The Press TUESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1956. Hungary

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28154, 18 December 1956, Page 14

The Press TUESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1956. Hungary

The heroic refusal of the > Hungarian people to submit to Russian tyranny must cause as much surprise as it does admiration in the democratic countries that can do so little to help. After all, the Russian Communist Party has had nearly 40 years’ experience in this kind of thing and has overwhelming physical power, to which the Hungarian people can oppose little but spirit and a good cause. In the end sheer weight of numbers and equipment must suppress the spark of freedom, provided the men in the Kremlin do not lose their nerve or count the cost in loss of good will too great. Even then Hungary will still have won a victory over oppression, because it has revealed oppression for what it is. The pretence that a legitimate Hungarian Government had appealed to the impartial Russians for help was never likely to deceive many persons; the continued resistance, in spite of the inability of the Western nations to help, and the Russian deportation of young men who might be national leaders have made it an impossible fiction. So much hasbeen tacitly admitted by the refusal of the Quisling regime in Budapest to admit United Nations observers, or even the Secretary. General (Mi Dag Hammarskjold) himself, to give an unbiased account of events

The obstruction of the Kadar Government amounted to contempt of the General Assembly, which should have expelled or suspended the Hungarian representative. As it was, the Assembly could not have done less than condemn the interference of Russia in the politics of its small neighbour, a decision that unhappily did not carry the support of some Arab and Asian countries, including India. Although Mr Nehru admitted that Russian intervention in Hungary is a “ gross “ and brutal exercise of armed “ force ”, India abstained from voting in the Assembly. India seems so colour-conscious that it has only an academic objection to the maltreatment of Europeans by Europeans, reserving its real displeasure for disputes between Europeans and Asians or Africans. A more practical reason why India is inclined to play down the Hungarian tragedy is its determination that Suez shall remain on the centre of the world stage. India has vital commercial interests in the Suez Canal, none m the Danube. This sacrifice of principle to political expediency may yet weaken the moral leadership India hopes to exercise in Asia and among uncommitted nations. The North Atlantic Powers have rightly decided that they can give Hungary little material help. They lack the military strength to win a quick war of liberation, and a long one would be more disastrous for Hungary than subjugation. What little aid and comfort they may be able to give will not remove the Hungarians’ impression that their country has been left to its fate; but the free nations must still do what they can. At least they should leave the Kremlin in no doubt about the world-wide detestation of Russian policy. That might just help to resolve the struggle in the Kremlin in favour of the group that genuinely believes in coexistence.