Vojtech Tuka

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Vojtech Tuka (July 4, 1880, Štiavnické Bane (at that time "Piarg") - August 20, 1946, executed in Bratislava) was the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Slovak Republic between 1940 and 1945 and one of the most controversial people in Slovak history.

Tuka was one the main forces behind the deportation of Slovak Jews to Nazi concentration camps in Poland. He was the leader of the Nástupists (radical wing of the Slovak People's Party).

Contents 1 Early career 2 Espionage allegations and first jail sentence 3 The Slovak Republic and Tuka's rise to political power 4 The persecution of Slovak Jews 5 Fall from power and death 6 Jewish retribution 7 References

[edit] Early career

Vojtech (sometimes referred to by the Magyar name Béla) Tuka was born in today's Štiavnické Bane. He studied law at universities in Budapest, Berlin and Paris. He became the youngest professor in the Kingdom of Hungary, teaching law in Pécs and from 1914 to 1919 at the (Hungarian language) Elisabethan University in Bratislava. After the dissolution of that university he worked as an editor in Bratislava.

After the founding of Czechoslovakia in late-1918, he was a secret agent of the Hungarian government and the secret coordinator of Hungarian irredentism in Czechoslovakia attempting to revive the pre-war Kingdom of Hungary (see Greater Hungary (political concept)), which included Slovakia. Since this aim also required the dissolution of the country of Czechoslovakia, he cooperated with adherents of Slovak autonomy or independence. He saw the struggle for Slovakia's autonomy as an intermediate stage on the way to his final goal — a restored Greater Hungary.

In accordance with his aims, he accepted Andrej Hlinka's offer to enter the Slovak People's Party (in order to destabilize Czechoslovakia through radical Slovak nationalism). He served as the secretary of the Hlinka’s Slovak People's Party (HSĽS), a party whose radical wing called for an independent Slovak state, and edited the party's periodical, "Slovák" (The Slovak). The HSĽS pointed out that the 1920 Constitution had not included that provision for Slovak autonomy alluded to in the Pittsburgh Declaration. Acting on this, the HSĽS introduced a Slovak autonomy bill into the Czechoslovak parliament in 1922. The bill was rejected but the HSĽS had established that autonomy was the core of its program, especially significant since public opinion in Slovakia was drifting towards the decentralists. These growing sentiments would later enable Tuka's rise to power.

In 1923 Tuka founded the organization Rodobrana ("Home Guard"). The Rodobrana was a semi-military organization that policed the HSĽS meetings.

Tuka was a deputy to the Czechoslovak parliament from 1925 to 1929.

[edit] Espionage allegations and first jail sentence

On January 1, 1928 Tuka published an article under the title "Vacuum iuris" alleging that there had been a secret annex to the December 31, 1918 Declaration of the Slovak Nation (Martin declaration), by which Slovak representatives officially joined the newly founded state of Czechoslovakia. Tuka argued that the validity of the declaration was agreed to be limited to ten years, in which case Prague’s writ would no longer run in Slovakia after October 28, 1928. After some hesitation, the Prague government charged Tuka with espionage on behalf of the Hungarian government and high treason. The trial found that Tuka’s allegations were in fact false and sentenced him to fifteen years imprisonment, of which he ended up serving roughly ten. Post-World War II documents retrieved from Hungary however showed that he was in the service of the Hungarian Irredenta.

[edit] The Slovak Republic and Tuka's rise to political power

On March 9, 1939, Czech troops moved into Slovakia (The Homolov Putsch) in reaction to radical calls for independence from Slovak extremists, including Tuka, who had recently released from prison. On March 13, Hitler took advantage of this situation, prompted Jozef Tiso (Slovak ex-prime minister deposed by the Czech troops) to declare Slovak independence. The remaining Czechoslovakia was incorporated into the Reich as a protectorate.

Soon thereafter, after being accused by Hitler of being too friendly to Jews, Tiso made Tuka Prime Minister. Tuka strongly advocated the deportation of Slovakia’s Jewish population to the east Nazi concentration camps. His anti-Semitic and radical policies put Prime Minister Tuka in stark conflict with the moderate President Tiso. Together with Internal Affairs Minister Alexander Mach, Tuka became the leader of the radical and pro-Nazi wing within the Slovak People's Party. This wing — enjoying little support among Slovaks — relied on the Hlinka Guard, i.e. the Rodobrana revived by Tuka when released from jail in 1938. He was also the vice-chairman of the Slovak People's Party.

The conflict between the moderate Tiso-wing and the radicals resulted in the Salzburg Compromise, concluded between Slovakia and the Reich on July 28, 1940, as a result of which Tuka and other anti-Semitic, radical political leaders increased their powers at the expense of Tiso and other moderates. The compromise called for dual command by the Slovak People’s Party and the Hlinka Guard (HSĽS). The Reich appointed storm trooper leader Manfred von Killinger as the German representative in Slovakia. While Tiso successfully restructured the Slovak People’s Party in harmony with Christian corporative principles, Tuka and Mach radicalized Slovak policy toward the Jews.

[edit] The persecution of Slovak Jews

With the shift in power to Tuka and the anti-Semites, Jews were banned from living in streets named after Hitler. In September 1941, the Jewish Code required that Jews wear the yellow star, annulled all debts owed to Jews, confiscated Jewish property, and expelled Jews from Bratislava, the Slovak capital. Twenty thousand Jews were to be deported under the German resettlement scheme, for which the Slovak government was to pay five hundred Reichsmark per deportee. The deported Slovak Jews were later to build the first gas chamber at Auschwitz.

In July 1942, however, Tuka summoned Dieter Wisliceny, an adviser on Jewish affairs, and asked for an explanation regarding the fate of the Jewish families sent to Poland. He was particularly concerned about those who had converted to Christianity, and requested permission for a Slovak commission to travel to the areas occupied by the Jews in order to ascertain their well-being. This outburst of concern on Tuka’s behalf had largely been caused by the diplomatic activities of the Papal Nuncio, Monsignore Giuseppe Bursio.

[edit] Fall from power and death

Despite enthusiastic support by Tuka and the radicals, the Nazis began to realize that they would never be able to completely “Nazify” Slovakia. Thus support for Tuka waned and the Nazis reluctantly gradually accepted acts of Slovak independence such as the suspension of Jewish deportations.

After World War II, following a brief trial, Vojtech Tuka was executed on August 20, 1946 (despite having already suffered a quadruple stroke, which left him disabled in a wheelchair).

[edit] Jewish retribution

In 1997, after two years of lobbying, Slovak Jewish leaders persuaded the Slovak cabinet to return property belonging to Slovak victims of the Holocaust. Swiss banks released a list of dormant account holders which contained the name of Vojtech Tuka. Slovak Jewish leaders, however, said they're not interested in Tuka's money. "Although Slovak Jews had to deposit their gold and money at the National Bank of Slovakia [during the war], they surely didn't deposit it in Tuka's account," said František Alexander, the executive chairman of Slovakia's Central Association of Jewish Religious Communities. Alexander added that the allocation of money from Tuka's account should be decided by an international council of justice, established by Swiss banks.

Although refusing to deal with Tuka's money, Jewish leaders offered a "solution" of how it could be spent. "Since Tuka was co-responsible for the fact that Slovak soldiers initially stood on the wrong side [Slovak fascists who joined the Axis in fighting the Soviet Army on the Eastern Front] and, consequently, many of them died in vain, the money could be used to upkeep their graves," he said.

[edit] References