Rumanian-Hungarian armed conflict in 1918-1919

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Cezarprimo
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1919

#16

Post by Cezarprimo » 02 Apr 2002, 10:15

To Denes :

I don't see were is the partial truth in saying that in 1919 Hungary was a communist state, or "5-6 month in 1919" are not a part from 1919 ?
Anyway, this is not important, I only wanted to mention that the romanians beside making themselvs a favor, they made the whole Europe a favor by crushing the communism in Hungary back than.

For the "half truths" I look forward to your "details" Denes, we'll talk than.

And I agree that the "Petit Entente" was aimed at containing Hungary, as all the three states had territorial disputes with Hungary, but in 1919, there was no "official" coallition and further, the serbs and the romanians had resons for a quarrel over Banat.

To Abel Ravasz :

Your posts regarding Romania are incorrect, the hungarian red army attacked Romania in an offensive in 1919, it managed to make some initial gains but it was stopped and later defeated, the hungarians began to realy flea in disorder only after the romanians managed to cross the Tisza river.
About Horthy, are you implying that he and his "army" fought against the romanians and thus reconquered waht was to be Hungary after Trianon ?

Regards
Last edited by Cezarprimo on 03 Apr 2002, 12:04, edited 1 time in total.

Abel Ravasz
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#17

Post by Abel Ravasz » 02 Apr 2002, 17:52

I'm not saying that Horthy's army fought and defeated the Romanian, I'm just didn't want to write Romanians actualy fled from some of the area in Hungary including Budapest to avoid fighting with an enemy stronger than the hungarian Red Army. Otherwise, how can you explain that Romanian troops left over the area of today's Hungary to the forces of a man, who was an admirer of the Habsburg house and wanted a Habsburg king for Hungary and de facto keeping the kingdom alive in the state?
And, when you say that
the hungarian red army attacked Romania in an offensive in 1919, it managed to make some initial gains but it was stopped and later defeated, the hungarians began to realy flea in disorder only after the romanians managed to cross the Tisza river
, it should mean that the Red Army was trying to get back some of the crucial area Romania had taken long after the end of the war... So you can't say that Romanians in fact counterattacked, because they were the first to attack after the war. Otherwise, its true, that the underpowered Red Army has fled after the Romanian had taken the Tisza river.
But I'd like to add that both the revisionism in our country and the belief in half truths in your country has already changed the history in the books made in both of the countries, for I believe that having read each others sources we could see why the other formed his opinion.

Abel


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Cezarprimo
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#18

Post by Cezarprimo » 03 Apr 2002, 12:02

I have already said that the Entente pressured the romanians to retreat from Hungary, as for Horthy's army I don't think it was a force to be reckoned with.

Why do you belive I am romanian ? Can't there be people of other nationalities interested in the history of central and east Europe or in the history of Romania and Hungary to be more precise ?

I totally agree with you, that when looking for the truth documents from both sides should be read as it lies usually in the middle.

Regards

Abel Ravasz
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#19

Post by Abel Ravasz » 04 Apr 2002, 11:40

Cezarprimo, sorry if I offended you with calling you Romanian :D But I didn't think of it as a negative ability :D OK, sorry. But you didn't tell you aren't Romanian and indeed responded with
I totally agree with you, that when looking for the truth documents from both sides should be read as it lies usually in the middle.
Which other side do you mean, if you're not Romanian?
As for Horthy's army, it indeed was a force to be reckoned with, because it was a stabile army, as small as it was, but still operating on a regular basis and fighting not because they had to but because they wanted their homes back.
And for another question. Yes, there could be somebody who's interested in this situation even with his country not involved. But that's rare.

Abel

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prejo
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#20

Post by prejo » 04 Apr 2002, 14:39

Sorry to intervene a little bit late on this discussion. I must admit that I did read only half of the messages posted on this topic. First of all I want to say that the romanian official flag' stripes are always (and always been) vertical. The romanian flags (blue-yellow-red) with horizontal stripes seen by Denes on a picture taken at Blaj ralleigh was most likely self made by the romanians from Transylvania and they probably were a little puzzled about the stripes' orientation. The second issue is the so called romanian-hungarian conflict in 1918-1919. Between falls of 1918 and spring of 1919 Romania moved its border three times. The last alignment was on Tisa (Tisza - sorry if I've mispelled the hungarian name). All movements were made against french recomendations. At the romanian-hungarian border the romanian army experienced some guerilla attacks conducted by the bolshevik hungarian army elements. Romanian army did not retaliate these attack only on french interventions at romanian army's HQ. The crossing of Tisa was made by romanian troops in mid July 1919 (again despite the intervention of french military attachee in Bucharest)and at the begining of August. I don't know if the romanian flag was over the hungarian paliament in Budapest. I didn't saw it. As far as i know Budapest was under romanian military administartion only for a few months. Also I don't consider this short miltary campaign neither a "liberation crusade" nor a occupation. The two leading reasons for this campaign were the retaliation on hungar attacks on the border and the defeat of Czech troops by the hungarian Red Army. The theory that this campaign was conducted by the romanians to do the dirty work and to clean all the bolshevik elements can be true. In fact romanian troops did fought on eastern front against russian bolshevik elements. It was the only army in the area not touched by the "communist virus".
In the end I want to say that all these information are from a book written by a romanian staff officer on romanian army's HQ, book based on battle orders and other documents emerged from romanian HQ. It contains also a few photos taken on romanian hungarian borders showing hungarian attrocities. But I personally consider these photos only propaganda and I tried to "stick to the facts". Also I consider this conflict and Transilvania's political status a very sensitive topic when it occurs between romanians and hungarians. No matter how arguments one or another can have, Always will exist a third to yell (or e-yell): "this is our land you invaders/thiefs!". This is the sole intervetion of mine on this topic.

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Cezarprimo
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#21

Post by Cezarprimo » 04 Apr 2002, 15:05

I am not at all offended by your calling me a romanian, if anything I like romanians.

In my phrase I was trying to say that whenever there is a dispute between two sides both of them should be heard as usually the truth lies in between. The two sides in question are romanians and hungarians.

I have no knowledge of an army under Horthy's command conducting operations against the romanian army after it occupied Budapest. However, to what I know, there was a transfer of authority between the romanian army and the hungarian Horthy administration in the territories belonging to Hungary according to the Trianon peace treaty. In short the romanians left by there own will (or better said Entente's will) and were not driven off.

Regards.

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prejo
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#22

Post by prejo » 04 Apr 2002, 15:07

Sorry to intervene a little bit late on this discussion. I must admit that I did read only half of the messages posted on this topic. First of all I want to say that the romanian official flag' stripes are always (and always been) vertical. The romanian flags (blue-yellow-red) with horizontal stripes seen by Denes on a picture taken at Blaj ralleigh was most likely self made by the romanians from Transylvania and they probably were a little puzzled about the stripes' orientation. The second issue is the so called romanian-hungarian conflict in 1918-1919. Between falls of 1918 and spring of 1919 Romania moved its border three times. The last alignment was on Tisa (Tisza - sorry if I've mispelled the hungarian name). All movements were made against french recomendations. At the romanian-hungarian border the romanian army experienced some guerilla attacks conducted by the bolshevik hungarian army elements. Romanian army did not retaliate these attack only on french interventions at romanian army's HQ. The crossing of Tisa was made by romanian troops in mid July 1919 (again despite the intervention of french military attachee in Bucharest)and at the begining of August. I don't know if the romanian flag was over the hungarian paliament in Budapest. I didn't saw it. As far as i know Budapest was under romanian military administartion only for a few months. Also I don't consider this short miltary campaign neither a "liberation crusade" nor a occupation. The two leading reasons for this campaign were the retaliation on hungar attacks on the border and the defeat of Czech troops by the hungarian Red Army. The theory that this campaign was conducted by the romanians to do the dirty work and to clean all the bolshevik elements can be true. In fact romanian troops did fought on eastern front against russian bolshevik elements. It was the only army in the area not touched by the "communist virus".
In the end I want to say that all these information are from a book written by a romanian staff officer on romanian army's HQ, book based on battle orders and other documents emerged from romanian HQ. It contains also a few photos taken on romanian hungarian borders showing hungarian attrocities. But I personally consider these photos only propaganda and I tried to "stick to the facts". Also I consider this conflict and Transilvania's political status a very sensitive topic when it occurs between romanians and hungarians. No matter how arguments one or another can have, Always will exist a third to yell (or e-yell): "this is our land you invaders/thiefs!". This is the sole intervetion of mine on this topic.

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#23

Post by Abel Ravasz » 04 Apr 2002, 21:24

prejo: nice to hear an objective voice from a new member on the "other side", certainly made up for a good first post.
cezarprimo: I don't know about transfer of authorities between Horthy and Romanians. Could you please back up this statement a bit?

Abel

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DenesBernad
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RE: reply to various topics

#24

Post by DenesBernad » 05 Apr 2002, 00:08

Let me clarify a few issues.

First, regarding the arrangement of colours on the Rumanian flag (I know it's a minor issue, nevertheless I want to prove my initial point). I have to correct Prejo in this matter. Here is an excerpt from an official Rumanian site (http://domino.kappa.ro/guvern/ehome.nsf/All/Drapelul): "Sigillography attests that at certain historical stages, the Romanian flag had the three colours arranged horizontally with the red in the upper part, the yellow in the middle and the blue in the lower part. " Case closed.

Second, regarding the sentence "Between falls of 1918 and spring of 1919 Romania moved its border three times", the lines Prejo mentioned were NOT official state borders, but rather demarcation lines. Officially, the territory was still part of the Hungarian Kingdom. Therefore, logically, the Rumanian troops attacked/advanced and the Hungarian troops (occasionally) counter-attacked. At first glance this could look like a minor difference; however, it's important. This also refutes Cezarprimo's earlier statement: "the hungarian red army attacked Romania in an offensive in 1919."

Cezarprimo wrote: "the Entente pressured the romanians to retreat from Hungary, as for Horthy's army I don't think it was a force to be reckoned with." This is correct, as the Rumanians were pressured by the Western powers to retreat beyond the border offered to them in 1916, in exchange for entering the war against the Central Powers, i.e. Rumania's de jure ally of those times.

"when looking for the truth documents from both sides should be read as it lies usually in the middle." Although this wit usually works, it does not apply at all the times. One has to be able to discern between historical fact and fiction, thus sometimes give full credit to either parties' version of events, if it is historically correct.

"The hungarians managed to defeat the czech army [it was rather the Czechoslovak army. D.B.] before they attacked the romanians (they would have been pretty stupid not to do so), so the bulk of the fight was between romaninas and Hungarians". As mentioned before, the Hungarians were counter-attacking the advancing Rumanians.
"the czechs become involved only when communist Hungary was already defeated and the french didn't intervene directly at all. The serbian army was involved only in Voivodina, until now I have no knowledge about it participating in the 1919 operations against Hungary, so Denes, pleas tell us a little bit more about this. "
Again, if one talks about a specific time period, he/she has to consider the realities of those times. This is an error often made not only by amateur historians, but professional ones as well.
In late 1918, Czechoslovak, Serbian and Rumanian (and later French) troops ALL crossed the official borders of the Hungarian Kingdom and begun taking over territories they considered theirs. The Hungarian Army and local defence units offered little resistance, as they were demoralised by the end of the war and their defeat. Therefore in early 1919 - the period Cezarprimo refers to - Czechoslovak, Serbian and Rumanian troops de facto stationed on the still official territory of the Hungarian Kingdom. The new borders were de jure established only in 1920, ratified by the Treaty of Trianon in 1921, then ratified by the Parliaments of all parties. Only then the new borders became official.

"Further, the Entenete pressured the romanians not to occupy the whole of Hungary and to retreat from there as soon as possible. I find amusing this caring for the communist Hungary". The Western powers did not persuade the Rumanians to retreat because they defended the Communist Hungary (by then, the Communists were long gone), they simply wanted to make the Rumanians stick to the original deal, made in 1916. However, the Rumanians apparently tried to take advantage of the fluid situation and to establish the state's border way beyond the agreed line (which is roughly today's Western borders), i.e. at the Tisza River. Finally, after a few months of negotiations and pressure, Rumanian troops retreated beyond the aforementioned 1916 line, only in late 1920.

To Ábel Ravasz, "The admiral [Horthy] formed a new army from the former Austrian-Hungarian army's veterans in south Hungary, and eventually re-took the most of the lost area, including the already pillaged capital, Budapest." As mentioned above, the Western Powers - not Horthy - persuaded the Rumanians to finally evacuate Budapest, then the Trans-Tisza region. Horthy entered the capital on his famous white horse and took over power only after the last Rumanian troops retreated from Budapest, without a shot being fired.

I hope I could offer acceptable replies to a few questions raised by a few members and also to dispel a few myths that persist on both the Rumanian and Hungarian sides.

Dénes

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#25

Post by prejo » 05 Apr 2002, 09:30

Denes, the romanian flag as we know today was adopted durring (or at the beginning of) the revolution in 1848 after the french model, in different colours of course. And the french flag (the flag of the 1789 revolution) was with vertical stripes. As I understood you were born near Reghin. Maybe you can remember the well-known pictures in the history book with all the "leaders of the revolution" with the flag in one's hand. How's the stripes oriented? And regarding the site you have indicated me it begins with an error: our flag is blue-yellow-red as the colours always are "read" starting from the hoist. Even in one of Saguna's poems the colours are indicated as above. The syntagm red-yellow-blue comes from the old (communist adapted) anthem, and it was written so for the poem's rythm. Unfortunatelly for us, romanians, this lead to a general mistake. The "certain history stages" could be the dacian stages? The Stephen The Great era? If you want to extend your arguments on the banners you are probably right since the banner (roamanian "banier/a" or "prapur" ) is ussually a flag hanged on a spear, and the stripes are definetly horizontal. But I understood the whole argument was arround the official romanian flag. And you've just made me broke my promise not to post again on this list :D But since all I wrote on this new post doesn't regard romanian-hungarian matter...

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#26

Post by Cezarprimo » 05 Apr 2002, 11:17

Denes, I agree with you, regarding the moving borders, they were actually demarcation lines.

If one regards the situation 'de jure' and I am refering now to the international scene, than once again, you are correct, the romanians attacked a territory that in 1918-1920 was still hungarian. But this territory was promiced to them by the Entente (that was than the victor, and thus in a position to fulfill it's promises) and there was a gathering of the representatives of romanians in Transylvania (that made up the large (or confortable, if you want) majority in that region) where they voted a unification with the Romanian Kingdom.
Further, untill the attack (counterattack) of the hungarian red army there were no major battles between romanian and hungarian armies (after the end of WWI). So, 'de facto' the situation was a little bit different.

Once again, 'de jure' you are right, french, serbian, romanian and czechslovak armies were stationing on what was still hungarian territory so they were all 'attacking' Hungary. However,' de facto' in the period which we are adressing, there were large battles only between romanian and hungarian armies. In the beginning of 1919 (I belive) the hungarain red army defeated the czech (czechoslovak) army, only afterwards it began large scale operations against the romanian army which they could not defeat but was defeated by.

And you are right about communists being gone and the quest for keeping the original deal. I just wanted to underline that the Entente was not on the romanian side in which case it would have said nothing to having Romania's border on Tisza.


To Abel Ravasz, see Denes's post. Once the romanians were gone, the authority went to Horthy's 'administration'.

Regards.

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#27

Post by Abel Ravasz » 05 Apr 2002, 21:03

OK, you must be right, with Horthy and the Romanians. But I wouldn't say that
and there was a gathering of the representatives of romanians in Transylvania (that made up the large (or confortable, if you want) majority in that region) where they voted a unification with the Romanian Kingdom.
type of voting for Romania or Hungary was fair to prove that Transylvania wanted to join Romania. Maybe taking the whole of Transylvania, Romanian are majority (which I'm not convinced in) but there were several regions of the area where Hungarians
made up the large (or confortable, if you want) majority
of population. And leaving them out of the voting is more than unfair.

Abel

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#28

Post by Cezarprimo » 08 Apr 2002, 18:00

I already had this kind of discussion in the old forum, if you want a more detailed look search in the archive. In short, a subdivision of Transylvania into counties or even villages so that everybody lives in the country of his or hers will would have been utopic.

I also had the discussion about what is Transylvania and every way you put it the romanians have at least a simple majority, however, in this case Transylvania is regarded as the area bordered by the east and south Carpathians and by today's border of Romania with Hungary and Ukraine. This is the are where I said that the romanians enjoy a confortable majority.

The austrian census of 1910 should first be read properly and after balanced with the romanian census held after 1920. Even if the 1910 census is read unbalanced (favoring hungarians) the romanians still held a majority in the area we are talking about.

However I agree that a proper referendum should have been held, but I belive that the result wolud have been the same, I mean favorable to romanians.

Regards

Regards

IAR80
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re

#29

Post by IAR80 » 13 Apr 2002, 19:40

How would history look if Romania got away with annexing Hungary, still allowing some authonomy and rights for the, now, ethhnic hungarians?
What major impact would it have on WWII?

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#30

Post by Ovidius » 14 Apr 2002, 00:32

How would history look if Romania got away with annexing Hungary, still allowing some authonomy and rights for the, now, ethhnic hungarians?
What major impact would it have on WWII?
Authonomy and rights for ethnic Magyars after an annexation of Hungary was going to mean only the repetition of the 1848 events. The Magyars tolerated to be nominally subject to the Austro-Hungarian empire after 1867 only because the empire's authority was present only in external relations, the internal problems of the state being in Magyar hands. Not only this, but the empire's army was 40 percent Magyar, and there were plenty of Magyars in administration - therefore they dominated the empire. They had earned via combat this position.

The idea that they were to live under the "Romanian peasants" would have been unbearable. MagyarCrusader poses as victim, because he knews this is sthe stance the Western Establishment sympathizes with(see Kuwait, Kosovo etc.) Read between the lines and you'll see the frustration of the Magyar in front of the Romanians he considers to be just brainless cattle.

An annexation of Hungary followed by authonomy for ethnic Magyars was going to bring Romania in a civil war. And this meant even less military disponibility in 1940. The Westerners from France to Germany and from Britain to Italy were to support the Magyars and not the Romanians, because this is what they did for centuries, they still do today and will still do forever, as long as there will be Magyars and Romanians on this Earth. :( Therefore the war would be lost by Romanians, and result in the dismemberment of the Romanian state, under the supervision of the Western powers and to the advantage of the Magyars. :(

The best approach would have been to annex Hungary and then teach the future Chancellor Hitler a lesson what to do in his future occupation of Poland. :lol: :lol: :lol:

~Regards,

Ovidius

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