Fraternity-Testvériség, 2007 (85. évfolyam, 1-3. szám)
2007-04-01 / 2. szám
The Treaty of Trianon On the 4th of June, 1920, one of the crudest treaties of human history was signed. Never before had a peace, imposed by violence, been more brutal in its bias, madder in its destructiveness, more forgetful of the lessons of history and better calculated to create future upheavals. The treaty cut mercilessly into the flesh of compact Hungarian populations. Hundreds of towns were separated from their suburbs; villages were split in two; communities were deprived of their parish churches or cemeteries; townships were cut off from their railroad stations and their water supplies. A 1000-year-old European country was made into an invalid as its territory was reduced from 325,000 to 93,000 square kilometers. In the process, 35% of all Hungarians were turned into foreigners within the towns built by their fathers, as the borders were redrawn around them. In this way, the Hungarians became Europe's largest minority as Hungary's territory was reduced by 71.3%. In comparison, the leader of the central powers: Germany lost only 9.5% of its territory. The outrage of this mockery of justice is illustrated by the fact that even Austria lined up at the carcass and received some parts of the dismembered Hungarian Kingdom. From the fragments of Hungary, the unnatural successor states of Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and greater Romania were created. These artificial entities forced Croats to live with Serbs and Czechs to live with Slovaks, demonstrating both the arrogance and the ignorance of Trianon's architects. These successor states were not only geographic monstrosities but also economic absurdities and therefore their self-destruction was just a matter of time. As of this writing two of the three successor states have already disintegrated. The Alleged Guilt Of Hungary Hungary was dismembered because she could not defend herself and because her greedy neighbors decided to help themselves to the unprotected carcass. Naturally, the architects of Trianon could not admit this and therefore invented the theory of Hungary's Guilt, claiming that 1) She started the First World War and 2) She was a historical German ally and as such a destabilizing force in Europe. Neither were true. It was the Serb para-govemmental organization, Narodna Obrana, which, with the encouragement of Russia and with the goal of a Greater Serbia, assassinated Archduke Francis Ferdinand in 1914 and it was the Premier of Hungary, who alone in the Austro- Hungarian Council of Ministers, voted against a war of retaliation against Serbia. As to the claim of being a natural German ally, history proves just the opposite. Whenever Hungary was independent, she acted as a keystone of balance between the Germanic and Slavic peoples and prevented attempts at both Pan- Germanic and Pan- Slavic expansions. In the first 500 years of her existence, starting with the battle of Lechfeld in 955, Hungary fought to block the spread of German influence and created stability by filling the power vacuum of the region. When under Germanic (Austrian) occupation between 1688 and 1867, she twice rose against the Germans and eventually gained her independence from them. The dismemberment of the Kingdom of Hungary in Trianon, 1921 Courtesy of András Szeitz szeitz@unixg.ubc.ca Fraternity - Testvériség / Summer 2007 7
