Fraternity-Testvériség, 1962 (40. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1962-01-01 / 1. szám
4 FRATERNITY but the general impression was of huge convergent masses chanting slogans. All through the second day furious battles raged. On one side were seventy Soviet tanks, fifty armored cars and small arms and automatic weapons. On the other were twenty-five thousand students and nearly two hundred thousand workers steadily pouring in from outlying districts ... To escape the wildly shooting Soviet soldiers and AVH men (political policemen) the insurgents broke into small groups and occupied strategic corner buildings. Some entrenched themselves in military barracks. But still there was no central command and each rebel unit operated on its own. This lack of organization contributed largely to the heavy casualties. No one plotted this revolt. It just happened.” Men, women and children who never had held guns in their hands before, joined the fight. Many of the Soviet tanks were brought to a halt and were destroyed with home-made gasoline bombs — so-called “Molotov-cocktails” —- which were often hurled by teen-agers. Heavy Hungarian tanks were also ordered out to fight the insurgents. But as “New York Times” correspondent MacCormack reported to his newspaper, some of these Hungarian tanks displayed the Hungarian national flag and their crews, instead of trying to crush the revolt, cheered the Freedom Fighters. “It was obvious” — wrote MacCormack — “that the Hungarian Army was refusing to make common cause with the political police.” In fact, whole units joined the insurgents under the leadership of such highly respected officers as General Pál Maiéter and General Béla Király. The Soviet trained Hungarian army disintegrated as a Communist force. But the Soviet authorities were troubled by other developments, too. The Report of the United Nations Special Committee on the Problem of Hungary notes that “there was evidence that some of the Russian soldiers disliked the task assigned to them. Those who had spent some time in Hungary had often established friendly relations with the people, many of whom could talk to them in Russian. There were a number of cases of fraternization with the Hungarians.” The Hungarian regime was fighting for its life. But much w’as at stake for the Soviet leaders, too. Sefter Delmer, correspondent of the London “Daily Express"\ dispatched the following to his newspaper: “I have been the witness today of one of the great events of
