Hungarian Revolution and Suez Crisis of 1956: Limits and Possibilities of American Diplomacy

УДК 327(73) ББК 63.3(7Сое)

Abstract

The year of 1956 stands out in the history of international relations during the Cold War. It was that year, when in parallel, two acute international crises developed almost simultaneously, one crisis developed in Eastern Europe and another one developed in the Middle East. The Hungarian revolution and the Suez crisis were independent of each other. But they had in common one fact. In both cases the involvement of the Soviet Union and the United States of America played a role. The extent of the involvement varied. For the American policy of the period of President Eisenhower, there were statements that the success of American diplomacy in Hungary aimed at "rollback of communism" was allegedly prevented by the Anglo-French-Israeli aggression against Egypt undertaken by the closest allies of the United States. This article proves that the administration of the 34^th President of the United States followed a pragmatic approach not intending to provide assistance to Hungarian rebels and limited to propaganda measures. And the anger of the Republican leaders in Washington was caused by the possible consequences of the tripartite aggression against the re-election campaign of Dwight Eisenhower as a president, but by no means imaginary calculations on the victory of the revolution in Hungary.