“Ask for Bread, not Peace”

Abstract

In contrast to restless students in Bucharest, Cluj, Iasi, Timiş oara, and other cities, who tried to organize rallies calling for government reforms in the fall of 1956 but failed, Romanian workers and peasants expressed their feelings about the revolution in nearby Hungary by going on feverish shopping sprees; stockpiling food staples; writing anonymous leaflets and graffiti; spreading rumors; and engaging in arson, vandalism, and physical brawls. The Hungarian crisis aroused in some citizens fears of a World War III, for others a war over Transylvania, and for still others a Hungarian-style revolt in Romania. A survey of published Securitate reports written between 26 October and 23 November 1956 shows that the three most frequent oral comments recorded were those complaining about the economy, those predicting that “what happened in Hungary will happen in Romania,” and those asking “why was the Soviet intervention necessary?” The economic complaints outnumbered the other two types of comments. Political messages, oral and written, spanned the spectrum, from fascist, Iron Guard songs, monarchist comments, to procapitalist slogans. Although most irredentist comments, oral and written, originated from cities in Transylvania, more than half of the incidents of physical aggression, including arson and other acts of sabotage, occurred in non-Transylvanian regions. Although the Securitate sometimes exploited ethnic tensions to gain recruits, Romanian citizens expressed more rage toward the communist dictatorship than against ethnic Hungarians.