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Khrushchev s reluctance to pursue a Hungarian police and security forces and June to undertake large-scale operations
military solution under such inauspicious caused widespread panic and near-paralysis aimed at  upholding and restoring public
circumstances induced him to seek a modus among senior Hungarian officials. order in Hungary.18 In accordance with a
vivendi with Gomulka whereby Poland The subsequent course of events on the plan code-named  Kompas, the Soviet
would have greater leeway to follow its own evening of October 23-24 has long been forces in Hungary had been placed on in-
 road to socialism. By the time the CPSU obscure, but the confusion is partly cleared creased alert in mid-October, and were
Presidium meeting opened on October 24, up by Novotny s report and a few other new brought to full combat alert on October 22-
the prospects for a solution of this sort ap- sources.14 It is now known, for example, 23 at the behest of the Soviet General Staff.
peared much brighter than they had just a that despite the growing turmoil in Budapest, Hence, when the mobilization orders ar-
day or two earlier. At the mass rally in the Hungarian Communist party leader, Erno rived from Moscow on the night of the 23rd,
Warsaw on the 24th, as Novotny mentions in Gero, did not even mention what was going the response on the ground was swift, de-
his report, Gomulka adopted a far more on when he spoke by phone with Khrushchev spite dense fog that hampered troop move-
conciliatory tone in his keynote speech. The late in the afternoon on October 23. Gero s ments. By the early morning hours of the
Polish leader emphasized the need for evasiveness during that conversation was 24th, thousands of soldiers from the USSR s
strengthened political and military ties with especially peculiar because he had already two mechanized divisions in Hungary (the
the Soviet Union, and he condemned those transmitted an appeal for urgent military so-called  special corps ) had entered
who were trying to steer Poland away from assistance to the military attache at the So- Budapest, and they were soon joined by
the Warsaw Pact.12 He also urged Poles to viet embassy. The Soviet ambassador, Yurii thousands more Soviet troops from a mecha-
return to their daily work and to refrain from Andropov, immediately telephoned the com- nized division based in Romania and two
holding any further rallies or demonstra- mander of Soviet troops in Hungary, Gen- divisions (one mechanized, one rifle) from
tions. This speech gave Khrushchev greater eral Pyotr Lashchenko, and relayed the ap- the Transcarpathian Military District in
reason to hope that a lasting compromise peal; but Lashchenko responded that he could Ukraine.19 All told, some 31,500 Soviet
with Gomulka would be feasible. Although not comply with the request without explicit troops, 1,130 tanks and self-propelled artil-
no one in Moscow could yet be confident authorization from Moscow.15 Andropov lery, 380 armored personnel carriers, 185 air
that the strains with Poland were over, the then cabled Gero s plea directly to Moscow defense guns, and numerous other weapons
worst of the crisis evidently had passed. and followed up with an emergency phone were redeployed at short notice to Budapest
Yet even as the situation in Poland call warning that the situation had turned and other major cities as well as along the
finally seemed to be improving (from desperate. Andropov s intervention, as Austrian-Hungarian border. Two Soviet
Moscow s perspective), events in Hungary Novotny reports, prompted Khrushchev to fighter divisions, totaling 159 planes, were
had taken an unexpected and dramatic turn contact Gero by phone for the second time ordered to perform close air-support mis-
for the worse. On October 23, the day before that evening. Khrushchev urged Gero to sions for the ground forces; and two Soviet
the CPSU Presidium met, a huge demonstra- send a written request for help to the CPSU bomber divisions, with a total of 122 air-
tion was organized in downtown Budapest Presidium, but the Soviet leader soon real- craft, were placed on full alert at airfields in
by students from the Budapest polytechnical ized, after the brief conversation ended, that Hungary and the Transcarpathian Military
university who wanted to express approval events in Budapest were moving too fast for District.
of the recent developments in Poland and to him to wait until he received a formal Hun- For the task at hand, however, this array
demand similar changes in their own coun- garian request (which, incidentally, did not of firepower was inadequate. The interven-
try. By late afternoon the rally had turned arrive until five days later).16 On behalf of tion of the Soviet Army proved almost wholly
violent, as the protesters and Hungarian se- the full CPSU Presidium and Soviet govern- ineffectual and even counterproductive.
curity forces exchanged fire near the city s ment, Khrushchev, according to Novotny, Gero himself acknowledged, in a phone
main radio station. The shootings precipi- authorized the Soviet defense minister, Mar- conversation with Soviet leaders on October
tated a chaotic rebellion, which was much shal Georgii Zhukov, to  redeploy Soviet 24, that  the arrival of Soviet troops into the
too large for the Hungarian state security units into Budapest to assist Hungarian troops city has had a negative effect on the mood of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]