G. Baross: Hungary and Hitler

The British' strongly disapproved of our having signed the Tripartite Pact [Translator's remark.' Anti-comintern pact of Germany, Italy, and Japan], and also it upset them that we had tolerated the transportation of German troops, although in a secret way, to Rumania. They also charged us with wanting to shift the Yugoslavs into German influence with our Belgrade pact. Although according to statements made by Gyorgy Barcza, Hungarian Ambassador to London, that the English opinion changed later, the English attitude of un-comprehension aroused great ire in Hungary and had caused Pal Teleki, Minister President, to become quite excited about It. Those persons close to him observed with great concern his tired and nervous condition.

The German Government, in reality, tried to pressure the government of Yugoslavia to adhere to the Tripartite Treaty. The Hungarian Government received this with great anxiety because it feared that in the Course of the negotiations the Germans would make promises to Belgrade to guarantee their frontiers. This would have endangered the validity of some allowances made to Foreign Minister Csaky in regard to some territorial claims. After long hesitation, the Yugoslav Minister President signed the Tripartite Pact in the last days of March 1941, at Vienna, and the Third Reich immediately announced that It was going to "observe forever the territorial integrity and independence of Yugoslavia," However, she did not guarantee the frontiers against Hungarian or other claims.

Two days later, however, the situation changed radically. The Soviet Union arranged a political coup d'état which removed Prince Regent Paul from the throne and placed the seventeen year oId Peter II on It instead, and set up a government

under the leadership of General Simovics who immediately concluded a friendship pact with Moscow.

Count Istvan Csaky did not live to know about this turn of events. On January 27, after great suffering, he died of a kidney ailment which he had contracted in a French prison camp during the First World War. This ailment flared up again during the negotiations in Belgrade and soon killed him. His successor was Laszlo Bardossy, Hungarian Ambassador to London and later to Bucharest. It was he who had to face all the increasing difficulties.

The unfortunate military ventures of Italy in Albania and Greece finally resulted in a complete rout of the Italian Army on all fronts. The English hurried to the aid of the two attacked countries and they landed on the Island of Crete and in Greece proper, united with the Greek Army and started to advance towards Bulgaria. Ribbentropp gathered from Molotov in the caurse of previous negotiations that the Soviet Union, continuing the Czarist politics, also coveted the Bosphorus and would have liked to have the Balkans within her sphere of interest. The coup d'etat of Belgrade seemed to indicate that already the country had been thrown into the arms of the Soviets. Under these circumstances, Hitler resolved to a series of ruthless forceful measures. As an introduction he sent German troops from Rumania to occupy Bulgaria.

A few hours after the coup d'etat in Belgrade, the German and the Italian Governments warned the Yugoslav Government in a mutual note that they considered the change in government a breach of the Tripartite Pact and would not tolerate It. At the same time the German Government communicated to the Hungarian Government that she intended to use force of arms against Yugoslavia and expressed the hope that Hungary would participate also in the military moves and It seemed advisable that the Hungarian and German general staffs meet to negotiate the details. The Hungarian Government was not surprised by this secret dispatch, because the German Third Reich had lauded the Hungarian Yugoslav friendship pact so highly, but had not expected her to insist upon military intervention. The Government had hoped that It would satisfy the Germans to insist upon crossing Hungarian territory to reach Yugoslavia. Therefore, it was a very disagreeable surprise to learn after the meeting of the German and Hungarian general staffs that the Germans had demanded that several (five, if I remember well) army corps participate in the tactical moves. Pal Teleki categorically refused to accede to this demand, but the Regent, and also the majority of the Cabinet members and broad circles of the Houses of Parliament, thought it desirable and necessary that Hungarian forces participate. They reasoned, and not without grounds, that if the Wehrmacbt alone occupied the old Southern Hungarian territories, they might eventually be lost forever from us, especially since the ethnic German settlers of

these southern territories had wanted to form an independent "Prinz Eugen Gau" administrative territory out of former Bacska and Banat and also even of the pure Hungarian counties of Baranya and Tolna. This territory would be under the direct rule of the Third Reich. Finally the Crown Council, with the Regent presiding, released three army corps to the disposal of the Germans, sent the fourth army corps to the Hungarian Russian border to hold a protective defense position, and it also set up the condition that all troops would not cross the former Hungarian-Croatian and Hungarian-Serbian frontiers and that their tactical moves were limited to exclusively Hungarian territories that is to say, the Bacska and Banat.

All the above happenings were brought to the attention of the English Government by Pal Teleki in hopes that they would be understanding of the attitude of the Hungarian Government. But within a few hours London replied through Gyorgy Barcza, the Hungarian Ambassador, to the Hungarian Government that If it were going to allow the transporting of German troops through Hungarian territory, diplomatic relations would be broken off with them, and that if we were going to grant armed assistance to the Third Reich, war would be declared on Hungary. On the morning of April 3,1941, Pal Teleki was found dead in his bed. He had shot himself. Among the letters which he left behind, there was one addressed to the Regent. Some sentences are quoted here in fragments: "We became traitors. I allowed the nation to lose her honor; maybe I am doing a service through my suicide to my country." This letter was never publicized but these few words were quoted to me by a very good friend of mine Dr. Peter Incze, personal secretary to Pal Teleki and counselor to the Minister Presidency.

In the afternoon of the same day, the Regent entrusted the duties of Minister President to Laszlo Bardossy. Bardossy also kept the portfolio of Minister of Foreign Affairs.

The same day Hugo Stinnes, who happened to be staying in Budapest, visited me and expressed his great sympathy concerning the tragic death of Pal Teleki and he was quite pale in the face when he added: "Hoffentlich kein Wechsel es ware furchterlich [Tranlator's remark: English: "I am hopeful that there is not going to be any change, it would be terrible] This remark of the reserved and cold businessman surprised me and at the same time made me very afraid. It remained in my memory.

While the bloodless body of Pal Teleki was reposing in its sarcophagus at the Minister Presidency, the armored cars, cannons, and armored infantry of the Wehrmacht hurried in endless columns day and night down along the River Danube on both sides, in Buda and in Pest. It would be interesting to know how many of the thousands of people who watched this phenomena were thinking that such a tremendous military

force could have annihilated the entire country at only one stroke of the hand.

in five consecutive years the nation had mourned over the death of Gyula Gombos, Kalman Daranyi (the latter died of a heart attack and an embolus in the brain), Istvan Csaky, and Pal Teleki. This is one of the most tragic chapters of the Hungary story, for with the passing away of these great personalities, the nation lost men of outstanding leadership and ability. These men had had a great and deep concept of a future for Hungary which was based on the reconstruction of the historical Hungary and its modernization. Although there were shades of differences in their policies, all four of them tried to realize their plans with equal purposefulness, heroism, and self sacrifice within the great cataracts of European and world currents of history. Their thoughts and their deeds were guided exclusively by the interest of the nation. They lived for it and they actually died for it because their deaths came while they were serving their nation.

The Armies of the Third Reich moved up along the frontiers of Yugoslavia passing through Hungary, Austria, Bulgaria, and Rumania. in the morning of April 6, the German and Italian Governments in a renewed mutual note communicated to the Yugoslav Government that they considered the Balkans in their sphere of interest, that they were not going to tolerate any kind of entanglements there, and that they declared the Belgrade coup d'etat a hostile act against the Tripartite Alliance. A few hours later the German Army penetrated Yugoslavia from all sides and started her tactical moves. During this time, the Hungarian Government continued to negotiate with the Germans. In spite of the mentioned decisions of the Crown Council, Bardossy was confident that eventually the Germans would be satisfied with a smaller force of the Honved, and he was afraid that if he lent larger military force to the Wehrmacht it might be taken farther into the Balkans. Bardossy insisted that the Honved Army occupy only the Bacska and Banat, the old Hungarian territories, and by no means should step over the historical Hungarian-Serb, and Hungarian-Croatian frontiers respectively. Finally he requested that the Honved Army should begin tactical moves only when Yugoslavia ceased to exist. The Regent and Hitler exchanged letters and the Hungarian generals (among them Bartha, Minister of Defense, and Werth) negotiated with German generals in Berlin (among them Paulus and Keitl) and the result of the negotiations in Budapest was a mutual understanding that about four or five divisions of the Hungarian Army would participate in the moves, and would occupy the Bacska and the Banat and would leave the old Serb and Croatian frontiers intact.

On April 7, the English Air Force bombed some Hungarian cities and the English Ambassador to Budapest communicated to the Hungarian Government that England was severing

diplomatic relations with Hungary. On April 10, Croatia and Slavonia declared their independence and with that Yugoslavia ceased to exist. On April 12, the Hungarian Honved divisions began their tactical moves. On April 15, F.D. Roosevelt, President of the United States, officially recognized the Hungarian attack on Yugoslavia, and in spite of the protests of the Hungarian Ambassador in Washington, declared that the United States and its citizens unanimously joined in condemning this action by the Hungarians.

The Hungarian Honved units continued their tactical moves according to plan. One division penetrated the so-called Baranya Triangle, which was a territory located at the junction of the Rivers Danube and Drava, which had belonged once to the county of Baranya, but then was detached and given to Yugoslavia in 1919. The troops have not met with armed resistance. Three other divisions moved into the Bacska, that is to say, in the old county of Bacs-Bodrog, and after having broken through three lines of defense, they meticulously followed the Croatian frontier line and reached the Danube River. The Hungarian and German population of the territories greeted the Hungarian Honved Army with great joy and a Serb battalion joined them even. But the Banat, consisting of the former Hungarian counties of Temes, Arad, and Torontal, was never occupied because Bucharest was against turning these territories over to the Hungarians; therefore, the Germans occupied them and the decision about the annexation of the territory was postponed. This German attitude toward the cancellation of previous agreements (very much like that of the "Goring-Bucht" [Translator's remark: Goring Bay]) was very disappointing for Hungary, and caused great animosity; It became obvious that this had been a gesture towards the Rumanians and that Pan-Germanic supporters had a hand in it.

With the cessation of military moves, the reorganization of the occupied territories was taken over by the military administration and the peaceful and friendly atmosphere of the Bacska changed and became very much distorted. Sectors of the Serb population obtained weapons somehow and started partisan "Komitachi" activities and raids against Hungarian soldiers and gendarmery outposts. The soldiers did not like being shot at from houses and gulches, and these acts of terrorism sadly enough led to some very severe and bloody retaliation. The Hungarian Government resettled about thirty to forty thousand Serbs, partly voluntarily and partly through Government force, from this part of the territory and settled in their place Hungarian minorities from the Rumanian Moldva who are called Csangos.

Under the leadership of the Kvaternik and the President Pavelics, Croatia became a republic, and the Hungarian Government recognized It Immediately. The Hungarian-Croatian relationship, which had been very friendly at the start, soon ran

into the difficulty over the territory located between the rivers Drava and Mura.

With the termination of the military moves of the Wehrmacht in Serbia, Hugo Stinnes asked me to travel on his behalf to Sophia, the capital of Bulgaria, to settle certain coal negotiations and disputes with the Bulgarians. I was very happy to do such for I had become very much interested in the Balkan situation and I wanted to study it first hand. I traveled by the Orient Express, and although it usually made the Belgrade-Sofia trip in six hours, it took fifty hours this time because the railroad line was under control of the Serb partisans and the Express had armored cars and cars manned with machine gun personnel to grant it protection and a free road. Although my trip was undisturbed, every railroad bridge and tunnel represented a major military project and the whole surrounding area had to be searched with a fine tooth comb; therefore, the train was forced to stop for hours and wait for a signal to proceed.

Everywhere in Sofia, in the street, in the offices, or in the shops, I was asked, "Are you a German?" When I would say that I was a Hungarian, they became very friendly and immediately started to make sarcastic remarks about the Germans who were everywhere in the city and country. If I remember well, a very high German naval command had its headquarters in Sofia, and there were innumerable German officers in the hotel. I observed the forced smiles of the Bulgarians when they were talking to these men. They very often asked me if I spoke either French or English, and upon my affirmative answer, they would immediately switch over to these languages although they spoke perfect German.

In those times there were very severe battles being fought in Greece and Albania. The Balkans were nothing but a big powder keg.

In spring of the year 1941, a shortage of public alimentation became perceptible. The needs of the Hungarian Army, mobilized for the tactical moves in the south, increased the demand for food shipments over and above those which were to be sent to the Third Reich in compliance with previous economic negotiations and agreements. The Government introduced measures which were characteristic of the First World War. It introduced a new food rationing which, of course, was met with great dissatisfaction everywhere in the country.

As I already mentioned, in November 1940, Molotov, Foreign Affairs Commissar of the Soviet Union, made hints as to the interest of Moscow in Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, and the Bosphorus. The Soviet Russian Empire obviously wanted to continue the centuries old Balkan policy of the Czars and this fact did not surprise anybody in Hungary. The Hungarians remembered well the circumstances which surrounded the First World War and the attitudes of the Czars in it. The Hungarians also saw a definite change in the situation of the Balkans; there the

intrigues of the Czarist Pravoslav and Panslavic elements were taken over by the Soviet Russian Communist imperialistic policies of expansion. At the same time the able Austrian, Hungarian, English, French, and Turkish diplomats were substituted now by the ruthless and tremendous military force of the Third Reich. There was no question that the competition of the two imperialistic tendencies can be solved only through a war.

A terrible question arose immediately: what will be the fate and the role of Hungary in this inevitable clash of powers?

As early as March 1941, President Bardossy and the Hungarian General Staff had been notified by Berlin that Moscow was conducting a double faced policy. Berlin wanted this situation clarified all the more, for the Russians had moved and concentrated a tremendous military force along the German eastern front lines. The press was silent about these messages, but both parliamentary and military circles were cognizant of them. The meetings of the Hungarian and German General Staff became more frequent and news gathered about them seemed to indicate that Berlin was not requesting Hungary's participation in tactical moves against the Communists, but wanted us to defend our Carpathian frontiers. To this end our Eighth Army Corps, located in Kassa, and the Mountaineer and Ranger Battalions were brought up to combat readiness, and they were all moved in to defense positions in the Carpathian Mountains. Several times, in confidential circles and in front of the writer of these lines, Bardossy hinted that he did not intend to grant any military assistance to the Germans. He stated further that, upon his proposal, one of the Council of Ministers brought a decision to this effect; at the same time it was decided to defend the Carpathian frontier and lend, in case of need, technical support only for the German tactical moves. The Regent fully approved of this decision of the Cabinet.

On June 22 of the year 1941 (this tragic date is carved in my memory forever), approximately 170 German Divisions, without any previous declaration of war, started their attack against the Soviet Russian Empire.

Five days later, on the 27th of July, Bardossy declared in the Lower House of Parliament that we entered a phase of war with the Soviet Russians. At the same time a similar statement was made by the President of the Upper House to the members of that chamber.

G. Baross: Hungary and Hitler