Nagy

• Nagy was a communist, but he believed that within a communist regime there could be more personal freedoms. In response to protests in the Hungarian capital, Budapest, after the policies of de-Stalinisation, Nagy - like Gomulka in Poland - proposed a set of reforms. He proposed:

  • Hungary should leave the Warsaw Pact
  • Hungary should become a neutral country with a degree of power sharing with non-communist groups

  (believed this was needed to restore its economy)
• These proposals gave the Soviet Union a serious cause for concern, if Hungary left the Warsaw pact then other Eastern European countries may follow and then the whole strategy of achieving security for the Soviet Union by surrounding it with pro-communist governments would be under threat.

  Khrushchev therefore ordered a Soviet invasion of Hungary
• Nagy and many of his supporters had believed that Khrushchev's criticism of Stalin would lead to a 'softer' approach with the satellite countries. They were wrong. Khrushchev could not allow any threat to Soviet security. When Nagy was executed, Khrushchev described his death as 'a lesson to the leaders of all socialist countries'