Romanian Army in Budapest 1919

The book from the link above was written by Andrew Simon, profesor at The University of Akron.
Other book written by the same gentleman above, "JOHN HUNYADI-Hungary in American History Textbooks" states that "[..]Seton-Watson [...] published a book, [I]Racial Problems in Hungary (London, 1908) and numerous anti-Hungarian articles afterward." [/I]It is known that mr. Seton-Watson was a great friend of nations as czech, slovak, serbs, romanians and others.

The clasification "anti-hungarian" of Seton-Watson writings shows clearly the side choosed by mr Simon.

As a mater of fact, the book linked states in it's foreword, writen by mr Simon, that "[...]Bandholtz writes far more about atrocities by the “Allied” Romanian Army[...]"
The same gentleman writes that "Major General Harry Hill Bandholtz was America’s representative to the
Inter-Allied Supreme Command’s Military Mission in Hungary at the end of
World War I."

That's one should ask: Bandholtz, as representative to the Inter-Allied Supreme Command’s Military Mission, was in the position to consider Romanian Army as "Alied" in this way, with " " ? He was a official person!
Or that comment represents the opinion of mr Simon? and in this case, his side is very clear shown by his opinions. And one can see that his side was not wearing red-yellow-blue colours...

That's incorrect. Andrew L. Simon only edited the book (see first page).
The actual book, written by Maj. Gen. H. H. Bandholtz, starts on page 23.

Gen. Dénes

Introduction is by Andrew L. Simon. And he just edited the book.
I'm glad that you noticed what is incorect! That means that the rest of the post is corect

We have in front of our eyes a book which is serving hungarian propaganda.

I'm wondering: this was the only memoires available? Those comented by a pro-hungarian gentleman? After all, Bandholtz was from the USA!

Incorrect, again.

This is a contemporary diary of a high ranking US soldier-diplomat, who witnessed the tumultuous events in the occupied Budapest, and Hungary, first hand.

Being a military man and an American, thus coming from far away, he had no reasons whatsoever to be a mouthpiece of Hungarian propaganda. He mainly observed and described the events he encountered on site and made notices while the events were still fresh. That's why his diary is such an interesting read.

If his work was also used by certain Hungarians to further their cause, that's a totally different matter, and does not detract anything from its value...

Gen. Dénes

This post has been edited by Dénes on December 06, 2007 06:50 am

Bandholz's objectivity is a dellicate issue, which would require some further study. I would recommend Lucian Leustean's book Romania, Ungaria si Tratatul de la Trianon (1918-1920) for this subject.

It seems to me Bandholtz was against Romania's action per se (of counterattacking and eliminating the Bolshevik government) not simply against the controversial or not issue of serizure/looting.

http://www.historicaltextarchive.com/books...bookid=4&post=1

For Denes,
1. Good idea for everyone to read gen. Bandholtz's diary and better understand why he was biased. He died in 1925, the diary was published in 1933, so that anybody could have it dressed up to look better or worse, according to whatever interests might fit. Admiral Horthy's interests (by the way, thanks to the Romanian blood lost on the field of honour fighting the Reds, the admiral without a fleet had plenty of time to build up his ragged army in the French zone of Szeged - in fact, at that time Hungary was practically divided like Germany and Berlin in WW2 - part of it occupied by the Romanian army after battling, the other peacefully by the French, Serbs and the Czechs (the Czech Army was a joke, they needed the French gen. Pelle to take the reins there).
Poor Hungary, to suffer so much after occupying and looting Romania for 2 years (Nov 1916- Dec 1918), together with Germany, Bulgaria and Turkey. By the way, who was the first to say that the winner takes it all? Before Stalin and ABBA !
The real problem of the inter-allied mission in Budapest was that it did not include a Romanian delegate. This was underlined at that time by the diplomats of the Foreign Office (UK), but everyone knows that everywhere in this world the military branch has priority over civilians exactly when it must be the other way around !

2. The first, ever, international Red Brigade (before those in Spain), fought against the Romanian army and lost lamentably. I am interested to know some names, maybe they surfaced later to build the communist society in their own countries.
Everybody should know that POLAND (fighting against Red Russia) and ROMANIA (fighting against the Red Hungary) delayed communism for 25 years. Not USA, not Britain, not French. They did a lot of business with Lenin and Stalin (especially the Americans, long before Germany after Rapallo). But this is another story.

For Victor and Denes,
Leustean's book is based on very serious documents, including papers from the American State Department of those years (1916-1920). Is a must for everyone eager to better understand the intricacies of policies of the so-called super powers at the conference in Paris. Bandlholz's diary is only one of the diaries and memoirs written by other contemporary military people of those days. His greatest merits for someone coming from the American Midwest, a colonel before being dispatched to Budapest (he had to be promoted a general on paper, because all the other members of the interallied mission were generals !). I wonder what were his previous merits on the battlefields in France.
From my point of view, the only military people qualified are those who actually fought along with or against the Romanian army. There are books written by Gen. Berthelot and Gen. Victor Petin (from the French Mission and the Danube Army, later figthing against the bolchevicks), Hindenburg, Ludendorf, Falkenheyn and many others. Also Lord Thompson of Carington wrote something (he was involved in the British sabotage mission of the oilfield area - they promised to pay for it and afterwards, just like many other times, they forgot about it after WW1 !). And the war correspondents also wrote some interesting things (I do not know many names, but everybody was so happy for MARASTI, MARASESTI, OITUZ, and so sad after BUDAPEST !)

What facts are you actually basing your allegations on? According to this logic, all diaries of renowned persons - which, by the way, are usually published after they pass away - cannot be trusted, as all of them could have been manipulated after their death.

Yet another major problem with this post, which repeats a myth perpetuated for years.

The Hungarian Red Army was actually formed only on March 24, 1919! Before that, the Rumanian Army fought against the remnants of the Royal Hungarian Army, which was disintegrating and demoralized after over four years of war and the news of the end of W.W. 1, as well as against ad-hoc local defence units from Transylvania.

Actually, the Rumanians - taking advantage of the positive circumstances for their cause existing in late 1918/early 1919 - would have fought against the Hungarians until they would reach the pre-set goal of defeating Hungary and occupying most of its territory no matter what colour the Hungarians were labelled with: red, blue or green...

Gen. Dénes

This post has been edited by Dénes on December 06, 2007 09:25 pm

as the Freikorps dispatched the "Bavarian Soviet Republic" by mid 1919, there was nothing for the Reds to export, because they were busy with their own troubles.
by 1919 Lenin perilously decided it was a great idea to start "bringing the revolution abroad" against the good advice of a more temperate Trotzki.
And we all know the "success" of that enterprise from the outcome of the Soviet-Polish war.

On the same line, thanks to Pilsudski, who saw the reds as a better discussion partner in a peace conference, for a Poland eyeing for the whole of Belarus, than the more nationalistic whites, stopped a final push which had send the surrounded reds flying into the well deserved oblivion in mid 1919.

So if one comes along to tell that the Polish-Soviet war wasn't about grabbing as much territory as possible, but a noble last-stand to save the europe from communism, he will have to hear that Pilsudski is also guilty for not erradicating the communism in Russia when he had an allmost fool-proof occasion to do so.
Because, after all, the whole war was about the defence against communism, wasn't it?

This post has been edited by dead-cat on December 07, 2007 12:24 am

For Denes,
1. The Romanian Royal Army did not fight at all, against any Hungarian army, between December 1918 and 16th April 1919. All they did was to advance to the line imposed by the superpowers in Paris. They were attacked by the Red Army on 16th April and afterwards it was attack followed by counterattacks, up to Budapest on 3rd August 1919.
2. Everyone should agree on the big mistake made by the so-called allies when not including a Romanian member in the inter-allied mission in Budapest. This is why it was possible for gen. Bandholtz to thank in public to the Romanian generals in Budapest for everything, and sending disgusting messages back home about the so-called naughy Romanian childrens. By the way, what happened to Bandholtz's stamp collection, much of it provided by the Romanians at his most unusual request ? Or to the highest war decorations bestowed to him by the Romanian Royal Family when he travelled to Bucharest WITHOUT THE PROPER AUTHORIZATION GRANTED FROM PARIS ?
3. Romanian army cut the lines connecting the Red army from Russia and Ukraine sent by Lenin and the Hungarian Reds. Everyone knows that the Romanian army had to fight in Pocutia together with the Polish army and in Slovakia (my grandfather's regiment fought at Rakamaz with 2nd Hunters Division) to help the Czechs.
4. Very interesting attitude at that time had the Italians. Colonel Romanelli (interallied mission) and Prince Borghese on the one hand, Gen. Picione on the other hand (he commanded the Czech army and had to be replaced by the French Gen. Pelle for very dubious actions). All of them encouraged Bela Kun's defiant attitude because Italy had territorial interests (Trieste) and economic interests.
5. I still need data on Hungarian kommissars surfacing later as brand-new philosophers, film directors in the West or communist prime-ministers (like Nagy Imre), general secretaries (Rakosi Mathias) and ministers.
5. Not all war diaries were published AFTER somebody's death. You must consider Hindenburg, Ludendorf, Falkenheyn, Averescu and even Nicolae Iorga. You seem to neglect the very damaging statement made by President Hoover on the looting of Budapest pediatric hospital, proved to be a fake. Just like COFARIU, a Romanian beaten to death at TARGU MURES in March 1990 (broadcasted all over the world as a Hungarian beaten to death by Romanians !).

I don't think anybody said that. The question is whether the statement, that Bandholtz' diary has been "dressed up" because it was published a few years after his death is enough.
However, if Bandholtz was biased towards the hungarians, why "dress up" the diary?
Now either he was biased or his diary has been adjusted to a pro-hungarian stance. Both don't fit the same time as accusations.

Having read the first 100 pages last night, i found lots of statements i'd like to cross-check as it isn't clear to me, whether his obvious dislike of romanians in general, is rooted in his experiences in hungary or if it has been allready present before his arrival.
However, I certainly found the introduction by Fritz-Konrad Krüger to be very one sided.

It seems that those who added plenty of notes to the diary of Bandholtz didnt remembered what germans, hungarians and austrians looted from Romania and from romanians from Transylvania.

They are just complaining that now they were "looted".

As I said before: hungarian propaganda, cos the diary is too comented by notes, near introduction and editor's note, trying to persuade the reader from the begining, in one certain direction. It is not impartial at all.
One can recognise all the signs of hungarian propaganda: hungarians are opresed, hungarians are looted, hungarians are killed, hungarians are beated by every surrounding nations: serbs, romanians, czech and so on.
Not a word at all about hungarian deeds, only in the case they are presented as the guiding light of european civilisation.

The Russian communists retook Odessa on April 6 1919.
The Hungarian communists attacked Romanian forces on April 10.
Lenin was known to have ordered troops sent to aid Hungary as early as March.
The French were the most ardent supporters of a united front against communism, with Poland and Romania its main pillars in the region, while the British and Americans were pretty much resigned with the victory of communism in Russia. Later the West did plenty of business with the industrialising Russians and then helped them out withstand Barbarossa.

Gen. Stefan Holban died in 1939. In Bandlholtz's diary there is a very curious note on him (page 29, note 1), stating that he committed suicide on the eve of an investigation ordered by the Romanian government after George Clerk's visit.
Can somebody clarify this matter for me ?
1. Year of Clerk's visit.
2. Year of the investigation ordered by R. government.
3. Actual reason of Holban's death.
Thank you.

This post has been edited by mateias on December 10, 2007 11:09 am