The Last Days of Budapest: The Destruction of Europe's Most Cosmopolitan Capital in World War II, Adam LeBor, author; David Thorpe, narrator
I don’t quite know where to begin. The amount of research that produced the information in this book is astounding, as it shines a bright light on the war in Europe, during the 1940’s, with its focus on Budapest, Hungary. Sadly, many of the same barbaric players are still disrupting world peace today, in Europe and the Middle East. Many of the same hateful kinds of people are gaining support and assuming positions of power with their loud protestations against the innocent that are coupled with the support of those who agree with their evil intentions and age-old hatreds. This book is an intense expression of the hate and barbarism that consumed those who supported Hitler, but also those who supported other authoritarian rulers like Mussolini, Franco, Hirohito and Stalin. Often switching sides to gain the advantage, these leaders were responsible for the war that raged on and on and for the proliferation of sadistic and violent behavior that defied credulity. The author has provided us with an educational and authentic presentation of the effects of World War II on a country with a conflicted allegiance, like so many others, but this country was late to the game. Because it entered late, it was a country that had the most surviving Jews at the end of the war. Yet, in so short a time, the brutality and sadism they experienced seemed far more horrifying than anything that I had learned before.
When the war began, Hungary’s leaders supported Germany’s position. Some underground programs and efforts, however, were staged from Hungary, because they remained quasi-neutral. This allowed the British SOE (Special Operations Executive), to develop some clandestine operations that used Hungary as their base. Spain had diplomatic relations with Hungary so many of the leaders of the resistance were able to use false papers identifying them as Spanish. This offered them immunity and enabled them to help fight back against the Germans and those that supported them. Those that had diplomatic immunity could move around more freely, engaging in surreptitious behavior, but many were betrayed, caught and executed. Hungary’s Regent, Admiral Miklós Horthy, actually tried to remain neutral, which kept Hungarian Jews safe from deportation until 1944 when a coup removed him from power. Still, the Hungarian authorities did align themselves with Hitler’s policies. Until the coup led by Ferenc Szálasi removed Admiral Horthy, varied people and organizations were more able to help the Jews escape if they wished. They could also attempt to hide their children and to save some lives when threatened. After 1944, it became far more difficult. The aid, however, came from people from all walks of life. It was the rich, the famous, the young, the old, the aristocratic, the Jew and the Christian who stepped up to the plate to save the lives of those being persecuted. Sadly, though, many Hungarians were as bad or worse than the Germans they supported.
Tragedies, errors, mistakes, lack of experience, incompetence, and accidents of fate prevented many efforts to save the people and the country, but that cannot take away from the efforts of the heroes who tried. In so many cases, sheer luck determined the outcome. Most of the Jewish community was wiped out in Europe because of the warped, barbaric behavior of a citizenry that was mad with hate, greed and selfishness, jealousy and envy. One can’t help but ask how such collective madness could gain a foothold in the world, yet are we not witnessing some of the same kind of madness flourishing again today? As we witness war again between Russia and Ukraine, the proliferation of hate again with the protest marches against Israel in America, as we witness antisemitism again with the barbaric attack of Hamas against the Jews on October 7th 2023, we are seeing the same kind of political games, power and greed motivating the behavior of the heads of state and the people participating in this grotesque behavior. Most people have not learned from history, but soldiers and innocent citizens are the victims who pay the price for their fury and decisions. History will judge the outcome and the players of today’s horrific behavior as it has judged the behavior of the past, but it seems that no one has learned from the past, since the same monstrous attitudes are resurfacing.
This book is so well researched that it leaves no assessment of any situation to chance, although life and death was often serendipitous, completely dependent on accidents of fate, it was mostly orchestrated by demented psychopaths who enjoyed the killing and the torturing. Using historic records, victim testimonies, court records, documents, diaries and other sources, the author has laid bare that period between 1940 and the end of World War II. He even goes back into the early 20th century and details the history of Hungary and its possible reasons for supporting Germany’s hateful policies, and then, eventually attempting to abandon Germany, but failing. Unfortunately, we are watching similar situations today, involving wars in Europe and the Middle East as the same mindset is guiding these leaders who are intent on conquering land that is not theirs to conquer. They are murdering innocent victims in the process.
There are a great many characters, names and dates, places and events in this book, so many, that in fact, it often gets confusing, but the information is so well researched that one cannot turn away, even when the incidents reported are revolting. They will make the reader wonder how human beings could even think of the things that were done to other humans and then think that they could get away with their cruelty. When one thinks of the heinous behavior some human beings were capable of, it was especially helpful to also learn of the acts of heroism that took place to try and combat those who were so evil, those who were trying to exterminate people, not because of anything they had done, but because of who they were. They derived sadistic pleasure from the torture and barbarism. The perpetrators did not only prey upon the Jews. They also murdered the Roma (gypsies), who like the Jews, were also thought to be racially inferior to the Aryans. However, their greatest effort was geared toward the annihilation of Jews.
The acts of barbarism defy the imagination. Three people would be tied together. The middle one was shot forcing that victim to fall into the Danube and take the other two with them to drown. Sometimes, whole families were murdered this way. Male sex organs were mutilated. Woman were raped with foreign objects. Twins were sewn together so their blood vessels would mix and then they would be left to die. These were only some of the monstrous ways in which people were tortured and murdered by the Germans and the Arrow Cross. The idea that the population was unaware of the brutality is a farce. The looting and the violence carried out by the citizens and the psychopaths was contrasted by the bravery of the heroes who stepped forward to try and save the victims, often becoming the victims themselves.
What would make a normal person seek the extermination of anyone? Why would so many go quietly into the night and not fight back? They were led to the slaughter like the proverbial lambs that they were. Even when the Germans were losing the war, the Hungarian fascist Arrow Cross Party, led by Ferenc Szálasi, became even more cruel in their behavior toward their victims. They murdered children, the elderly, doctors, nurses and their patients in cold blood as they emptied the orphanages, hospitals, and nursing homes. When the Russians came and so-called liberated the country, they were even more barbaric, in some cases, raping, pillaging and murdering those who had falsely thought they had survived the carnage. The book highlights the places, the people and the camps where people withered and died. Sometimes the information is overwhelming and difficult to believe, but the barbarism, deportations, and outright murder of the Jews, and others of Hungary is well is documented.
Varied emotions are displayed on every page. There was abject terror, passive acceptance, grief, fury, frustration and helplessness, because there was no way to fight back once the door was open and the monsters entered. They were slowly robbed of their possessions, their self-respect, their independence, and finally, their lives. Several facts are important. I will highlight a few. The Glass house provided papers for Jews hoping to escape. Carl Lutz, a Swiss diplomat was the person behind it. There were far less permits, however, than people seeking refuge. Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat, engaged in several rescue operations saving thousands of Jews. He disappeared, and no one knows what happened to him. When bodies were thrown into the river after they were shot, he and his people rescued those who managed to separate themselves from those they were tied to and then swim away. Hannah Senesh (Szenes) rescued Jews from deportation. She had moved to British Palestine and was safe from Hitler’s madness, but she returned to Hungary to help in the resistance effort of the SOE.
Tracing the history of Buda and Pest from the early 1900’s through the days of WWI and WWII, the author has done a remarkable job of detailing the entire history of Budapest, Hungary, from the Trianon Treaty that crippled them, to the Communist takeover, and then to the invasion by the Nazis. Revolutions and protests seem to have been a big part of its past. I was struck with the question of why Hungary would align itself with Germany again after failing the first time in World War I.
The book could have used some editing as it was often repetitious and the time line wandered. However, because of the amazing presentation of information and sources, that has to be forgiven. The book made me wonder why today’s Jews are supporting those who want to eliminate them “from the river to the sea” and are supporting a candidate for mayor, in NYC, that does not support them either. Why haven’t they learned from history and October 7th that turning the other cheek only gets both sides slapped? The belief that if they are kind to their enemies their enemies will learn to like them seems to be an obvious oxymoron, but their complicity, with their support, seems to have encouraged even more of a madness in the world that is once again embracing antisemitism.