Kun, Béla

(1886–1939)

   Communist dictator of Hungary in 1919. Kun came from a middle-class Jewish family and joined the Social Democratic Party when he was sixteen. He was a prisoner of war in Russia at the time of the revolution and immediately joined the Bolsheviks, becoming a fervent disciple of LENIN. He returned to Hungary soon after the revolution of October 1918, which had brought Karolyi to power as head of a government of Social Democrats and Radicals. Kun tried to overthrow Karolyi’s regime and was imprisoned in February 1919. Karolyi soon found the situation too difficult to handle and Kun was released and made head of the government. He eliminated all the moderates from it and proclaimed Hungary a Soviet republic. His policy led the peasants to refuse to supply food to the towns. This and the failure of his armies, especially against the Romanians, caused Kun to flee the country to Moscow. He was executed by Stalin in 1939.

   Kun was totally alienated from Judaism. However, his regime included a number of Jews and there were anti-Jewish riots in the ‘White terror’ that followed its suppression. About three thousand Jews are believed to have been killed.