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Salient: Victoria University Students' Paper. Vol. 24, No. 12. 1961.

Hungary Reds

Hungary Reds

Sir,—I regret that I was unable to attend the debate so unfortunately titled "Belter Red than Dead," From Salient's marginal comments however I venture to suggest:
(1)That the debate became very emotional and had turned into unessential channels.
(2)That a group of people— selected from the supposedly best-informed section of this country's capital, dedicated to find nut the truth about beliefs and misbeliefs and selected presumably for their debating abilities were unable to support their arguments with sufficient facts.
(3)That this defeat was especially regrettable because our age witnesses a desperate struggle of ideas, and because
(a)their opposition too, seemed to have used little theoretical persuasion, but at least one remark Is definitely out of fashion on Moscow—to which I will return;
(b)The country of Sir Leslie Munro should know more about Hungary and Hungarians especially in the tragic light of witch-hunting fires of the trials of Hungarian Catholic priests.

To elaborate my third point, here is "Lovanish" Garden's statement.

"You don't see misery among the common people in Russia."

Now this utterance is unfortunate for Garden for many reasons.

Firstly, because it. is most probably quite untrue.

Hungarians know that after World War II Russian troops stationed in Hungary were mostly ignorant Asian savages compared to the most rustic Hungarian peasant. They committed many atrocities such as can be expected from any troops during and immediately after war. However, the point is, that their most prized loot was neither the raping of girls nor the stealing of drinks, but wrist watches, which were to many of them quite unknown before.

Later many Russians settled as technical experts or advisers—and because my family and I knew many of them very Intimately—I am certain that they found in Hungary a living standard that was much higher and quite superior to what they were used to in their own country. In spite of this, their propaganda claimed that the Soviet standard of living was above that of the Americans.

Secondly. Provided that the above claim could be proved it would still be Invalid.

Material prosperity can mean terror, constant fear and uncertainty, as the example of Nazi Germany shows which improved the economic position of its workers, ceased unemployment.

Thirdly. In spite of the claims of previous Soviet propaganda, Khrushchev recently admitted that the living standards of American workers is vastly superior to that of the Soviet ones, moreover though the Soviet just succeeded (!) to win against Great Britain and France in this field, only in 1971 will it supersede the U.S. It is true they already succeeded in the space race. (Incidentally, is this to be a proof for their peaceful intentions and their concern for workers?)

Finally I want to express my contempt for the following statement.

"What about the one they sent back because he was a criminal?"

If this individual wants to judge 200,000 people on the basis of one or even many hundreds of criminals, he must be crazy! As a material fact there was a Hungarian Welfare Officer about two years ago who helped to adjust the refugees to this new life, but his work is no longer necessary as the Department of Internal Affairs had published their opinion that the majority of the refugees are well adjusted.

Yours faithfully,

Not For Animal Farm.