Slovak Society, the Second World War, and the Search for Slovak "Stateness" J. Luke Ryder Department of History, McGill University, Montreal February 2017 A thesis submitted to McGill University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Ph.D. in History © J. Luke Ryder, 2017 i Table of Contents Abstract………………………………………………………………………….... iii Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………….. v List of Abbreviations…………………………………………………….……..... vii Introduction………………………………………………………………....…….. 1 Chapter I. From the First Czechoslovak Republic to the Slovak State: Elite Politics and State Formation in Between the Wars….….... 12 Chapter II. The Slovak State, 1939-1943: "Construction Work" Unfinished……………………….…..…… 52 Chapter III. Maturing Resistance: Slovak Society from Dislocation to Rupture………….……… 104 Chapter IV. The Slovak Uprising of 1944: Slovak Society from Rupture to Re-Articulation………...….. 150 Chapter V. The Afterlives of the Slovak National Uprising in Postwar Czechoslovakia, 1945-1989………………….…...….. 191 Conclusion…………………………………...…………...………….….……. 244 Bibliography……………………..……………………………………….…... 255 ii Abstract Positioning the Second World War as a pivotal juncture in modern Slovak history, this study argues that the emergence of a Nazi-Allied Slovak State (1939-1945) and the 1944 rebellion launched to overthrow it (known as the Slovak National Uprising [SNU]) were episodes critical to the formation of collective sociopolitical ideals in postwar Slovakia. Under- explored and inadequately understood in Anglo-American scholarship, the Slovak State and the SNU represent uniquely Slovak responses to the major societal ruptures induced by geopolitical fragmentation and war, first following the Munich Agreement of 1938, and then the collapse of German hegemony in Europe in late 1944. Since 1945, these events and their putative legacies have become divisive and heavily mediated constructs, deployed to advance particular political agendas, as well as to challenge or reaffirm existing arrangements of power. Furthermore, because they imply discrete articulations of Slovak state- and nationhood, the State and the SNU have come to support opposing positions in contemporary debates over Slovakia's political future. This research also illuminates some of the ways in which the war initiated transformations in demography, economy, and social practices in Slovakia. More broadly, it suggests that the uses of wartime history in today's East-Central Europe remain both manifold and insufficiently researched. iii Abstrait En positionnant la Deuxième guerre mondiale comme un moment clé de l’histoire slovaque contemporaine, cette étude soutient que l’émergence d’un état slovaque allié aux nazis (1939 – 1945) mais aussi la révolte de 1944 (connue sous le nom de « Soulèvement national slovaque » [SNS]) furent deux épisodes essentiels pour la formation d’idéaux sociopolitiques dans la société slovaque d’après-guerre. Peu étudiés et mal compris dans l’historiographie anglo-américaine, la création de l’état slovaque et le SNS représentent les seules réponses slovaques aux ruptures sociétales majeures introduites par la fragmentation géopolitique et la guerre, d’abord à la suite des accords de Munich de 1938, puis suite à l’effondrement de l’hégémonie allemande en Europe à la fin de l’année 1944. Depuis 1945, ces événements et leur héritage présumé sont devenus des concepts donnant matière à controverse et fréquemment manipulés afin d’être utilisés pour appuyer certains programmes politiques, mais aussi pour défier ou conforter les régimes en places. De plus, puisqu’ils impliquent une articulation différente entre les notions d’état et de nation, l’état slovaque et le SNS ont été utilisés pour soutenir des positions opposées dans les débats contemporains sur le futur politique de la Slovaquie. La présente analyse met également en lumière les conséquences de la guerre sur la démographie, l’économie et les pratiques sociales en Slovaquie. De manière plus générale, elle suggère que, tout en étant largement utilisée, l’histoire de la guerre ne fait pas l'objet de recherches suffisamment approfondies dans l’Europe centrale et orientale d’aujourd’hui. iv Acknowledgements I could not have completed this dissertation project without the vital support of friends, family members, institutions, and mentors. I owe a debt to my parents for encouraging my childhood fascination with the past, and in later years, with all things Mitteleuropa. Friends in North America and Europe have schooled me with the sort of humor and pathos rarely found in books; their insights and belief in the historical craft have also sustained me through the peaks and valleys of this long trek. Many generously offered more concrete kinds of sustenance; I am thankful to Andreas Winkler, Ned Richardson-Little and Julia Sittmann, Carolynn McNally, Anna Thier, and Petra Svardová for their hospitality, whether with a plate of Flamkuchen, a glass of slivovica, or a mooring in a foreign port. Languages have posed a hurdle in my research, one I scarcely could have cleared without the patience and skill of teachers, tutors, and translators. Thanks are due to the Czech linguist and pedagogue Christian Hilchey, German instructor Heidi Wetz-Kubach, and Slovak tutor Michal Gendiar. My friend Gabriela Hlavová rightfully insisted that my spoken Slovak go beyond the barroom basics; she offered crucial assistance translating everything from legal documents to conference papers, as well. I have also gratefully received language grants and instruction from the American Council of Learned Societies, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), Indiana University, Palacký University, and the Goethe Institute. Archival work for this project required several stays in Germany and the Slovak Republic. I'd like to thank the Fulbright Commission in Bratislava, McGill University, and the Centre for German and European Studies at the University of Montreal for making these trips possible. I have benefited considerably from the expertise of my Slovak colleagues. v Historians Marek Syrný and Anton Hruboň provided valuable sources that would have otherwise escaped my attention; Miroslav Michela offered a window into the present-day controversies surrounding Slovak historiography. The Mandel Center fellowship program at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum also exposed me to rare source materials and some of the finest scholars I have encountered in the field. Absent the tireless commitment of my doctoral supervisor, Professor James Krapfl, this project would have never moved past its infancy. His emphasis on critical rigor in interpreting primary sources, careful methodological reasoning in history writing, and a general mastery of secondary literature, have spurred me toward higher standards in academic work. I hope that his infectious enthusiasm for the peoples and cultures of East- Central Europe and singular dedication to documenting their experiences of struggle and triumph have found a voice in my own writing. I am grateful to Professor Judith Szapor, as well as my colleagues and former students at McGill, for regularly reminding me of the larger social import in "doing history." Any achievement reflected in the following pages must above all be shared with my wife and partner, Liz. She has offered unflagging support at every step, buoying me in defeat and cheering me in success. Her wit, groundedness, and generosity of spirit have modeled a rare kind of inspiration—the courage to overcome self-imposed impasses and habits of spiritual abnegation. She has often challenged me with the wisdom captured in French high- wire artist Philipe Petit's aphorism: “Les limites existent seulement dans l'esprit de ceux qui ne savent pas rêver." Whatever errors or oversights that appear in the following are of course mine alone. vi List of Abbreviations AMSNP – Archive of the Museum of the Slovak National Uprising BArch – Bundesarchiv Berlin CDM – Christian Democratic Movement CMD – Czechoslovak Ministry of Defense CNC – Czechoslovak National Council CPC – Communist Party of Czechoslovakia CPS – Communist Party of Slovakia CSS – Central State Security DP – Democratic Party EBHG – Emergency Battalions of the Hlinka Guard FP – Freedom Party GS – General Secretariat HG – Hlinka Guard HSPP – Hlinka's Slovak People's Party HY – Hlinka Youth MC – Military Center MENE – Ministry of Education and National Enlightenment NC – National Committee PP–OS – People's Party–Our Slovakia PSNU – Party of Slovak National Unity RNC – Revolutionary National Committee RTVS – Slovak Radio and Television SCPC – Soviet Central Partisan Command SCTO – Slovak Christian Trade Organization SD – Reich Security Service SDP – Social Democratic Party SMER – Direction–Social Democracy Party SNA – Slovak National Archives SNC – Slovak National Council SNU – Slovak National Uprising SPP – Slovak People's Party USHMM – United States Holocaust Memorial Museum USNA – United States National Archives USP – Union of Slovak Partisans vii viii Introduction At a recent ceremony commemorating wartime Nazi atrocities, Slovakia's Premier Robert Fico offered an unsettling admission: “Some people say that fascism is creeping here [again].... It’s not creeping here, it’s present here."1 Illiberalism at home and abroad have indeed beset Fico and his Direction–Social Democracy party (SMER) over the past year. A few months after a Slovak neo-Nazi party gained several seats in parliament, the Slovak Republic assumed the presidency of a European Union facing right-wing