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1956 - Budapest: the time and the place are associated in the minds of many Frenchmen. The name of the Hungarian capital became one of the most painful symbols of the last days of the Fourth Republic: after Budapest many Frenchmen were forced to face their own illusions about the socialist countries. Afterwards public opinion and the French press became interested in the tragedy with the intensity commensurate to its significance in the Fall of 1956. To be sure, the activity of the French government and its motivations in national and especially international contexts have remained obscure to this day. The opening of the archives in the West as well as in the former Soviet block permit us to reconstruct a subtle picture of the Hungarian Revolution’s repercussions in France.