Posted on 11/03/2006 6:22:41 AM PST by Nextrush
It was becoming increasingly obvious that Soviet forces were closing in on Budapest, but Imre Nagy continued to seek negotiations for a Soviet withdrawl from Hungary.
By November 3rd with the city surrounded, the Soviets said they were ready to talk and a delegation that included the Defense Minister, Pal Maleter, (who led freedom fighter resistance when the revolution began) went to dinner with Soviets at 10pm. By midnight, they were all under arrest.
During the early morning hours of November 4th the advance of Soviet troops into the city began. After Mr. Nagy and his cabinet met and learned that Communist leader Janos Kadar had proclaimed a government, it was decided to resist the Soviets.
At 5:20 AM Nagy broadcast a message over Radio Free Kossuth (Hungarian Free Radio station): "Today at daybreak Soviet troops attacked our capital with the obvious intention of ovethrowing the legal Hungarian democratic government. Our troops are in combat. The Government is at its post. I notify the people of our country and the entire world of this fact."
It was estimated that all over Hungary on this day the Soviets used 4-thousand tanks and hundreds of thousands of soldiers to put down the Hungarian Revolution.
The center of Budapest was seized by 8AM. Nagy and some other leaders fled to the Yugoslavian Embassy to seek refuge. Fighting in some parts of Budapest and some parts of Hungary continued for several weeks. 200-thousand refugees streamed out of the country into Austria and Yugoslavia.
The House of Commons debate over Suez and the competing television speeches of Prime Minister Anthony Eden and Labor Party Opposition Leader Hugh Gaitskell created a fierce conflict. Some Conservatives wanted to break with Eden and vote against the government but Gaitskell's open call for a new prime minister to replace Eden scared them off.
Speaking on November 3rd in response to the UN resolution of November 2nd, Eden said he would be agreeable to ceasing hostilities if among other things Egypt and Israel would agree to stop fighting.
From his vantage point in Israel, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion sensed he might lose British and French support and decided not to wait for a Franco-British invasion that might not happen.
Ben-Gurion agreed to a cease-fire, provided the Egyptians did the same. The Egyptians had already agreed to cease fire but Ben-Gurion awaited clarification. However, his decision to stop fighting literally took the rug out from under the Anglo-French justification for military action (that the fighting threatened the security of the Suez Canal).
Eden hit the roof over the decision and by next day (November 4th) the French had convinced Ben-Gurion to retract the cease-fire.
Early on the morning of November 4th, a United Nations General Assembly resolution was approved by a vote of 57 in favor and 19 abstentions calling for an emergency force to be sent into the area to "secure and supervise the cessation of hostilities."
Later that morning diplomats at the United Nations began working out the details of such a force.
French and British air raids continued in Egypt on targets that included railway stations, bridges and military bases.
This Sunday I am participating in a memorial concert at a Hungarian Catholic Church in Detroit. We are singing a Requiem Mass and the orchestra is mostly Detroit Symphony players. I hope all goes well, the Mass by Cherubini who was Italian of course, is a beautiful tribute to those who were killed in the Hungarian Revolution.
Very good - is this your original narrative or are you cutting and pasting?
My writing is original, but obviously I am drawing on different sources for what I write, some online and books from my personal library.
As I wrap these posts up in the next few weeks I will cite
books and online sites that I used as sources.
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