Mátyás Rákosi

Mátyás Rákosi was a commissar in Hungary's short-lived Soviet Republic in 1919, then spent over fifteen years in prison after returning to organize the underground Communist Party in 1924. He became such a cause célèbre that an International Brigades battalion bore his name; Moscow finally traded him out in 1940 for battle flags from 1848. When the Red Army pushed into Hungary in early 1945, Rákosi returned and led the re-founded Communist Party to a crushing defeat in free elections, but Moscow secured him the deputy prime minister post and control of the Interior Ministry. From there he used intrigue and conspiracy to destroy opponents piece by piece - his "salami tactics" - seizing total power by 1948. An ardent Stalinist, he built a personality cult, orchestrated show trials, imprisoned hundreds of thousands, and devastated the economy until reformist Imre Nagy briefly replaced him as prime minister in 1953. Rákosi clawed back control and ousted Nagy by 1955, but Khrushchev's 1956 denunciation of Stalin left him fatally exposed; he resigned in July and fled to the Soviet Union three months before the revolution his abuses had made inevitable. He died in exil