Salzburg Conference
The Salzburg Conference (
The result was Slovak capitulation to German demands and the replacement of Nástup supporters by members of the pro-German radical faction. Ultimately, the Slovak State became more strongly oriented towards Germany, especially in the area of anti-Jewish measures. However, aspects of the Slovak State's administration, such as the lack of qualified Slovak People's Party supporters in high-level positions and the adoption of the Führerprinzip with the conservative politician Jozef Tiso as its supreme leader, limited the impact of the German ultimatum.
Background
The Slovak State was a one-party state dominated by the Slovak People's Party, which had two main factions, radical and conservative/clerical. The radical branch was led by Vojtech Tuka and Alexander Mach, commander of the paramilitary Hlinka Guard, and was supported by Germany due to its acceptance of German dominion. President Jozef Tiso's clerical branch was more popular among the Catholic clergy and the population. These factions engaged in a power struggle, fighting for German support. Another faction was a group of intellectuals centered around the journal Nástup, which was radical in its authoritarianism but opposed the imitation of Germany and insisted on an independent foreign policy; foreign minister Ferdinand Ďurčanský belonged to this group.[5][6][7] Germany sought the expulsion of the Nástup group from positions of influence, as it could work with Tiso's faction which tended towards pragmatism in its foreign policy.[8]
The summit took place during a quiet spell in the war, shortly after the
Demands
In mid-July 1940, German dictator Adolf Hitler invited Tiso, Tuka, and Mach to a summit held in Salzburg. The Sicherheitsdienst wanted Ďurčanský to be invited, so that it could thwart any attempts by the latter to escape losing power.[8]
On 28 July, Tiso first met privately with German foreign minister
The Slovaks requested a revision of the First Vienna Award.[16] Specifically, they wanted six former districts to be returned to Slovakia: Vráble-Šurany, Lučenec, Jelšava, Košice, north Sátoraljaújhely and Sobrance District—3,600 square kilometres (1,400 sq mi). According to the Slovak foreign ministry, these areas contained 209,000 Slovaks and 100,000 Hungarians.[17] During the meeting with Hitler Ribbentrop interjected to say that a revision was "out of the question".[15]
According to Israeli historian Yeshayahu Jelinek , "we lack many details regarding the meeting, particularly about instructions, if any, given to Tuka and Mach".[18]
Result
The Slovaks conceded to the German ultimatum and agreed to replace influential Nástupists with reliably pro-German radicals.[19][20][21] Ďurčanský was replaced as interior minister by Mach,[1] while Tuka became foreign minister.[17] Jozef M. Kirschbaum , another Nástupist, was dismissed as Secretary-General of the Slovak People's Party, while Konštantín Čulen, the head of the Propaganda Ministry, was replaced by the radical Karol Murgaš.[22] Nevertheless, the Germans recognized that the radical candidates were not as competent as the men that they replaced, and were therefore careful not to go too far in demanding influential offices for them.[23] Ďurčanský later claimed that his dismissal proved that he was anti-Nazi and actually a "friend" of Jews.[19]
The conference marked a success for the radical faction of the party and a defeat for Tiso's clerical faction. Tiso considered the summit "the worst box on the ears that I ever received". He offered his resignation.[16] None of the Slovak leaders (except Mach) was happy with the result; Tuka had hoped to become president or defense minister and was ill-equipped to deal with the demands of the new offices he had obtained.[24]
After the conference, the new government "oriented definitively and exclusively on Germany", in the words of Jan Rychlík.[25] The conference also resulted in an intensification of the Slovak State's anti-Jewish policy, which was now modeled on that of Germany.[1] As a reaction to the Salzburg talks, the Slovak People's Party embraced the Führerprinzip ("Führer principle"), putting Tiso in a position of complete authority and bypassing the German-mandated political changes.[26][27] Another effect that limited the effect of the German diktat was that there were few Slovak People's Party supporters qualified for high office, partly because of the reliance of the Czechoslovak state on Czech bureaucrats. Therefore, the government relied heavily on Slovaks who did not support the party (four-fifths of the Foreign Affairs officials who had reported directly to Ďurčanský had held similar positions in the Czechoslovak government and were almost certainly not Slovak People's Party supporters). Leading officials such as Karol Klinovsk, head of the Presidium of the Slovak Foreign Ministry since 1939, were left undisturbed for lack of a qualified replacement.[28]
Advisers
Another result of the Salzburg talks was the appointment of various German advisers to Slovakia, although these advisers were not completely new, nor were they unique to Slovakia.
- SS-ObersturmführerRudolf Dienst (police)
- Hans Hamscha (agriculture)
- Police Captain Holst (police)
- Police Major Müller (police)
Including staff, in the end about seventy or eighty people were part of this advisory corps.[33]
References
- ^ a b c Hutzelmann 2018, p. 27.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, pp. 842–843.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, p. 242.
- ^ Ward 2013, p. 184.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 843.
- ^ Kamenec 2011, pp. 184–185.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, p. 244.
- ^ a b Jelínek 1971, p. 245.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, p. 243.
- ^ a b Tönsmeyer 2003, p. 64.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, pp. 245–246.
- ^ Ward 2013, p. 211.
- ^ Ward 2013, pp. 211–212.
- ^ Piahanau 2012, pp. 16–17.
- ^ a b Suppan 2019, p. 492.
- ^ a b Ward 2013, p. 212.
- ^ a b Piahanau 2012, p. 17.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, p. 246.
- ^ a b Legge 2018, p. 228.
- ^ Hutzelmann 2018, pp. 24–25.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, pp. 843–844.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, pp. 246–247.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, pp. 247–248.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, pp. 246, 249.
- ^ Rychlík 2018, pp. 121–122.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, p. 251.
- ^ Ward 2013, p. 219.
- ^ Tönsmeyer 2003, p. 98.
- ^ Tönsmeyer 2003, p. 65.
- ^ a b Tönsmeyer 2003, p. 63.
- ^ Jelínek 1971, pp. 248–249.
- ^ Tönsmeyer 2003, pp. 67–68.
- ^ Tönsmeyer 2003, p. 68.
Sources
- Jelínek, Yeshayahu (1971). "Slovakia' Internal Policy and the Third Reich, August 1940–February 1941". Central European History. 4 (3): 242–270. S2CID 145451318.
- Hutzelmann, Barbara (2018). "Einführung: Slowakei" [Introduction: Slovakia]. In Hutzelmann, Barbara; Hausleitner, Mariana; Hazan, Souzana (eds.). Slowakei, Rumänien und Bulgarien [Slovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria]. ISBN 978-3-11-036500-9.
- ISBN 978-1-139-49494-6.
- Legge, Jerome S. (2018). "Collaboration, Intelligence, and the Holocaust: Ferdinand Ďurčanský, Slovak Nationalism, and the Gehlen Organization". Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 32 (2): 224–248. ISSN 8756-6583.
- Piahanau, Aliaksandr (2012). "Slovak-Hungarian relations in the mirror of the Soviet-German conflictive alliance (1939–1941)" (PDF). Prague Papers on the History of International Relations (2): 1–24.
- Rajcan, Vanda; Vadkerty, Madeline; Hlavinka, Ján (2018). "Slovakia". In ISBN 978-0-253-02373-5.
- Rychlík, Jan (2018). "Slovakia". In ISBN 978-1-316-51034-6.
- JSTOR j.ctvvh867x.
- ISBN 978-3-506-77532-0.
- Ward, James Mace (2013). ISBN 978-0-8014-6812-4.