with a rifle butt then literally kicked and torn to pieces.' THE 'DAILY WORKER' STALINISM It would be difficult to find an occasion in history where there was a more discredited political tendency than the British Communist Party. Having served Stalin loyally for well nigh 30 years, and justified his most brutal crimes, the men who lead the CPGB are incapable of orfering anything but a classical Stalinist answer for the events in Hungary-and as always this has led them to the most ridiculous positions. Here is their record:

'Counter-revolution in Hungary staged an uprising in the hours of darkness on Tuesday night!

('Daily Worker,' Thursday, October 25.)

The same edition carried an article entitled "The Hell that was Horthy's'. Whilst factually it contained material that was accurate, its purpose was to smear the revolution that had begun in Hungary as "fascist inspired'.

The 'Daily Worker' stuck OI counter-revolution theme for several days. In this it was faithfully supporting the line taken by 'Pravda', the Kremlin's mouthpiece, which right from the start denounced the Hungarian events as 'counter-revolutionary.

Then came the formation of the Nagy government and the repudiation of 'Pravda' by 'Szabad Nep', the Stalinist paper of the Hungarian Workers' Party. In strong language it denounced a 'Pravda' dispatch which was headed 'Collapse of the anti-peoples' adventure in - Hungary'- 7 'mistake'.

'What happened in Budapest, says 'Szabad Nep', 'was neither anti-people nor an adventure, and it did not collapse.

"The slogans on socialist democracy were the loudest, not those of the reactionaries nor counter-revolutionaries.

'The revolutionary people of Pest and Buda want freedom, people's freedom, a life without despotism, terror and fear, more bread and national independence. Would this be "anti-people adventure"?

asks the paper.

The first point in the Hungarian revolutionary demands of 1848 was national independence.

"Today also this is the first point. What has collapsed and can truly be called anti-people is the reign of the Rakosi-Gero clique!

Saying that the Hungarian nation wanted independence, and that this was the hirst among its demands, the article continued:

'Let Hungary be free. Let it be an independent country, and let it live with its neighbour the Soviet Union in peace and friendship on this basis.' This scared the "Daily Worker editors, especially as it was rumoured that the Soviet armed forces were being withdrawn. They felt that perhaps it was Moscow policy to let the Nagy government get on with things, so they began to change the line, and what was previously -untaravalutioney they now recognised as having perhaps been revolutionary' after all. The editorial on Tuesday, October 30, remarked:

bitter experiences of the past period, and which the government, the Party and the people should work in unity to implement.

"This is not a sign that the majority of Hungarians want to return to the days of landlordism and capitalism, as the western press would like us to believe.

'Whatever deep resentment and burning criticism exists as a result of mistakes and wrongs since the end of the war, communists and socialists in Hungary and outside know that to attempt to put the clock back would be the worst possible disaster for the Hungarian people!

Diplomatic language to be sure, but a decisive change from its editorial on October 25.

If we had relied upon the 'Daily Worker' for our news and policy on Hungary, we would be forced to reason something like this. From October 25 to somewhere in the region of October 30 the Hungarian events were counter-revolutionary; then they began to change to revolutionary. This was, by implication, acknowledged in the publication of the dispatch of Peter Fryer (already quoted) on November 3.

On Sunday, November 4, Soviet tanks in large formations opened fire on Budapest and other cities. It was now clear that the rumoured withdrawal of Soviet troops was a smokescreen behind which massive troop and tank formations for an all-out assault were mustered. Immediately these forces went into action the 'Daily Worker' changed its line, and on November 5 proceeded to support the intervention of the Red Army, again denouncing the Hungarian events as 'counterrevolutionary'.

What is clear from all this is that the British Communist Party leadership and the Daily Worker' have one simple guide to help them work out their policy, and that is 'watch Moscow and the Red Army and support them under all contions.

When Gero called upon the Red Army to fire upon an unarmed population the 'Daily Worker' denounced the Hungarian events as 'counter-revolutionary'; when it appeared that the Nagy government was being supported and the Red Army withdrawn, these same events became revolutionary, and when once more the Red Army returned to the attack they again became counter-revolutionary. Where in the world could be found a more glaring example of Stalinist reasoning?

STALINISM AND COUNTER-REVOLUTION IN HUNGARY The events in Hungary after the end of the war were similar to what took place in all EasternEuropean countries with the exception of Yugoslavia. In 1945 the revolution was bureaucratically carried out through the intervention of the Red Army, The Hungarian Stalinist Party was hoisted into power, not through the popular intervention of the masses, but upon orders from Stalin in Moscow.

The Russian Revolution in 1917 established the complete overthrow of the Czarist regime by the democratic power of the workers and peasants through their Soviets. In the early days they defeated the internal forces of counter-revolution not so much by force of arms as by argument and policy. The Soviets were supported by the overwhelming majority of the Russian population. That is why the Russian Revolution was a comparatively peaceful affair, with only a handful of people losing their lives. The real struggle and were an imperialist agent of fascism. It was under those conditions that the Moscow frame-up trials were organised—the object being to direct opposition away trom the bureaucracy by creating a diversion along the lines that the forces of imperialism were preparing to take over in the USSR. From all this the Soviet workers were left with no choice but to support Stalin. Indeed we know that the victims of the trials themselves, having become completely demoralised, actually agreed to tell these monstrous lies because they felt in their demoralisation, that this was the only way they could defend the gains of the revolution.

To Stalin, Hungary was a buffer zone of military importance only-but having decided to intervene in 1945, he had to face a number of problems: the chiet problem being the tact that Hungary was a capitalist state, and in order to gear its economy to that of the Soviet Union he was forced to destroy the capitalist property relations and replace them with state ownership.

Insofar as this was done, it was supported by the overwhelming majority of the working class who, directly and indirectly, participated in the event. The Stalinist bureaucracy in Moscow and their Hungarian agents never for one moment relaxed their tight hold over this movement. Power in Hungary was maintained in a similar way to that maintained in Moscow. The Rajk trial was staged for similar reasons to that of the Moscow trials. The regime was propped up by the secret police.

The tragic story of 61-year-old Dr. Edith Bone, an ex-member of the British Communist Party who was jailed by the Hungarian Stalinists conhrms this in most concrete form:

I had been in the cellar cells for over two months,' she says, 'when the police decided to declare their real purpose. I was taken again to the third floor.

*There had been many big industrial accidents in Hungary, due to the lack of higher skilled technicians, and the workers were getting restless. The Unite manilad a setpegoat Britain was to be that scapegoat. I was to "confess" that I was a secret agent, sent by the British Intelligence Service to organise sabotage. I was to be given a list of names, and was to say yes, these men were the saboteurs.

'I was to "confess" all this at a public trial and in return said the police, I would get a light sentence of four years. This sentence, they promised, would be reduced to two, and I would serve them in good conditions. ('I suffered and I accuse''Daily Express', November 9, 1956.) An paik of lies let the baly lorier hat this him ght. In its issue of November 3 appears the litorial statement:

*The "Daily Worker" expresses its condemnation of the inhuman treatment of Dr. Edith Bone and our deep sympathy with her in the ordeal to which she has been subjected This bureaucratic transfer of power had another side to it as well. In politically expropriating the Hungarian working class, it enabled the remnants of the old ruling class to find an effective cover for counter-revolutionary work amongst the masses who more and more became hostile to Stalinism.

Since the workers were not permitted to deal with the old capitalist elements through democratic organs of power such as the Soviets in Russia in 1917, the basic struggle remained unresolved. Stalinism in Hungary was like a vast repressive lid which since 1945 had clamped itself down upon the whole nation-rightist and leftist elements alike.

When the revolution finally blew the lid off, events in Hungary expressed themselves through the centre Nagy government as a state of dual power. Right-wing, capitalist inspired and peasant senatives era the recolutionary well as pres was also the case inside many of the workers' councils, and it was similar to what happened in the Russian Soviets immediately prior to the revolution. This situation is also described by Peter Fryer of the London 'Daily Worker' in his interview with C. Coutts, November 3, 1956:

'A great number of political groups were now active in Budapest and the rest of Hungary. The air was thick with manifestoes ranging from those who wanted to defend collective ownership to those who were against it but could not say so yet, and therefore put the people's genuine national demands in an anti-socialist way.

'What the outcome was going to be nobody could say with: certainty. The revolutionary committees, and in the factories, revolutionary workers' councils had no overall direction and aim, no overall basis of policy.

'I don't want to minimise the danger of the return of the emigres,' said Mr. Coutts, 'But if the revolutionary committees can hammer out some form of unity around the basic demands for an independent, democratic and socialist Hungary, then all attempts at counter-revolution will be defeated!

Mr. Coutts believed the working class ithout an organised leadership.

'There are dangers of terrorism against individual communists. In fact, that has begun. But in spite of everything there will be a Party that will identify itself with the Hungarian revolution and will be forced now to win the Hungarian working class for socialism on the basis of conviction!

We can see therefore that by November 3 the situation was crying out for genuine socialist leadership and that, according to Coutts and Fryer, it was possible that this could have come from the working class. On the other hand, the centrist government of Nagy was swinging continued

PROBLEMS OF THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL THEIR SPLIT FROM THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE in 1962 ing on a document on US per- to do anything of the sort.

reaction they might have the capacit did not save Robertson and his group from expulsion from the Socialist Ision from the Socialist He had in fact been assigned prompted questionWorkers' Party. As soon as Cannon, Dobbs, Hansen and Co. had come out Result of the Montreal Con authority of the conference, two fronts: (1) building ou in support of the reunification conference with the Pabloites they also made Pabloites they also made terence decisions nearly sever suentest preparation to throw Robertson and his group out of the SWP. This they left it to the last moment, he the advice of the international establishing as much of did in December 1963, after a fake enquiry following so-called charges that now claimed that he was tired movemen became dialogue as possible betwee and could not listen to the dis- eader of the fused organisaRobertson went quietly. He did not volunteer to supply the Socialist Labour League and the International Committee with copies of the relevant documents, just as one of his locuments, just as one of his hearing the answers. org members supplied Hansen and the SWP with correspondence arising from the international revealed the real role of this Robertson wants conference of the International Committee of the Fourth International last April. October 29,196 Three