Pál Pritz

The National Interest

Hungarian Foreign Policy in the Twentieth Century

 

History rarely heeds the neat parameters of a century. Yet a century can turn out to be longer than its years. When it comes to Hungarian foreign policy we can begin around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, and hasten to add that the ensuing century was long indeed. The politically wise generation of Ferenc Deák, József Eötvös and Count Gyula Andrássy,¹ which helped to form the Compromise of 1867, was superseded by an altogether more self-confident one, which sought not to strengthen the dualist arrangement but to transform—or indeed destroy—it. This ruling class, for the most part, was blithe to the gathering storms in the rest of the world. For Hungary, it all culminated in the forced signing of the devastating document in the Grand Trianon Palace on June 4, 1920.² The blow smote on Hungarians is barely fathomable. Even a historian familiar with the subject finds it an onerous task to properly grasp its implications and retell the story.³
Self-assurance is no bad thing; ambitious projects after all are not for the faint-hearted. But carried to excess, it seems like fiddling. The elephantine Neo- Gothic edifice of Parliament built on the Danube embankment between 1885 and 1906 is one example of the excess of the fin-de-siècle. Hungary had little to justify such an ambitious show of imperial pride: nowhere else on the continent was there such a huge Parliament (its London counterpart is only a few centimetres bigger). And halfway through its construction, in 1896, the Government decided to stage lavish celebrations of the thousandth anniversary of the Hungarian Conquest (as it happens, 895 was the decisive year in the process of Magyar settlement).⁴ Let’s not forget, either, that the Royal Palace on the opposite bank of the Danube was rebuilt, growing twice its original size yet lacking any real function since the shared ruler governed his empire from Vienna.
Besides indulging in grand projects, the prewar ruling class was blind to the need to bring the people into the fold of the political nation. Instead, they busily conserved their privileges at any price. Skilled and hard-working builders had erected an impressive Parliament. Did the lawmakers inside live up to the promise of that magnificent edifice? Endre Ady perhaps went too far when he described it as “a beautiful nest of robbers”. Whatever the case, it is fair to say that debate in the chambers on irrelevant constitutional issues surpassed any genuine effort to help the country along the path of progress. Prime Minister István Tisza was upstanding. Yet his protracted wrangling with a coalition of parliamentarians— whose main occupation was to proclaim empty nationalist slogans—consigned him to preserving the status quo rather than modernizing the nation.
Hungary was a partner nation of Austria, and its influence on foreign policy was in keeping with that status. The Danube Monarchy, a Great Power in the conventional sense⁵—though, by then, not in a modern sense⁶—possessed a foreign policy, but one which was confined to the Balkans. Early in the century, it opposed reviving local national liberation movements. The sole concern of every step—every step to interfere in Balkan affairs—was to secure its own future and to contain the centrifugal forces of its national minorities. The Hungarian prime minister was in the position to influence that foreign policy. And István Tisza took an active part in isolating Serbia, helping its ally Bulgaria by turning it into an economic and military player, and ensuring Romania’s loyalty.
Historians agree that the Greater Hungary, as founded by Saint Stephen, fell for two reasons. First, Hungary lost the war at a time when the Austro- Hungarian Empire was no longer able to carry out its traditional role of keeping the balance of power. Second, it failed to win the support of the national minorities, which received encouragement from nationalisms that were diametrically opposed to Hungarian nationalism. So people who place the blame for the emerging situation solely on the selfishness and narrowmindedness of the Hungarian ruling classes are unhistorical and ideologically motivated—and therefore wrong.
But three things are certain. First, the powerful can achieve more than the powerless. Second, there is little doubt that the holder of power, István Tisza⁷, had the chance to act more wisely. It is enough to quote his notorious words spoken in Sarajevo in September 1918: “If we mean business, forget the slogan of national self-determination!… Have I come here to listen to such nonsense?” ⁸ Third, everything that happens has a cause, and nothing disappears without some trace. Even a lost cause can leave its mark, while individuals and regimes that thought of themselves as (ultimate) winners are bound to turn to dust in time only to be reborn in some modified form later.

In the modern age, nationalism is the engine of foreign policy. Let’s simply define nationalism as national feeling (thereafter we can ask whether or not nationalism was justified or how far it defended some justified national interest, whether it served progressive or reactionary forces, at what point justified national interests collided, how a third party—a smaller or greater country—benefited from that conflict or was hurt by it). The nation, however, is a historical category—even if speeches by politicians sometimes claim otherwise—and its content is largely determined by the people in charge. That is why charges of high treason and betrayal of one’s nation are so risible. Enjoy public respect one moment and you’ll be a traitor the next. When political winds change again, another law declares you a great son of the nation. Only time will tell how one national interest or another declared by the powers-thatbe actually turns out in the end. A politician may be marked as a traitor. But unless he is subject to criminal law,⁹ he cannot be said to commit high treason. Rather, the relevant question is: does a politician represent the national interest well or badly?¹⁰

Until the rise of nationalism, dynastic interests were the engine of foreign policy. Until 1918 Habsburg emperors (Francis Joseph I and Charles I) were heads of state in Hungary. However, this had been the age of nationalism for quite some time. So whereas the ruling dynasty had a say in foreign-policy decisions, the interplay of national forces—which now strengthened, now weakened one another—was the dominant factor shaping foreign policy.
Making use of the opportunities born out of the Compromise of 1867, Hungarian foreign-policy makers did much to assert Hungarian national interests. Count Gyula Andrássy¹¹ won acceptance for an arrangement whereby the ratio of officials in the diplomatic service domiciled in Hungary should match the Hungarian contribution to the costs of managing joint affairs (called the quota). Although Hungary was unable to ever fully realize that ratio, in time it came quite close to it. (In this light, it is worth noting that personalities were of great importance in day-to-day politics and foreign policy.) Hungarian foreign policy had been successful, too, in asserting national interests. In 1868 it managed to ward off an attempt to convert the dual into a trial monarchy. In the relationship with Russia and in dealings with the Balkans, Hungarian interests were asserted to the limits of what was realistic.
Eleven nations inhabited the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Their interests were so diverse that, though Vienna-Budapest was the centre of power, its foreign policy failed to reach the seas, let alone the territories beyond them, even though such matters went with Great Power status. Efforts made towards achieving a more dynamic foreign policy were less than effective owing to the structural problems described above, which considerably limited its effectiveness.
It is certain that Hungary’s decisive role in the outbreak of the world war in 1914 did not serve the national interest. Yet even a statesman as strong-minded as Tisza could not avert it. A whole library of books surrounds the subject. The relevant literature is so extensive because the argument was a dialogue of the deaf carried on between people who dealt with the facts tendentiously and neglected important relevant aspects, whether intentionally or inadvertently.
Tisza knew that Hungary would not be able to maintain its prewar position. If Hungary won the war, the Germans would call the shots. If it lost, the Entente would open the floodgates for the national minorities’ desire for independent statehood.
What was fated was bound to happen.¹² On 3 November 1918 General Viktor Weber signed the armistice agreement in Padua on behalf of an Empire that had ceased to exist by then. Not only national issues were on the agenda in the Danube Basin but social ones too. Social revolutions were fought and won.
A particular Hungarian tragedy, however, was the failure of the so-called Chrysanthemum Revolution associated with Count Mihály Károlyi¹³, Hungary’s leader between 1918 and 1919 during its doomed affair with democracy. This not only failed to defend Hungary’s pre-Trianon frontiers but it could not realize even its own policy: the creation of a Western-style democratic Hungary.
Criticism of Károlyi generally falls on two counts. First, he was naive about the real intentions of the victors, and, second, he was slow to defend the pre-Trianon borders. The first has substance, but as for the second charge, his detractors wilfully misinterpret the military convention signed in Belgrade on 13 November 1918¹⁴. That was a momentary success which was later torn to pieces by the logic of the victors’ interests. Those who criticize Károlyi for neglecting the defence of the country overlook the fact that the soldiers were up to their necks in the war. What mattered to them most was defending their own region. They prized a better life for themselves more than the fate of some remote corner of the Monarchy. And we should underline the fact that Károlyi was not in a position to defend the historical kingdom of Hungary.¹⁵ He did make political mistakes, however. In a terribly thorny situation into which he was forced by the Entente (the note associated with Lieutenant Colonel Ferdinand Vix¹⁶), Károlyi failed to assess the domestic political situation adequately, convinced that by handing over power to the Social Democrats he would remain head of state.
In his memoirs György Barcza, an eminent member of the Hungarian diplomatic corps in the interwar period, who served as minister to the United Kingdom between 1938 and 1941, expressing what many of his contemporaries thought (as many today think), denied that Károlyi’s revolution was national¹⁷. Barcza argued that it did not serve the national interest. But the democratic revolution of autumn 1918 really stood on a national basis. Although it proclaimed itself a people’s republic on 16 November, it was more national than popular. It was national too in the historical sense of the term, which expresses that (given the very long period of ethno-genesis) a wide gap existed between the people and the political nation.¹⁸
Barcza was wrong when he wrote that it was a bloodless revolution. In the absence of reliable research, the exact figures are unknown. But there is much evidence to show that not only the Soviet Republic and the ensuing counterrevolution were bloody, events at the time of the Chrysanthemum Revolution also resulted in casualties.¹⁹ It was the task of Károlyi’s democratic revolution, more than of later regimes, to bring the fierce passions that had accumulated over four years of a war of the masses—entirely senseless in the eyes of millions of participants—under control. Countess Ilona Batthyány and her friends were right when, in the early days of November 1918, they issued the slogan that “Support Mihály or else Bolshevism will take over.”²⁰ Károlyi acted in the spirit of that recognition.²¹ The ire of the people and resulting mob violence would have meant death to many aristocrats. Count István Bethlen also had to flee from his estate at Sámsond in Transylvania (Şamşud, Romania). He and his family hid in a nearby canebrake. At nightfall they fled to Marosvásárhely (Tîrgu Mures¸). Barely escaping the lynch mob, István Bethlen could see for himself that the ‘problem’ was lawlessness rather than Károlyi’s revolution.
Had things been different, he would have fled abroad. But he chose revolutionary Budapest where he was safe and where, for a while, he took part in politics with Károlyi.²² A state of martial was declared and law and order were restored in towns and villages. In doing so, this policy followed national tradition. Emotional and tactical considerations prevented it from breaking with the ideal of the Hungary of King St Stephen.
The past is misinterpreted by those who argue that the Hungarian Soviet Republic—with its northern campaign which was initially successful—did more for Hungary’s integrity than the Chrysanthemum Revolution. I am the last to deny the value of the northern campaign, but facts show that Béla Kun and his associates²³ expected an imminent world revolution and that the Entente was not tolerant of the new regime at all (the base promises of Georges Clemenceau notwithstanding). In fact it was at that very time that the Entente powers modified their views to Hungary’s disadvantage, and the decision-makers voted in Paris in favour of allotting Western Hungary to Austria²⁴ (lest Austria follow the example of the Soviet Republic).

After the Bolshevik regime collapsed, a counter-revolutionary regime followed. The Entente and the Romanian army occupying Hungary—in August, it even eagerly entered Budapest—assisted its establishment. The Social Democrats returned to their original programme. The national interest, in their view, could be served best if, with the help of the Entente, they created a bourgeois democratic regime. Miklós Horthy and his associates, who were gaining in strength among the counter-revolutionaries, believed that a markedly anti-liberal, authoritarian regime best embodied the national interest. However different the two visions were, both camps regarded as selfevident that the Entente should be the moderator of the debate (which also meant that it would not be decided within a national framework).
Sir George Clerk acted as moderator. Although his own sympathies, and of the powers on whose behalf he acted, favoured Garami and his associates²⁵, he had no option but to negotiate a compromise that involved concessions to both sides. That is how a limited parliamentary system emerged, whose details were to be elaborated by Bethlen. Although the regime became badly distorted after the Prime Minister resigned in 1931, it remained viable down to March 1944, when German troops occupied Hungary. (To this day the character of the Horthy regime is still hotly disputed. Some describe it as a repulsive repressive regime; others come close to likening it to a Western-type parliamentary democracy.)
The postwar political class was convinced that they would best serve the interests of the nation if their first priority remained the restoration of the country’s prewar borders. The Social Democrats, weak to start with (and of lessening influence) and the democratic liberals, who were even weaker, called for a revision of the borders along ethnic lines and were therefore repeatedly accused of being deficient in national feeling. In fact, such a policy would have best served the interests of the nation. The official policy was unrealistic in its essence.
The basic contradiction of Hungarian foreign policy between the two world wars was that the policymakers and their supporters—those endowed with a modicum of common sense—were well aware that the country lacked the strength to restore Saint Stephen’s borders, nor was it likely that this situation would change in the foreseeable future. If that dream was to come true, Hungary had to seek the support of those Great Powers which were dissatisfied with the Versailles peace settlement. Potential allies were Italy and (a gradually strengthening) Germany. True, in the 1920s Germany strove to mend fences with France (Stresemann carried out the provisions of the Peace Treaty and was, in the language of his critics, an Erfüllungspolitiker (a compliance politician), and István Bethlen²⁶, Gyula Gömbös and many others at a very early stage formed an alliance with Germany. That hazardous notion was thus already present in the bud in the twenties. The politician and historian Gusztáv Gratz²⁷ censured Bethlen for this in a monograph which, although written as early as during the Second World War, remained unpublished for decades.²⁸ In other words, what remained of Hungary was put at risk in the hope of regaining the lost territories.
Russia could not be excluded from the circle of potential allies. (That is why Miklós Bánffy, Bethlen, Kálmán Kánya and some others toyed with the idea of officially proposing cooperation with Russia. However, in 1924, they could not even achieve the establishment of diplomatic relations. The relevant agreement was initialled but was not implemented. The government of Gyula Gömbös regularized relations in February 1934 but Hungary, between the two world wars —including the Social Democrats—could not imagine any such thing. Hungarian– Russian diplomatic relations were formal. In 1940 Pál Teleki²⁹ turned down Moscow’s proposal to coordinate foreign policy in their dealings with Romania.
In 1927 Italy signed an impressive Treaty of Eternal Friendship³⁰ with Hungary, which was a tangible diplomatic achievement for Budapest. The age of diplomatic quarantine was over. Only a few years earlier, Hungary could not obtain membership of the League of Nations (at the first attempt in 1921, but only at the second in 1922). Years of untiring diplomatic effort were needed to secure a much-needed loan from the League of Nations. What Rome was interested in was not Hungary but the whole of the Danube Basin. Italy’s regional approach weighed heavily on Hungarian–Italian relations at the time.
For a long time, Italy maintained particularly cordial relations with Romania, and, for years, Mussolini sought good relations with Prague, too. Italy’s national interest dictated such a foreign policy although Hungarian propaganda suggested otherwise.
There was an even bigger headache for Budapest: Italian–German relations were fraught with tension over a long period. Hungarian foreign policy had to walk a tightrope between Rome and Berlin, since it needed both of them for a revision of the frontiers. As Mussolini wanted to block Berlin’s access to the Danube Basin, he wanted a Rome-Vienna-Budapest political bloc. The makers of Hungarian foreign policy could not go along with that, as this would have antagonized Berlin. The Germans were aware of the danger. To avert it, in February 1934, they signed a second supplementary agreement to the ineffective German–Hungarian economic cooperation agreement of 1931 with Hungary. The supplementary agreement envisaged the German purchase of 50,000 tonnes of Hungarian grain. This German–Hungarian accord notwithstanding, Germany was disappointed to learn that minutes were nevertheless agreed in Rome.
Prime Minister Gyula Gömbös manoeuvred nimbly between the two great powers. He did not join a political bloc that may have lost him the goodwill of the Germans, but he made certain concessions to a mistrustful Mussolini. Italy agreed to purchase 320,000 tonnes of grain from Hungary, which indicated to the Germans that the ‘price’ of Hungarian sympathy was higher than their token gesture of a promise to buy 50,000 tonnes. What Gömbös accomplished was perhaps the most skilful tightrope walk between rival great powers in the history of Hungarian foreign policy in the 20th century. Moreover, he demonstrated Hungary’s commitment to Austrian independence, something which Germany took note of. So Hungary played no part in Austria’s loss of independence. Before the Anschluss in 1938, Mussolini looked to Hitler for support to bring his Abyssinian adventure to a bitterly successful close.
Claims made to this very day that Gömbös was solely to blame for Hungarian– German relations leading to a tragedy are, in this light, unhistorical. Rather, it was due to a Hungarian foreign policy based on an all-or-nothing gamble. But this va banque policy had its precursors, and additional factors complicate the story. For example, Gömbös maintained an unfriendly nationalist policy towards the country’s ethnic Germans. And many continue to misinterpret his visit to Germany in 1933. Here is the background: two weeks before Gömbös met Hitler, Western democracies had initialled an agreement with Hitler and Mussolini paving the way for the Munich agreement of 1938. And let’s not forget that István Bethlen had already visited Berlin three years before (Hitler was not in power then) putting Hungary’s foot in the German camp.
Hungary’s revisionist policy was unrealistic even between 1938 and 1941, when it achieved spectacular territorial gains and almost doubled its 1920 area. All this was a gift by a great power, obviously made for selfish reasons. Hungary paid for this with the catastrophe of the Second World War. And not only that: the hype linked to territorial gains further distorted the nation’s knowledge of the international situation, which had never been sound.
There was a vast difference between the First Vienna Award of 2 November 1938 and the second one of 30 August 1940.³¹ The first was tacitly recognized by the Western democracies. By the time of the second, a large part of France had been occupied, Vichy France was dependent on Germany, and Great Britain, left to his own devices, was heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe. In a matter of a few days, on 5 September, Churchill declared in the House of Commons that Britain did not recognize the Second Vienna Award. It is commonly emphasized how dearly Hungary paid for the Second Vienna Award. However, a cost-benefit analysis does not suggest an exorbitant price. Hungary recovered territories the size of a country.
Few Hungarians noticed something far graver: Britain and Germany had become outright enemies. What Churchill said in Parliament on 5 September³² was not his most solemn statement. By then the Second Vienna Award was a fait accompli anyway. More importantly, Hungary should have paid more attention to what Churchill also said, namely, that the fight that was under way was a struggle of life and death which the British Empire could not afford to lose.
Hungary and Yugoslavia signed a Treaty of Eternal Friendship in December 1940. The document remains controversial for Hungarians to the present day. Hungary had meant to take that step independently, but it fitted German plans. Hitler overran Yugoslavia because the people of Belgrade, manipulated by the British Secret Service, toppled the Yugoslav government that had signed the Tripartite Pact. There was no German pressure on Hungary to join in the invasion. But a most attractive offer had been made—territorial gains—that Horthy found irresistible against his better judgement. Teleki and Bárdossy could not restrain him from giving a rash response. In sum, the German offer to Hungary created a dilemma which offered no solution.
Time resolves much—but much blood is spilt meantime. Technically, Hungary did not attack Yugoslavia; it waited for its disintegration. In April 1941 the Hungarian army entered territories that had been part of Hungary before 1918. Serbian troops had made far more serious provocations than what happened at Kassa (Košice) when, on 26 June 1941, aircraft unidentified to this day bombed it. Still, the Hungarian onslaught only began after Slavko Kvaternik, the Croatian ustaša leader, proclaimed the State of Croatia. That Croat state at the time became a German satellite. This was all the Croats obtained then. Real independence was only won in 1992.
But this was irrelevant compared with the crucial fact that Britain, which had been attacked by Germany, showed no tolerance whatsoever towards Hungary. Pál Teleki was the only member of the Hungarian establishment who understood that. An about-turn was beyond him. All he could do was to warn with his life³³ that there was no continuing along this road. The message of his last deed was that Hungary’s fate was more important than the ethnic Hungarians in Yugoslavia. Although Miklós Horthy and László Bárdossy³⁴ understood the message, they did not alter the course that the Supreme Council of National Defence (which had still included Teleki) set on 1 April. After the war, Bárdossy was vilified, Teleki glorified. In fact, what Bárdossy did was ‘merely’ to proceed along a road marked out by Teleki earlier, at a time when the late prime minister’s suicide had warned him not to continue.
The biggest mistake the regime committed at that time was to attack the Soviet Union in June 1941. Historians disagree in evaluating that move. Yet with decades of hindsight it seems certain that this criminally mistaken step should not have been taken at that time and in that way. Given the geopolitical situation and the commitment to Berlin—and public opinion sliding to the far right—involvement in the war could not be avoided. In June 1941, however, the revisionist trap did not force Hungary to take that step. The Germans did not apply direct pressure; they just a created a conducive ‘atmosphere’.³⁵ Hitler, the mysterious sphinx, knew that sooner or later Hungary would get entangled in the war anyway. Hungary had some room for manoeuvre but, faced with the blinded military and a Horthy who lacked statesmanship, Bárdossy, a bureaucrat by nature, lacked the stamina to put up any resistance.
On the other hand, there was nothing in the often mentioned Molotov telegram³⁶ that was of use to Hungary in influencing the future. It was just a tactical move by a cornered Soviet Union. Bárdossy, for his part, committed a gross diplomatic error: he did not respond in the same courteous, tactical manner. No one with any empathy for the situation at the time would imagine that he suppressed that telegram. In the official Hungary of the time there was no reason to suppress such a document. Apart from personal responsibility for such a step, declaring war on the Soviet Union originated from the essence of official Hungary of the time. It was an anti-democratic move, one that did serious harm to the Hungarian national interest.

Horthy in the first place (wrongly) treated the Košice incident as a provocation that called for war, and Bárdossy’s cabinet followed suit. That was the last fatal step along the road to the German occupation in March 1944. Given the slippery slope of that historical situation, there was practically no way to avoid declaring war also on the UK and the US³⁷. Any facetious comment on the absurdity of that is out of place.
Miklós Kállay³⁸ never had a “shuttlecock policy” nor did he “attempt to make a separate peace”. Indeed, he tried to establish contacts with Britain and America in the stubborn belief that they were ready to come to an agreement without prior consultation with their Soviet Ally. They were not. Cohesion was much stronger amongst the Allies than dissension. Britain and America avoided any move behind Moscow’s back, the more so because they knew the Soviets would have promptly learnt about it anyway. It was clear that, given Hungary’s political position, it was within the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence. The US accepted this, and was even ready to counter any British attempts that would endanger such an arrangement. It was wary of Britain’s record in world politics and wished to open a new chapter after the war. This further narrowed the Kállay government’s small room for manoeuvre.
As a consequence, the preliminary armistice agreement of September 1943, as brokered by the British, was in actual fact an agreement with the Anti- Fascist Coalition. As it turned out, that agreement came to nothing.
On 15 October Horthy’s attempt to sign an armistice agreement with the Soviets was foiled by the Germans. The underlying cause of his failure was his absolutely mistaken decision to go to Klessheim and approve the German occupation of Hungary.³⁹ By October 1944 Hungary’s law enforcement authorities had become incapable of implementing Horthy’s decisions. The events proved his distrust in Germans. The problem was he prepared his break with the Germans unskilfully, so his attempt was bound to fail.

In 1945—the start of a new chapter in Hungary’s history—the leaders were right to acknowledge the ‘new Trianon Treaty’⁴⁰ as largely inevitable. Illusions resurfaced on both sides of the political divide. On the Left, many thought that Moscow promoted Hungarian national interests effectively when in fact Moscow sought to punish rather than help. Adherents to the West trusted that Western democracies would stand up for Hungarian interests. Yet even before the Cold War began the reality of handling a bipolar world took precedence.
Meanwhile many harboured the emotionally charged belief that the Western powers had sold Hungary down the river to the Kremlin in Yalta. But this was wrong: decisions had already been made at the Tehran Conference in November 1943. (When Britain abandoned its plan to land in the Balkans, it more or less forfeited its influence on events in Central Europe.)
Hungary was barely able to assert its national interests until 1956. Until 1953 its foreign policy was almost nonexistent and was nominal thereafter.
The 1956 Revolution was ill-fated from the start, even if illusions had been widely cherished⁴¹. And yet the heroes of that popular uprising did more for the Hungarian national interest than anyone else in the 20th century. Views diverged, but on one thing there was agreement: the repressive regime and Moscow’s dominance must cease. The decision to wage a war of independence, crushed as it was, served the nation’s interests too.
The 33-year intervallum between 1956 and 1989 had been and gone. But it is still too early to offer a comprehensive assessment⁴² of those decades. Many Hungarians are disappointed about the democratic period since, and this clouds their view of the preceding period. And historians in any case require a longer perspective. What is clear, however, is the legacy of 1956: János Kádár’s Hungary was liveable and the transition in 1989 bloodless.
One common view is that Kádár’s regime secured more independence in domestic policy by toeing Moscow’s foreign-policy line unswervingly. New evidence suggests a more nuanced view. Nevertheless, we should keep a key principle in mind: nuances don’t alter the big picture. Hungary was dwarfed by Moscow. Let’s not forget the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968,⁴³ a painful dilemma for Kádár. Involuntary as Hungary’s participation was in that multinational operation, Kádár hurt the nation’s interests.
We now know that party leaders argued fiercely behind closed doors on how to represent the interests of ethnic Hungarians in neighbouring countries. The Kádár regime was, by and large, unable to stand up for the interests of all Hungarians. It lacked the courage to walk the narrow path which might have better protected Hungarians living beyond the border. Only the transition of 1989–90 ushered in a foreign policy that took all Hungarians into account.

Hungary’s transition of 1989–90 was part of the transformation of the whole region and was closely linked to the fall of Soviet communism. Yalta’s iron hand had ruled for decades. Now it went limp with startling suddenness as the bipolar order, marking international relations almost ever since the end of the Second World War, collapsed. The period 1990–91 was momentous: Soviet troops withdrew from Hungary, the Warsaw Pact and COMECON dissolved, the Soviet Union disintegrated, Czechoslovakia became Slovakia and the Czech Republic, and a protracted civil war followed the disintegration of Yugoslavia.

These momentous changes had a fundamental impact on the course of Hungarian foreign policy. Although successive Hungarian governments were at odds politically, foreign policy consistently rested on three pillars. First, instead of looking to the east, Hungary began looking to the West and restored all severed links with Western states (not to mention joining NATO and the EU). Second, Hungary began exploring and making use of cooperation with its neighbours and other countries of the region. Finally, it took the fate of Hungarians living in neighbouring countries far more seriously than before. Still there were, of course, some differences. The Socialist–Free Democrat coalition subordinated the Diaspora to Hungary’s strategic commitments to NATO and the EU. József Antall and then Viktor Orbán saw the Hungarian minority as a part of the nation regardless of domicile and Hungary’s EU membership did not take precedence.
After the transition of 1989–90, many Hungarians harboured illusions about the future. They believed that Hungary’s membership of NATO and the EU would happen overnight and that Hungary’s return to capitalism would automatically bring the high living standards of welfare states. By contrast, about a third of the population became worse off and another roughly third of the population suffered relative losses in their living standards. Still, the course of foreign policy shaped in 1990 has retained the support of most Hungarians to the present day.
And the two exceptional events—Hungary’s joining NATO in March 1999 after nearly 15 years of hard work, and the EU in May 2004—tells its own story: in the referendums on both, votes in favour far outnumbered those against; but turnout was low. Fifty-one per cent of eligible voters abstained in the first referendum and 54 per cent did so in the second. You could put it this way: the entity of the nation voted yes but the entities comprising it—the people— didn’t. Hungary’s future is bound up with the efficacy of its foreign policy. But the gap between people and nation needs to be tangibly reduced if its foreign policy is to succeed in the future.

 

¹ Ferenc Deák (1803–1876) was a leading figure of the Hungarian reform-minded opposition to Habsburg rule in the Reform Age (1825–1848). Minister of Justice from March to September 1848. After the defeat in the War of Independence in 1849, he formulated a policy of passive resistance to Habsburg absolutism. As from 1861, he worked for an agreement with the Austrian Court. Published the Hungarian conditions for a Compromise in Pesti Napló at Easter 1865. After the Compromise of 1867, he refrained from accepting a government post but continued as a member of parliament; Count Gyula Andrássy, Sr. (1823–1890) went into exile after the 1848–49 Revolution and War of Independence. Was sentenced to death in absentia in 1851 and amnestied in 1858. Returned to Hungary and worked with Ferenc Deák. Served as prime minister from 1867. Was the successful foreign minister of Austria-Hungary between 1871 and 1879. Had a prominent role in the convocation and the deliberations of the Congress of Berlin in 1878; Baron József Eötvös (1813–1871) was an important public figure as early as the Reform Age. Served as Minister of Religion and Education in 1848. Went into exile after 1849 but returned in 1853 and was among the architects of the Compromise together with Ferenc Deák. Reappointed minister of religion and education (1867–71) initiating important legislation (on public education, the emancipation of Jews, national minority rights).

² Hungary suffered the severest peace terms among the vanquished of the First World War. The territory of the country shrank to a third (93,000 km2 from 282,000 km2) and the population was reduced from 21 million to 7.6 million. Over three million ethnic Hungarians found themselves outside the frontiers. The Peace Treaty prohibited the raising of a conscript army and the country lost the greater part of its mines and industry.

³ We cannot give a fair account and have to be content by reporting: György Barcza, an erudite and well-informed diplomat, was in Copenhagen at the time of the signing of the Peace Treaty. In his memoirs he recalls that Danes who were not hostile towards Hungary at all told him bluntly that Hungary had got what it deserved because it had been an ally of Germany. Still, he commented: “…my entire consciousness and political sense told me that no Hungarian should ever sign that Peace Treaty.” Casting aside his expertise and reserve, this is how he goes on formulating a position incompatible with his training as a diplomat: “No doubt, the Entente would have occupied Hungary if it had rejected to sign the Peace Treaty; moreover, it would have given a free hand to our revengeful neighbours, who demonstrated their attitude to us in territories that had been ceded into their possession and we would have had to live under the most difficult conditions for years. But I would have faced any suffering rather than voluntarily attaching my signature to such a dictate... Occupation by the Entente would not have lasted for too long; indeed, it would not have been longer than a few years as it would have exhausted the Entente... on realizing our resolve, they would have perhaps revised their position... after all, if Hungary weathered Ottoman Turkish rule for 150 years, it could have weathered a rule of some years by the Entente or Czech-Serbian-Romanian troops knowing that by doing so, we can perhaps eventually save the future of the country. We would have certainly won the appreciation of the world at large.” (Emphases – P.P.) György Barcza, Diplomata emlékeim 1911–1945 [My Memoirs as a Diplomat]. 2 vols. Compiled and edited by László Antal. Annotations and afterword by András D. Bán. Editorial history by John Lukacs. Budapest: Európa, 1994, volume I, pp. 149–150.

⁴ Celebrations of a modest scale in 1895 would have been enough yet the Government wanted to think big and ‘corrected’ the date to 1896.

⁵ In terms of its size of territory and population and the number of soldiers it could mobilize.

⁶ In terms of the dynamism of its economy and the ability to export capital; the character of its social set-up and the standards of the education and culture of its population.

⁷ Count István Tisza (1861–1918) was a steadfast supporter of the dualist system of 1867 and a conservative-liberal statesman. Prime minister in 1903–5 and 1913–17. Contrary to popular belief, in 1914 he opposed the war. He only agreed to the ultimatum to Serbia (the equivalent of a declaration of war) under pressure by Vienna and Germany.

⁸ Ferenc Pölöskei, Tisza István. Budapest: Gondolat, 1985, p. 268; Gábor Vermes, Tisza István. Budapest: Osiris, 2001, pp. 460–461; László Tőkéczki: Tisza István eszmei, politikai arca [The Ideological and Political Characteristics of István Tisza]. Budapest: Kairosz, 2000.

⁹ When, say, somebody sells state secrets for financial compensation.

¹⁰ It is not my intention to dispute that there can be several cases in between but perhaps the above phrase catches the essence of the issue the most clearly.

¹¹ See footnote 1.

¹² Revengeful soldiers assassinated István Tisza in late October 1918. An observant Calvinist, his final words were as follows: “The hand of Destiny.”

¹³ Count Mihály Károlyi (1875–1955) was one of the richest magnates in Hungary. A radical supporter of democratic reforms before and during the First World War, in opposition to a pro-German foreign policy. Led the Chrysanthemum Revolution of 1918 and was President of the first Republic of Hungary.

¹⁴ The general armistice agreement signed at Padua did not determine demarcation lines for Hungary. Germany was still a belligerent nation at the time and the Allied wished to deploy their forces in the Balkans against them, moving through Hungary. A Hungarian delegation went to Belgrade to negotiate ways in which the resulting damage to the country could be reduced to a minimum. Since Germany capitulated on 11 November, there were no Allied troop movements through Hungary, and Clemenceau refused to recognize the convention signed at Belgrade as an agreement of general validity. The Paris Peace Conference then treated the convention as an agreement entered into by the local representative of the Allies.

¹⁵ It is not my intention to suggest that the way Hungary’s borders were redrawn was the only possible scenario. If Hungary had been shrewder in negotiating with the Entente, adjusting to the international conditions and manoeuvring in the political arena, the frontiers could have been drawn in a more favourable way.

¹⁶ Lieutenant Colonel Vix arrived in Budapest in late 1918 to oversee the implementation of the Belgrade Convention. He served a note on the Hungarian Government on 20 March 1919. Its wording was unfortunate, also from the point of view of the Allies. Its meaning can only be understood in a broader context. The Allies intended a war of intervention against the Russian Bolsheviks with the support of Romania. The Romanians however claimed that they could not attack in the east because “Hungarians ready to attack” were there behind them. The note presented by Colonel Vix therefore sought to set up a neutral zone. The eastern limit of the proposed zone approximately coincided with the future Trianon frontiers. Its western boundary cut deeply into areas inhabited only by ethnic Hungarians.

¹⁷ Barcza, op. cit., vol. I, p. 116.

¹⁸ The people and the nation have not become one down to this day. However, discussing that issue would be beyond the scope of this article.

¹⁹ For more details, see Tibor Hajdu, Az 1918-as magyarországi polgári demokratikus forradalom [The Democratic Revolution in Hungary in 1918]. Budapest: Kossuth, 1968, pp. 85–103. Speaking at a conference of the Hungarian Historical Society in March 2009, Tibor Hajdu said: “For the present reawakened counter-revolutionary sentiment it [i.e. the Hungarian Republic of Soviets – P. P.] was a disaster, a low point in Hungarian history. The number of the victims of the ‘Red Terror’ is exaggerated even though it was lower than that of the White Terror or that of the law-and-order operations of the Chrysanthemum Revolution.” Századok Füzetek, no. 5 (2009), p. 5.

²⁰ Tibor Hajdu, Károlyi Mihály. Politikai életrajz [Mihály Károlyi. A Political Biography]. Budapest: Kossuth, 1978, p. 286.

²¹ That shows the absurdity of the view that in March 1919 Károlyi voluntarily handed over power to Béla Kun.

²² Ignác Romsics, István Bethlen: A Great Conservative Statesman of Hungary 1874–1946. A Political Biography. Highland Lakes, NJ: Social Science Monographs, 1995, p. 85, pp. 87–89.

²³ The reference is to leading figures of the Hungarian Soviet Republic. Béla Kun (1886–1939) headed that regime. A prisoner of war in Russia during the First World War, in November 1918 he returned to Hungary as a Bolshevik. Founded the Hungarian Party of Communists, which sought to overthrow the democratic republic of Mihály Károlyi from the far Left. Technically, he “only” became Comissar for Foreign Affairs of the Hungarian Soviet Republic, being aware that the fate of his regime depended on the international situation.

²⁴ German Austria was formed following the disintegration of Austria-Hungary. It lacked any Austrian national consciousness. To make this new state viable, it needed a “breadbasket” and western Hungary (today’s Burgenland) was ideal for that purpose. For that reason the Allies revised their original position, and, yielding to the Austrian Government they awarded that territory to Austria, a decision more justified from the ethnical than any other point of view.

²⁵ Reference is to leading Hungarian Social Democrats. Ernő Garami (1876–1935) was best known abroad. In 1919 he distanced himself from the Hungarian Soviet Republic, and went into exile.

²⁶ Count István Bethlen (1874–1946), a conservative-liberal statesman; served as prime minister in 1921–1931. Carried out the consolidation of Hungary after the Treaty of Trianon. He oversaw the creation of a limited parliamentary system which—with certain minor distortions— survived to March 1944, when the country was occupied by the Germans.

²⁷ Gusztáv Gratz (1875–1946), a conservative-liberal and legitimist politician. Served as finance minister in 1917. Minister to Austria in 1919–21. As President of the Ungarländischer Deutscher Volksbildungsverein he fought for the cultural rights of the German national minority in Hungary (with scant success) but discouraged the German dissimilation of Germans in Hungary.

²⁸ The manuscript only re-emerged and was published in 2001. Gusztáv Gratz, Magyarország a két háború között [Hungary between the Two World Wars]. Editing, annotations and afterword by Vince Paál. Budapest: Osiris, 2001.

²⁹ Count Pál Teleki (1879–1941), conservative statesman; prime minister in 1920–21 and 1939–41; renowned geographer; lay the foundations of human geography in Hungary.

³⁰ As was customary in the era, the treaty was an agreement signed at a court of arbitration. In principle it involved the duty of mutual consultation but that soon fell into oblivion. It was a source of problems rather than a blessing that Mussolini promised to return weapons that had been taken during the First World War. When in 1929 at Szentgotthárd and in 1933 at Hirtenberg attempts were made to return Hungarian weapons, the Little Entente made a diplomatic scandal about them.

³¹ In the wake of Munich (September 1938), upon the failure of direct Hungarian–Czechoslovak talks, with Paris and London showing indifference and Berlin and Rome acting as referees, a territory of 12,000 km2 and 1,050,000 inhabitants reverted to Hungary. (The Czechoslovak census of 1939 indicated that 57 per cent of the people involved in the decision were Hungarian-speaking, while the Hungarian census of 1941 put the figure at 84 per cent.) The Second Vienna Award was also the work of Berlin. As a result, northern Transylvania and Székelyföld (Székely Land) reverted to Hungary with an area of 43,000 km2 and a population of 2.4 million (including one million Romanians. At the same time, 400,000 Hungarians remained in southern Transylvania).

³² Churchill, as prime minister, unambiguously declared that Great Britain could not accept a decision imposed on Romania by force.

³³ Prime Minister Pál Teleki committed suicide at dawn on 3 April 1941. Most likely because on the day before Hungary’s Minister to Great Britain, György Barcza had informed him in a telegram that in the given situation Britain categorically rejected the Hungarian plan to re-annex Yugoslav territories that had belonged to Hungary prior to 1918.

³⁴ László Bárdossy (1890–1946), diplomat, Foreign Minister after 1940. Served as Prime Minister after Teleki’s death. Was condemned to death as a war criminal and executed in Budapest in 1946.

³⁵ The expression was used by László Bárdossy in his testimonial during his trial before a postwar people’s tribunal.

³⁶ At a time when the Soviet Union was in a tight corner, Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov sent a message to Hungary through the Hungarian minister on 23 June 1941. He said that Moscow showed understanding for Hungary’s territorial claims against Romania.

³⁷ Acting under Soviet pressure in November 1941 Great Britain sent an ultimatum to Hungary that this country could not accept. Consequently, by December the two countries were in a state of war with one another. A few days later, when Hitler declared war on the United States, Bárdossy, acting under German and Italian pressure, also declared war on the USA.

³⁸ Miklós Kállay (1887–1967), prime minister between 1942 and the German occupation.

³⁹ On 15 March 1944 Adolf Hitler summoned Regent Horthy to Klessheim (near Salzburg), to obtain his agreement for the occupation of the country.

⁴⁰ The Peace Treaty that Hungary signed in February 1947, contrary to wartime US and UK plans, repeated the 1920 decisions. With reference to the geostrategic vulnerability of Bratislava, three additional Hungarian-inhabited villages were annexed by the newly established Czechoslovakia.

⁴¹ Charles Gati, Failed Illusions: Moscow, Washington, Budapest, and the 1956 Hungarian Revolt. Washington: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2006.

⁴² There is however genuine need for the publication of historical source works and analyses of partial aspects of that period as they can lay the groundwork for future sound and comprehensive evaluations.

⁴³ On 20 August 1968, the Soviet Union, Poland, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary and Bulgaria carried out an armed intervention in Czechoslovakia to put an end to the political process (allegedly: “counter-revolutionary”) that had started there earlier that year.

 

Pál Pritz
is Professor of Modern History at the Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest.
He has published widely on Hungary’s 20th-century history and diplomatic relations
including The War Crimes Trial of Hungarian Prime Minister László Bárdossy,
New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.