Hungary Inspires Spain's Students
MOWRER, RICHARD
Demonstrations for Freedom HUNGARY INSPIRES SPANISH STUDENTS By Richard Mowrer Madrid Here as elsewhere, the Hungarians' revolt against Communist oppression has excited admiration and respect....
...resounded...
...That these views are shared by many Spaniards, particularly among the youth, was confirmed a few days later after the Soviet military crackdown in Hungary...
...As Franco Spain has repeatedly proclaimed its hostility to Communism, an outright ban on demonstrations in support of Hungary was out of the question...
...In the East and in the West, there resounds today a unanimous call to liberty...
...We, too, want democratization of our regime...
...It was because the Franco regime, correctly evaluating the rebellious mood of the students, took extraordinary police precautions to prevent any but officially sanctioned demonstrations from building up...
...So an officially approved parade consisting of several hundred youths waving Spanish and Hungarian flags was allowed to march through downtown Madrid flanked by grey-coated Policia Armada...
...Quite possibly, for Spain's poor economic situation is getting worse because of swiftly rising prices...
...Meanwhile, clandestine leaflets are being circulated calling on Spain's university youth to show "active solidarity with the heroic students of Hungary who are fighting for liberty...
...We are against dictatorship...
...At present, it is they who, of all Spaniards, are the most restive...
...And we Spaniards don't even have a foreign intruder to contend with...
...Throughout the free world, indignation over Russian brutality took the form of large-scale and sometimes violent demonstrations...
...The authorities were determined not to allow a repetition of last winter's street clashes between Falangists and liberal-minded students...
...But within the Franco regime itself these sentiments are tinged with uneasiness...
...Obeservers here have been struck by the remarks of U.S...
...and underneath in letters so small as to be barely discernible: "For Hungary...
...a student at Madrid University exclaimed during a discussion with this writer of the Hungarians' fight for freedom...
...As the scuffle developed, the Russians were momentarily forgotten and shouts of "Down with the police...
...But in Barcelona students were demonstrating in a not-so-correct manner...
...Ambassador to Ecuador Christian Ravndal, who was until recently Minister to Hungary...
...What impresses one about this remark is that in some respects it could apply to Spain, for here, too, students and intellectuals tend to take the lead in promoting national dissent...
...Later, it was admitted that the police had been too precipitate...
...They all carried an oddly identical account of the event which said, in part: "It is to be noted that the students began their march after classes so as not to interfere in the slightest with their work at the University...
...In the 1920s, student agitation led to the downfall of Primo de Rivera's dictatorship...
...The police, mindful of standing orders to break up demonstrations, charged with swinging truncheons...
...All the countries of the civilized world have condemned this aggression...
...Members of the Catholic Action youth organization had gathered in a private hall, made speeches, and then poured out into the street shouting "Down with the Russians...
...The leaflets say: "The heroic rebellion of the Hungarian people in defense of man's essential liberties is being suppressed in rivers of blood by a tyrannical power assisted by foreign troops...
...Here no one ventures an opinion at this time, least of all your correspondent...
...Down with Soviet tyranny...
...Nothing of this has been reported in the Government-controlled press...
...The demonstrators dispersed in the most correct manner, giving by their conduct an exemplary impression of enthusiasm, order and work which profoundly impressed the people of Madrid...
...Support the Hungarian students who are giving their lives in the name of those very ideals for which we are struggling...
...In October 1955, it was the students who initiated open criticism of the Franco regime's restrictiveness...
...The Hungarians have won the respect and support of the Spanish people, who also have experienced tyranny, the horrors of civil war, hunger, and the suppression of liberty...
...But if public manifestations of anger were less explosive here than in other countries, it was not just because Madrid has no Communist party headquarters to smash or Communist embassies to stone...
...Information Service as saying that the Hungarian rebellion was started by the "most noble and sensitive" segments of the population, the students and intellectuals, who were joined by the workers and later by the Army...
...Under cover of manifestations of solidarity with Hungary, they took sideswipes at the Franco regime by parading banners inscribed in large letters: "We students demand liberty...
...Down with tyranny...
...For the convulsions in Eastern Europe have had the effect of firing Spanish students and intellectuals with a stronger determination to press for more liberty in their own country...
...Down with police states based on terror and on the rule of silence...
...Massive mobilization of police, supported by fire trucks armed with high-pressure hoses, effectively scattered concentrations of youths in the University City district on the capital's outskirts before they could get near enough to town to be heard...
...The following day, Madrid papers made much of the fact that the youths had comported themselves "in a correct manner...
...As for the workers, will they one day join the students in protest...
...Students of Spain...
...Down with all dictatorships which debase religion and culture, which falsify the law and falsify the truth with their controlled press...
...Long live the fight of the Hungarian people...
...They're making us look like a bunch of cowards...
...In Spain, similar sentiments sought expression...
...And the Army...
...By showing their solidarity with the Hungarians, they have reasserted those freedoms which are the heritage of honor: freedom of religion according to one's own conscience, freedom of association, freedom of expression, free labor unions...
...The authorities' reaction was to close the University of Barcelona for a week...
...Down with all tyrannies...
...At the headquarters building of the Falange, a large Hungarian banner was flown at half-mast and the assembled crowd chanted "Viva Hungria...
...But what have we done to bring it about...
...Neither have the attempts by Madrid University students to stage similar demonstrations...
...The Ambassador is quoted by the U.S...
...Nor did they want to be confronted with demonstrations that started out anti-Communist and wound up pro-democratic...
...As it turned out, one meeting called in favor of Hungary degenerated into a denunciation of the police...
Vol. 39 • December 1956 • No. 50
