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Hungary World War II
In December 1940, Teleki signed a short-lived Treaty of
Eternal Friendship with Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav
government,
however, was overthrown on March 27, 1941, two days after
it
succumbed to German and Italian pressure and joined the
pact.
Hitler considered the overthrow a hostile act and grounds
to
invade. Again promising territory in exchange for
cooperation, he
asked Hungary to join the invasion by contributing troops
and
allowing the Wehrmacht (German armed forces) to march
through its
territory. Unable to prevent the invasion, Teleki
committed
suicide on April 3. Three days later, the Luftwaffe
mercilessly
bombed Belgrade without warning, and German troops
invaded.
Shortly thereafter, Horthy dispatched Hungarian military
forces
to occupy former Hungarian lands in Yugoslavia, and
Hungary
eventually annexed sections of Vojvodina.
Horthy named the right-wing radical Laszlo Bardossy to
succeed Teleki. Bardossy was convinced that Germany would
win the
war and sought to maintain Hungary's independence by
appeasing
Hitler. Hitler tricked Horthy into committing Hungary to
join his
invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, and Hungary
entered
the war against the Western Allies the following December.
In
July 1941, the government deported the first 40,000 Jews
from
Hungary, and six months later Hungarian troops, in
reprisal for
resistance activities, murdered 3,000 Serbian and Jewish
hostages--near Novi Sad in Yugoslavia. By the winter of
1941-42,
German hopes of a quick victory over the Soviet Union had
faded.
In January the German foreign minister visited Budapest
asking
for additional mobilization of Hungarian forces for a
planned
spring offensive and promising in return to hand Hungary
some
territory in Transylvania. Bardossy agreed and committed
onethird of Hungary's military forces.
Horthy grew dissatisfied with Bardossy, who resigned in
March
1942, and named Miklos Kallay, a conservative veteran of
Bethlen's government, who aimed to free Hungary from the
Nazis'
grip. Kallay faced a terrible dilemma: if he broke with
Hitler
and negotiated a separate peace, the Germans would occupy
Hungary
immediately; but if he supported the Germans, he would
encourage
further pro-Nazi excesses. Kallay chose duplicity. In 1942
and
1943, pro-Western Hungarian government officials promised
British
and American diplomats that the Hungarians would not fire
on
their aircraft, sparing for a time Hungarian cities from
bombardment.
In January 1943, the Soviet Red Army annihilated
Hungary's
Second Army during the massive counterattack on the Axis
troops
besieging Stalingrad. In the fighting, Soviet troops
killed an
estimated 40,000 Hungarians and wounded 70,000. As
anti-Axis
pressure in Hungary mounted, Kallay withdrew the remnants
of the
force into Hungary in April 1943, and only a nominal
number of
poorly armed troops remained of the country's military
contribution to the Axis Powers. Aware of Kallay's deceit
and
fearing that Hungary might conclude a separate peace,
Hitler
ordered Nazi troops to occupy Hungary and force its
government to
increase its contribution to the war effort. Kallay took
asylum
in the Turkish legation. Dome Sztojay, a supporter of the
Nazis,
became the new prime minister. His government jailed
political
leaders, dissolved the labor unions, and resumed the
deportation
of Hungary's Jews.
While Kallay was prime minister, the Jews endured
economic
and political repression, but the government protected
them from
the "final solution." The government expropriated Jewish
property; banned the purchase of real estate by Jews;
barred Jews
from working as publishers, theater directors, and editors
of
journals; proscribed sexual relations between Jews and
non-Jews;
and outlawed conversion to Judaism. But when the Nazis
occupied
Hungary in March 1944, the deportation of the Jews to the
death
camps in Poland began. Horthy used the confusion after the
July
20, 1944, attempt to assassinate Hitler to replace Sztojay
in
August 1944 with General Geza Lakatos and halt the
deportation of
Jews from Budapest. Of the approximately 725,000 Jews
residing
within Hungary's expanded borders of 1941, only about
260,500,
mostly from Budapest, survived.
In September, Soviet forces crossed the border, and on
October 15 Horthy announced that Hungary had signed an
armistice
with the Soviet Union. However, the Germans abducted the
regent
and forced him to abrogate the armistice, depose the
Lakatos
government, and name Ferenc Szalasi--the leader of the
Arrow
Cross Party--prime minister. Horthy abdicated, and soon
the
country became a battlefield. Hungary was sacked first by
the
retreating Germans, who demolished the rail, road, and
communications systems, then by the advancing Soviet Red
Army,
which found the country in a state of political chaos.
Germans
held off the Soviet troops near Budapest for seven weeks
before
the defenses collapsed, and on April 4, 1945, the last
German
troops were driven out of Hungary.
Data as of September 1989
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