I had spent 25 years in the US Air Force, and I was a retired USAF Lt Colonel. There were two active duty USAF captains, space systems engineers, on the trip also; the two captains and I were on the trip because we had just completed a MBA program with University of Nebraska. It was a reward for the two years, or so, of work we had just put in.
The entire time we were in Budapest we were followed. No big surprise. The Communists made it a practice to keep track of anybody who might be, in their opinion, a security risk. That definitely applied to three American Air Force officers. Our itinerary in Budapest included some tours of local industrial sites, the American embassy, and some of the local landmarks such as the Hungarian Parliament, Saint Stephens Church, and some typical Communist monuments to the defeat of the NAZIs during WWII. Along our path sat the still empty shell of the Austro-Hungarian Emperor’s Summer Palace on a high ridge along the west bank of the Danube River. The Soviet Army had turned the Summer Palace into a shell because the NAZIs used it as an observation post and strong point. There also were scars from the 1956 Hungarian Uprising that were quite evident on a lot of buildings in urban Budapest. I suspect those scars were also reminders of what could happen if dissent became openly expressed.
For most of the countries on our itinerary a declaration that we were a tour group and the passenger manifest was sufficient; however, we all had to submit individual entry visa requests to get into Hungary. Every member of our tour group had to fill out a detailed set of questions because the Hungarian regime wanted to know how much attention we deserved. The Cold War raged around us, and unbeknownst to us, a further complication made things even more interesting: the Soviet Army would be in the middle of an annual troop rotation into Hungary, but we didn’t know that just then.
The Communists were a paranoid lot; the regime assumed the worst, what with three military officers in the party. The border guards knew we were coming and gave us a special welcome.
During the routine stop at the Austria-Hungary border our rail coach was uncoupled from the Austrian train; we were towed out into a large empty switching yard. Border guards ordered us to unload our luggage; there was no platform to unload onto; it was just rock ballast and iron rails. A Hungarian train pulled up and we were ordered to board an empty coach. Well, the coach was not quite empty; at the far end of the coach there were several people standing around chatting in what I assumed was Hungarian.
Most of the tour members went to the nearest compartment and sat down. I stood by one of the open windows and watched the passing terrain as we left the switching yard and started our journey to Budapest. It was an amazing sight. Since this was Socialism, the land was all one big collective farm; since it was May the land was one big expanse of plowed ground as far as I could see. There was not a fence line or tree to be seen anywhere.
A young man from the far end of the coach sauntered up to me and tried to strike up a conversation. He told me, in a Middle West American accent, that he had grown up in Chicago. Yeah, right. He tried to chat with me for a few minutes but I ignored him. Finally, he sauntered back to the far end of the coach. Welcome to the Workers Paradise of Hungary.
The Hungarians were not happy. The Hungarians had a lot of reasons for their discontent. Top among them was the fact that Austria came out of WWII on the free side of the Iron Curtain while Hungary was a vassal of the Soviet Union. Austria might have become one of those vassal states also, but the Western Powers resisted Soviet demands. However, by treaty, Austria was to remain neutral and not join the NATO alliance. There was an entire lot of the vassal states that stood between Russia and Western Europe that were not happy; they lived their lives in poverty while their rulers lived comfortably. Janos Kadar had ruled Hungary since the 1956 Hungarian Uprising had been crushed by Soviet tanks. Life had not improved one iota in the thirty-plus years since that time. The state stores featured little in the way of food items: two or three kinds of sausage and one or two kinds of cheese. None of the stores had much to offer.
Strong ties still existed between Austria and Hungary; Hungary was a remnant of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Austrians had built a shopping zone in the Pest side of Budapest. It gave the Hungarian communists some hard currency, and it was a place where the Austrians could buy things duty free to take home after visits. Hungarian citizens didn’t have much access to the place for a couple of reasons: They were poor and barely scraping by and the Hungarian government did not allow them access to that special place. Western visitors or anyone else with money was welcome, however, including Americans. One afternoon my wife and I, along with the two Air Force captains, decided to check out the special shopping zone to find out what it had to offer.
It was short walk from our hotel. As we were nearing the zone, I caught sight of someone tailing us from across the street. Every time we would stop to window shop, our tail would stop too. When we moved on, he moved on. He was pretty obvious. To complete the picture, he was dressed in a very loud short sleeved shirt and was carrying a shopping bag; it was hard not to notice him. After our third or fourth time doing our stop and go routine, I told the women to go into the store we were in front of; I would remain outside. After the women went into the store I turned around and stared at our “minder.” After a couple of minutes, he realized he was busted; he turned around and retraced his steps until I lost sight of him. I then walked into the store and told my wife and the two captains what had happened. Such is life in a totalitarian state.
We finished our tour of Budapest and packed up to leave the Workers
Paradise. The train that would take us
back to civilization was an Austrian train, not one of the seedy Hungarian
trains, thankfully. We departed Budapest
and headed for Vienna and then on to visit prosperous Munich, Paris, and London. A lot of the students were watching at the windows as
the miles passed by. When we crossed the
border back into Austria the students cheered.
That is life in a totalitarian state. That is what Bernie
Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and the rest of the Democrats want for you.
