We obtained the new Russian history textbook – it really says that fighters of former fascist units were behind Hungary’s 1956 revolution

Although the Russian Embassy in Budapest denied it, in its passage on the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, the new Russian history textbook says exactly what was earlier reported in the G7 article and then widely published in the Hungarian press.

The embassy dismissed the objections to the textbook, arguing that ten different versions of the book had been produced and that it was not clear whether the text in question was from the final version. The history textbook that G7 referred to in their article last week was made available in their follow-up article on Thursday. However, it included a watermark reading 'expert opinion', so one might think that the Russian embassy's claim that the published version was a 'manipulated draft' was perhaps true at the time.

But it was not! In fact, we obtained a valid, printed version of the textbook from Russia, the one that was distributed to 11th grade students in public schools there on September 1st. The text backs up the Hungarian criticism of its statements about 1956.

The "events" of 1956

In the textbook, the section on Hungary (see photo at the beginning of the article) reads:

• “During the uprising, the insurgent radicals – many of whom had previously been fighters in the then fascist Hungary's armed forces – 'made a name for themselves' not only by vandalizing Soviet monuments and symbols, but also by committing countless murders of representatives of the Hungarian Workers’ Party, members of the law enforcement agencies, and their own families. There were even conscripted soldiers protecting [prisons and military] facilities among the victims of the inhumane massacres.”

The textbook has the following to say about the demonstrations in Hungary in the wake of the protests in Poland:

• “The demonstrators criticized the Hungarian leadership for its pro-Soviet stance, demanding Hungary's withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact. Being fully justified in assuming that the catalysts for the crisis in Hungary were Western secret services supporting the internal opposition, the Soviet Union deployed troops to Hungary, to assist the Hungarian authorities in suppressing the action.”

Students only have to answer a single question after this. Based on the above explanations, the answer in class is likely to be a short "no": “Could criticism of Stalin's personality cult in the Soviet Union have been the trigger for the events of 1956?”

The textbook never calls 1956 a revolution, it only refers to it as " the events".

This corresponds to the official Hungarian interpretation of 1956 prior to the regime change in 1989, when Hungary was still part of the Soviet sphere of influence. The Hungarian and Soviet historiography at the time called 1956 a "counter-revolution" directed against communism, organised by Horthyist (followers of the national conservative Miklós Horthy, who was regent of Hungary between 1 March 1920 and 15 October 1944 – TN) and Arrow Cross (far-right Hungarian ultra nationalist party in power between 15 October 1944 and 28 March 1945 – TN) circles with the help of Western secret services. Before 1989, the events of that period were also euphemistically referred to as the "regrettable events of October".

This approach, common in the former Soviet Union, was also followed in the recent statement of the Russian embassy in Budapest, which denied that the textbook had called the '1956 revolution' 'fascist'. The embassy's statement on Facebook put the two words in quotation marks, and otherwise only referred to 1956 as “the events”.

There is no doubt that there is no sentence in the book that says 'the 1956 revolution was fascist' – but no one has ever claimed that, although this was essentially what the Russian Embassy denied.

Indirectly, however, the revolution – or more precisely, as the textbook puts it, 'the uprising of the radicals' – and fascism are closely linked in the text.

Not a word about the legitimate Hungarian government

Whether Hungary can be called fascist in terms of its role in World War II would not necessarily be incomprehensible from a Soviet/Russian perspective. After all, Hungary declared war on the Soviet Union and participated in the military campaign against it as both an occupier and a combatant on the side of Nazi Germany, the Jewish laws were in force, and the deportation of Hungary's rural Jews began in 1944 with the active participation of the Hungarian state agencies. The latter was also emphasised by Viktor Orbán in 2017 during Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Budapest. It is also true that, according to the Basic Law, Hungary was not a sovereign state from 19 March 1944, when the German occupation began until the first free parliamentary elections in 1990, which partly absolves it of some of its responsibility for World War II.

The Russian textbook stresses that the Soviet troops came to the assistance of the Hungarian leadership in order to bring the events to a close.

The text makes no mention of the role played by the legitimate Hungarian leadership on the side of the revolution, including Prime Minister Imre Nagy, who announced the withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact.

The statement of the Russian embassy in Budapest also hinted at this different perception of the 1956 revolution: 'Modern Russia has an unchanged respect for the historical remembrance of the Hungarian people and recognises that there are complex issues in our common history, which rightly include the events of 1956.

It is for this reason that we have always approached the issue with great caution and care, refusing to allow it to be used for political ends and were not willing to allow the events of the past to be examined from today's perspective, out of their historical context." Despite the unchanged respect, the Russian communiqué once again avoids calling the 1956 revolution a revolution – which is one of the cornerstones of the Hungarian regime change in 1990.

This is also to be taught in the occupied Ukrainian territories

It is important to note that this is not a teacher's guide or an optional textbook.

The newly published "standardized textbook" must be used in all Russian schools. This is the first year when schoolchildren in the Ukrainian territories under Russian occupation have also been given a copy of the textbook, which is the only one that may be used.

The book's author, former culture minister and advisor to the Russian president, the flamboyant Vladimir Medinsky, who has made it a point to subordinate history to "memory politics", announced in early August that the textbook would be given to students throughout the country, including in the provinces of Kherson, Zaporizhzhya and the whole of Donbas, which Russia unilaterally claims as its own, along with Crimea, which it has occupied since 2014.

Looking at the final text of the textbook, the Russian embassy's claim that the accusation against the textbook "reminds us of the children's game called 'telephone', when a word or phrase is whispered 'in your neighbour's ear' and the end result is not at all what was said at the beginning" is unfounded.

In the statement, the embassy also made a defence with a point that is actually proof of the abolition of press freedom in Russia: they wrote that "the criticism was unfortunately based on an article by a news portal that used the Latvian-based online publication Meduza as a source". According to them, this site "specialises in the production and dissemination of anti-Russian fake news". In fact, the publication was forced to relocate its operations from Russia to Latvia.

They also wrote that the news circulated in the press was an out-of-context evaluation of the events of 1956 in Hungary, with the deliberately negative portrayal of the Russian position – but here, we quoted the whole text concerning 1956 in Hungary, not just an excerpt.

Putin's glorious deeds, a war that's not war

In the 450-page book, the version that also made it to G7, 100 pages are devoted to the Putin era, and 18 pages to what the Russian leadership is calling the "special military operation", i.e. the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The second half of the book deals at length with the period after 2000 which includes Putin's rule. In short, the first half of the book rehabilitates the Soviet period, while the second half glorifies Putin, and explains his actions and authority to Russian 11th-graders.

There are currently several articles, posts and news reports on Russian sites announcing that the new books are ready and that from this autumn "Russian students will be able to acquire much more useful knowledge than before". They point out that the book’s chapters also deal with current issues:

• Relations with the West at the beginning of the 21st century,
• the US pressure on Russia,
• Ukrainian neo-Nazism,
• the coup in Ukraine in 2014, the deterioration of the situation,
• the special military operation, the new territories.

On 25 August, the Russian state news agency, RIA reported that these books will be distributed to all Russian schools before the beginning of the school year. The news agency illustrated the article with the picture of the cover of the alleged draft textbook. According to the article, the head of the education ministry also said that quality education on history must be turned into a cornerstone while facing " information warfare and the West's attempts at distorting the truth".

Furthermore, all Russian textbooks in history and literature are currently being standardised, and this is scheduled to be completed by 2025.

The textbook is not available in Russian stores at the moment. "This is expected by 2024 at the earliest, at the moment the books are primarily distributed to schools, which is a huge amount," a representative of one of the biggest Moscow bookstores told Telex, confirming that this will indeed be the only history textbook for 11th graders in state schools.

The opposition was indignant, the Foreign Ministry reacted unusually calmly

The disputed history book has sparked outrage among many, including the Hungarian opposition. Momentum's chairman asked FM Szijjártó whether – being Foreign Minister – he intends to take action to address the history-falsifying book, Demokratikus Koalíció (DK) sent a letter about the book to the Russian ambassador, and Jobbik also demanded that Szijjártó summon the Russian ambassador. Despite this, politicians from the governing parties and their ideologists have made little or no comment regarding the claims made in the history book.

Initially, the Hungarian government had only one reaction to the book's claims: Tamás Menczer, State Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said that "in 1956 the Hungarian people rebelled against the communist dictatorship, this is not a matter for debate", and added that any claim to the contrary was false. Shortly before the publication of this article, ATV managed to address a question to Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó. He said that he was not willing to discuss the '56 revolution as a subject up for debate, which is why he did not summon the Russian ambassador. Szijjártó added that "1956 is one of the most glorious moments in Hungarian history" and that all Hungarians who stood up for Hungary's freedom at the time were heroes. "We reject and resent any assessment to the contrary," the Foreign Minister said.

Telex had earlier sent questions to several government officials or ideologists with close ties to the government, but only Szilárd Demeter replied. Historian Mária Schmidt, who is keen to shape the memory polictics of 1956, did not respond to our questions either. Only the 20th Century Institute, which she directs, put up a Facebook post about 1956 after our inquiry, but it was not clear why they considered it relevant at this time. Our article about how the case of the Russian textbook shows how strongly the Hungarian government has chained itself to Putin may be found here.