White Terror (Hungary)

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Hungarian communist executed by counter-revolutionary forces

The White Terror in Hungary (

Red Terror.[1][2] Tens of thousands were imprisoned without trial, and as many as 1,000 people were killed. Furthermore, between 1,250 and 2,500 Jews, who were targeted in particular, were killed and tens of thousands more injured between 1919 and 1921. Assuming all Jews were traitors and communists, far-right militias raped, robbed, and massacred them.[3]

Background

At the end of

Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, Czechoslovakia, and Romania – efforts which resulted in Hungary's losing two thirds of its land area and one third of its Hungarian-speaking nationals. These losses, together with the postwar socioeconomic upheaval, catalysed deep feelings of humiliation and resentment among many Hungarians.[1]

In this volatile atmosphere, the nation's fledgling efforts to form a single stable government failed. In March 1919, a government of communists, taking over from a Social Democrat-Communist coalition, established the

invaded
Hungary, eventually reaching Budapest in August 1919. Upon the invasion, most Hungarian communists, including Kun, went into exile.

First phase (1919)

In the south of the country, an alternative government was formed to replace the Hungarian Soviet Republic. Leading the armed wing of this new government, the "National Army", was Admiral Miklós Horthy, the last commander of the erstwhile Austro-Hungarian Navy.[5]

Among the officers who answered Horthy's call were ultra-nationalist soldiers who mounted a campaign of atrocities in a retaliation to the Red Terror; to eliminate communist supporters and frighten the population into obedience to the new order.[6]

The pogroms and mass murders were carried out by units of the "National Army" commanded by Mihály Horthy; paramilitary organisations also committed killings, especially during the "Hungarian Awakening".[7]

These units, commonly known as the "White Guard," carried out a campaign of murder, torture, and humiliation.

Jews, who were broadly blamed for the revolution because most leaders of the communist repression had been Jewish.[8][6]

The most notorious of unit commanders was

Anton Lehár, and Iván Héjjas, who focused his efforts on the Hungarian plain around the town of Kecskémet. Their detachments were part of the National Army, but tended to function as personal battalions, following a fanatical loyalty to their commanders.[6] Their atrocities included torture, rape, summary execution, and desecration of the corpses for public display.[10]

Hardest hit were the regions of Transdanubia, the wider area of Horthy's headquarters in Siófok, and in the lowlands between the Danube and the Theiss rivers, where mass murders which aroused international attention were committed in Kecskémet and Orgovány.[7]

Second phase (post-1919)

The National Army invaded

Kingdom of Hungary. But, far from discontinuing their campaigns, the reactionary units expanded and continued terrorising their targets for almost two more years; politically motivated violence devolved into grudge-murders and kidnappings for profit. White Guard officers began to vie for power among themselves and plotted one another's assassinations.[6] Horthy's biographer, Thomas L. Sakmyster, concluded that Horthy looked the other way in 1919 while the White Guard officers raged through the countryside.[11]

End of the White Terror

By 1920, the terror had receded noticeably.[7] In 1921, Pál Prónay was prosecuted for crimes related to the White Terror. After Prónay joined a failed attempt to restore the Habsburg king, Charles I of Austria to Hungary's throne, his battalion was disbanded.[12]

Despite the disbandment of the Prónay battalion, in subsequent years, sporadic attacks occurred.[7]

See also

References

  1. ^ .
  2. .
  3. .
  4. ^ Balogh, Eva, Istvan Friedrich and the Hungarian Coup d'Etat of 1919: A Reevaluation, Slavic Review, Vol. 35, No. 2 (Jun., 1976), pp. 269-286
  5. ^ Bodo, Bela, Paramilitary Violence in Hungary After the First World War, East European Quarterly, June 22, 2004
  6. ^ a b c d Bodo, Paramilitary Violence
  7. ^ .
  8. . Retrieved 22 September 2022.
  9. .
  10. ^ Bodo, "The White Terror in Hungary," 156.
  11. ^ Sakmyster, Thomas L. (2000). Miklos Horthy: Hungary's Admiral on Horseback. Columbia University Press.
  12. ^ Bodo, Political Violence

Further reading

External links

Media related to White Terror (Hungary) at Wikimedia Commons