Fáklyaláng, 1965. október (6. évfolyam, 1-10. szám)
1965-10-23 / 10. szám
FÁKLYALÁNG 3 An Appeal to the President of the United States, Members of Congress and to the American People for Justice of Hungary “These are the times that try men’s souls”, said Thomas Paine in the American Crisis. Now there is a World Crisis, and the United States among all nations is best fitted to meet the emergency. It thus has the duty to lead in the work of salvage. She has mobilized four millions in the past, and left thousands of her sons in 243 acres of cemeteries and more on the battle fields. America won the war, yet she permitted those whom she has saved from defeat to dictate the peace, which is no peace. “Let the American people beware! Let them look into these questions before it is too late! Too late for what? To late to stem the tide of discontent, of disorder and political and economic revolution!” These are momentuous words of the great American, Nicholas Murray Butler. The eyes of Hungary are turned to the United States of America, “unless the American People extend a brotherly and helping hand, Hungary must suffer all the injustices ivithout defense, all the miseries without help, and the intrigues ivithout resistance.” (“The Wreck of Europe”, by Francesco Nitti.) It is the duty of the American People, as Christians to hasten to the mutilated and bleeding form of Hungary, bind and heal her wound, and restore her to life. In the days, years and centuries of danger to Christianity and civilization, Hungary exposed her breast to the enemies of Christian civilization and copiously shed blood, that Christian civilization may survive. This great defender of Christian civilization, whose sons stepped spontaneously in to the lines of American pioneers and liberal thoughts and fought in the armies of Washington and Lincoln valiantly — is now in mortal danger; Hungary’s life depends upon the goodwill and helping hand of America. This responsibility stays until Hungary is saved and peace be restored to Europe! If America turns the ray of truth upon the enemy of Hungary, the compaction of Europe will assume a new and healthy color. It will be then, and not till then, that hundreds of millions of people in Europe will be freed of their shackles of involuntary servitude; Hungary will be saved, and the ivorld at last, will have a just and durable peace. Our prayer, therefore to our President, Members of Congress and to the American Nation is that, in the name of truth, in the name of human decency, in the name of all that is fine and beautiful in Christian fellowship, and in the memory of the Hungarian heroes of the American Revolutionary and Civil War, interest yourself in the case of mutilated Hungary. You say the word that Hungary must be restored and returned to life and that there must be. and that there shall be peace in Europe. And then the Sun of peace and justice in all its majestic glory, will appear on the eastern horizon of Europe, and with its benevolent smile, will cast its life giving rays of hope and love and mutual understanding over war-ridden and suffering Europe, ami there shall be peace! In 1852 at a meeting in America, Kossuth with prophetic accuracy fortold the future events of today by stating, that “FROM RUSSIA, NO SUN EVER WILL RISE! There is sky and air and water there; but to find the Sunlight where is most spreads and lightens the “Path of Freedom,” we must come to America. All who now suffer from oppression in the East, look with hope to the free institutions of this WESTERN W ORLD. . . . but the Ceasars of the North and the genius of the Freedom have no place upon this earth, for both of them; one of them must yield. Which shall yield?................America must decide!”. . . .. Many misfortunes have befallen Hungary, her territory has been divided before, but she has recovered, as she can never fall for good, because the country itself is created by God as a perfect geographic and economic unit, welded into an unbreakable entity by the honest work of one thousand years. Neither can she remain weak for ever, because historic Hungary and its independance are essential guarantees of the peaceful and unified evolution of Europe.” Thoughts About A Revolution Nine years have passed since the glorious Hungarian Revolution and Freedom Fight of 1956. Let us stop for a moment to think about those events that changed the course of history in Central and Eastern Europe and shook the conscience of the Free World, at least for a short time. First of all, it must be remembered that the outbreak of the Revolution took the world by surprise. The West, while liquidating the former colonial empires in Africa and Asia, was reminded of the threat of a new colonialism under the disguise of Communism. The Hungarian people — even though for a very short time — managed to regain the freedom that was promised by the victorious powers in many solemn declarations and in the Peace Treaty with Hungary. The responsibility of the Free W'orld for the bloody crushing of the regained freedom that had been is even greater than its responsibility for the enslavement of the country by the Soviet Union after the end of World War II, because at that time Hungary was already held in bondage by the occupation forces and her freedom had not been restored while in 1956 the Hungarian people regained their freedom in a matter of a few days against the military might of the Soviet Union. The memories of the plight and suffering of the Hungarian people has faded away in the turbulent nine years that followed the Revolution. The wounds have slowly begun to heal and the martyrs have almost been forgotten. It is, therefore, the solemn duty of those who represent the Revolution in the Free World to recall the events of the tragic but glorious days of October-November 1956. This they owe to the memories
