The life and rule of Hungarian Communist leader Mátyás Rákosi (9 March 1852-5 February 1971; served as de facto leader of the People's Republic of Hungary between 1945 and 1956).
2. Mátyás Rákosi was born Mátyás Rosenfeld on 9
March 1892 in Ada, Austria-Hungary (now Ada,
Serbia).
Served in the Austro-Hungarian Army in World
War I.
Was captured by the Russians and spent the
majority of the war in a prison camp in Russia.
3. Joined the Hungarian Communist
Party upon returning to Hungary
in 1918.
Was commander of the Red Guard
in the Hungarian Soviet Republic
established by Béla Kun in March
1919.
Admiral Miklós Horthy, the
commander-in-chief of the
Imperial and Royal Fleet, returned
to Hungary in November 1919 in
the midst of the Hungarian-
Romanian War and led the
successful overthrow of Kun’s
government.
Rákosi escaped to Russia; with
Joseph Stalin’s support, he became
Secretary of Comintern.
4. Rákosi returned to
Hungary in 1924, only
to be imprisoned by
Horthy’s government.
Escaped to the Soviet
Union upon his release
in 1940 and stayed in
Moscow for the
remainder of World
War II.
5. When the Red Army drove the Nazis
out of Hungary in 1945, Rákosi
returned from hiding and became
General Secretary of the Hungarian
Communist Party.
In the free elections held in November
1945, the Hungarian Communist Party
received only 20% of the votes.
However, the Communists took over
Hungary because they filled all the
important posts; Rákosi emerged as
the most important political figure in
Hungary.
The Hungarian Communist Party
became the biggest single party in 1947
elections and served in the coalition
People’s Independence Front
government.
6. The communists, with Rákosi as
prime minister, gradually took
control of the government.
When foreign secretary László Rajk
openly criticized attempts by Joseph
Stalin to impose Stalinist policies on
Hungary, he was arrested, convicted
of treason and executed.
Nothing could stop Rákosi from
imposing authoritarian rule; nearly
2,000 people were executed and
more than 100,000 were arrested.
These brutal policies were opposed
even by some members of the
Hungarian Communist Party;
around 200,000 were expelled by
Rákosi from the party.
7.
8. Rákosi faced great difficulty in managing the Hungarian
economy and living standards in Hungary dropped.
His government’s popularity declined significantly; when Joseph
Stalin died in March 1953, Rákosi was replaced as prime minister
by Imre Nagy.
Nevertheless, he remained the General Secretary of the
Hungarian Communist Party; over the following three years,
Rákosi and Nagy fought in a bitter struggle for power.
In 1956, he was ousted from power ; he was expelled from the
Hungarian Communist Party in 1962.
Following his expulsion, Rákosi went into exile in the Soviet
Union and died in Gorky (now Nizhny Novgorod) on 5 February
1971, almost 36 days short of his 79th birthday.