Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

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Peter89
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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#31

Post by Peter89 » 17 Jan 2020, 15:50

Just a quick notion of Horthy and his political understanding: he was living at his family estate in Kenderes. Once he realized that a physician (a general practicioner) is missing from the village. It turned out that he was a Jew and he was sent to patch up roads in Ukraine. So he allowed the poor guy to return home. Source: Nagybaczoni-Nagy Vilmos: Végzetes esztendők
"Everything remained theory and hypothesis. On paper, in his plans, in his head, he juggled with Geschwaders and Divisions, while in reality there were really only makeshift squadrons at his disposal."

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#32

Post by steppewolf » 17 Jan 2020, 15:55

wm wrote:
16 Jan 2020, 23:54
There were things that were "normal" by East European standards: over-the-top reprisals, brutality, looting/rape/wanton murders by primitive soldiers who themselves were victims of abject poverty. The poverty that didn't make them noble, at all.
somehow I missed this so I suggest you to start for here :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_wa ... rld_War_II


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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#33

Post by Poot » 17 Jan 2020, 17:49

Peter89 and Steppewolf,
Thank you both for the additional information, commentary and linked information. I'll look at those when I get more time today.
Thanks again!
Pat
He who lives by the sword, should train with it frequently.

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wm
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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#34

Post by wm » 18 Jan 2020, 12:10

Peter89 wrote:
17 Jan 2020, 15:40
I am not sure what we are talking about here. Horthy himself did not order the Holocaust, but he did next to nothing against it.
And the proof of that is?
Considering extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#35

Post by Peter89 » 18 Jan 2020, 15:58

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 12:10
Peter89 wrote:
17 Jan 2020, 15:40
I am not sure what we are talking about here. Horthy himself did not order the Holocaust, but he did next to nothing against it.
And the proof of that is?
Considering extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Okay, let me provide you some. Even though the claim is not extraordinary, because he was the Regent of Royal Hungary during the Holocaust in Hungary.

I will divide Horthy's responsibility as a passive bystander (and in some cases, an active perpetrator) of the Holocaust into 3 major eras:

1.) the 1918-1920 years, the years of the so-called "White Terror" and the very mild punishments for members of the far-right militias who participated in various crimes against humanity, including persecution of Jews.
2.) the 1920-1941 years, when Jews (and ethnic Germans btw!) were gradually discriminated and alienated from the society; when Horthy actively supported political movements and paramilitary organizations which brood antisemitic views openly
3.) The 1941-1944 years, where he, as the Commander in Chief and the ultimate owner of the executive power in Hungary missed crucial steps to save the Jews

1.) Horthy disbanded the paramilitary groups of the White Terror in the autumn of 1920, with a general amnesty. Let's take a look at some fine gentlemen who received an amnesty from His Excellency.

- Pál Prónay: became Horthy's bodyguard at Szeged, but later formed a paramilitary organization call the White Guard. The tortured, mutiliated and killed hundreds of Jews mostly in Transdanubia. One of his loyal and eager comrade was Mr. Dénes Bibó, another distinguished hero. Let me show you some of their greatest achievements in Transdanubia.

https://images.alfahir.hu/alfahir/2019- ... viszik.jpg
https://images.alfahir.hu/alfahir/2019- ... C3%A1n.jpg
https://images.alfahir.hu/alfahir/2019- ... 0Tabon.jpg

Can you recognize the responsible Commander of this lovely army?
https://images.alfahir.hu/alfahir/2019- ... 3fokon.jpg

You might have think that they were not openly proud of their deeds. But they were:

"A Bibó nevű erősen lihegve jelenti: „Kapitány úr, alássan jelentem, megvan a zsidó, épp oldalt szaladt nekem a sűrű kukoricásban, fültövön lőttem, azonnal vége lett." „Hiszi a fene nektek, üvöltök rájuk, hát akkor hoztátok volna el mutatónak legalább azt a konya fülét ennek az imposztor zsiványnak." Tisztem nem szól semmit sem, elsomfordál.

Amikor már elfogytak az elítéltek mind, és nem volt több akasztanivaló – tisztem ismét mellettem terem. Kezében egy összegöngyölt lapulevelet tart, amelyet diszkréten széthajt, és megmutatja benne a frissen levágott emberfület. Miután személyesen ellenőrzöm, hogy a felakasztott hullák közül nem félfülű-e valamelyik, azt mondom neki: „Jól van, hát csak tedd el most már spirituszba talizmánnak."
The soldier named Bibó reports gasping heavily: 'Captain, I report to you, we've got the Jew. He ran towards me from my side in the dense corn-field, I shot him at parotid, he was finished right away.' 'I shall not believe you' - the captain shouted, 'You should have brought me at least the ears of that bludgering bastard!'. Then my officier said nothing more, he slinks off.

When we ran off the convicted, and we had no one more to hang, my officier stands beside me once more. He holds a folded leaf in his hands, and unfold it gently in front of me, showing me the freshly cut-off human ear. After I check the hanged corpses myself if they all have both their ears or not, I say to him: 'Alright, keep it as a talisman to enhanche your spirits.'
source: Péter, Bozsik: Az Attentátor

What kind of a statesman gives amnesty to such beasts?

See also:
Bodó, Béla: Paramilitary Violence in Hungary After the First World War
Pál, Prónay: A határban a halál kaszál (memoirs)
István, Varga: Adalékok a zsidóság fonyódi történetéhez

2.) Horthy signed and proclaimed the following major antisemitic laws under his regency:
1920. XXV. tc. (Numerus Clausus)
1938. XV. tc. (Első Zsidótörvény / "First Jewish Law") restricted the number of Jews in each commercial enterprise, in the press, among physicians, engineers and lawyers to twenty percent
1939. évi IV. tc. (Második Zsidótörvény / "Second Jewish Law") for the first time, defined Jews racially: individuals with two, three or four Jewish-born grandparents were declared Jewish.
1941. évi XV. tc. (Harmadik Zsidótörvény / "Third Jewish Law" ) prohibited intermarriage and penalized sexual intercourse between Jews and non-Jews.

All of these, combined with the 1941 census, were the legal and administrative foundations of the deportation of Jews (and ethnic Germans). Horthy could have convinced Pál Teleki to assign more Jews to Christians on the census, or leave them out altogether (just as they left out some ethnic minorities such as the gipsies).
In 1920 he took control of the Hungarian government and adopted the title "regent." Horthy's government was antisemitic and invoked a
Numerus Clausus (quota) law of September 1920, which restricted the number of Jews who could attend university. In fact, Hungary was the first government in post-World War I Europe to issue such a restriction. Hungary allied itself with Germany and Italy In 1938 Horthy began instituting further anti-Jewish legislation.
source: Yad Vashem ( https://www.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Micr ... 206429.pdf )

Furthermore, Horthy, as Commander-in-Chief of the Hungarian Royal Army, enabled and instituted (and allowed!) the Munkaszolgálat ("Labour service") which was absolute nonsense in military terms. Highly qualified intellectuals dug holes and trenches, cleared minefields without equipment, etc. in Soviet-Ukraine. Most of them never returned. Amongst the perished were Miklós Radnóti and Antal Szerb, two of the most influential writers in Hungarian literature. He had the right to employ them in sensible and humane fashion. For example, do not conscript them from the Hungarian economy at the first place, as the economy suffered a manpower shortage already.
Miklós Radnóti: I know not what…

I know not what to strangers this dear landscape might mean,
to me it is my birhplace, this tiny spot of green;
ringed now with fire, it was, once, my childhood rocking me;
I grew there as a fragile branch from the parent tree;
O may my body sink bac to that life-giving soil.
This land is home to me: for if a bush should kneel
before my feet I know its name just as it's flower,
I know who walks the road, whither and at what hour,
I know what it might mean if reddening pain should fall
dripping some summer dusk down the lintel or the wall.
For him who flies above it, a map is all he sees,
this living scape of being but symbols and degrees;
the reader of the maplines has neither known nor felt
the place where the great Mihály Vörösmarty dwelt;
what's hidden in the map? yes, barracks, mills and arms,
but for me crickets, oxen, steeples, quiet farms;
with field-glasses he marks the crops and industries,
but I, the trembling labourer, the forest trees,
the twittering orchards, vineprops with their tended grapes,
and the old granny in the graveyard where she weeps;
and what is targeted as rail or factory
is just a lineman by his signal-box to me,
and children watch him wave his red flag for the guard,
and sheepdogs roll and tumble in the foundry yard;
and in the park the trace of loves who once loved me,
the honey taste of kisses sweet as bilberry,
and on the way to school you'd not step on a crack,
let you'd forget your lesson or break your mother's back;
the pilot cannot see that paving-stone, that grass:
to see all this there is no instrument or glass.

For we are guilty too, as others are,
we know how we have sinned, in what, and when and where:
but working people live here, poets in innocence,
breast-feeding infants with their dawned intelligence,
and one day it will brighten, hid now in safety's bark,
till peace shall write upon our land its shining mark
and answer our choked words in sentences of light.

With great wings cover us, O guardian cloud of night.


January 17, 1944.
https://www.babelmatrix.org/works/hu/Ra ... t%E2%80%A6

He also established the so-called Order of Vitéz for those Christians who served the country in times of war, so he could award his heroes with lands and titles (note the feudal flavour in this). Amongst the ranks of this distinguished order we have can find the following gentlemen:
- László Endre (Hungarian Interior Minister)
- László Ferenczy (Eichmann's trustee)
- and many others, but most importantly the Chief Captain of the order: Miklós Horthy himself. Let me translate parts of his letter to PM Pál Teleki in October 1940:

"Alapításánál főleg a fajnemesítés gondolata vezetett. [...] A vitéz csak engedéllyel házasodhatik, idegen fajból származót csak akkor veszünk fel, ha 100%-ig magyarul érez, megbízható, és maga kéri a névmagyarosítást. A legbátrabb és legjobban dekorált zsidó is ki van zárva."
When I founded the Order, I was mainly driven by the thought of racial eugenics. [...] The vitéz can only marry with permission, and we only accept candidates from other races if they feel 100% Hungarian, he is trustworthy, and he himself ask his name to be changed to Hungarian. Even the bravest and most decorated Jew will be excluded.
See also:
Laczó, Ferenc: Hungarian Jews in the Age of Genocide
Ungváry, Krisztián: A Horthy-rendszer és antiszemitizmusának mérlege - Diszkrimináció és társadalompolitika Magyarországon, 1919-1944

3.) There were three main mistake made by Horthy regarding the Jews between 1941-1944:
- He allowed Hungarian regular soldiers to deport Jews from Hungary to Kamianets-Podilsky, where they were shot en masse.
- He allowed the perpetrators of the Novi Sad raid to get away with their crimes against humanity, including Ferenc Feketehalmy-Czeydner, who later joined the SS, and returned to Hungary after the German occupation. HE let Sándor Képíró back to the ranks of the HRA, which was a clear sign that you can get away with any kind of crimes as a Hungarian officier.
- But most importantly, when the German occupation happened, Horthy, as CiC of the HRA, did not ordered an immediate turn against the Germans, but he instituted the Sztójay Cabinet, which began to deport Jews immediately. He did not support the Stauffenberg plot either.

I hope these evidences are hard enough for you.
"Everything remained theory and hypothesis. On paper, in his plans, in his head, he juggled with Geschwaders and Divisions, while in reality there were really only makeshift squadrons at his disposal."

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#36

Post by wm » 18 Jan 2020, 20:02

That an affirmative action was introduced in a country where the Jews dominated in the economy and were seriously overrepresented among the students doesn't mean Horthy was a wanna-be genocider.
The action had its reasons, it could have been wrong or good reasons, it could have solved the problem or not. That's debatable.

White Terror was in response to Red Terror. Maybe it was over the top response, maybe it wasn't. That's debatable. Communism was a mortal danger to anybody, we don't know what kind of genocide the Stalinist communists would have introduced in Hungary, but they would.
That Horthy opposed communism doesn't mean he was a wanna-be genocider.

Of course, it's not possible to prove a negative, but Randolph Braham (a Hungarian Jew) in his monumental work The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary says a few times that no proof of Horthy's acceptance the Holocaust exists, and that despite the fact he's clearly biased against him.

btw
I admire your conviction that only the poor and uneducated should die in wars.
But the well educated and wealthy should stay at home and enjoy the spectacle on national TV.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#37

Post by steppewolf » 18 Jan 2020, 21:11

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
I admire your conviction that only the poor and uneducated should die in wars.
But the well educated and wealthy should stay at home and enjoy the spectacle on national TV.
He didn't said that, why are your twisting his words? He said sending highly educated people to dug holes do not make sense from economically. Why would you send a Uni professor to do that when he might be useful for something else?

Also you are twisting the burden of proof. A long list of facts proving his antisemitic stance was presented to you yet you continue to claim his innocence.

Extraordinary claim is to say Horthy didn't knew about Jewish deportations and their fate, that he was unaware of what is happening around him, a man who was head of a state. You basically say he was that stupid.

All Axis heads of states knew about this in some degree and about war crimes generally (Petain,Antonescu, Tiso etc.). With all that, some people, although they committed of war crimes, escaped or were even employed if their skills or evidence they could offer proved useful. Probably Horthy was somehow deemed more important for allies not to be handed to Soviets/Yugoslavs or occupied Hungarian state. So I think you should prove Horthy was innocent and didn't knew about Jews. The simple fact he stopped the deportations once he was warned by W Allies speaks against his alleged lack of knowledge. I'm curious, why are you so eager to claim Horthy was that naive?

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#38

Post by Peter89 » 18 Jan 2020, 21:39

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
That an affirmative action was introduced in a country where the Jews dominated in the economy and were seriously overrepresented among the students doesn't mean Horthy was a wanna-be genocider.
The action had its reasons, it could have been wrong or good reasons, it could have solved the problem or not. That's debatable.
Yes, yes. Holocaust had to happen, because the Jews were overrepresented in the society. And don't forget their wealth too, it could be taken away and redistributed.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02

White Terror was inresponse to Red Terror. Maybe it was over the top response, maybe it wasn't. That's debatable.
Yes, and Red Terror was in response of the feudal imperialism, where a royal family dispute sacrificed millions in trenches. The perpetrators of the antisemitic White Terror were given amnesty by Horthy. Thus, he pardoned actual, documented murderers of Jews.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
Communism was a mortal danger to anybody, we don't know what kind of genocide the Stalinist communists would have introduced in Hungary, but they would.
That Horthy opposed communism doesn't mean he was a wanna-be genocider.
I never said that Horthy was a wanna-be genocider; don't put words into my mouth. I said that he did next to nothing against the Holocaust and that he was less antisemitic than an average Hungarian citizen in 1940 (he was still an antisemite, but in a feudal sense, so he was keen to discriminate Jews, but he wouldn't massacre them himself).
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
Of course, it's not possible to prove a negative, but Randolph Braham (a Hungarian Jew) in his monumental work The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary says a few times that no proof of Horthy's acceptance the Holocaust exists, and that despite the fact he's clearly biased against him.
Yes, he had no clue, he that's why he called upon the "Három Laci" (Ferenczy László, Baky László, Endre László) on 26 June 1944 to stop the deportations, when the international pressure on him started to mount.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
btw
I admire your conviction that only the poor and uneducated should die in wars.
But the well educated and wealthy should stay at home and enjoy the spectacle on national TV.
Absolutely not, my argument here is not based on morality. IF you lead your country to a war, AND your country lacks qualified manpower at home, THEN you don't send the qualified manpower away to do senseless slave labour and die. It was a terribly bad manpower management, fueled by hatred.
"Everything remained theory and hypothesis. On paper, in his plans, in his head, he juggled with Geschwaders and Divisions, while in reality there were really only makeshift squadrons at his disposal."

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#39

Post by wm » 18 Jan 2020, 23:18

steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
He didn't said that, why are your twisting his words? He said sending highly educated people to dug holes do not make sense from economically.
Yes, it doesn't make sense from the economic point of view, but make sense from the moral one. Especially if your country is on the verge of destruction.

steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
Also you are twisting the burden of proof. A long list of facts proving his antisemitic stance was presented to you yet you continue to claim his innocence.
That someone is in conflict with Jews doesn't mean he is a wanna be genocider. Political conflicts happen all the time, politics are impossible without them.

steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
Extraordinary claim is to say Horthy didn't knew about Jewish deportations and their fate, that he was unaware of what is happening around him, a man who was head of a state. You basically say he was that stupid.
He wasn't stupid, he merely didn't know "his" Jews were going to be killed. Nobody knew that except a few German leaders.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#40

Post by wm » 18 Jan 2020, 23:40

Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
Yes, yes. Holocaust had to happen, because the Jews were overrepresented in the society. And don't forget their wealth too, it could be taken away and redistributed.
That's not true. The Jews formed a tiny minority in Germany. They were invisible. Hiter was driven by different motives.

Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
Yes, and Red Terror was in response of the feudal imperialism, where a royal family dispute sacrificed millions in trenches. The perpetrators of the antisemitic White Terror were given amnesty by Horthy. Thus, he pardoned actual, documented murderers of Jews.
The communists committed one of the largest genocides on this planet, only the Chinese were "better." They didn't do it because of some royal families.
They did it because their ideology was innately criminal, even more than the Nazi one.
Never defend criminals, even Jewish ones.

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
I said that he did next to nothing against the Holocaust
What do you want him to do against the Holocaust, it happened far away from Hungary.
He did nothing against the murder of over 2 million Soviet POWs.
He did nothing about the Nazi involuntary euthanasia program that cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
And the death of 3 million of Poles, and even against the Holodomor.

Do you know someone who did? Churchill, Stalin, Roosevelt? Anybody?

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
Yes, he had no clue, he that's why he called upon the "Három Laci" (Ferenczy László, Baky László, Endre László) on 26 June 1944 to stop the deportations, when the international pressure on him started to mount.
When he was informed about the true fate of the deportees.
If he had been truly responsible he wouldn't stop the deportations, that would be pointless - it wouldn't save him. He would be a war criminal already.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#41

Post by Peter89 » 19 Jan 2020, 09:01

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:40
Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
Yes, yes. Holocaust had to happen, because the Jews were overrepresented in the society. And don't forget their wealth too, it could be taken away and redistributed.
That's not true. The Jews formed a tiny minority in Germany. They were invisible. Hiter was driven by different motives.
We're talking about the Hungarian Holocaust here.
But all the same, every genocide starts with someone noting: "Hm, this group is overrepresented in the society.".
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:40
Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
Yes, and Red Terror was in response of the feudal imperialism, where a royal family dispute sacrificed millions in trenches. The perpetrators of the antisemitic White Terror were given amnesty by Horthy. Thus, he pardoned actual, documented murderers of Jews.
The communists committed one of the largest genocides on this planet, only the Chinese were "better." They didn't do it because of some royal families.
They did it because their ideology was innately criminal, even more than the Nazi one.
Never defend criminals, even Jewish ones.
You're rapidly shifting towards an ideological debate whether Communism or Nazism was better, etc. Let's just say that Horthy pardoned bestial antisemites and leave it at that.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 20:02
Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
I said that he did next to nothing against the Holocaust
What do you want him to do against the Holocaust, it happened far away from Hungary.
He did nothing against the murder of over 2 million Soviet POWs.
He did nothing about the Nazi involuntary euthanasia program that cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
And the death of 3 million of Poles, and even against the Holodomor.
A nice try to generalize Horthy's political responsibility to the level of world peace.

No; he was responsible for his own citizens and units under his command. He let about half a million Hungarians humiliated and massacred, while the country was occupied by another country. Horthy, as Commander in Chief of HRA, had the right to declare war on Germany and sue for peace when the first transport rolled out. Those Jews were his citizens.
[/quote]
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:40
Peter89 wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:39
Yes, he had no clue, he that's why he called upon the "Három Laci" (Ferenczy László, Baky László, Endre László) on 26 June 1944 to stop the deportations, when the international pressure on him started to mount.
When he was informed about the true fate of the deportees.
He had every infos he needed. I will not repeat my previous posts, he knew these gentlemen and their motives.
"Everything remained theory and hypothesis. On paper, in his plans, in his head, he juggled with Geschwaders and Divisions, while in reality there were really only makeshift squadrons at his disposal."

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#42

Post by steppewolf » 19 Jan 2020, 20:09

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:18
steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
He didn't said that, why are your twisting his words? He said sending highly educated people to dug holes do not make sense from economically.
Yes, it doesn't make sense from the economic point of view, but make sense from the moral one. Especially if your country is on the verge of destruction.
What verge of destruction are you talking about? Work detachments were sent in 1941-1942 in Soviet Union, at that time Hungary was at its best after WW1.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:18
steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
Also you are twisting the burden of proof. A long list of facts proving his antisemitic stance was presented to you yet you continue to claim his innocence.
That someone is in conflict with Jews doesn't mean he is a wanna be genocider. Political conflicts happen all the time, politics are impossible without them.
The original post and question didn't differentiate between genocide, mass killing, Holocaust but was concerned with survival of Jews in a certain context.
wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:18
steppewolf wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 21:11
Extraordinary claim is to say Horthy didn't knew about Jewish deportations and their fate, that he was unaware of what is happening around him, a man who was head of a state. You basically say he was that stupid.
He wasn't stupid, he merely didn't know "his" Jews were going to be killed. Nobody knew that except a few German leaders.
OK, prove that a head of Axis state didn't know Jews were killed all over Nazi occupied Europe.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#43

Post by Futurist » 20 Jan 2020, 08:20

wm wrote:
18 Jan 2020, 23:18
He wasn't stupid, he merely didn't know "his" Jews were going to be killed. Nobody knew that except a few German leaders.
Was this hypothesis really that hard to figure out, though? I mean, if the Nazis are vehemently anti-Semitic, already conducting a genocide against Jews and largely hiding it from their own public and from the world, and have occupied Hungary, would it actually make sense for Horthy to assume that the Nazis were telling the truth when they were telling him that "his own" Jews weren't going to get murdered?

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#44

Post by wm » 23 Jan 2020, 00:37

"already conducting a genocide against Jews" - nobody knew that - it was a state secret.

That Jews were killed in Russia didn't mean they would be killed in occupied Poland.
That they were killed in occupied Poland didn't mean they would be killed in independent Hungary.
Even Jews thought like that, especially the Hungarian Jews, they all arrived in Auschwitz ignorant of their fate.
David Kranzler in "Man Who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz" writes that even in Switzerland nobody knew about the Holocaust at that time.
The Holocaust was invisible among all the killings all around.

The Nazis were vehemently anti-Semitic but not outwardly, see the German press or Goebels' speeches - they were antisemitic, but weren't violent.

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Re: Was it a mistake for Miklos Horthy (the Hungarian regent) to seek a separate peace?

#45

Post by wm » 23 Jan 2020, 00:43

Peter89 wrote:
19 Jan 2020, 09:01
You're rapidly shifting towards an ideological debate whether Communism or Nazism was better, etc. Let's just say that Horthy pardoned bestial antisemites and leave it at that.
Actually most civil wars ended up in amnesty. It was a prudent move especially in a country so unstable like Hungary.

Peter89 wrote:
19 Jan 2020, 09:01
Horthy, as Commander in Chief of HRA, had the right to declare war on Germany and sue for peace when the first transport rolled out. Those Jews were his citizens.
With what, the police? The Army was fighting the Soviets.
He had been trying to exit the war for a year already, and it wasn't doable.

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