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History of Hungary


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Revolution of 1956 and Hungary's temporary withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact. The multi-party system was restored by Prime Minister Imre Nagy. Many people were shot and killed by Soviet and Hungarian political police (ÁVH) at peaceful demonstrations throughout the country, creating a nationwide uprising.

Spontaneous revolutionary militias fought against the Soviet Army and the ÁVH in Budapest. The roughly 3,000-strong Hungarian resistance fought Soviet tanks using Molotov cocktails and machine pistols. Though the preponderance of the Soviets was immense, they suffered heavy losses, and by 30 October most Soviet troops had withdrawn from Budapest to garrisons in the Hungarian countryside.

On 4 November 1956, the Soviets retaliated, sending in over 150,000 troops and 2,500 tanks. During the Hungarian uprising an estimated 20,000 people were killed, nearly all during the Soviet intervention. Nearly a quarter of a million people left the country during the brief time that the borders were open in 1956.

Kádár Era 1956–1988

In the first days of November, the Soviet leadership was still undecided about the developments in Hungary, but soon the position prevailed that an intervention was necessary to prevent Hungary from breaking away from the Soviet bloc. János Kádár (Minister of State in the Imre Nagy cabinet) was chosen by the Soviet party leadership to act as the head of the new government intended to replace Imre Nagy's coalition cabinet. In the reprisals following the crushing of the uprising by the Soviet troops, 21,600 mavericks (democrats, liberals, and reformist communists) were imprisoned, 13,000 interned, and 230 brought to trial and executed.Imre Nagy, the legal Prime Minister of the country, was condemned to death and executed in 1958.

Following the invasion, Hungary was under Soviet military administration for a couple of months, but Kadar was capable of stabilizing the political situation in a remarkably
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