November 1. Imre Nagy announces that Hungary withdraws from the Warsaw Pact and becomes a neutral state.

November 4. The Soviet troops move into Hungary again. Together with the Soviet units a new government arrives, which will be headed by János Kádár. Fierce fighting continues until November 15. Five thousand-seven thousand Hungarians get killed and 18 thousand become wounded.

Sandor Kopacsi (head of Budapest’s police):

   In retaliation for Molotov’s cocktails the Soviet armoured units were raising to the ground all buildings from which they were being attacked with bottles filled with gasoline. The Russians were demolishing entire quarters of the streets if they suspected that the insurgents were hiding there. In this way hundreds of buildings were destroyed, mainly in the districts populated by workers’ families, which were the cradle of the uprising. .

Wiktor Woroszylski (writer):

Sunday, November 11:

[...] We look around: not a single house has escaped war damage. There are wide holes in every building, chiefly at the level of the first or second floor. [...] Completely different marks have been left in the roadways. A scary, black, tangled mass of metal – a dead tank, can be seen every few paces. We also see several destroyed “katyushas”…  

   On our way back from Csepl we pass the streets Feren körut and Üllői ut, which are located very close to the city’s centre. Here the sight is even more frightening: all the buildings are burnt or broken, the roadways are in ruin, the air is filled with the smell of burning and with dust, and there are narrow paths beaten among the rubble. This picture is not new to us. It is Warsaw of 1944. It is the picture of a captured city.