In the spring and summer of 1956 the Soviet Union invaded 
Hungary to reassert control of the country. The First Domino is the 
first full analysis in English drawing on new archival collections from 
East-bloc countries to reinterpret decision making during this Cold 
War crisis. Johanna Granville selects four key patterns of 
misperception as laid out by political scientist Robert Jervis and 
shows how these patterns prevailed in the military crackdown and 
in other countries’ reactions to it.

    Granville examines the statements and actions of Soviet 
Presidium members, the Hungarian leadership, U.S. policy makers, 
and even Yugoslav and Polish leaders. She concludes that the 
United States bears some responsibility for the events of 1956, as 
ill-advised U.S. covert actions may have convinced Soviet leaders 
that America was attempting to weaken Soviet hegemony over 
Eastern Europe.

    Granville’s multi-archival research tends to confirm the post-
revisionists’ theory about the cold war: it was everyone’s fault and 
no one’s fault. It resulted from the emerging bipolar structure of the 
international system, the power vacuum in Europe’s center, and 
spiraling misconceptions.

_________________________________________________________

JOHANNA GRANVILLE resides in Montgomery, Alabama. She spent
several years conducting archival research for this book in Moscow,
Budapest, and Warsaw.


Number Twenty-six: Eastern European Studies


What people are saying about this book

“This is a remarkable study of Cold War history because the
author . . . has availed herself of recently opened Soviet and other
archives to describe how Hungary became the first 'domino' in a
process that resulted ultimately in the Soviet Union's loss of
hegemony over Eastern Europe in 1989.”—Washington Times,
March 21, 2004, by Arnold Beichman, Research Fellow at the
Hoover Institution, Stanford University

“. . . a fascinating study, meticulously documented, that not only
sheds new light on an agonizing incident in the Cold War, but shows
how it fits with theories of decision-making. Using archives from
several countries, Granville demonstrates that leaders woefully
misunderstood each other, had very different perspectives, and failed
to realize that their views were not shared.”—Robert Jervis,  
Columbia University

“. . . Granville has combined new information with thoughtful 
analysis to enrich our understanding of one important event in 
Cold War history, and thus contributes to a better understanding of
the broader canvas of that history as well.”—Raymond L. Garthoff,
former CIA Analyst and Ambassador to Bulgaria

“. . . With her extensive scholarly examination of the Soviet 
intervention in Hungary, Johanna Granville makes a wonderful 
contribution to the new field of international cold war history.
With a wealth of new sources from the former East Bloc, Granville
recreates the true atmosphere of the biggest crisis in the communist
world after Stalin's death, a bizarre mixture of ideological rigidity,
fears, hopes, and disastrous misperceptions. I hope that not only
Westerners, but Russians, will be able to read this book.”—Vladislav
 Zubok, Temple University

“This is the best available analysis of the international history of
the 1956 Hungarian rebellion against Communism. Dr. Granville has
written a book that through first-rate research brings together the
key sources on that crisis and that thereby helps explain the
decisions reached not only in Budapest and Moscow, but also in
Washington, Beijing, and Belgrade.”—Odd Arne Westad, London
School of Economics