APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110037-3
or another dominant central European power and the weaker nations in the area that it sought to subjugate. For the Soviets in 1956 as for the Habsburgs in 1848 the use of military force to crush Hungarian revolts has had this effect. The 1848 revolt against the Austrians was crushed with critical assistance from Russia, but it so boldly dramatized Austrian misrule that the ensuing period of reforms led directly to the Great Compromise of 1867. It gave Hungary nominal equality with Austria in the Empire and almost total autonomy in domestic politics. The 1956 revolt against the Soviets similarly dramatized the evils of Stalinist imperialism in Eastern Europe. It set off a series of changes in the Soviets' relations with its satellites in Eastern Europe which in the early 1970's has still not run full course. (U/OU)
The impact of 1956 on the Hungarian-Soviet relationship has been massive. Efforts to recreate Hungary in the image of a small Soviet republic, following the same political formulas Moscow uses to rule its citizens, have ceased. Since early in the 1960's, Janos Kadar, the party leader imposed on Hungary by the Soviet Red Army in the wake of the revolt, has charted an evolutionary course. While remaining true to the fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist ideology and strengthening the "socialist" character of Hungary, he has recognized and met to some extent the demands of his nation for a more humane, more Hungarian, form of communism. (U/OU)
The range of these compromises is wide. The reform of the economic structure, the more "liberal" cultural policies, the muted role of the secret police, and the wider array of consumer goods available to Hungarians represent some of Kadar's more visible improvements. They are appreciated by the vast majority of Hungarians, whose attitude of quiet compliance has helped Kadar achieve since the early 1960's a record of stability unequaled in Eastern Europe. Kadar has gone even further, promising gradual political reforms, a few of which he has already introduced in watered-down form. (U/OU)
Continued peaceful evolution will, however, depend on Kadar's ability to establish for his regime a more solid basis of support among the population. His acceptance clearly is conditional. The Hungarians know that the price Moscow has demanded of Kadar for permission to plot domestic reforms is to keep the domestic situation on an even level and to give loyal support to Moscow's foreign policy positions. And they also suspect that the Kremlin leaders may someday decide that the reforms are unacceptable. They doubt that when that time comes Kadar would, or could, effectively fend off Soviet demands for tighter orthodoxy in Hungary. (U/OU)
Kadar, like other Hungarian leaders before him, has not found a means of controlling nationalism and transforming it into a creative force. He and his lieutenants have opted instead for a sterile policy of dampening almost all nationalist expression. This hypercaution is unpopular with Hungarians of all political persuasions, including significant numbers of Communist party members. Young people especially are materialistic and are beginning to show signs of disaffection with the compromises their parents have had to make to secure any semblance of a decent standard of living. Nationalism bordering on chauvinism is a traditional alternative for Hungarians in the absence of other guiding spiritual ideals—ideals that communism, despite its philosophical pretensions, has not been able to instill. (U/OU)
One of the main factors that has helped Kadar keep down Magyar nationalism since 1956 has been the older generation's sense of "no alternatives." They realize that Hungary's options are frozen by the political and military balance in postwar Europe. For them, especially, the Soviets' use of military power against the Dubcek reformers of Czechoslovakia in 1968 reinforced the memories of what Moscow did to Hungary in 1956. (U/OU)
The Hungarians, with their small numbers and shortsighted antipathy toward most of their neighbors, may well be doomed to continuing to exchange one foreign "protector" for another and to engage in bloody demonstrations of their patriotism as the only safeguard against national extinction. But there are some among them who are determined to find a new solution to this dilemma. One such vision rests on the creation of a "Danubian confederation," a strong alliance of all the states in the area based on mutual guarantees of independence within a larger entity. Whether this concept—based at least in part on nostalgia for the Austro-Hungarian Empire—is realistic even over the longer term may be doubtful, but it is a concept that Hungarians hope their neighbors will not lightly dismiss. It is, moreover, a tenacious dream, and, at the very least, a hopeful sign that the Hungarian people have not resigned themselves to the grim prospect of unending strife and cyclical bloodletting in defense of their homeland. (U/OU)
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110037-3
