Architect of Hungary's Sovietization who built one-party rule through 'salami tactics'
Released on 30 October 1940 and reaching Moscow on 6 November, Rákosi stood beside Stalin atop Lenin's Mausoleum the next day as the October Revolution Day parade crossed Red Square.
General secretary of the Hungarian Communist Party (1945–1948) and then general secretary, later first secretary, of the Hungarian Working People's Party (1948–1956), he ruled Hungary as its de facto leader from 1948 to 1956. Arrested in 1925, he received an 8.5-year sentence in 1926 and a life term in 1935, serving over fifteen years in prison before reaching Moscow in November 1940. After returning in 1945 he dismantled the democratic parties through 'salami tactics' and forced the Social Democrats into a merger to build one-party rule, bearing responsibility for mass imprisonment, forced-labour camps and the Rajk show trial. He handed the premiership to Imre Nagy in 1953 yet obstructed reform as first secretary, was removed on 18 July 1956, expelled from the party in 1962, and died in Gorky on 5 February 1971 after deportation to Krasnodar, Tokmak and Arzamas.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1919People's Commissar of Trade, Hungarian Soviet Republic; commands Red Guard and Red Army
- 1921–1924Secretary, Executive Committee of the Comintern
- 1925–1940Imprisoned under the Horthy regime (8.5-year sentence, later life; freed 1940)
- 1940–1945Leads the Foreign Bureau of the Hungarian Communist Party, Moscow
- 1945–1948General Secretary, Central Committee of the Hungarian Communist Party
- 1948–1956First Secretary, Central Committee of the Hungarian Working People's Party (MDP); General Secretary until 1953
- 1952–1953Chairman of the Council of Ministers, Hungarian People's Republic
- 1956–1971Forced exile in the USSR (Kirghizia, Arzamas, Gorky)
Related historical events
- 1918.10–1919.08The Hungarian Soviet RepublicCommissar for social productionServed as deputy trade commissar and commissar for social production and commanded the Red Guard in late July.
- 1919–1938The Horthy regime: from the White Terror to the turn to the rightImprisoned Communist leaderImprisoned for over fifteen years after the trials of 1926 and 1935, he was handed over to the Soviet Union in 1940.
- 1938–1944.03Hungary on the Axis side: from the Vienna Awards to the DonImprisoned Communist leaderReleased to the USSR in 1940 in exchange for the 1849 banners; later condemned the founding of the Peace Party.
- 1944–1949The People's Democracies of Eastern EuropeGeneral secretary of the Hungarian Communist PartyHe led the formation of the Left Bloc in 1946 and the break-up of the Smallholders in 1947, and in a 1952 lecture described the process as cutting "like a salami, slice by slice".
- 1944–1949Hungary: From the Smallholders' Victory to the Rajk TrialGeneral secretary of the Communist Party, deputy prime ministerHe drove the Left Bloc of 1946, the demand for Ferenc Nagy's resignation in 1947, the merger of 1948 and the arrest of Rajk in 1949, and in a 1952 lecture described the process as cutting "like a salami, slice by slice".
- 1953Hungary's New CourseFirst secretary of the partyCriticized in Moscow and stripped of the premiership, he tried to slow the New Course after Beria's fall.
- 1956.02The Twentieth Party Congress and the Secret SpeechHungary's Stalin, forced out in July 1956His Stalinist rule, his forced resignation in July 1956, and the failure of his successor Gerő formed the immediate backdrop to the Hungarian Revolution.
- 1956The Hungarian RevolutionStalinist hardlinerThe architect of the Stalinist rule that provoked the uprising, ousted just before it.
'Salami Tactics' and the Construction of One-Party Rule (1945–1949)
Rákosi's method of seizing power is summed up by the phrase he himself coined: 'salami tactics' (szalámitaktika). After the Independent Smallholders' Party won 57% in the 1945 elections, Rákosi's Communists set about slicing away their coalition partners piece by piece, 'like salami.' First they formed a left-wing bloc to fracture the Smallholders; then a new electoral law in 1947 disenfranchised roughly half a million citizens (8.5% of the electorate). In that year's elections the Communists became the largest party with 22.25%, while the Hungarian Independence Party, which had won 13.4%, was banned on fraud charges. In June 1948 Rákosi forced the Social Democratic Party into a merger, creating the Hungarian Working People's Party (MDP), and in May 1949 a single-list election delivered 97% of the vote, completing formal one-party rule.
The climax of the consolidation was the show trial of Interior Minister László Rajk in 1949. Rajk, a Communist with an outstanding anti-fascist record, was Rákosi's potential rival. He was arrested on fabricated charges of 'Titoism' and 'Zionist conspiracy,' and hanged after a dramatic public trial in September 1949. The Rajk trial set the pattern for purges across Eastern Europe and allowed Rákosi to eliminate internal party dissent decisively. Stalin called Rákosi his 'best Hungarian pupil,' and Hungary became the model case of Sovietization. The salami-tactic formula was subsequently referenced as a standard Communist power-grab methodology throughout the emerging Eastern Bloc.
The Post-Stalin Crisis and Rákosi's Fall (1953–1956)
By late 1952 Rákosi was imitating Stalin's last purge. At the end of February 1953 he announced to the Central Leadership the arrest of Gábor Péter, head of the State Protection Authority (ÁVH), and several officers and functionaries, while the Political Committee members István Kovács and Zoltán Vas were criticized and sent to the provinces. All were of Jewish origin. Summoned to Moscow in late May after Stalin's death, he was told to reshape the leadership, but when asked to recommend a deputy he objected to every name.
At the Kremlin on 13 June Rákosi reported as if he had nearly finished his "homework." Malenkov answered at once: "We gain the impression that the Hungarian comrades are underestimating the shortcomings." Beria accused him of personally directing the ÁVH and even ordering beatings, and said the premiership would more fittingly go to a Hungarian; Khrushchev declared that "Comrade Rákosi is unable to work collectively." Humiliated, Rákosi could only agree to Nagy's appointment, and on 16 June said he very much regretted not having been taught such a lesson before.
Back home he still ran the machinery. At the Political Committee on 20 June, after news of the East Berlin uprising, he conceded that without an immediate turn "the gravest of crises" threatened. At the Central Leadership meeting on 27 June he gave the most self-critical speech of his career, condemning the personality cult, the concentration of power and the sidelining of cadres of Hungarian origin. But during the meeting he reported a telephone call from Moscow saying the resolution should not be published, and proposed that the measures be announced in Parliament as the new government's programme rather than as a party resolution. That kept the criticism of him out of public view. The title of general secretary was abolished, but he went on leading the party as first secretary.
When news of Beria's arrest reached the Political Committee on 9 July, he recovered his nerve. In a broadcast speech to the Budapest party activists on 11 July he passed quickly over the criticism, repeated the old goals of industrialization and priority for cooperatives, and said it would have been more sensible to announce the tasks first in the party's name. From then on he did not openly obstruct the New Course but slowed it by demanding a thorough "analysis." Beria was executed on 23 December that year.
The counter-attack paid off in early 1955, when Malenkov was pushed aside in Moscow. On 9 March the Central Leadership condemned Nagy's "rightist deviation," and on 18 April Nagy was dismissed as prime minister. But Khrushchev's Secret Speech of February 1956 fatally weakened Rákosi. On 23 March in Eger he admitted that the Rajk trial had been fabricated, and on 18 July the Central Leadership removed him and installed Ernő Gerő as first secretary. He left for the Soviet Union and never returned to Hungary.