Slovak National Uprising

Situation map in first days of Slovak National Uprising

Rebels began the uprising on 29 August at 8:00 p.m. under the command of Ján Golian. They entered Banská Bystrica in the morning of 30 August and made it their headquarters. German troops disarmed the Eastern Slovak Army on 31 August. Many of the soldiers were sent to camps in Germany while others escaped and joined the Soviet-controlled partisans or returned home. On 5 September Ján Golian became the commander of all the rebel forces in Slovakia and was given the rank of General. Slovak forces in central Slovakia mobilized 47,000 men. His first analysis of the situation predicted that insurgents could resist German attacks for about two weeks.[7]

Guards at the three main labor camps, Sereď, Nováky, and Vyhne, fled at the beginning of the uprising and most Jewish prisoners left.[8][9] About 1,600[10] to 2,000[11] Jews fought as partisans, ten percent of the total insurgent force.[12] Fifteen percent of Jewish partisans were killed.[11] Many Jewish partisans hid their religious affiliation due to antisemitism in the partisan movement.[13]

By 10 September the rebels had gained control of large areas of central and eastern Slovakia, including two airfields, which were used by the Soviet Air Force to fly in equipment.

The German offensive retakes territory.

The pro-German government of Tiso remained in power in Bratislava. Germany moved 40,000 SS soldiers under Gottlob Berger to suppress the uprising, which detained and disarmed two Slovak divisions and 20,000 soldiers that had been supposed to secure the mountain passes to help the Red Army. Beneš had met with Stalin and Molotov in Moscow in December 1943 to secure Soviet support for the uprising, but Soviet premier Joseph Stalin and the Soviet military command Stavka failed to deliver the needed support on time to the insurgent army and even blocked Western offers of military aid, as they had done only a few weeks earlier during the Warsaw uprising. Meanwhile, General Konev and the Soviet partisan headquarters in Kiev, Ukraine, continued to undermine the Slovak insurgent army by ordering partisan groups operating in forward positions in Slovakia to conduct operations independently of the Slovak insurgent army and avoid coordination. The Soviet-led partisans even demanded and took desperately needed weapons and munitions that had been stored for the Slovak uprising. The vast majority of Soviet airdrops of weapons over insurgent-held territory in Eastern and Northern Slovakia were quickly confiscated by Soviet partisans and little ended up in the hands of the much stronger and better trained Slovak insurrectional army.

Ján Golian, one of the main organizers and commander of the rebel forces.

On 8 September, the Red Army began an offensive on the Dukla Pass on the Slovak-Polish border and tried to fight through the Carpathian Mountains to penetrate into Slovakia. This poorly planned and late action resulted in tremendous casualties on both sides and became bogged down for nearly two months.

Beneš, the Soviet partisans, and various Slovak factions began to argue among themselves, each seeking operational control. Despite repeated efforts, General Golian could not persuade the different sides to coordinate their efforts. General Rudolf Viest flew in and took command on 7 October, with Golian becoming his second-in-command. Viest could not control the situation when political rivalries resurfaced in the face of military failure.

The uprising also coincided with the stalling of the Soviet summer offensive, the failure of the Warsaw Uprising, and other troubles on the side of the Western allies. The Red Army and its Czechoslovak allies failed to quickly penetrate the Dukla Pass despite fierce fighting between 8 September and 28 October; they suffered 85,000 casualties (21,000 dead). The Czechoslovak government in exile failed to convince Western allies to ignore Stalin's obstructionism and send more supplies to the area.

On 17 September two B-17 Flying Fortresses flew in the OSS mission of Lieutenant James Holt-Green. The SOE team of Major John Sehmer followed the next day on its way to Hungary. Their reports confirmed the suspicions of Western Allies that the situation of the uprising was worsening.

Jozef Tiso decorates German soldiers in Banská Bystrica after the uprising

On 19 September, German command replaced SS-Obergruppenführer Berger, who had been in charge of the troops fighting the Uprising, with General Höfle. By that time Germans had 48,000 soldiers; they consisted of eight German divisions, including four from the Waffen-SS and one pro-Nazi Slovak formation.

On 1 October the rebel army was renamed the First Czechoslovak Army in Slovakia, in order to symbolize the beginning of the Czech-Slovak reunification that would be recognized by the Allied forces.

A major German counteroffensive began on 17–18 October when 35,000 German troops entered the country from Hungary, which had been under German military occupation since 19 March 1944. Stalin demanded that his advancing Second Ukrainian Front led by General Malinovsky be immediately diverted from Eastern Slovakia to Budapest. The western advance of Soviet forces came to a sudden halt in late October 1944, when Stalin's interests focused on Hungary, Austria and Poland rather than Slovakia or the Czech lands. By the end of October, Axis forces (six German divisions and one pro-Nazi Slovak unit) had taken back most of the territory from the insurgents and encircled the fighting groups. Battles cost at least 10,000 casualties on both sides.

Insurgents had to evacuate Banská Bystrica on 27 October just prior to the German takeover. SOE and OSS agents retreated to the mountains alongside the thousands of others fleeing the German advance. The rebels prepared to change their strategy to that of guerrilla warfare. On 28 October, Viest sent London a message that said the organized resistance had ended. On 30 October, General Höfle and President Tiso celebrated in Banská Bystrica and awarded medals to German soldiers for their part in the suppression of the uprising.

The main OSS team, along with two British officers and a soldier, a Czech officer, two American civilians and war correspondent Joseph Morton were cornered near the village of Polomka by Christmas 1944, under heavy winter conditions, and captured on 26 December by a 300-man strong German SS anti-partisan unit.[5] All of them were taken to Mauthausen concentration camp, where the agents and soldiers were executed in January 1945. Morton's life was not spared, and he was also shot to death on 24 January 1945.[14]

Memorial of the Slovak National Uprising in Banská Bystrica

Armored train Hurban (replica) preserved in Zvolen

Nonetheless, partisans and the remains of the regular forces continued their efforts in the mountains. In retaliation, Einsatzgruppe H and the Hlinka Guard Emergency Divisions executed many Slovaks suspected of aiding the rebels as well as Jews who had avoided deportation until then, and destroyed 93 villages on suspicion of collaboration. Several villages were burned to the ground and all their inhabitants were murdered, as in Ostrý Grúň and Kľak (21 January 1945) or Kalište (18 March 1945). A later estimate of the death toll was 5,304 and authorities discovered 211 mass graves that resulted from those atrocities. The largest executions occurred in Kremnička (747 killed, mostly Jews and Roma) and Nemecká (900 killed).

On 3 November, the Germans captured Golian and Viest in Pohronský Bukovec; they later interrogated and executed them.

SOE and OSS teams eventually united and sent a message in which they requested immediate assistance. Germans surrounded both groups on 25 December and captured them. Some of the men were summarily executed. Germans took the rest to Mauthausen concentration camp where they were tortured and executed.

The German victory only postponed the eventual downfall of the pro-Nazi regime. Six months later, the Red Army had overrun Axis troops in Czechoslovakia. By December 1944 Romanian and Soviet troops had driven German troops out of southern Slovakia in the Battle of Budapest. On 19 January 1945, the Red Army took Bardejov, Svidník, Prešov and Košice in Eastern Slovakia. On 3–5 March they had taken over northwest Slovakia. On 25 March they entered Banská Bystrica and on 4 April marched into Bratislava.

The main military objectives were not achieved due to the bad timing of the uprising and lack of cooperation by Soviet partisans. This undermined the plans of the insurrectional Slovak army. The guerrilla struggle, however, tied up significant German forces that could otherwise have reinforced the Wehrmacht on the eastern front against the advancing 1st Ukrainian Front to the north and south of Slovakia. Nevertheless, much of Slovakia was left devastated by the Uprising and the German counter-offensive and occupation.

29 August is a national holiday in Slovakia. Starting in 1947 various Commemorative coins of Czechoslovakia were minted in remembrance of the uprising.

• Bauer, Yehuda (2002). Rethinking the Holocaust. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-09300-1.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Fatran, Gila (1996). "Die Deportation der Juden aus der Slowakei 1944–1945" [The deportation of the Jews from Slovakia 1944–45]. Bohemia: Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Kultur der Böhmischen Länder (in German) (37): 98–119.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Kubátová, Hana (2014). "Jewish Resistance in Slovakia, 1938–1945". In Henry, Patrick (ed.). Jewish Resistance Against the Nazis. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press. pp. 504–518. ISBN 978-0-8132-2589-0.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Nižňanský, Eduard; Rajcan, Vanda; Hlavinka, Ján (2018). "Nováky". In Megargee, Geoffrey P.; White, Joseph R.; Hecker, Mel (eds.). Camps and Ghettos under European Regimes Aligned with Nazi Germany. Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos. 3. Translated by Kramarikova, Marianna. Bloomington: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. pp. 874–877. ISBN 978-0-253-02373-5.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Nižňanský, Eduard; Rajcan, Vanda; Hlavinka, Ján (2018). "Sereď". In Megargee, Geoffrey P.; White, Joseph R.; Hecker, Mel (eds.). Camps and Ghettos under European Regimes Aligned with Nazi Germany. Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos. 3. Translated by Kramarikova, Marianna. Bloomington: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. pp. 881–883. ISBN 978-0-253-02373-5.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Nižňanský, Eduard; Rajcan, Vanda (2018). "Vyhne". In Megargee, Geoffrey P.; White, Joseph R.; Hecker, Mel (eds.). Camps and Ghettos under European Regimes Aligned with Nazi Germany. Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos. 3. Translated by Kramarikova, Marianna. Bloomington: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. pp. 887–888. ISBN 978-0-253-02373-5.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Rothkirchen, Livia (2001). "Slovakia". In Laqueur, Walter; Baumel, Judith Tydor (eds.). Holocaust Encyclopedia. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 595–600. ISBN 978-0-300-08432-0.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)