Arrow Cross Party

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The Arrow Cross Party (Hungarian: Nyilaskeresztes Párt – Hungarista Mozgalom, literally "Arrow Cross Party-Hungarianist Movement") was a pro-German anti-Semitic national socialist party led by Ferenc Szálasi which ruled Hungary from October 15, 1944 to January 1945. During its short rule, 80,000 Jews, including many women, children and elderly were deported from Hungary to their deaths. After the war, Szálasi and other Arrow Cross leaders were tried as war criminals by Hungarian courts.

Formation

The party was founded by Szálasi in 1935 as the Party of National Will but was outlawed two years later for its violent radicalism. The party had its origins in the political philosophy of pro-German extremists such as Gyula Gombos, who famously coined the term 'national socialism' in the 1920s. It was reconstituted in 1939 as the Arrow Cross Party, modelled fairly explicitly on the Nazi Party of Germany. Its iconography was clearly inspired by that of the Nazis; the Arrow Cross emblem was an ancient symbol of the Magyar tribes who settled Hungary, thereby representing the racial purity of the Hungarians in much the same way that the Nazi swastika was supposed to allude to the racial purity of the Aryans.

Ideology

The party's ideology was somewhat similar to Nazism, though a more accurate comparison might be drawn between Austrofascism and Hungarian fascism - extreme nationalism, extreme Catholicism, the promotion of agriculture, anti-capitalism, anti-Communism, and militant anti-Semitism. The Arrow Cross Party conceived Jews in racial as well as religious terms, though the necessary scientific capital for a widespread and elaborate program of eugenics simply did not exist in Hungary at the time. Thus, although the Arrow Cross Party was certainly far more modern than the Judeophobic Horthyite regime (Horthy's anti-semitism was based entirely upon Christian belief) it was still very different to the German Nazi Party. Instead, much of the party's ideals were based upon mythos. The paradox being that although the party was pro-Catholic and its anti-semitism had its origins in Christian belief, Szalasi and his colleagues endorsed a respect for the pagan traditions of the Magyar and Avar peoples. The Arrow Cross Party was also more radical economically than other fascist movements, advocating worker rights and land reforms.

Rise to power

During the 1930's, it gradually began to dominate Budapest's working class district, defeating the Social Democrats. It must be noted, however, that the Social Democrats did not really contest elections effectively; they had had to make a pact with the conservative Horthyite regime, thus preventing the abolition of their party. It subscribed to the Nazi ideology of "master races" which, in Szálasi's view, included the Hungarians and Germans, and it also supported the concept of an order based on the power of the strongest – what Szálasi called a "brutally realistic étatism". However, its espousal of a "Greater Hungary" and Hungarian values (which Szálasi labelled "Hungarizmus" or "Hungarianism") clashed with Nazi ambitions in central Europe, delaying by several years Hitler's endorsement of the party.

The German Foreign Office instead endorsed the pro-German Hungarian National Socialist Party, which had support among German minorities. Before World War II, the Arrow Cross were not proponents of the racial antisemitism of the Nazis, but utilized traditional stereotypes and prejudices to gain votes among voters both in Budapest and the countryside. However, the constant bickering among these diverse fascist groups prevented the Arrow Cross Party from gaining even more support and power.

The Arrow Cross obtained most of its support from a disparate coalition of military officers, soldiers, nationalists, crypto-communists and agricultural workers; it was the only interwar party to operate an effective and modern system of recruitment. Utilising these techniques, the Arrow Cross Party promulgated fierce rhetoric and aggressive propaganda. It was only one of a number of similar openly fascist factions in Hungary, but was by far the most prominent. When it contested the May 1939 elections - the only ones in which it stood - the party won more than 25 % of the vote and 30 seats in the Hungarian Parliament. This was only a superficially impressive result; the majority of Hungarians were not permitted to vote. It did, however, become one of the most powerful parties in Hungary. The Arrow Cross was banned on the outbreak of World War II, forcing it to operate underground.

By 1944, however, it had gained the open support of Germany and the pro-German Prime Minister Döme Sztójay legalized the party again in March 1944. In October 1944 Hungary's ruler, Regent Miklós Horthy, was forced to resign by the Germans, who installed the Arrow Cross Party in government and appointed Szálasi as prime minister and head of state. Its rule was bloody but short-lived, as Soviet and Romanian forces were already fighting in Hungary even before Szálasi's takeover. The Battle of Budapest began in December 1944 and the Arrow Cross government effectively fell the following month. Arrow Cross members and German forces continued to fight a rear-guard action in the far west of Hungary until the end of the war in April 1945.

Post-war developments

After the war, many of the Arrow Cross leaders were captured and tried for war crimes; many, including Szálasi himself, were executed.

The ideology of the Arrow Cross has resurfaced to some extent in recent years, with the Neo-Fascist Hungarian Welfare Association prominent in reviving Szálasi's "Hungarizmus" through its monthly magazine, Magyartudat ("Hungarian Awareness"). However, it is very much a fringe element of modern Hungarian politics.

In 2006 a former high ranking member of the Arrow Cross party named Lajos Polgar was found to be living in Melbourne, Australia. Polgar was accused of war crimes, but the case was later dropped and Polgar died of natural causes in July that year.

References

External links

The Siege of Budapest

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