German invasion of Hungary (1944)

Operation Margarethe
Part of World War II

The four-pronged German invasion of Hungary
Date15 March 1944
Location
Hungary
Result

Axis victory

Belligerents
 Germany  Hungary
Commanders and leaders
Adolf Hitler
Döme Sztójay		 Miklós Horthy
Miklós Kállay

In March 1944, Hungary was occupied by the Wehrmacht. This invasion was formally known as Operation Margarethe (Unternehmen Margarethe).[1][2]

Course of events

German Bf 110s flying over Budapest in January 1944.

Hungarian Prime Minister Miklós Kállay, who had been in office from 1942, had the knowledge and the approval of Hungarian Regent Miklós Horthy to secretly seek negotiations for a separate peace with the Allies in 1943. On 3 September 1943, Italy signed the Armistice of Cassibile with the Allies, which led Adolf Hitler to order the occupation of Italy along with the Italian occupation zones in the Balkans and France. On 9 September 1943, on abroad a yacht in the Sea of Marmara, just outside of Istanbul, the British ambassador to Turkey, Sir Hughe Knatchbull-Hugessen secretly signed an armistice with the Hungarian diplomat László Veress under which Hungarian forces would surrender to British and American forces the moment they arrived in Hungary.[3] After the Italian armistice, Hitler ordered the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) to being planning for Operation Margarthe I for the occupation of Hungary and Operation Margarthe II for the occupation of Romania.[4] On 30 September 30, 1943, Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel of the OKW reported to Hitler that both plans were complete and the Reich was ready if either Hungary and/or Romania signed an armistice as the Italy had just done.[5]

Beginning in November 1943, Elyesa Bazna, the Albanian valet to Knatchbull-Hugessen, obtained access to his ambassador's safe, photographed secret British diplomatic documents within, and sold them to the Germans. The Germans paid Bazna with counterfeit British pounds, which thereby ruined his dreams of getting rich from his treachery. One of the documents Bazna sold to the Germans was the secret armistice Knatchbull-Hugessen had signed with Veress. By early 1944, the Red Army had advanced into the Ukraine and almost reached the foothills of the Carpathians.[5] As Germany obtained most of its oil from Romania, Hitler was determined to defend his principle source of oil, which in turn made Hungary crucial to the German war effort as the Romanian oil had to cross Hungary to reach Germany.[5] Owing to his concerns about maintaining access to oil, Hitler believed that the Hungary would bolt from the Axis the moment the Red Army reached the Carpathians.[5] Hitler wanted to prevent the Hungarians from deserting Germany. On 7 March 1944, Hitler decided to activate Operation Margarthe I.[6] As Romania under Marshal Ion Antonescu, Croatia under Ante Pavelić and Slovakia under Father Jozef Tiso all had terroritioal claims against Hungary, Hitler's first plan was to erase Hungary from the map by partioning Hungary between Romania, Croatia and Slovakia.[6] Wilhelm Höttl, a SS officer was opposed to the partition plan, believing that the Hungarians would fight to the death if faced with such a threat.[6] As crossing Hungary was the fastest and easiest route for Romanian oil to reach the Reich, it was likely that the Hungarians would destroy their transport infrastructure such as railroads and bridges, which would temporarily cut Germany off from the Romanian oil at a time when the Wehrmacht was being badly pressed by the Red Army on the Eastern Front. Höttl wrote up a memo calling for a political solution under which Germany would occupy Hungary, but keep horthy as regent in order to prevent any sabotage of the Hungarian transport infrastructure.[7] Höttl had to struggle to get the memo placed on Hitler's desk in the Reich Chancellery, forcing him to bribe an aide-de-camp to leave the memo on Hitler's desk..[7] On 12 March 1944, German troops received orders by Hitler to capture critical Hungarian facilities.[8]

Hitler invited Horthy to the Palace of Klessheim, near Salzburg. On the evening of 15 March 1944, when Admiral Horthy was watching a performance of the opera Petofi, he received an urgent message from the German ambassador Dietrich von Jagow, which stated that he had to see Horthy immediately at the German Embassy.[9] When Horthy arrived, von Jagow gave him a letter from Hitler inviting him to a face-to-face meeting at Schloss Klessheim in Austria on 18 March.[10] On 16 March 1944, Horty met with Kállay who advised him not to go to Schloss Klessheim, saying that as "Supreme Warlord" the Honved (Royal Hungarian Army) would be leaderless in his absence and he suspected a trap.[10] Kállay told Horthy he should send the chief of the general staff, General Ferenc Szombathelyi instead.[10] Szombathelyi agreed to go, but insisted that Horthy come along as well as he felt it would be "madness" for Hitler to spring a trap.[10] On 17 March 1944, Horthy along with Szombathelyi, Lajos Csatay and the Foreign Minister Jenő Ghyczy left for Schloss Klessheim via train and arrived early on the morning of 18 March.[11]

As Horthy was fluent in German, he did not need a translator as he met Hitler and the German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop.[11] As both heads of state conducted their negotiations at Schloss Klessheim, German forces not already stationed in Hungary quietly marched from Reichsgaue of the Ostmark into Hungary. The meeting served merely as a ruse to keep Horthy out of the country and to leave the Hungarian Army without orders.[7] Hitler stated he ordered the occupation in Italy in September 1943 because the Italians had signed an armistice with the Allies and because he knew the Hungarians had also an armistice, he just ordered an occupation of Hungary.[11] Hitler blamed the armistice pm Kállay and stated if Horthy was wiling to co-operate, he would be allowed to continue on as Regent.[11] Horthy later told the British historian C.A. Macartney: "If I had my revolver with me, I would have shot the scoundrel; all my life I'll regret that I didn't do it".[11] The meeting took a bizarre turn when Horthy fled from the conference hall with Hitler and Ribbentrop chasing after him, telling him to sign the protocol or else Hungary would be destroyed.[11] Horthy told Hitler he would give him as word as a Hungarian officer and gentleman he would commit suicide if Hungary surrendered to the Allies, leading Hitler to ask "what good would that do me?"[12] The meeting ended at about noon with Horthy attempting to leave, but being blocked by Ribbentrop who told him the Allies were staging an air raid on Salzburg and he would have to wait.[12]

The negotiations between Horthy and Hitler lasted until 18 March, when Horthy boarded a train to return home. Szombathelyi played the crucial role in convincing Horthy to sign the protocol.[12] At about 8pm, Ribbentrop told Horthy that Hitler wanted to see him again.[12] Hitler softened the blow by promising the occupation would be over as soon as he had confidence in the new Hungarian government, saying "the German troops shall be withdrawn as soon as a new Hungarian government that has my confidence has been formed".[12] On 19 March, the military occupation of Hungary began.[13][14] The Germans kept side-tracking Horthy's train, delaying his return to Hungary while Kállay had no idea of the agreement that Horthy had just signed.[15]

Kállay had went to bed and he later remembered: "I was hardly in me bed when my direct phone with the ministry of the interior rang. Kerzesztes-Fischer told me only to get dressed and that he would be with me very quickly because serious events were under way. A few minutes later he arrived to tell me that the frontier guards had reported that the Germans had crossed the border in trains, tanks and armored cars, the various units evidently heading towards Budapest...Accordingly to the general staff the following forces had been concentrated against us: on the western frontier, five German divisions; in the north and around Kassa one German and one Slovak divisions; along the southeastern frontier ten Romanian divisions; in the Belgrade area, four to five German divisions; westward of this, important Croatian forces had been deposed against us. The only forces that we had ready for action were those in the Carpathians".[16] Kállay called an emergency meeting with the three Honved generals in Budapest, who each commanded a corps, who were János Vörös, Károly Beregfy and István Náday to ask for their advice[17] As the meeting was in progress, a telegram from Szombathelyi arrived, saying that there was to be no resistance until Horthy returned to Budapest.[17] Shortly afterwards, the German military attache, General Greiffenberg, then showed up at the prime minister's office with a letter from Keitel.[17] Keitel's letter was the first inking Kállay had of the Schloss Klessheim agreement.[17] The letter warned that any Hungarian resistance would be "ruthlessly" crushed.[17] Vörös, Beregfy and Náday all advised Kállay that resistance was futile.[17] Kállay was notably angered with the approach of the generals and advocated resistance, saying that history would just the judge the Hungarians harshly if they just accepted an occupation with no resistance.[17] Both Vörös and Beregfy openly refused to obey any orders to resist while Náday warned that an order to resist risked causing a civil war as much of the Hovned officer corps were fascist radicals.[17] The most Kállay was able to achieve was a promise that the Honved would resist if attacked and that the Honved would be put on the highest state of alert.[18] Kállay spent the next three hours buring secret documents from the prime minister's office in the fireplace.[18] Szombathelyi then issued orders saying there was to be no resistance.[18]

When Horthy arrived in Budapest, Wehrmacht soldiers were waiting for him at the station. Horthy was told by von Jagow that Hungary would remain sovereign only if he removed Kállay and replaced him with a government that would co-operate fully with Germany. Otherwise, Hungary would be subject to an undisguised occupation. At a meeting of the Crown Council, Kállay and the Interior Minister Ferenc Keresztes-Fischer gave their opinions that Hungary was no longer independent and any actions taken from this point onwards would be illegal.[19] Keresztes-Fischer added that the SS had arrested 45 well known Hungarians including several MPs.[19] Kállay advised Horthy to abdicate rather go on with the occupation, saying he was legitimizing the German presence by staying on as Regent.[19] The former prime minister István Bethlen also visited the Royal Castle to tell Horthy to abdicate and not to appoint a new prime minister again under the grounds he was lending his prestige to the occupation by staying on.[20] A group of Jewish leaders led by Ferenc Chorin and Móric Kornfeld arrived at the Royal Castle to ask Horthy to stay on as Regent, arguing that if abdicated, someone worse would be appointed as the new head of state.[19] The Germans had wanted Béla Imrédy as prime minister, whom Horthy rejected.[21] On 23 March 1944 Horthy appointed Döme Sztójay as prime minister to appease German concerns.[22]

Being a complete surprise, the occupation was quick and bloodless. Generally, there was little resistance, but there were several border incidents as the frontier guards fired on the invaders and at Bicske the railroad workers went on strike rather than assist with the invasion.[23] There was so little resistance that most Hungarians failed to notice that their country had just been occupied.[24] The initial German plan was to immobilise the Hungarian Army, but with Soviet forces advancing from the north and the east and the prospect of British and American forces invading the Balkans,[25] the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht decided to retain Hungarian forces in the field and so sent troops to defend the passes through the Carpathian Mountains from a possible invasion.

Following the German military occupation, Adolf Eichmann was instructed to arrange the transportation of 550,000 Hungarian Jews from wartime Hungary (including Jews from territories that had been annexed from Czechoslovakia (Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia), Romania and Yugoslavia) to extermination camps with Hungarian authorities' collaboration.[26]

Aftermath

Despite the occupation, Horthy regardless attempted to negotiate a peace treaty and surrender with the Soviet Union. By October 1944 the Soviet Budapest offensive was nearly ready to launch and Horthy made a radio broadcast that an armistice had been agreed. The Germans were ready, however. Horthy was overthrown in Operation Panzerfaust, a coup that placed the Nazi-friendly Arrow Cross Party (NyKP) in power. Following the Siege of Budapest the capital fell to the Soviets on 13 February 1945 and the government fled.[27]

See also

Books and articles

  • Cornelius, Deborah S (2011). Hungary in World War II: Caught in the Cauldron. New York: Fordham University Press. ISBN 978-0823233441.

References

  1. ↑ Andreas Hillgruber, Helmuth Greinert, Percy Ernst Schramm, Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht (Wehrmachtführungsstab) 1940-1945, Band IV: 1. Januar 1944 – 22. Mai 1945 (Bernard & Graefe, 1961)
  2. ↑ Carlile Aylmer Macartney, October Fifteenth: A History of Modern Hungary, 1929–1945, 2 vols. (Edinburgh University Press, 1956–57), II, 226.
  3. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 258.
  4. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 268-269.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Cornelius 2011, p. 269.
  6. 1 2 3 Cornelius 2011, p. 270.
  7. 1 2 3 Cornelius 2011, p. 271.
  8. ↑ Chant, Christopher (1 September 2020). "Operation Margarethe I".
  9. ↑ Cornelius, Deborah S Hungary in World War II: Caught in the Cauldron. New York: Fordham University Press, 2011 p. 273
  10. 1 2 3 4 Cornelius 2011, p. 273.
  11. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Cornelius 2011, p. 274.
  12. 1 2 3 4 5 Cornelius 2011, p. 275.
  13. ↑ "The Holocaust in Hungary".
  14. ↑ see also Hungary in World War II#German occupation of Hungary
  15. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 277.
  16. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 277-278.
  17. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Cornelius 2011, p. 278.
  18. 1 2 3 Cornelius 2011, p. 279.
  19. 1 2 3 4 Cornelius 2011, p. 281.
  20. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 282.
  21. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 284.
  22. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 285.
  23. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 280.
  24. ↑ Cornelius 2011, p. 283.
  25. ↑ Earl F. Ziemke. Stalingrad to Berlin: The German Defeat in the East, page 208. U.S. Government Printing Office, 1968. "In November [1943] the transfer to the Eastern Front of the divisions allocated for Margarethe and intelligence reports that the Rumanians and Hungarians had secretly ironed out their difficulties and might try to desert the Axis in conjunction with an American-British invasion of the Balkans, complicated the problem."
  26. ↑ Cesarani, David (2005). Eichmann: His Life and Crimes. London: Vintage. pp. 159–195. ISBN 978-0-099-44844-0.
  27. ↑ Beyer, Greg (17 October 2024). "The Siege of Budapest in WWII: Everything You Need to Know". TheCollector. Retrieved 26 December 2025.

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