1947-1956 - Rakosi's Rule
In 1947 the postwar cooperation between the Soviet Union and the West collapsed, marking the beginning of the Cold War and the beginning of the end for Hungary's democratic coalition government. Having seen communist parties seize power in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia and a communist insurgency threaten Greece, the Western powers dedicated themselves to containing Soviet influence. In May communists were expelled from the governments of Italy and France, and a month later the United States promulgated the Marshall Plan for the economic reconstruction of Europe, which was appealing to the to East European governments.
Stalin feared a weakening of the Soviet Union's grip on Eastern Europe. Anticommunist forces in the region remained potent, and most of the communist governments were unpopular. In addition, East European parties began taking positions independent of Moscow; for example, communists in the Polish and Czechoslovak governments favored participation in the Marshall Plan, and Yugoslavia and Bulgaria broached the idea of a Balkan confederation. By September Stalin had abandoned gradualism and reversed his earlier advocacy of independent, "national roads to socialism." He now pushed for tighter adherence to Moscow's line and rapid establishment of Soviet-dominated communist states in Hungary and elsewhere. The policy shift was indicated in September 1947 at the founding meeting of the Cominform, an organization linking the Soviet communist party with the communist parties of Eastern Europe, France, and Italy.
The HCP proceeded swiftly to assume full control of the government. First Secretary Rakosi became the country's most powerful official and dictated major political and economic changes. In October 1947, noncommunist political figures were told to cooperate with a new coalition government or leave the country. In June 1948, the Social Democratic Party merged with the HCP, forming the Hungarian Workers' Party (HWP). In 1949 the regime held a single-list election, and on August 20 of that year the government ratified a Soviet-style constitution. The official name of the country became the Hungarian People's Republic, and the HWP's control of the government was assured. In 1952 Rakosi also became prime minister.
In 1948 Yugoslavia was expelled from the Cominform, and the Soviet-Yugoslav rift broke into the open. Almost overnight it became treasonous for communists to display any approval of Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito or to advocate national roads to socialism. Beginning in 1949, the Soviet Union unleashed a four-year reign of terror against "Titoists" in Eastern Europe. Rakosi purged members of the party's wartime underground, potential rivals, and hundreds of others. Rajk, who continued to support a Hungarian road to socialism, "confessed" to being a Titoist and a fascist spy and was hanged in 1950. Another victim was future party chief Janos Kadar, who was jailed and tortured for three years.
Between 1948 and 1953, the Hungarian economy was reorganized according to the Soviet model. In a campaign reminiscent of the Soviet Union's forced collectivization of agriculture in the 1930s, the regime compelled most peasants to join collective farms and required them to make deliveries to the government at prices lower than the cost of production. The regime accelerated nationalization of banking, trade, and industry, and by December 1949 nearly 99 percent of the country's workers had become state employees. The trade unions lost their independence, and the government introduced Soviet-style central planning. Planners neglected the production of consumer goods to focus on investment in heavy industry, especially steel production, and economic self-sufficiency.
In January 1949, Hungary joined the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon), an organization designed to further economic cooperation between the Soviet Union's satellites. The authorities also agreed to form joint-stock companies with the Soviet Union. These companies allowed the Soviet Union to dominate Hungary's air and river transportation, as well as its bauxite, crude oil, and refining industries and other sectors.
With the opposition parties disbanded and the trade unions collared, the churches became the communists' main source of opposition. The government had expropriated the churches' property with the land reform, and in July 1948 it nationalized church schools. Protestant church leaders reached a compromise with the government, but the head of the Roman Catholic Church -- Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty -- resisted. The government arrested him in December 1948 and sentenced him to life imprisonment. Shortly thereafter, the regime disbanded most Catholic religious orders, and it secularized Catholic schools.
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