G. Baross: Hungary and Hitler

one of the Hungarian Ambassadors to continue negotiations with him, and that either Baron Apor at the Vatican, or Velics at Athens, or Baron Bakacs Bessenyei at Vichy would be suitable. Taylor also communicated to Baranyai that the Americans were ready to send a parachute contingent with radio equipment into Hungary. Upon hearing Taylor's communications, Kallay immediately transferred Baron Bakacs Bessenyei to Berne; he also refused to accept a parachute detachment because of its dangerous nature, and instructed Bakacs Bessenyei to conduct negotiations with caution. (This instruction was the reason that Lipot Baranyai refused to participate in further negotiations.) Similar instructions were sent to Barcza pertaining to his negotiations with Mr. H. After these events, the English and Americans changed their attitude and became very rigid. Mr. H and Mr. Taylor demanded that the units of the Hungarian Army be withdrawn from the Russian front, and when Kallay opposed this request and stated that such an action would immediately entail a German occupation of Hungary, they stated that it should be risked.

When the Italians laid down their arms they emphasized their deed as an example to be followed. They also stated that the bombing of Hungarian cities would be unavoidable if the Hungarian industry did not stop delivering to the Third Reich. Both of them urged Kallay to receive an Anglo-Saxon military commission. When they heard in February 1944 that the Hungarians planned to resist on the Carpathian frontier, Mr. H. communicated to Barcza that even tough he understood the attitude of the Hungarians, it was futile to think of a special handling of Hungary at the peace conferences and that such an event could happen only if Hungary would immediately break relations with the Germans when the Soviet Russian Army reached the Carpathian Mountain Chain. At the same time, Taylor and Dulles notified Bakacs Bessenyei that Washington did not accept the Hungarian-German cooperation against the Russians, but that it was ready to inquire of Moscow whether they would stop at the Hungarian frontier if the Honved Army would not defend it together with the Wehrmacht and if the Hungarians would forbid the German Army to cross their territory, implying the use of force of arms if necessary. Upon receipt of the reports of Barcza and Bakacs Bessenyei, Kallay communicated to them that, since the pressure of the Soviet Russian Army was increasing, we could not break relations with the Germans because the Communist peril would only grow; if he had to choose between the Soviet Russians and the Germans, then of course, one could not decide against the Germans. Taylor and Dulles soon after told Baron Radvanszky, and I quote, "Today the Russians may convince us but we will never convince them." In this matter, the opinion of Mr. H remained unknown. The Berne negotiations ceased, and everything surrounding them; only late in September 1944 did

Bakacs Bessenyei learn, upon request of Miklos Horthy, that he could not negotiate about a Hungarian Armistice without the Soviet Russians.

The trends of the negotiations conducted in Switzerland were in the hands of Baron Alfred Wodianer, Hungarian Ambassador there. In the spring of 1943, Kallay and Count Antal Sigray, a legitimist (the adherents of the family Hapsburg were called legitimists in Hungary), sent secret messages to him asking him to get in touch with the government in Washington by using the good services of the Hungarian heir to the throne Archduke Otto of Hapsburg.

The purpose of his negotiations was to prepare a possible way for Hungary to break relations with the Third Reich and link her fate to that of the Allies. Wodianer communicated this message to Don Jose de Saldanha, a Portuguese gentleman who he knew was on very good terms with the Archduke. Saldanha immediately communicated to the Archduke that he wanted to talk to him about a very important matter. The Archduke immediately talked to President Roosevelt, in order to prepare for the arrival of Saldanha, who arrived in the United States in the beginning of March and communicated the Hungarian message to the Archduke; the Archduke was ready to negotiate with President Roosevelt but first requested further orientation from the Hungarian Government and official authority to conduct negotiations.

The meeting between the Archduke and President Roosevelt suffered a delay because the latter was negotiating with Churchill in Quebec. In September and also later in October, Wodianer received letters from Tibor Eckhardt and according to these the Archduke had met with Mr. Roosevelt and also with Mr. Churchill in Quebec; both statesmen were ready and inclined to settle for a conservative solution for Central Europe, but they held it imminently necessary that the Hungarians clarify their relationship with the Allies beforehand. They also seemed ready not to let Hungary fall into the Soviet Union's sphere of interest.

Eckhardt also communicated that in Washington there was a favorable attitude towards Hungary. The Archduke sent his brother Archduke Charles Louis to Lisbon and the latter transmitted his messages concerning the parleys and negotiations conducted with President Roosevelt and of the agreement with him. This agreement stipulated that the Allies would guarantee Hungary's independence, that her administration would continue, that her Army would not be disarmed but would be furnished with modern equipment, that her frontiers were to stay the same as those traced in the two Viennese Arbitrage decisions and, concerning the return of the entire Transylvanian territory, a separate proposition would have to be submitted.

The conditions of the agreement required a quick and immediate decision by the Hungarian Government. Kallay

communicated at the end in November to Wodianer that Archduke Otto may act as Hungarian Head of State only in the case that the Regent abdicate or the Germans occupy the country. He also stated that Hungary was ready to lay down arms to the Western Allies but not to the Soviet Union and requested that the negotiations should not be mentioned in front of Benes who would immediately notify Moscow of their nature.

In the autumn months, Wodianer received confidential information from the American Military Attache, who was on friendly terms with him, according to which Central Europe was a sector which fell into those territories under the Commander in Chief of the Western Allies in Europe, General Eisenhower, and the General wanted to arrive in that territory before the Soviets and did not intend to turn over the Balkans to Soviet rule.

Similar communications were received by Wodianer from Kowalsky, a Polish Colonel, who was one of the leading personalities of the Polish resistance movement in London and was oriented about the intentions of General Eisenhower through intimate members of the inner circle.

In January 1944, an American citizen of Hungarian origin by the name of Ferenc Peak arrived in Lisbon and communicated to Wodianer that he was the only competent and authorized representative of Washington. He apparently was aware of the negotiations conducted between Archduke Otto and President Roosevelt, but in addition to their results he stated that the Americans wanted to save Hungary from the Soviet Russian sphere of interest and did not wish to have a government similar to that of Mihaly Karolyi; on the contrary, they hoped that Hungary would be the center of the reconstruction of Europe. He also expressed the hope that Hungary's territorial requests be taken favorably and that eventually the return of Transylvania would also be placed on the agenda. Peak added that the only condition was that Hungary should urgently prove through her deeds that she was ready to side with the Allies at any given moment. It would be best if she would withdraw her Armies from the Soviet Russian front and would make communications concerning the situation in Slovakia, Rumania, and the Balkans.

Upon receipt of Wodianer's report concerning the communications of Deak, Kallay answered only that the Hungarian Government would gladly withdraw her contingencies from the Soviet Russian front but that she was unable to carry out such actions.

In March 1944, Archduke Otto met again with President Roosevelt, and in the course of it, the President declared that if the Hungarian Government would declare herself ready to support the Allies at any given opportunity, he, the President, would be favorably inclined to make a statement about maintainance of the Transylvanian frontiers of 1940 and towards the settlement of the Czechoslovakian territorial questions by a popular vote. He also authorized the Archduke to transmit this statement to the Hungarian Legation at Lisbon through the secret radio code

of the United States. A courier was immediately dispatched from Lisbon to Hungary with the message but, upon hearing of the happenings in Hungary of March 1944, he destroyed the documents and Kallay fled.

I have already given an account in previous parts of this study about the secret negotiations conducted during the Sztojai and Lakatos governments.

While negotiations were being conducted in Ankara, Berne and Lisbon with the knowledge of the Minister President Kallay and with his active participation, we also know of other attempts to negotiate which were started by benevolent but not competent persons, I will give some of the more important ones in the following.

The chief of the press division of the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Aladar Szegedi-Masszak worked out a memorandum in the spring of 1948 in which he documented in detail the happenings of the Hungarian foreign policy. He stated that the expansion of Soviet Russia should stop at her 1939 frontiers, that the question of the Danube Valley had to be solved and he proposed an eventual federal solution, that the territorial requests of Hungary in relation to Czechoslovakia and the Transylvanian region should be satisfied, and that if the Croatians wished to return to the Hungarian mother land they should be permitted this. This memorandum was read several personalities, probably by Kallay also, and its author sent it to the Hungarian Ambassador at Stockholm, Peter Matuska, with the request that he should transmit the document to the British and American Ambassadors, which he did.

Also in spring 1943, Mr. Gibson, an official of a British trade union, published an article in the Daily Telegraph, and according to him, he had had the opportunity to negotiate with Hungarian, Bulgarian, and Rumanian politicians and he had communicated to them the standing of the British Labor Party and that of the British Government. These communications were the following: Hungary was regarded as an adherent of the Axis, that the Hungarian Social Democratic Party and the Press were demanding the return of the Hungarian Army from the Soviet Russian front and that it was requested that Hungary detach herself from the Third Reich. The communications also stated that it was requested that Hungary return all the territories taken away from Czechoslovakia and other Allies, that Hungary should make it possible for the agricultural problems of Central Europe and the Balkans to be solved, and that she should adhere to that block of countries to which Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and Greece already adhered. As it turned out, the so-called "Hungarian politician" whom Mr. Gibson negotiated was Vilmos Bohn, former Army Commissar of the Communist Government of Bela Kun, who lived as an emigrant in England. This affair, of course, brought ire and consternation in Hungary.

Ferenc Honthy was the honorary Hungarian Consul in Geneva and a member of the Small Holder's Party. An English diplomat advised him to concentrate Hungary's attention on the Soviet Russian Empire because Hungary's fate would be decided by her. Honthy got in touch with a Soviet Russian personality who formerly had held a high position in the Russian diplomatic corps. This unknown personage communicated to Honthy that the primary task of the Allies was to annihilate the German armed forces, and the Soviet Union had a leading role in this action; therefore, all demands of Moscow in the peace negotiations and pacts were going to be satisfied to the very last. The Soviet Russians were going to demand the Baltic states, Bessarabia, and those territories of Poland which were not inhabited by ethnic Poles; the fate of Carpath-Ruthenia in Hungary depended on the peace guarantees given by the Hungarians to the Soviet Russians, for the Russian Empire did not want to expand her frontier and was ready to accept ethnic views but demanded a guarantee. Hungary had made some great mistakes in the past but the future was more important; therefore, it seemed advisable that the Hungarian Government immediately withdraw her troops from the Eastern Front and break relationship with the Third Reich. Eventual dangerous consequences of such actions would be prevented if Hungary would let Anglo-Saxon parachutists descend in her territories, and later Transylvania would gain autonomy.

Honthy made personal report of these meetings to the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. There, however, they communicated to him that closer contact with the Soviet Russians would be opposed by the Regent and nobody would take the responsibility of such a step.

Janos Marty, intelligence officer of the Hungarian Consulate Service and born in Vienna, was assigned the mission to halt the armed partisan activities of the Tito followers on Hungarian territory. Marty met several times with Tito at the frontier railroad station Gyekenyes and then agreed mutually not to attack each other, and in case the British did occupy the Balkans, Tito would join them and would stop at the Hungarian frontiers leaving Hungary to the English. As we have seen, this agreement had some very tragic consequences on October 15, 1944.

Count Michel de Vienne was the French Ambassador to Budapest during the Thirties. He was a descendant of an ancient French aristocratic family, and he established many friendly relationships in Budapest due to his excellent manners and outstanding spiritual wit. He frequently contacted the leading political personalities of Hungary and established a very friendly and intimate relation with Gyula Gombos and with his Minister of Foreign Affairs Kalman Kanya.

In the spring of 1940, Count de Vienne came to Budapest as a private citizen and got in touch with the Minister President of that time, Count Pal Teleki; he advised Teleki that in case of a crisis he should influence the Regent to leave Hungary and to form an exile government somewhere in the West which would be accepted by the major powers of the world.

Such an exile government would clearly prove the antipathy of Hungary towards the Third Reich whatever happened later. In the spirit of ancient maritime laws which say no captain may leave the sinking ship and also as a Hungarian gentleman and soldier listening to his innermost voice of honor, the Regent did not even want to consider the proposition and advice of Count de Vienne.

The Minister President, however, not wanting to lose such an opportunity and desiring to answer the friendly gesture of the Anglo-Saxon powers, wanted to initiate some action, and decided that he would send Tibor Eckhardt, a representative in Parliament and President of the Small Holder's Party, to Washington D.C.

Count Teleki wanted to solve two problems with this move. On one hand, he would be able to place an excellent politician accustomed to dealing with foreign political representatives in a position of trust and importance; on the other hand, he would have eliminated the ever disagreeable presence of a member of the Houses of Parliament who in the past twenty years through his whims and sometimes irresponsible attitude had created much trouble in the internal and foreign political sphere for the Government.

Eckhardt accepted this mission but the final details were not easy ones. Eckhardt needed permission for a leave of absence from the House of Commons to be able to go abroad, plus his mission could not be kept secret and it was subject to vehement attacks by the extreme right wing (National Socialist) party. Furthermore, Eckhardt also needed money and to transfer funds to Washington involved technical difficulties. Nevertheless, the House of Commons voted and granted him a furlough and Lipot Baranyai, president of the Hungarian National Bank, saw to it that one million dollars was transferred to the Hungarian Embassy in Washington to be disposed of exclusively by Regent Horthy, Minister President Teleki, and Baranyai himself.

Eckhardt's travels suffered delays because the English Government dragged out the granting of a transit visa. Finally Eckhardt traveled through Egypt to Washington and imediately got in touch with the Hungarian circles representing various political opinions and factions in the United States. his actions in connection with Archduke Otto, Hungarian heir to the throne, became very well known but he by no means fulfilled the expectations balancing on his stay in the United States.

Sir Owen O'Malley, British Ambassador to Budapest, also brought to the attention of the Regent at the beginning of the year 1940 the great danger which would be created if Hungary acceded to the wishes of the Third Reich to transit the country.

In his answer, the Regent emphasized that he would never accede to such wishes, but that he would react immediately instead by abdicating and forming an exile government abroad in order to give a constitutional emphasis to his opposition to such action. At that time the Regent sought to entrust the formation of an exile government to Count Istvan Bethlen. O'Malley reported this conversation to his government.

At the same time Gyorgy Barcza, Hungarian Ambassador to London, upon his own initiative and assuming the responsibility, put the question to Sir Alexander Cadogan, Under Secretary of the British Foreign Office, about the stand of the. Government of Britain should Horthy and his government transfer their seat to England. Cadogan answered that, "the British Royal Government would be highly honored, would be very pleased and would recognize the Hungarian Government."

The Hungarian Government acknowledged these British. statements and inquired whether the British Government would recognize such a Hungarian exile government as the constitutional representative of the country whatever happened in the future. The Hungarian Government did not get an answer to this question, but O'Malley did inquire as to the carrying out of such a plan on the eve of the attack planned by the Third Reich against Yugoslavia. He received an evasive answer. The reason for this hesitant attitude was that Teleki was afraid that Edward Benes, who had mighty patrons in London, would be able to halt the recognition of the Hungarian exile government by the British Government. After Teleki's suicide, O'Malley visited the Regent and received the information that Hungary was going to participate in the German-Yugoslav conflict (like I described above) for the reasons that Hungary had historical connections with Germany, that she needed a road to the sea, that she wanted to gain back her lost territories, that she could not expect any help from the British, and last but not least, that the Third Reich might take vengeance on Hungary. Horthy stated at the time that the formation of an exile government could not be taken into consideration at the moment. O'Malley enumerated important arguments and

also made bitter reproaches to the Regent who answered, "It is all in vain, my decision is firm."

On April 7, 1940, the British Government ceased diplomatic relations with Hungary, and the English flyers bombed the cities of Pecs, Szeged, and Villany.

According to Ambassador Barcza, Churchill made the following statement:

"The Hungarian Government is in a tight position. We English have made mistakes in the past. Hungary always stated openly that she wanted to reacquire those territories that were taken away from her, and it is humanly comprehensible that her armies are occupying those. I am sorry that politically I cannot do anything else but break diplomatic relations with you."

Gyorgy Barcza, one of the most outstanding of our five excellent diplomats abroad, was called back by our Government from London and he requested his immediate retirement. Later (as we already saw above) he continued to contribute outstanding service to his country.

In 1948, members of our diplomatic corps abroad observing the hesitant and inadequate attitudes of the Kallay Government and the futile developments of the situation on the war front realized that their efforts were also slowly becoming meaningless. At this time, upon initiative of former Ambassadors Gyorgy Barcza and Gyorgy Bakacs-Bessenyei, these diplomats started to organize into a group by the name of the Dissidents. Baron Apor, Baron Wodianer, Chika, Ullein, Pelenyi, and many others joined this organization. The British and American Governments communicated their benevolence and pleasure to Barcza.

Shortly before the fateful day of March 19, 1944, the Hungarian Government sought to support this organization and sent thirty-five kilograms of gold through the Hungarian National Bank to be deposited with the Swiss National Bank in the trust of Bakacs-Bessenyei, Baron Radvanszky, and Vladar. (Writer's remark: this fund was also called later the "Horthy Fund" without any particular foundation.)

The Dissident diplomats never formed an exile government and this gold later became the subject of heated, bitter and disagreeable arguments.

I remind the reader that the pages of Hungarian history know three phases of the settlement of Germans in Hungary.

First, already our kings of the family Arpad settled into the foothills of the Northern Carpathian Mountains; in the Szepesseg area, Zipsers of Flemish origin; and into the foothills of the Southern Carpathian Mountains, in the area known as Barcasag, Germans or so-called "Saxons" coming from various parts of Germany. The first settlers, the Zipsers, for about 800 years gave outstanding artisans, merchants, noted artists, scientists, and soldiers to Hungary. (Author's remark: among them, for instance, one of the most outstanding generals of the fight for liberty in 1848-49, General Arthur Gorgey.)

The second ones, the Saxons, however, standing on the protection of the rights granted to them by certain royal decrees, opposed the Hungarian national interests for the most part, even after Francis Joseph I rescinded their ancient privileges.

The second phase of settlement is the one that was initiated by the Viennese Government after the cessation of Turkish occupation; the Turkish era of devastation which left vast territories uninhabited and uncultivated in southern Hungary, in Transdanubia, and in the area surrounding the capital city. In these uninhabited areas the Austrian Government settled several hundred thousand Germans from the Schwarzwald (the Black Forest), from the Rhine bank, and from Alsace. These farmers and artisans worked and toiled in the most fertile areas of the country and gave very valuable services to their land through their skill, their participation in public administration and the army; however, there never was an opportunity which would subject their loyalty to the test. They remained neutral during the war for liberty in 1848-49.

The third phase or category is that in which German settlers slowly drifted into Hungary from the neighboring Tyrolean, Carinthian, and Styrian regions of Austria. They were usually called "Schwabians" (or as the Hungarians spell it "Svab") but they also had local names which varied with the area. For instance, the "Ponzichter" lived in the area of Sopron because they liked to grow beans. The name of those living in the area of Pozsony (at present the Czechoslovak Bratislava), were called the "Kraxlhuber" because they mounted every Sunday to their high vineyards. The German artisans of the country of Zemplen were called the "Wanderbursch" because in their apprentice years they went wandering. The Germans of the Baranya county area were called the "Weinpeisser" because they "bite" their red

wine while tasting it, so it was said. These drifters were laboring people; they always stayed uninterested and strange to the affairs of Hungary and the Hungarian Nation with the exception of those in the Pozsony area who always participated in all the Hungarian events. Pozsony was for centuries the crowning city and also the seat of the Hungarian Parliament.

The nationalistic idea, which was born and which developed in the 19th century, had aspirants and followers also among the Schwabs of Hungary. In Hungary, like everywhere else in the world, they were led by personalities, who either did it because of their idealistic tendencies or because they just wanted to be in the limelight; the leaders began to cause disagreeable moments for the various governments and administrative organs of all countries including Hungary. Since the support for these movements did not come from Germany or from Austria, they remained an internal affair of Hungary and were treated more or less benevolently by Hungarian authorities, but it has to be emphasized that it did not have a great response among the ethnic circles. They remained hard working citizens of their country, served as soldiers, public servants, and even willingly and gladly changed their names to Hungarian ones.

This peaceful coexistence remained undisturbed until the atmosphere of the Hitlerian era struck and in a few years changed everything radically.

According to the 1920 census data, there were 551,600 ethnic Germans living within the Hungarian limits as set by the Treaty of Trianon. Under the leadership of Transylvanian Saxon Dr. Gustav Gratz and the executive management of Parliamentary Deputy Dr. Jakab Bleyer, there was formed in 1924 the "Ungarlandisch-Deutcher Volksbildungsverein." (

German-Hungarian People's Educational Association) (U.D.V.) This organization first worked in the interest of developing a German-Hungarian understanding, and insisted upon the revisions of the peace treaty; until it fell into the clutches of the press of the Third Reich in the early 1930's, it also promoted culture and professional knowledge.

The German press at that time wrote about the oppression which the ethnic Germans were being subjected to in Hungary, and the U.D.V. stepped onto the scene with demands which created uneasiness in the Hungarian political circles; at this point Gyula Gombos, Minister President at the time and of outstanding political loyalty and equipoise, started to find mutual solutions with Dr. Jakab Steinacker, the director of the "Volksbund der Auslanddeutschen" (V.B.A.) (Association of the German People Living Abroad) on one of his visits to Germany.

This man enlightened him about Hitler's opinions; according to Hitler there was no difference between Germans of the Reich

and those living abroad, and they both have to serve the cause of Germany. He encouraged Gratz to continue his work in the U.D.V., but also said that there was going to be another more militant organization founded in Hungary in the future. This organization was the "Volksdeutsche Kameradschaft" (Ethnic German Collegiate Society ) which was founded in 1934 and managed by Ferenc Basch who also had very strong connections with the German secret organization "Ausslandsdienst." ( Foreign Service Organization) He also received orders from the same.

From then on the German minority became restless, their voice became sharp and their paper, the Deutscher Volksbote (German Popular Messenger), published attacking articles which immediately were echoed in the papers of the Third Reich; in those times we could read in such papers that, and I quote: "The German frontier is at the Lake of Balaton; we cannot be satisfied to have only the Burgenland, for the German cultural sphere is equal to German territory." The Hungarian courts sentenced to prison some of these agents and instigators, and Foreign Minister Kanya directed the attention of German Foreign Minister Baron Karl Neurath to these Pan-Germanic intrigues during the latter's visit to Budapest in September 1986.

But there were other rather grave symptoms appearing also. Those were, for instance, that the youth organization called "Wander-vogel" (Migrating Birds) started to drift into Hungary from Germany; they distributed handbills, newspaper clippings and scrapbooks which all propagated National Socialist and anti-Semitic ideas. They also propagated that the Hungarian ethnic Germans should form a "Volksgruppe" (Ethnic group) and the result of this instigation was that news was spread stating that Hitler would cut as much as he wanted out of Hungarian territory. All this, of course, resulted in a growing mistrust and antipathy among the Hungarians for the propagandistic Germans; even our own Schwabs were opposed to these.

After the Austrian Anschluss, the "Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle" (Ethnic German Central Office) seated in Berlin whose task it was to spread the political philosophy of the Third Reich, opened a new central office in Vienna under the leadership of Dr. Wilhelm Hottl and was supported with ample funds. This office was responsible for the area of Italy and East Central Europe. Of course, Huttl immediately got in touch with the right wing elements in Hungary, he also somehow enticed into his services the Hungarian newspaper Magyarsag, and he established channels for German money to drift into Hungary. His influence in Hungarian internal affairs through his secret and well-organized channels, both in political and economic affairs, was soon perceptible. In the Hottl's intrigues, the members of the U.D.V. acted as spies

and denunciators, and they had ample and outstanding results. The Teleki government disbanded the U.D.V. in 1940 and permitted instead the organization of the "Volksbund der Deutschen in Ungarn." ( People's Association of Germans in Hungary) The Government also permitted further appearance of the paper Deutscher Volkebot. (German People's Messenger). This organization was under the leadership of the disagreeable, argumentative, and hateful person, Dr. Ferenc Basch, who instigated the Hungarian ethnic Germans in every way in spite of their outstanding and eminent position in all phases and walks of Hungarian life:

The ethnic Germans of Hungary, who had had unlimited privileges and unlimited possibilities for development, changed almost overnight to an egocentric, grasping and demanding force in the country.

At the end of the Thirties the Hungarian ethnic Germans refused to accede to the regulations of the Hungarian authorities, refused to pay taxes, refused to enter military services, refused to speak the Hungarian language, and upon every question put to them in Hungarian, they answered rudely and assumed a threatening attitude.

They gladly accepted service in the SS ranks upon summons issued by the Third Reich, and they gladly "escaped," as they called it, to Germany giving up their work, their farms and everything.

The Volksbund promoted and encouraged the idea that the southern Hungarian territories returned to the mother country after the German-Yugoslav conflict should be called the "Schwabische Turkei" ( Schwabian Turkey) or "Prinz Eugen Gau" (Prince Eugene Administrative District) and they should be annexed. According to these demands the cities of Eszek, Pecs, Temesvar, and Orsova, their respective regions, plus the county of Tolna, and the mining districts of Transylvania should become a separate Gau, administrative district, outside Germany but under the authority of the Third Reich.

This idea is still alive in certain Austrian circles and can be illustrated by the small map attached which was edited in the Fifties in Vienna. The only difference is that the Burgenland (Author's remark: which always was ethnographically, historically Hungarian) is shown three times as large as it actually is, and they do not show the Schwabische Turkei which comprises the Southern Hungarian Bacska and which at present belongs to Yugoslavia.

What may have been Adolf Hitler's ideas about Hungary and her fate in case the Third Reich would have won the war, General Bela Vasvary, former commanding general of the 16th Hungarian Division, related to me in 1949 as follows.

In 1946, he (General Vasvary) with several other Hungarian refugees in the Austrian Carinthia, in the English Zone, invited all Hungarians for a little Christmas celebration. In this refugee

camp lived also Emil Kovarc, a notorious, bloodthirsty adherent of Ferenc Szalasi. He (Kovarc) was not invited; he was awaiting his extradition to the Communist Hungarian authorities. Finally the good hearted Hungarians invited him also out of pity; knowing that he had spent a long time in the Third Reich, Vasvary asked whether he knew what Hitler would have done with Hungary in case of a victory. Emil Kovarc, being well informed, stated that Hitler had wanted to change Hungary into a protectorate state in which he would have left constitutional institutions, the Parliament, a responsible Government the courts and its administrative organization; however, all positions of responsibility in the Government, in the judicial, in the public administration, in the finances and also in the counties would have been filled with Germans from the Third Reich or absolutely trustworthy, ethnic Germans from Hungary. In the Parliament he would have introduced a oneparty system.

With this I think the picture is complete.

(signed) Gabor Baross

G. Baross: Hungary and Hitler