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Slovakia and its Minorities 1939–1945: People With and Without National Protection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Yeshayahu Jelinek
Yeshayahu Jelinek*
Affiliation:
University of Haifa
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Extract

In October 1966, a conference of Czech, Slovak, and Magyar historians discussed in Bratislava (Czechoslovakia) the characteristics of Fascism in their respective countries. The nature of Slovak nationalism caught the attention of the participants. While mainly analysing Slovak-Magyar relations, the scholars touched only slightly on some of the other ethnic groups living in Slovakia, Germans, Ukrainians, Poles, Gypsies, and Jews. In order to study and understand Slovak nationalism during the Second World War, problems and conditions of each of the above-metnioned groups should be studied. A mutual comparison might assist in the creation of a substantive summary. Yet even a most thoroughgoing analysis of the relations between a dominant nation and the subjected minorities would not provide us with a comprehensive definition of Slovak nationalism.

Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 4 , Issue 1 , Spring 1976 , pp. 1 - 15
Copyright
Copyright © 1976 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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References

Notes

1. Príspevky k dejinám fašizmu v Českosiovensku a v Madarsku, Bratislava, 1969, pp. 309–321.Google Scholar

2. According to the census of December 31, 1938, out of 2,656,426 inhabitants of Slovakia, 2,260,894 were Slovaks, 77,488 Czechs, 69,106 Ruthenes, 128,347 Germans, 57,897 Magyars, 3,848 Poles, 28,763 Jews (85,045 proclaimed themselves as being of the Mosaic faith), 26,265 Gypsies. (Uzemie a obyvatellstvo Slovenskej Republiky a prehl'ad obcí a okresov odstupených Nemecku, Madarsku a Pol'sku, Bratislava, 1939, p. 11.)Google Scholar

3. The Slovak League was one of the main bodies in charge of promoting Slovakhood.Google Scholar

4. Pavol Čarnogurský, “Narodný stát,” Slovák (Bratislava), April 5, 1939.Google Scholar

5. The Slavonic minority in East Slovakia was termed variously as Ukrainians, Ruthenes, Russins, and Rusniaks. I shall use the terms, “Ukrainians” and “Ruthenes,” interchangeably.Google Scholar

6. No. 185/1939, paragraphs 91–95 of the Collection of Slovak Laws.Google Scholar

7. No. 255/1939 of the Collection of Slovak Laws; Regulations of the Minister of Interior No. 17 622-5/1939 of October 18, 1939.Google Scholar

8. No. 185/1939, paragraph 59, and No. 121/1940 of the Collection of Slovak Laws.Google Scholar

9. The Political Archives of the German Foreign Ministry, Bonn, File Inl II C 2421; Deutsche Gesandschaft, Kult 3, Nr. 6, Nr. 3325, Bratislava, June 1, 1943: Vortrag des deutschen Volksgruppenfeuhrer Ing. Franz Karmazin vor dem Voelkerrechtsausschuss der Deutschen Akademie in Berlin am 26.3.1943.Google Scholar

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21. Supra, pp. 150–152. Dudáš, the Leutenant-General of Šariš-Zemplin administrative district (1940–1945), was a notorious Slovak chauvinist and Anti-Semite.Google Scholar

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28. Gardista (Žilina), July 30, and August 14, 1942; Slovakische Rundschau (Bratislava), III, 10 (May 15, 1942), p. 15.Google Scholar

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30. An expression used by the ranking officials of the Slovak Foreign Ministry, Yeshayahu Jelinek, “The ‘Final Solution'–the Slovak Version,” East European Quarterly, IV, 4 (January 1971), p. 12.Google Scholar

31. T-175, R 556, 9431610, SS Sicherheitdienst report on a Karmazin-Endroes conversation, January 3, 1940.Google Scholar

32. For a discussion of the information filtered to Slovakia, see my unpublished dissertation, Hlinka's Slovak People's Party, 1939–1945, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA, 1966, pp. 156–158.Google Scholar

33. Yeshayahu Jelinek, “The Role of the Jews in Slovakian Resistance,” Jahrbuecher fuer Geschichte Osteuropas, Neue Folge, XV, 3(September 1967), p. 419.Google Scholar

34. T-175, R 522, 9391614, Report of the German Legation about the situation of the Ukrainian minority, April 23, 1941.Google Scholar

35. Actes et Documentes du Saint Siege Relatifs a la Seconda Guerre Mondiale, Citta del Vaticano, 1967, Vol. 3, Document No. 87, p. 184, Orsenigo to Maglione, January 5, 1940; Doc. No. 104, p. 205, Maglione to Orsenigo, January 19, 1940; Doc. No. 118, p. 222, Orsenigo to Maglione, February 24, 1940; Doc. No. 320, p. 486, Notes of Msgr. Tardini, October 21, 1941, etc.Google Scholar

36. Livia Rothkirchen, “The Policy of Vatican and the Holocaust in “Independent Slovakia,” Yad Vashem Studies, VI (1966), pp. 23–45.Google Scholar

37. Slovák (Bratislava), May 1, 1940, p. 8. An address given by Dr. Tiso; T-175, R 529, 9400298, Franz Karmazin (?): Grundlinien zum Aufbau der Deutsch-Slovakischen Gesellschaft, November 2, 1939.Google Scholar