[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 156 (Friday, October 23, 2015)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1522]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        HUNGARY AND THE HARD WAY

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                        Friday, October 23, 2015

  Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, 59 years ago today, the 
Hungarian people rose up against the Soviet-installed communist 
dictatorship--a revolution that remains a model of patriotism, heroism, 
and resistance against tyranny today. I submit the following remarks 
delivered last evening at an event commemorating this momentous 
anniversary by Louis S. Segesvary, Ph.D., of the American Hungarian 
Federation.

                  [From American Hungarian Federation]

                        Hungary and the Hard Way

                     (By Louis S. Segesvary, Ph.D.)

       It was in the month of October, on the twenty-third day in 
     1956, that the small Eastern European nation of Hungary rose 
     up in a revolution against the Soviet Union that represented 
     the first major challenge to its military dominion since 
     World War II.
       Nearly six decades have passed since then, yet it would be 
     a mistake to discount the significance of this revolution 
     merely because of the passage of time. This was David facing 
     down Goliath in the modern era, and as such it remains and 
     will remain an inspiration to freedom loving people 
     everywhere.
       Historians have explained to us the cause of the Hungarian 
     uprising against the mighty Soviet empire as one of chafing 
     under the weight of totalitarian occupation. But this 
     explanation is hardly enough. Many peoples have suffered 
     similar fates without risking the human costs associated with 
     revolution. Those that have been willing to pay the price 
     have been far fewer, and the more formidable the force of the 
     occupier, the even fewer number. Bravery has always been the 
     difference.
       In this respect, Hungary and the United States share a 
     similar past. Both risked revolutions against the greatest 
     powers of their times. Only the American patriots were 
     successful while Hungarians were seemingly not.
       But it is just at this point that we must be the most 
     careful in assessing the significance of Hungary's revolt 
     against the Soviet Union, which pitted a nation of only ten 
     million against the armed forces of a world superpower. For 
     the sheer courage displayed in this uprising against the most 
     hopeless of odds not only stunned the world but inspired it. 
     As the French writer and Nobel Laureate Albert Camus put it 
     at the time,
       ``Hungary conquered and in chains has done more for freedom 
     and justice than any people for twenty years. . . Those 
     Hungarian workers and intellectuals, beside whom we stand 
     today with such impotent sorrow, understood this and have 
     made us the better to understand it. That is why their hope 
     is also ours. In spite of their misery, their chains, their 
     exile, they have left us a glorious heritage which we must 
     preserve: freedom, which they not only chose, but which in a 
     single day they gave back to us.''
       Practical consequences as well were to follow the Hungarian 
     revolution even as it was crushed by columns of Soviet tanks, 
     for the sacrifices of the freedom fighters helped lead 
     eventually to a crescendo of falling dominos and the 
     dissolution of the entire Soviet Union itself. The seven days 
     of freedom Hungarians had achieved in 1956 meant that Goliath 
     had been mortally wounded, his aura of invincibility 
     shattered. It was just a matter of time before he collapsed 
     into the dust once again just as in biblical times.
       Today Hungary is a fledgling democracy experiencing the 
     kind of attacks that don't come from the muzzles of AK-47s or 
     the cannons of Soviet era tanks. Caught in the whirlwind of 
     the migrant crisis enveloping Europe, with nearly 400,000 
     political and economic migrants transiting the country so far 
     this year on their way to Austria and Germany, it has been 
     subject to harsh public criticism for not being accommodating 
     enough to this flood of humanity.
       Regrettably, the fact that Hungary has faithfully adhered 
     to the very protocol established by the European Union to 
     deal with asylum seekers in requiring their registration on 
     entry is generally ignored. But even more fundamentally, the 
     civilizational issues associated with nation states are just 
     as often disregarded. Whatever one thinks of Hungary's 
     insistence on protecting its borders, one also has to 
     consider the broader implications of what chaos will do to 
     Europe's cultural distinctiveness.
       Albert Camus' stirring words on the Hungarian revolution 
     are well known. Not as well-known are his prophetic words, 
     just as profound, about the dangers associated with the 
     breakdown of civilizational rules. While the pitfalls of 
     anarchy meant the unpleasant task of having to make order, he 
     wrote, there had to be order, because without order, he would 
     die, ``scattered to the winds.''
       He could have been speaking here once again about Hungary 
     as well. Only this time it was about a people seeking to 
     preserve the national identity they had secured for 
     themselves with their own blood six decades earlier. It is a 
     stand that not everyone will agree with, it is a stand that 
     can be debated, but it is a stand that is once again 
     resonating throughout the world.
       The stakes in this debate are not to be taken lightly 
     because we should never forget that how this migrant crisis 
     is resolved will affect not only this generation of Europeans 
     but generation after generation to come. In a very real 
     sense, these future generations are fated to live with the 
     consequences of the choices made today with no other recourse 
     to them. That means the decisions by all of us affected by 
     this crisis need to be as wise as we can make them and our 
     consciences as clear as we can keep them.
       The choices Hungary has taken so far in upholding the 
     asylum precepts of the European Union and safeguarding its 
     borders represent the hard way, a path of thorns on which 
     Hungary has so often found itself in its brilliant but tragic 
     history. It has risked its reputation on these choices, and 
     only time can tell us how sagacious they have been. In the 
     meanwhile, let us hold our rush to judgement. Especially on a 
     day in which we honor Hungary for its great sacrifices for 
     freedom.

                          ____________________