Századok – 2002

Tanulmányok - A Sajti Enikő: Impériumváltás; magyarellenes megtorlások; kitelepítések és a konszolidáció feltételeinek kialakulása a Délvidéken 1944–1947 V/1061

A DÉLVIDÉK 1944-1947 KÖZÖTT 1113 vákuumot Tito az ő kárára töltse ki. Sztálin elképzeléseibe 1947 után végképp nem illett bele egy balkáni jugoszláv középhatalom. Sztálin 1948-ban Jugoszlávia ellen indított „nemzetközi koncepciós pere" során Magyarország jó szomszédból ismét ellenséggé vált, a jugoszláv önigazgatás bevezetése miatt pedig megbomlott a két ország közötti rendszerazonosság is. Márpedig, mint láttuk, e két előfeltételen nyugodott Belgrád magyarokkal kapcsolatos kisebbségpolitikája, e két előfeltétel viszont 1948-ban megszűnt. Ezért ettől kezdve az anyaország 1944 után egyébként is csekély kisebbségtámogató lehetőségei megszűntek és kizárólag Jugoszlávia hatalmi elitjének józan belátásától függött, hogy megbüntetik-e ismét kollektive a magyarokat anyanemzetük politikája miatt, vagy hagynak számukra némi mozgásteret. Az ország kényszerhelyzete szerencsére ez utóbbi irányába hatott. CHANGE OF REGIME, ANTI-HUNGARIAN RETALIATIONS, RESETTLEMENTS AND THE CONDITIONS OF CONSOLIDATION IN NORTHERN SERBIA IN 1944-1947 by A. Sajti Enikő (Summary) The study attempts for the first time in Hungarian historiography to narrate on the basis of Hungarian and Yugoslav archival sources the fate suffered by the some 500.000 Hungarians of northern Serbia (former southern Hungary) from the arrival of the Yugoslav army in October 1944 to the signing of the Hungarian-Yugoslav treaty of friendship in December 1947. The author describes the revenge taken by the partisans, the „even colder days", and analyses the roots of the retaliation, which went back mostly but not exclusively to the Hungarian razzia of 1942. She also tries to establish the sources and the credibility of contemporary estimates which put the number of Hungarians killed by the troops of the Department of National Defence, the cleansig apparatus of the Yugoslav administration, at some 40.000, a figure which has been fixed in Hungarian historical memory. Having examined the results of recent research, she comes to the conclusion that on account of considerable differences between the various estimates (they range from 5.000 to 4.0000 victims) no satisfying result can be attained. The common feature of the Yugoslav military administration and of the Hungarian system introduced in 1941 was the intention of both states at the time of their respective acquisition of the territory to make it nationally as compact as possible and, in the lack of an effective political structure to hold a strong grip of the local administration by means of a strong military presence. The author then analyses the gradual decrease of the attententio paid to the Hungarians of Yugoslavia by the Hungarian foreing policy, which led to the Hungarian government's tolerating without protest the mass retaliation directed against the Hungarians, the complete resettlement of whole villages and the forced removal of thousands of Hungarians to working camps. This attitude can be explained by at least two reasons: first, by the bad conscience caused by the razzia of 1942; secondly, by the foreigh policy which saw Yugoslavia as the only country among the neighbours of Hungary from which support could be obtained at the peace treaty and in opposing the mass removal of Hungarians from Czechoslovakia. The study examines in detail the expatriation of the Hungarians, the plans of mutual resettlement elaborated by the government in Belgrade, the effects of the Yugoslav agrarian reform on the Hungarian minority and the gradual emergence of the political and ideological conditions of consolidation and its results. It is with regard to the ancient notional unity in Serbian national identity of land and race that the author interprets the Yugoslav plans of partial or entire expatriation of the Hungarians in 1944/45 as well as the actual Slav settlements carried out in northern Serbia at the same time. The study also examines the major social consequences for the Hungarians of the agrarian reform and of the settlements. The author concludes that as a result of the third consecutive change of rule since 1918 the Hungarian society of northern Serbia not only suffered an unprecedented loss in numbers (some 84.800 people left Yugoslavia, almost twice as many as in 1918), but also completely lost its otherwise much weakened middle classes. The consequence was