History of Hungary

This is the history of Hungary. See also the history of Europe, the history of present-day nations and states, Hungary before the Magyars, and Hungary.

The Regency (1920 - 1944)

In January 1920, Hungarian men and women cast the first secret ballots in the country's political history. The votings were not totally free, because the entire left-wing either boycotted or was excluded from the voting. A large right-wing majority was elected to a unicameral assembly. In March, the parliament annulled the Compromise of 1867, and it restored the Hungarian monarchy but postponed electing a king until civil disorder had subsided. Instead, Miklos Horthy was elected regent and was empowered, among other things, to appoint Hungary's prime minister, veto legislation, convene or dissolve the parliament, and command the armed forces.

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Hungary's signing of the Treaty of Trianon on June 4, 1920, ratified the country's dismemberment. The territorial provisions of the treaty, which ensured continued discord between Hungary and its neighbors, required the Hungarians to surrender more than two-thirds of their pre-war lands. Nearly one-third of the 10 million ethnic Hungarians found themselves outside the diminished homeland. The country's ethnic composition was left almost homogeneous, Hungarians constituting about 90% of the population, Germans made up about 6%, and Slovaks, Croats, Romanians, Jews and Gypsies accounted for the remainder.

Related Topics:
Treaty of Trianon - June 4 - 1920

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New international borders separated Hungary's industrial base from its sources of raw materials and its former markets for agricultural and industrial products. Hungary lost 84% of its timber resources, 43% of its arable land, and 83% of its iron ore. Because most of the country's pre-war industry was concentrated near Budapest, Hungary retained about 51% of its industrial population, 56% of its industry, 82% of its heavy industry, and 70% of its banks.

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Horthy appointed Count Pál Teleki prime minister in July 1920. His right-wing government issued a numerus clausus law, limiting admission of "political insecure elements" (these were often Jews) to universities and, in order to quiet rural discontent, took initial steps toward fulfilling a promise of major land reform by dividing about 3,850 km² from the largest estates into smallholdings. Teleki's government resigned, however, after the former emperor, Charles IV, unsuccessfully attempted to retake Hungary's throne in March 1921. King Charles's return produced split parties between conservatives who favored a Habsburg restoration and nationalist right-wing radicals who supported election of a Hungarian king. Count István Bethlen, a non-affiliated right-wing member of the parliament, took advantage of this rift forming a new Party of Unity under his leadership. Horthy then appointed Bethlen prime minister. Charles IV died soon after he failed a second time to reclaim the throne in October 1921.

Related Topics:
Pál Teleki - 1920 - Numerus clausus - Charles IV - 1921 - István Bethlen - Party of Unity

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As prime minister, Bethlen dominated Hungarian politics between 1921 and 1931. He fashioned a political machine by amending the electoral law, providing jobs in the expanding bureaucracy to his supporters, and manipulating elections in rural areas. Bethlen restored order to the country by giving the radical counterrevolutionaries payoffs and government jobs in exchange for ceasing their campaign of terror against Jews and leftists. In 1921, he made a deal with the Social Democrats and trade unions (called Bethlen-Peyer-pact), agreeing, among other things, to legalize their activities and free political prisoners in return for their pledge to refrain from spreading anti-Hungarian propaganda, calling political strikes, and organizing the peasantry. Bethlen brought Hungary into the League of Nations in 1922 and out of international isolation by signing a treaty of friendship with Italy in 1927. The revision of the Treaty of Trianon rose to the top of Hungary's political agenda and the strategy employed by Bethlen consisted by strengthening the economy and building relations with stronger nations. Revision of the treaty had such a broad backing in Hungary that Bethlen used it, at least in part, to deflect criticism of his economic, social, and political policies.

Related Topics:
1931 - Bethlen-Peyer-pact - League of Nations - 1922 - Italy - 1927

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The Great Depression induced a drop in the standard of living and the political mood of the country shifted further toward the right. In 1932 Horthy appointed a new prime-minister, Gyula Gömbös, that changed the course of Hungarian policy towards closer cooperation with Germany and started an effort to magyarize the few remaining ethnic minorities in Hungary. Gömbös signed a trade agreement with Germany that drew Hungary's economy out of depression but made Hungary dependent on the German economy for both raw materials and markets.

Related Topics:
Great Depression - 1932 - Gyula Gömbös

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World War II

Hitler used promises of returning territories, economic pressure, and threats of military intervention to compel the Hungarians into supporting his policies, including those related to Jews, which encouraged Hungary's anti-Semites. In 1935 Hungary's the most important fascist party, the Ferenc Szálasi's Arrow Cross, was founded. Gömbös successor, Kálmán Darányi attempted to appease the anti-Semites and the Nazis by proposing and passing the First Jewish Law, which set quotas limiting Jews to 20% of the positions in a number of businesses and professions. The law failed to satisfy Hungary's anti-Semitic radicals, and the regent then appointed the anti-Nazi Béla Imrédy, who banned all Hungarian fascist parties and drafted a harsher Second Jewish Law, before Horthy forced his resignation in February 1939. The new government of Pál Teleki approved the Second Jewish Law, which greatly restricted the Jewish employment and defined Jews by blood, disregarding conversion.

Related Topics:
Hitler - 1935 - Ferenc Szálasi - Arrow Cross - Kálmán Darányi - Béla Imrédy - 1939

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The first Vienna Award of 1938 returned parts of Czechoslovakia (Slovakia and Carpathian Ruthenia) with predominantly Hungarian population. In March 1939 however, Hungary occupied the rest of Sub-Carpathia with no Hungarian population and also tried to occupy the rest of (in the meantime independent) Slovakia, but after a war with Slovakia it only gained easternmost Slovakia. The second Vienna Award returned the northern part of Transylvania in September 1940. There were atrocities on both sides and in both country during this handing over, transitional period . As an German-Italian mixed commitee stated: "Romanians commited more robberies, hungarians more assassinations". In october 1940 a reciprocity policy (especially in minoritiy question) have started between Romania and Hungary and continued until the end of WWII. Dividing Transylvania between Romania and Hungary, Hitler was able to manipulate and control both of his future allies. On November 20 1940, fearing of the Nazi, Teleki affiliated Hungary on the Tripartite Pact. In December, he also signed an ephemeral "Treaty of Eternal Friendship" with Yugoslavia. Few months later, when Hitler asked Hungary to join and support invasion of Yugoslavia, promising territory in exchange of cooperation, unable to prevent Hungary's participation at war alongside Germany, Teleki committed suicide. The right-wing radical László Bárdossy succeeded and in April 1941, after German attack, Horthy dispatched the military forces to occupy former Hungarian lands in Yugoslavia, and Hungary eventually annexed sections of Vojvodina, Croatia and Slovenia.

Related Topics:
Vienna Award - 1938 - March - Sub-Carpathia - Slovakia - 1940 - Romania - November 20 - Tripartite Pact - László Bárdossy - 1941 - Vojvodina - Croatia - Slovenia

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Hungary was unaware and it didn't join the invasion of the Soviet Union from the

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day of June 22 1941. Hitler did not directly ask for Hungarian aid, but many Hungarian officials argued if Hungary did not quickly join, it would be surpassed by Romania in the competition for border revisions in Transylvania. Hungary, allied with Germany against the Soviet Union, entered the war at the end of June, after the questionable Soviet bombing of Kosice (Kassa) city in Slovak area. By December 1941, the hopes of a quick victory over the Soviet Union had faded and Hungary's troop contingent increased at 150,000 in 1942. Worried about Hungary's increasing reliance on Germany, Horthy removed Bárdossy and replaced him with Miklós Kállay, a veteran conservative of Bethlen's government. He continued Bardossy's policy of support Germany against the Red Army, but he also began negotiations with the Western Allies. Hungarian Army suffered great human loss after a heavy Soviet breakthrough at the River Don, shortly after the fall of Stalingrad in January 1943. There were several secret negotiations with the British and the American government, but there was no connection with the Soviets, as the Western Allies requested. Aware of Kállay's deceit and fearing that Hungary might conclude a separate peace, on March 1944, Hitler ordered Nazi troops to occupy Hungary and Döme Sztójay, a supporter of the Nazis, became the new prime minister. He governed with the aid of a Nazi military governor, Edmund Vessenmeyer. Horthy was confined to a castle, in essence placed under house arrest.

Related Topics:
June 22 - 1942 - Miklós Kállay - River Don - Stalingrad - 1943 - 1944 - Döme Sztójay - Edmund Vessenmeyer

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In July 1941, Bárdossy government deported 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 Vojvodina. Hoping to win Germany favor by persecuting Jews, Bardossy pass the "Third Jewish Law" in August 1941, which prohibited marriage and sexual intercourse with Jews. While Kallay was prime minister, the Jews endured economic and political repression, but the government protected them from the "final solution." But when the Nazis occupied Hungary in March 1944, the deportation of the Jews to the German death camps located in occupied Poland began. The infamous SS Colonel Adolf Eichmann came to Hungary and directed the destruction of at least 400,000 Jews.

Related Topics:
Novi Sad - Political repression - Poland - Adolf Eichmann

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In August 1944, Horthy replaced Sztójay with General Géza Lakatos. In September, Soviet forces crossed the border, and on October 15 Horthy announced that Hungary had signed an armistice with the Soviet Union. The army ignored his orders and the Germans forced him to abrogate the armistice, depose Lakatos government, and name the leader of the Arrow Cross Party, Ferenc Szálasi, as prime minister. Horthy abdicated, and soon Hungary became a battlefield. Szálasi promised greatness for Hungary and a prosperity for the peasants, but in reality Hungary was crumbling and its armies slowly surrendered, one by one. In cooperation with the Nazis, Szálasi restarted the deportations of Jews, now focusing on Budapest. A fascist reign of terror resulted in random massacres of Jews and other "suspicious" people. The retreating German army demolished the rail, road, and communications systems and the advancing Red Army 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, controlled now by the Soviet Red Army.

Related Topics:
Géza Lakatos - October 15 - Ferenc Szálasi - April 4 - 1945

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