Béla Kun

Béla Kun (February 20, 1886 - 1939?) was a Hungarian Communist who ruled Hungary for a brief time in 1919.

Kun fought for Austria-Hungary in the First World War. He was captured as a prisoner of war and taken to Russia, where he became a Communist. Upon his release, he returned to Hungary, where the resources of a shattered government were further strained by refugees from lands lost under the Treaty of Trianon. Desiring to attempt a Communist revolution, which lacking mass support could only be a coup, he communicated by telegraph with Russian Communist leader Vladimir Lenin¹.

On March 21, 1919, Kun and the small Communist Party made their move, establishing the second Communist government in Europe (after Russia itself). Contrary to advice from Lenin and the Bolsheviks, Bela Kun's government refused to redistribute land to the peasantry thereby alienating the majority of the population. The government only lasted for 133 days. Rear Admiral Miklós Horthy, aided by anti-Communists from Romania, crushed the Communists, and forced them to hand over power to a Social Democratic party.

After Kun was deposed in Hungary, in 1920 he was placed in charge of the the regional revolutionary committee in the Crimea.

Béla Kun then went into exile in Vienna, Austria, then also controlled by Social Democrats, and eventually made his way back to Russia. There he rejoined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and became a leading figure in the Communist International as an ally of Grigory Zinoviev. In this capacity, he went to Germany to advise the Communist Party there and sought to encourage that party to follow the Theory of the Offensive which he and Zinoviev supported. When put into practice, this theory led to the loss of support for the KPD.

He was killed in the late 1930s, during Joseph Stalin's purge of the Communist old guard.

1. Record Of Wireless Message To Béla Kun March 23, 1919