A Honvéd column retreats through eastern Transylvania (the so-called Szeklerland), in the vicinity of Sepsiszentgyörgy (in Rumanian Sfântu-Gheorghe) – as indicated by the road sign – in the autumn of 1944. Note the Steyr RSO (Raupenschlepper Ost) towing a 40 mm Bofors flak cannon, at left, and the opportunist bicyclist who grabbed the opportunity for a free ride.
Following the disaster of the Wehrmacht’s Heeresgruppe Mitte in late June 1944, the Hungarian First Army found itself stripped of all German reserve units from its rear areas, units that were hastily thrown into battle further to the north, against the advancing Red Army. On 23 July, the weakened Hungarian First Army was targeted by a local offensive carried out by Soviet units on the left flank of the First Ukrainian Front. The Hungarian lines at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains were overrun on the first day. Within less than a week, the Honvédség units’ resistance collapsed. Soon, the fortified Hunyadi Line was also penetrated at several points. Surviving units withdrew randomly, soldiers occasionally dropping their weapons as they tried to escape the onslaught. Most tanks of the Second Armoured Division had to be abandoned due to lack of fuel. Some semblance of order was to be restored only by public hangings and sporadic summary executions of deserters and panic-mongers.
Because of the defeat of his army, Colonel General Beregfy
was removed from command by Chief of the General Staff, Colonel General Vörös,
replacing him temporarily with Lieutenant General Ferenc Farkas. Thanks to the
commanding presence of Lieutenant General Farkas and his firm stance the
situation was soon restored in the last days of July and the retreat of the
Honvéds stopped. The troops of the First Army were directed towards Hungary’s
so-called ‘millenary border’ spanning the wooded Carpathian Mountains’ peaks
and passes in the Kárpátalja Region, at the edge of south-western Ukraine. Once
regrouped there, the Hungarians mounted a spirited defence, which surprised
Army General Ivan Y. Petrov, the new commanding officer of the Fourth Ukrainian
Front, and his staff. Further Soviet attacks carried out in the first days of
August were repulsed by the Honvéds, entrenched in the Carpathians, with their
back to the Hungarian border. Thanks to their last stand, the Red Army could
not cross into Hungary proper – at least not yet.
Having realized his country’s desperate situation, the
elderly Horthy started to seriously contemplate exiting the war and asking for
an armistice in order to save Hungary from being overrun by the Red Army.
Therefore, he decided to remove the pro-German Sztójay and offer the prime
minister’s portfolio to Colonel General Géza Lakatos, Horthy’s trusted soldier.
Parallel to this move, he intended to assemble a new ‘technocrat’ government.
However, the reluctant and politically inexperienced veteran general did not
aspire to any political limelight and looked for any excuse to avoid Horthy’s
offer. The delicate situation was cleared by Dr Veesenmayer, Hitler’s
confidante in Budapest. Because the old-fashioned Horthy wanted to perform the
cabinet change openly and gentlemanly, he forwarded the list of his appointees
to Berlin. Hitler responded immediately through Veesenmayer, refusing the
government’s new restructuring and threatening a new military intervention in
the case that the change went through. Hitler’s blunt message and its harsh
tone as it was conveyed by Veesenmayer deeply offended the proud Horthy, who
contemplated immediate resignation and retirement. However, his advisors
eventually convinced him not to resign and to stay in power for the sake of
Hungary. Due to Hitler’s blackmail, Sztójay stayed in power and the Hungarian
government remained un-restructured. Horthy’s opposition to the Germans
materialized in the refusal to name a Wehrmacht officer as Chief of Staff of
the Hungarian First Army, a position assigned instead to the trusted young
Staff Colonel Kálmán Kéri in July; the assignment of the First Army’s command
to one of his trusted older generals, Colonel General Béla Miklós on 1 August,
in lieu of the right-wing General Beregfy; and the firm order to stop the
deportation of Budapest’s Jews to the Third Reich. The far-right
Nyilaskeresztes (Arrow Cross) Movement was banned as well, despite Berlin’s
obvious displeasure. These top personnel moves in the First Army, along with
changes in the leaderships of the Second Army, were done in line with Horthy’s
secret plan of leaving the Axis camp at a proper moment, in order to save his
country from the imminent disaster.
Parallel to securing his grip on the army, Horthy begun to
initiate secret talks with the Allies, even with the mistrusted and feared
Russians, in order to obtain acceptable terms for an armistice. His plans were
strongly affected by the young Rumanian king’s coup and the unexpected
unilateral ceasefire declared by the Rumanian Army against the Allies
(including the Soviets) on the night of 23 August 1944. This unforeseen move
shifted Hitler’s attention from mistrusted Hungary to his most important East
European ally, Rumania, which he thought was a strong supporter in the common
fight against Communism.
Horthy immediately realized that the situation had changed
dramatically. Following the Rumanians’ ‘betrayal’, the Soviet Army could easily
cross the southern Carpathian Mountains – a natural fortress the Hungarian
defence strategy was counting on – and invade Hungary from the south-east,
through southern Transylvania. He took advantage of the Germans’ weakened
position and shift in attention, and forced Veesenmayer to accept the change of
government. Accordingly, Colonel General Géza Lakatos, the new prime minister,
took office on 29 August. Most of the new ministers were loyal to the Regent,
but two were actually German informers, so Veesenmayer was aware of the new
cabinet’s every move. Lakatos was an excellent soldier, an honest and
straightforward man, but a political novice not suitable for the new
high-stakes position during those turbulent times. Initially refusing Horthy’s
request, he reluctantly accepted the new position and only to obey his
superior’s direct order. In contrast, the new Foreign Minister, retired Colonel
General Gusztáv Hennyey, was well suited for the key position and greatly assisted
Horthy in planning the armistice. The Hungarians’ plans were accelerated by the
successful Rumanian coup d’état and the following dramatic change in the
military situation at Hungary’s borders.
From 25 August, Rumanian troops started local attacks against
the Hungarian border posts on the Transylvanian border between the two
antagonistic countries, although there was no formal declaration of war issued
by Bucharest (this happened only on 7 September). This was the date when the
ground war actually reached Hungarian territory. Five days later, Rumanian
forces firmly occupied the first piece of land in the ceded northern
Transylvania, near Barót (Baraolt). The danger of combined Soviet–Rumanian
troops advancing from southern Transylvania prompted the Wehrmacht to declare
eastern Hungary, including northern Transylvania, a battle zone. The Germans
decided to counter-attack and planned to push the new frontline to the
Transylvanian Alps (southern Carpathian Mountains) by overrunning the
Rumanian-administered southern Transylvania, hoping to build up a strong
defence line in the high mountain peaks.
The joint Honvédség–Wehrmacht offensive started from the
area of Kolozsvár (Cluj, Klausenburg) on 5 September and initially progressed
well against the ineffective Rumanian resistance. However, soon, strong Soviet
reinforcements arrived in southern Transylvania, which stopped the Axis
advance. A ferocious battle raged in the area of the city of Turda (Torda,
Thorenburg), which changed hands several times. Ultimately, the numerically
superior Soviet–Rumanian units prevailed and the Hungarian–German troops were
pushed back beyond the borderline by 7 October. Nevertheless, the Red Army’s
thrust was temporarily stopped, allowing the Axis units to safely evacuate the
Székelyföld in eastern Transylvania. The epic battle of Turda, fought mostly by
Magyar soldiers, was one of the shining combat feats of the wartime Honvédség.
In the meantime, a separate offensive of the Honvédség in western Transylvania towards Arad started on 9 September 1944. At this point, it involved the IV and VII Corps, as well as the 1st Armoured Division, completed by two replacement field divisions and a replacement Huszár regiment. This force was lead by Lieutenant General vitéz József Heszlényi, commanding officer of IV Corps. The Hungarian Third Army was officially formed only on 19 September 1944, based on the headquarters of IV Corps, led by the same Heszlényi. Despite the initial success of the last independent Hungarian operation of the Second World War, the city of Arad, taken on 13 September, had to be abandoned a week later due to the overwhelming Soviet–Rumanian counter-attack.
Colonel General Lajos Veress, commanding officer of the
Hungarian Second Army – the principal Honvédség force in Transylvania – despite
his personal feelings as a native of Transylvania, being aware of his enemies’
superiority, ordered a general retreat. Kolozsvár, Transylvania’s historical
capital, was evacuated by the Honvédség without a fight on 10 October, to avoid
its destruction. Even before Kolozsvár fell, the first Soviet troops had
advanced beyond Hungary’s pre-war borders on 24 September. In early October,
the Red Army engaged the defenders in the puszta (Hungarian plain), planning a
speedy occupation of the whole of eastern Hungary and targeting the capital
itself, which they planned to capture ‘on-the-go’. However, the Soviets did not
succeed in quickly overrunning eastern Hungary and taking Budapest swiftly, as
originally planned. The task given by Stalin to Marshal Rodion Y. Malinovsky,
to capture Budapest by the end of October and thus open the road to Vienna,
proved to be a total failure. He actually needed another three and a half
months to achieve that goal.
The Soviet Army’s advance into Hungary proper prompted
Horthy to speed up his effort to take his country out of the war. The
76-year-old Regent had realized a while ago that the war was lost and the only
way to save his country being used as a theatre of war by both the Germans and
the Soviets, who would plunder and destroy it in trying to achieve their own
respective goals without paying much attention to the Hungarians themselves,
was to achieve a separate armistice with the Allies. Therefore, despite what
certain post-war Hungarian sources claim, the real power behind the movement to
take Hungary out of war was the elderly Regent. To achieve this he was ready to
talk even to the loathed Soviets, as he realized that the Danube Basin was to
be a Soviet zone of influence and he could not rely on the support of the
Western Allies. Horthy planned to achieve a truce with the Soviets, declare an
armistice, and then persuade the Germans to leave Hungary voluntarily,
transferring the country into a transition zone for the Soviet Army rather than
into a battlefield. His plans were obviously naïve, out of touch with reality.
To achieve these steps, first he tasked Colonel General in Reserve vitéz István Náday, known for his pro-British views, to clandestinely fly aboard a German-marked Heinkel He 111H transport to Italy and initiate peace talks with them. The aircraft took off from Csákvár secondary landing ground on 22 September. After the pilot failed to locate an airport where he could safely land, he eventually belly landed in darkness, near Termoli, in Foggia province. However, the mission failed, as the Allies refused direct talks, and directed Budapest towards Moscow. When this situation became known to Horthy, he clandestinely sent a delegation led by vitéz Gábor Faragho, Inspector of the Police and Gendarmerie, to the Soviet Union. The freshly promoted Colonel General and his small team arrived in Moscow, via Slovakia, on 1 October. The Soviets welcomed the Hungarian truce delegation, but did not accept their peace offer, modelled after the Finnish armistice. Instead, the Soviets insisted on the Rumanian model, which had more severe terms. This model did not assure neutrality for Hungary, as requested by Horthy, but rather an instant change of sides and immediately fighting the Germans alongside the Red Army. Moreover, Stalin made it clear that all recent territorial changes would be reversed, although he left a minor hope for the Hungarians by declaring that ‘all Transylvania, or a larger part of it, shall be returned to Rumania’. Indeed, Stalin was not interested in keeping the Hungarian ruling elite in power, as he wanted radical change and a different social order. He was also primarily interested in reaching Austria as soon as possible through Hungary, so that the Red Army could occupy that country before the Allies. A secondary goal was to secure a sizeable port on the Adriatic Sea. Therefore, he intended to use the Hungarian troops only as cannon fodder against the Germans, without actually guaranteeing anything in the so-called peace offer. Small wonder Budapest was reluctant to accept these unfavourable terms.
Following a few days of indecision, General Faragho
eventually signed the Soviet-dictated armistice at the Kremlin, on 11 October,
after being reluctantly accepted by the Hungarian Crown Council the day before.
Horthy had no choice but to accept all terms, as formulated by Moscow. He
actually planned to carry out all terms, except for one – an immediate attack
on German troops. The old-fashioned Horthy, with his gentlemanly manners and
way of thinking rooted in the nineteenth century, could not accept the betrayal
of his comrades-in-arms, despite the many disappointments they caused. He still
hoped for a solution by persuading the Germans to leave Hungary without a
fight, based on a gentlemen’s agreement, despite his personal contempt against
Hitler and, generally, the Nazis. He was also well aware that his troops would
not fight their German allies even if ordered by him, in contrast to what the
Rumanian soldiers did following their king’s call. His emissaries established
contact also with the leftist opposition, united in the so-called Hungarian
Front, asking for their active support. Horthy even planned to cede powers to
new people, more suitable for a radically changed situation, realising that his
time as a ruler under any circumstances was now over.
However, by early October, Berlin became aware of the
Hungarians’ intentions to bail out. To counteract a possible repetition of the
Rumanian betrayal, the German headquarters drew up a plan, code named Operation
Panzerfaust (Armoured Fist). In planning this operation, the Germans relied not
only on their own men, but on several key Hungarian figures as well, most
notably General Károly Beregfy, the deposed commander of First Army, and Ferenc
Szálasi, the leader of the extremist Arrow Cross movement (officially called
Nyilaskeresztes Párt–Hungarista Mozgalom, or Arrow Cross Party–Hungarist
Movement). After establishing general details of the plan to counteract the
Hungarian escape from the Axis camp, the Germans decided to wait for the
Regent’s next step.
In the meantime, Horthy proceeded with his own plan. He
ordered several Honvédség units he believed could trust to the capital, placed
on alert the few huszár elements available in the country (the division was
returning from Poland), and told the palace bodyguards and the Danube Flotilla
– the only notable force stationed in the capital – to be prepared for any
eventuality. It has to be noted that of these forces, only the bodyguards could
be realistically counted on, but their meagre number was far from sufficient
for such a large scale plan. These actions did not escape Berlin’s attention,
however. They made steps so Operation Panzerfaust could be started at any
moment. Parallel to this, the Arrow Cross party members also started to
organise. The party’s second in command, retired Major Emil Kovarcz, mobilized
and armed party members, ready to counteract any attempts to take Hungary out
of the war. By mid-October, all three sides were ready to act, or counter-act.
The apparent but tensioned lull was dispersed by the first
act preceding the Hungarian coup attempt on 15 October – which happened to be a
pleasant autumn Sunday. At 8:30 in the morning, the Gestapo’s civilian-clad
secret agents, supervised by a certain ‘Dr Wolff ’, a pseudonym of the famous
SS-Hauptsturmannführer Otto Skorzeny, kidnapped Miklós Horthy jr (Operation
Micky Maus), the Regent’s sole surviving son. He was the political leader of
the forces preparing the change and the commander of the army corps stationed
in Budapest, instrumental in Horthy’s plans. This way, the Germans could also
blackmail ‘Micky’s’ elderly father. An hour later, General Vörös arrived at the
palace with the ultimatum signed by Generaloberst Heinz Guderian, Chief of
Staff of OKH (Oberkommando des Heeres). Guderian declared the whole territory
of Hungary as a combat area, where only the German Army headquarters was
allowed to issue orders to military units, including the Honvédség. Regardless
of these ominous facts, Horthy stuck to his plan. At 11:00, he declared his
intention to exit the war and ask for an armistice in front of the Supreme
Crown Council. All his ministers individually agreed to Horthy’s plan. Later,
he ordered the Prime Minister, General Lakatos, to carry out his orders.
At noon, the Regent called Veesenmayer to his office and
informed him of his intentions, including the denunciation of the alliance with
the Third Reich and declaration of a ceasefire with the Soviet Army. The German
plenipotentiary was not expecting Horthy to make a deal with the Soviets and asked
him to reconsider his action. Horthy refused and at 13:10 he delivered a speech
on the national radio station. He declared on the airwaves that the war was
lost, demanded that the Wehrmacht leave the country and asked for an armistice
with the Soviets. Even before the last sentence was aired, the Germans
initiated Operation Panzerfaust. They closed all transmission points in an
attempt to hinder the transfer of Horthy’s instructions to Honvédség units
throughout the country. The orders were nevertheless aired through the second
broadcast of the Regent’s proclamation to his nation. However, at this stage
Horthy’s plan stalled. Many Honvédség officers were outraged that they now had
to deal with the loathed Soviet Army. Several key officers ordered their men
not to put down their arms, but to wait for further orders. Chaos and confusion
reigned in the ranks of the Honvédség and all over Hungary. A key role in the
confusion was played by General Vörös who, having second thoughts, aired on the
radio a further proclamation at 17:20, explaining that Horthy’s proclamation
could not be regarded as capitulation and ordering his subordinates to wait for
further instructions. Prime Minister Lakatos also hesitated to carry out
Horthy’s orders. The contradictory information, rumours and the lack of further
firm orders for action confused even the soldiers loyal to the Supreme
Commander. The country’s population also reacted with apathy. There were no
demonstrations or any mass movements. The leftist leaders did not take the
workers out to the streets, as promised. Everybody was waiting passively for
events to unfold.
In parallel with the Hungarians’ inactivity, the Germans and
their extremist Hungarian allies acted swiftly according to their own plans.
Shortly after 16:00, a small joint German/Arrow Cross detachment occupied the
main radio station building without a single shot being fired. Party members
took over power in several key points of the capital. Soon, they read their own
proclamation to the country, announcing that the Arrow Cross movement had taken
over power in Hungary. Several pro-Arrow Cross officers arrested their
superiors and took over command. Even the trusted Danube Flotilla decided not
to lay down arms and continued to fight against the Soviets. Their pro-British
commander, Horthy’s former aide, Vezérfőkapitány (Captain-General of the River
Forces, equivalent to Vice-Admiral) Dr vitéz nemes Kálmán Hardy, was arrested
by his own men. Acting according to the plans of ‘Operation Trojan Horse’,
aimed at swiftly occupying Budapest, German tanks, supported by elite troops,
mostly Waffen-SS men, took over key positions and aimed their guns on the
Citadel’s gates where Horthy was trapped.
Horthy was isolated from the outside world. He was not aware
of what was going on in the capital, or the countryside. Due to lack of the
expected response from his army and people, he became insecure. His position
was worsened by an ultimatum issued by Marshal Malinovsky, commander of Second
Ukrainian Front, in which he requested that the Honvédség start attacking the
Germans immediately. The tone of the Soviet ultimatum convinced even Horthy and
his most faithful men that such a prompt order could not be carried out and
that there was only one choice he had left – to negotiate with the Germans. At
dawn on 16 October, Horthy was persuaded by Veesenmayer to withdraw his earlier
proclamation and reluctantly handed over power to the Arrow Cross party leader
Ferenc Szálasi, freshly released from the Citadel prison. Later, the Parliament
was informed – without actual proof – that Horthy had resigned and had ordered
the Honvédség to continue the fight against the Red Army. Horthy was then
‘invited’ to SS headquarters, where he was kept under ‘honour guard’ until
events unfolded according to the Germans’ plans. On 17 October, at 17:00,
Miklós Horthy, his family and entourage, boarded a train and headed into German
internment in the Hirschberg Castle in Bavaria. With this final act, the
elderly Regent’s active involvement in Hungary’s destiny came to an end.
Horthy’s son was never released from German captivity and spent the rest of the
war in the concentration camp at Dachau until liberation.
Horthy’s ill-conceived and poorly executed plan to step out
of war and spare his country further destruction failed less than twelve hours
after his proclamation was aired on the radio. As a consequence, Hungary faced
a further eight months of Total War and wanton destruction.
The failure of the Hungarian leaders to leave the Axis camp
had also a noted effect on the behaviour of the Red Army soldiers in Hungary
and their attitude towards the Hungarians, regarding them as the ‘fascist
enemy’, similar to the Germans, and dealt with them accordingly.
