Slovak National Uprising
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The Slovak National Uprising (Slovak: Slovenské národné povstanie, abbreviated SNP) or 1944 Uprising was an armed insurrection organized by Slovak anti-Nazi resistance movement during WWII. It was launched on August 29 1944 from Banská Bystrica. The uprising was an attempt to oust the government of pro-Nazi Jozef Tiso. Although the rebel forces were defeated by Germans, guerilla warfare continued until the liberation of Slovakia by the Soviet Army in 1945.
The use of the word 'national' in the name of the rebellion is still a subject for debate, as some people claim that the allegedly pro-communist uprising did not have unambiguous popular support. Others argue the Uprising had very little to do with Communist resistance.
Preliminaries
Edvard Beneš, leader of the Czechoslovakian government in exile in London, had initiated the preparations for the possible revolt in 1943 when he made first contacts with the dissident elements of the Slovak army. In December 1943, various groups that would be involved with the uprising—the government in exile, Czechoslovak democrats and communists and Slovak army—formed the underground Slovak National Council, and signed the so-called Christmas Treaty, a joint declaration to recognize Beneš' authority and to recreate Czechoslovakia after the war. The council was responsible for creating the preparatory phase of the Uprising.In March 1944, Slovak army lieutenant colonel Ján Golian took charge of the preparations. Conspirators stockpiled money, ammunition and other supplies in military bases in central and eastern Slovakia. The rebelling forces called themselves Czechoslovak Forces of the Interior and the First Czechoslovak Army. Approximately 3,200 Slovak soldiers deserted and joined partisan groups or the Soviet Red Army. In April 1944 some Slovak Jews escaped from Auschwitz and eventually spoke about the horrors in German death camps.
In summer 1944 partisans intensified their war against German occupation forces mainly in the mountains of north-central Slovakia. In July, Red Army troops in the Soviet Union and Poland began to advance towards Slovakia. By August 1944 the Red Army was at Krosno, Poland and within 40 kilometers of the North-Eastern Slovak border.
Two heavily armed divisions of the Slovak Army together with the entire eastern Slovak Air Force were deliberately relocated to Prešov in north-eastern Slovakia in summer 1944 to execute one of two preplanned options to begin the Uprising. The two options were: (1) the two divisions would start the Uprising by coordinating their capture of Dukla Pass (joining Poland and Slovakia through the Carpathian Mountains) with the arrival of the Soviet Army (1st Ukrainian Front under Marshall Ivan Konev), or (2) respond to insurrectional army leader Lieutenant Colonel Ján Golian's orders to start resistance by immediately confronting any invading German forces and hold the pass until the Soviet Army could arrive. Colonel Viliam Talský was Chief of staff over the two divisions. He had agreed in advance with the insurrectional army leadership and the uprising planning committee of the Slovak National Council to execute either of these two plans, depending on the circumstances he faced. On August 27 1944 in Martin, a group of communist partisans killed 30 members of a German military mission en route from Romania, a country that had just changed sides to support the Allies. German troops began to occupy Slovakia the next day to put down the rebellion. At 19:00 hours on August 29 1944 Slovak Defence Minister Gen. Ferdinand Čatloš announced on state radio that Germany had occupied Slovakia. Golian sent the coded message to all units at 20:00 hours to begin the Uprising. Instead of adhering to the agreed plan, Colonel Talský gathered the entire eastern Slovak Air Force on August 30 and abandoned the two divisions flying to a prearranged landing zone in Poland to join Marshall Koniev and the Soviet Army. The two divisions, left in chaos and without leadership, were quickly disarmed on the afternoon of August 30 without a single shot. Consequently, the Uprising commenced prematurely and lost a crucial component of their plan as well as their two most heavily armed divisions capable of resisting any German advance.
Forces
Accounts of the exact numbers of combatants vary. At first, the rebel forces consisted of an estimated 18,000 soldiers. The total increased to 47,000 after mobilization on September 9 1944, and later to 60,000, plus 18,000 partisans from over 30 countries.
In addition to Slovak forces, the combatants included various other groups from escaped French POWs to Soviet partisans and SOE and OSS operatives. The Slovak side had to use mostly bi-planes and improvised armored trains to fight against the better equipped German weapons. In addition to Soviet aid, U.S. B-17 bombers dropped supplies and OSS agents.
The Uprising begins
Rebels began the uprising on August 29 8:00 p.m. under the command of Ján Golian. They entered Banská Bystrica in the morning of August 30 and made it their headquarters. German troops disarmed the Eastern Slovak Army on August 31. Many of the soldiers were sent to camps in Germany while others escaped and joined the Soviet-controlled partisans or returned home.On September 5 Ján Golian became the commander of all the rebel forces in Slovakia and was given the rank of general.
On September 8 the Red Army began an offensive on the Dukla Pass on the Slovak-Polish border. Slovak forces mobilized 47,000 men and tried to open the frontiers in the Carpathian Mountains to let Red Army units to penetrate into Slovakia. The battles dragged on for two months.
By September 10 the rebels gained control of large areas of central and eastern Slovakia. That included two airfields, and the Soviet Air Force began to fly in equipment.
Momentum lost
The pro-German government of Tiso remained in power in Bratislava. Germany moved 40,000 SS soldiers under Heinrich Himmler to suppress the uprising. They detained two Slovak divisions and 20,000 soldiers that had been supposed to secure the mountain passes to help the Red Army.Beneš, the Soviet partisans and various Slovak factions began to demand operational control. General Rudolf Viest flew in and took command on October 7. Golian became 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 Czechoslovakian allies failed to quickly penetrate the Dukla Pass despite of the fierce fighting between September 8 and October 28; they suffered 85,000 casualties. The Czechoslovak government in exile failed to convince western allies to send more supplies to the area.
On September 17 two B-17s flew in the OSS mission of lieutenant James Holt-Green. 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.
Counteroffensive
On September 19 German command replaced General Berger, who had been in charge of the troops fighting the Uprising and General Hofle took charge. 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 October 1 the rebel army was renamed the 1st Czechoslovak Army in Slovakia, in order to symbolize the beginning of the Czech-Slovak reunification that would be recognized by the Allied forces.
Major German counteroffensive began on October 17-18 when 35,000 troops entered the country from Hungary.
By the end of October, Axis forces 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 October 27 just prior to the German takeover. SOE and OSS agents retreated to the mountains alongside the thousands of others fleeing German advance. The rebels prepared to change their strategy to that of guerrilla warfare. On October 28, Viest sent London a message that said the organized resistance had ended. On October 30, General Hofle and President Tiso celebrated in Banská Bystrica and awarded medals to German soldiers for their efforts in the suppression of the Uprising (claimed by some to have been done by Tiso as to save the lives of Slovak soldiers captured by German forces in the Uprising, who were deported to concentration camps, and to save 3 Slovak cities from German bombardment).
After the end of the regular warfare
However, partisans together with the remains of the regular forces continued their efforts in the mountains. In retaliation, Einsatzgruppen executed many Slovaks suspected of aiding the rebels and destroyed 93 villages for suspicion of collaboration. 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) and Nemecká (900 killed).On November 3 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 December 25 and captured them. Some of the men were summarily executed. Germans took the rest to Mauthausen concentration camp where they were tortured and executed.
Aftermath
Much of Slovakia was left devasted by the Uprising and the German counter-offensive and occupation. 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. The Red Army eventually broke through in November. By December 1944 Romanian and Soviet troops had driven German troops out of southern Slovakia in the Battle of Budapest. On January 19, 1945, the Red Army took Bardejov, Svidník, Prešov and Košice in Eastern Slovakia. On March 3-5 they had taken over northwest Slovakia. On March 25 they entered Banská Bystrica and on April 4 marched into Bratislava. Although the main military objectives were not achieved due to inproper timing of the Uprising, which if occurred later could theoretically have reverted the whole of Slovakia to the allied side and allowed the Red Army to quickly pass through Slovakia (though it is questionable whether the Soviet leadership would have preferred such an option), the guerilla struggle bound significant German forces that would otherwise reinforce the Wehrmacht on the frontlines.External links and references
- [Friends of Dukla Pass Association]
- The Slovak National Uprising museum in Banská Bystrica (http://www.muzeumsnp.sk/english/index.htm), the War Museum in Svidník
- [Czechoslovak military units in USSR (1942-1945)], some units of the 1st Czechoslovak Army corps joined Slovak National Uprising
- Kirschbaum, Stanislav. A History of Slovakia: The Struggle for Survival
- Lettrich, Jozef - "History of Modern Slovakia" (F.A. Praeger 1955)
- Vlcko, Peter - "In the Shadow of Tyranny: A History in Novel Form" (Vantage Press 1973); ISBN 0533003636
- Martin D. Brown - The SOE and the failure of the Slovak National Uprising (History Today December 2004)
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