National Affairs: Kidnaped

For more than a month, the world's most powerful nation huffed & puffed, but it could not budge a minor Soviet slave state. Four U.S. flyers, lost over Hungary on a routine C-47 cargo flight from Germany to Yugoslavia, had been forced down by Red fighter planes (TIME, Dec. 17). Hungary rudely ignored Washington's request that the men be released, refused to let them have counsel or see U.S. legation representatives. Before the U.N. in Paris last week, Russia's Andrei Vishinsky piled insult on injury: he branded the U.S. flyers as spies, publicly hoped that they would be punished by "our military and judicial authorities."

Later, Vishinsky took back the "our" as a slip of the tongue. But two days after Vishinsky's speech, his wish came true. The Hungarian government announced that it would bring the U.S. airmen to trial. The charge: "Having with premeditated intention violated the border of Hungary." By putting four servicemen in uniform on trial as spies, the Reds had gone further than they had ever dared before.

Then the Hungarians added their final gesture. Even before the U.S. could wind up to fire another note of protest, a military court in Budapest this week handed down its decision: the four airmen had been tried, found guilty, fined $30,000 each or three months in jail. Hungary's ransom ring, which had made a lucrative haul in goods for the release of Businessman Robert Vogeler, was down to a simpler racket—a barefaced pursuit of hard cash.