Toward a New Central Europe

MISSED OPPORTUNITIES FOR FEDERALIZATION

BELA PADANYI-GULYAS

THE great French revolution and the revolutions erupting in its wake ended feudalism in Europe. This historic development became advantageous to every country which was predominantly homogeneous linguistically: members of the same nationality acquired equal rights and became the powerful components of those political and economic functions which were previously handled only by the privileged few. Thus the potential of a whole nation was enhanced.

The same historic development also shook the foundations of such multinational countries as the Habsburg Empire, which kept in polit. ical and economic unity that vast territory in Central Europe extending from the Carpathian Mountains to the Alps, and from the river Elbe down to the Adriatic Sea. The Habsburg Empire was the product of a still vital and virulent feudalism. Both the Hungarian and the Czechs crowns were acquired by the Habsburgs by royal marriage, which was a legal ground for change of sovereignty in a feudal system. They took possession of Milano with Lombardy and of Venice with the Istrian Peninsula on the grounds of similar marital contracts. The revolutions overthrowing feudalism destroyed the very power that kept the empire together. The forces of nationalism released by the fundamental social changes were acting like centrifugal forces in the case of the multinational Habsburg empire, and they were working on its final disintegration.

It may perhaps be asked: was the disintegration unavoidable? Was it a must? Or was there a possible way for the component nationalities to find a new political and economic synthesis to replace the bonds of feudalism?-a synthesis which is more and more accepted and necessary today as far as Central European peoples are concerned.

Searching for an answer to the above question one has to admit that the political history of the last century can only be viewed as a series of missed opportunities.

Neither in the Reform Era in Hungary in the beginning of the 19th century nor at the time of the revolutions in the middle of the same century, had the Habsburg dynasty an emperor or a statesman

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of vision with respect to the historic events to come. An unpardonable mistake of Prince Metternich, mastermind of the policy of the Habsburg Empire, was his obstinate efforts to prolong the spirit of the Holy Alliance, which was dead even when it started. Blinded by his stubborn prejudices, he was unable to see that neither the p]atform of the Reform Era nor that of the first Hungarian responsible government of 1848 had ever aimed at disengagement from the bonds of the empire. The lawful authority of the Habsburgs was never questioned. The Hungarian nation saw the legality of the 1848 government in the fact that the King gave his sanction to the corpus of the 1848 legislation. Had the Emperor not broken his own pledge, the Hungarian fight for freedom would perhaps not have started at all. But after the King declared "rebels" the members of the same cabinet he had solemnly appointed, and after he ordered the Croat Ban Jellasich to attack with his military forces the new Hungarian system, there was nothing left for the Hungarian nation but a war of selfdefense.

Before this happened there was a good possibility for the Empire to transform itself into a federation of constitutionally independent nations with the dynasty in their midst, as happened in the British Isles in the form of the United Kingdom. Had there been a broadminded imperial policy or politician in the time when Hungary achieved her new Constitution, there would have been no reason why the same status should be denied to Bohemia and Croatia; simultaneously the Poles in Galicia could have developed their own land with Krakow as their national capital; and the multinational territory of Transylvania with her quite special historic traditions and her already existing self-government granted by an imperial diploma, could also have resisted against the popular demands of March 15, 1848; and defending her political unity rather than accepting the Union with Hungary as the motherland, she might have changed as well her outdated Hungarian-Szekler-Saxon feudal form of government to a Hungarian-Rumanian-Saxon unity. Who knows, in the case of Transylvania, what better future could have come for those unfortunate peoples who today are facing the worst ordeal of their history.

While blaming the fatal historic negligence of the imperial leadership in the 19th century, it cannot be denied that the political maturity of the different nationalities was also lacking. The remarkable progress made by the Hungarian nation from the beginning of the Reform Era to the final achievement of a parliamentary government in 1848 had no parallel in Austria, in Bohemia, or in Croatia. Their development from a feudal to a national statehood was much slower. This fact was proved when the nearly simultaneous revolutions in Vienna and in Prague could not incite the Austrian and the Czech nations as a whole. They did not resist the brute forces of the Emperor,

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as the Hungarians did. The Croats in fact failed to start any action whatsoever toward social reforms.

This lack of a synchronized progress enabled the reactionary imperial leadership to take the worst possible course: to apply the principle of divide and rule. The peoples of the Empire were allowed and even encouraged to play a game against each other. Ironically, that immoral policy finally dug the grave of the Habsburg Empire.

The hatred was characteristic and prevailed for a long period, almost up to the present. 1)

The national leaders, excellent as they were otherwise, could not rise above the tragic prejudices. Kossuth, for instance, could arrive at his realistic consideration of a Danubian Federation only in exile. 2) Had he proclaimed it while still the leader of the Hungarian nation, the freedom fight of 1849 perhaps would not have been doomed to a tragic failure in its isolation. The 1867 Compromise (of Austro-Hungarian) whose chief architect was Ferenc Deak meant the starting point of a new historic development, but it offered a solution only for the Hungarian problem rather than for the reorganization of the Empire as a whole. The Emperor could not have resisted against such a proposition at that time when the wounds of his lost wars were still sore. Thus the Compromise of 1867 remained one of the missed opportunities to recreate the dual (Austro-Hungarian) Monarchy at least as a triangular (Austro-Hungarian-Czech) Empire.

If we have criticized Ferenc Deak-whose wisdom and political strategy granted him a place among the major European statesmen-more criticism is due to Tomas Masaryk, the noted Czech statesman, for his negligence and lack of foresight. He knew quite well that the chauvinism was aimed at the destruction of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, without regard to its historic and cultural traditions and to the interests of the rest of the nations of the Empire. This meant not only the disregard of the interests of the Germans and the Hungarians, but also those of the Poles, the Slovaks, and the Ruthenians, peoples with equally rich traditions. Similarly, the Croats thoroughly misunderstood their historical and geopolitical assets when they joined a Southern Slav union, namely, Yugoslavia. It may safely be said that the years following World War I represent another examples of the missed opportunities, for there was a good possibility to establish a reliable new system to replace the Habsburg Empire, to create a federation for a loyal and peaceful cooperation of the respective Central European nations. 3)

It is generally admitted today that the Little Entente could never play a positive role in the area. This was most clearly demonstrated at the time of Hitler Instead of bringing together their own forces, in the atmosphere of distrust, the members of the Little Entente preferred to base their defense on the sanctions granted by the Great Powers.

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It is not the purpose of this study to investigate the complicated ideological and political relations existing between the two world wars. Nor does it try to review and judge who made the greater mistake in Hungary: those who expected the correction of all the injustices of the Trianon "Treaty" from an Axis victory or those who hoped that the Soviet "liberation" might bring peace for the Central European nations. We only wish to state two facts: first in the historic cataclysm of the first half of the 20th century, all these nations became suffering victims; secondly, no political trend succeeded in trying to establish a federation of these peoples, which would have granted them peace and security. 4 ) The fact that the nations of Central Europe did not recognize their common destiny prior to or during World War II, cannot be considered as the single cause of all the changes following the war. We are not entitled to expect more wisdom from the political leaders of Czechoslovakia, Hungary or Rumania, than from the signatories of the Yalta Pact, in which nearly half of Europe with independent nations of more than a hundred million population, was given over to the Soviet Union. For Stalin, it was only a matter of time to degrade these occupied countries to the position of Soviet colonies, with no possibility of organized resistance against their aggressor.

We think that no one in the free world would believe that the Czechs, Rumanians, Hungarians, Slovaks, or others whose names are almost forgotten in the West became Communists by conviction and joined voluntarily the Soviet Bloc. Also, though not common knowedge, it is known by many in the West that the hurriedly formed Communist parties lost in the first elections held in the countries under the Soviet occupation. In Hungary only 17% of the representatives in the National Assembly were Communists. In this early time of the Soviet domination, with Communists in the minority in Czechoslovakia, in Hungary, and in Rumania, the anti-Communist political forces were increasing. If only in the three captive nations mentioned above, their common destiny had been recognized, and if they could have organized their joint national resistance, the process of Soviet colonization would have been much more difficult. On the contrary, this colonization was made quite easy in the atmosphere of the old antagonisms among the Central European nations. 5) Utilizing the opportunities of that miserable era, Czech and Slovak, chauvinism laid new claims to getting additional territories from Hungary-which had already been mutilated in 1920 and started the forcible deportation of the Hungarian nationalities from Slovakia. At the same time, Czechoslovakia gave over to the Soviets the whole territory of Sub-Carpathia, with all its Ruthenian, German and Magyar populations, without any negotiation or any request for a plebiscite. 6) In Transylvania persecution and suppression of the Magyars started.

Soviet propaganda in the meantime tried to make others believe

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that the quarrels of the Central European nations could be solved only at the "ideological level", i.e., only the Communist internationalism is able to provide for a reasonable synthesis in this multilingual region. The same propaganda earmarked as "chauvinism" and suppressed mercilessly every trend toward national independence or toward the formation of any kind of blocs which might have helped some groups to obtain independence. (Soviet-Yugoslav animosity started in 1948 with regard to the possibility of the formation of a Balkan Bloc )

What really happened was that the Soviet Union accepted and applied the same immoral policy once used by the reactionary Austrian Empire: secretly stirring the antagonisms between the Central European nations; hindering their contact; 7) not tolerating the development of any ideology recognizing their common destiny and keeping each of them in perfect dependence on Moscow. This became quite clear during the revolutions 8) of 1956 in Poland and in Hungary, where these events kindled national freedom fights as had happened in 1848. A historic opportunity of this caliber offered farreaching possibilities for all Central European peoples to regain their independence, furthermore, to rearrange all Central Europe-provided that a consciousness of the common goals and of their common destiny could have worked as a political force.

As a witness and participant of the Budapest Freedom Fight, this writer can determine, on the ground of his personal experience that during their life-or-death struggle, the Hungarians had more hope in a possible simultaneous uprisings in Czechoslovakia or in Rumania, than in any help from America, or from the United Nations. Anyone witnessing the events in Hungary knows-what was carefully kept secret, and officially denied by the Communist press-that Ruthenians, Slovaks, and, Ukrainians as well, came over, illegally, to Hungary to participate in the October Freedom Fight. 9) The control of the Slovakian boundary became loose because of the sympathetic feelings demonstrated by the Slovak people. And, after being defeated, Hungarian freedom fighters took refuge in, and received help from Slovakia. Nor has the fact of the participation of partisans of Yugoslav origin, mainly Croats, who were fighting together with the Hungarians to the end, been ever admitted officially.

All this proves that a common destiny was sensed, if only sporadically, by the peoples beyond the frontiers of Hungary. The Czech, Slovak and Rumanian peoples did not join the Hungarian revolution. This can be explained partly by the perfidious and quick Soviet propaganda which claimed that the Hungarian Freedom Fight was aiming at "revisionist" national goals and would develop into aggressive acts against Czechoslovakia and Rumania in order to defend the Hungarian minorities in those countries. This Soviet propaganda was absolutely without foundation. Among several official and unofficial

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Hungarian statements and demands, there was not a single one alluding to aggression. The contrary is true. The Soviet propaganda, however, succeeded not only in preventing anti-Communist uprisings in Czechoslovakia and Rumania, but also in offering excuses for the old Stalinist factions in both countries, helping them to keep the reins of government in spite of the fact that the Communist Party in Poland, and even in the Soviet Union, took into account the possibility of further ''de-Stalinization''. 10)

With all this, we arrived at the most recent opportunity which was missed, and which surpassed all previous missed opportunities both in scale and in importance. Thus, the cause of the freedom and self-determination of the Central European peoples was dropped from the agenda, and the rebuilding of a new Central Europe was postponed for an uncertain period of time. The opportunity was not utilized by the Central European nations to regain the initiative in shaping their own future by mutual understanding and cooperation independent of the bargaining great powers.

*"Responsible Government" means responsible to an elected Parliament. Governments before 1848 were responsible only to the King.

1) Political struggles in this region prior to the 19th century had not these characteristics. The Dozsa-revolution, the struggles of Bocskai and Rakoczi for religious freedom and national independence, show no signs of hatred between nationalities. As for the latter, it is a fact, that some of Rakacziís most enthusiastic "kuruc" fighters were Ruthenians.

2) See B. Talbot Kardos, "From Kossuthís unknown federalist papers". Pub. in this volume.

3) "Britain has... always held it to be her interest that this area, Central Europe, should be held by a Power or Powers strong enough to maintain its own real independence, but not strong enough itself to be aggressive." - C. A. Macartney, "Britain and Eastern Europe," published in this volume.

4) At this point it would be a mistake not to mention some attempts made for a Central European reconciliation, even though they never attained practical results, nor did they represent the policy of any responsible government. Such was the speech of Miklos Horthy at Mohacs in 1926, suggesting mutual understanding between Yugoslavia and Hungary; the discernment of Tomas Masaryk in his older age, in favor of a partial revision of the boundaries dividing Czecho-slovakia and Hungary, the plan of Tibor Eckhardt, a leader of one of the major oppositional parties in Hungary, to deter the Hitlerian danger, and, finally, the Hungaro-Yugoslav Treaty of mutual friendship and nonaggression pact in 1940, initiated by Minister President Pal Teleki, who sacrificed his life soon after the Treaty collapsed, when German troops marched through Hungary to attack Yugoslavia.

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5) Even old Czech and Hungarian emigrants, who collaborated in the exile during World War II, became hostile toward each other. "In Prague I was received with icy coldness... What was even more painful was the fact that the Czechs had succumbed to the same excessive chauvinism against which we had once so passionately fought in Hungary. (George Faludy: My happy days in hell. An European Autobiography, pp. 199-200.)

6) See Hungarians in Czechoslovakia (New York, 1959, p. 58.)

7) There was a period when it was easier to go from behind the Iron Curtain to the West, than to travel from one "satellite" country to another.

8) The word "revolution" is used very emphatically because both uprisings were real revolutions of the people against the Moscow regime, which grew stiff in its dogmatism.

9) The fact that Soviet military units, stationed in Hungary even prior to the uprising, showed sympathy toward the freedom fight and later joined it was also testified by eyewitnesses.

10) The "de-Stalinization" in Czechoslovakia and Rumania started long after the suppression of the Hungarian revolution.

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Toward a New Central Europe