A Statue of Limitations
The Hungarian elections are over.
The controversy over the ‘memory’ statute to World War II goes on. Victor Orban’s Fidesz won the recent national elections against the
neo-liberal, pro-EU Magyar “Socialist” Party (“MSZP”) again. Jobbik came in second in the EU elections and
retained their hold on 3rd in national elections. A tiny left organization made no
headway. Marx is discredited, so no
working class path is open at this point.
The MSZP is the rechristened Hungarian Socialist' Workers Party, which
held power until 1989, and then became a social-democratic organization. The MSZP was elected several times until the effects of the
European economic collapse hit Hungary
in 2009. Hungary now flounders under the right-populist
and reactionary nationalist leadership of Fidesz. Fidesz considers all Hungarian-speaking
citizens of Transylvania, a region now in Romania,
as voters and citizens of a ‘greater’ Hungary. Revanchism by any other name…
 |
| Orban controls the courts, universities, elections, press |
Fidesz and Jobbik represent a reactionary Hungarian response to the failures of
the EU - principally the EU's reliance on the capitalist financial
markets, real estate as private property and austerity for the working
classes. Scapegoating immigrants, Jews, Roma or 'foreigners' is the
main line of nearly all the parties that were more successful in the recent
European Parliament elections except Syriza. Which goes to show that people have to break to the left of the social-democrats to give voice to the working classes.
The statue planned for Szabadság Térre square (‘Freedom
Square’) in Budapest
presents the Nazi imperial eagle attacking the Archangel Gabriel, which
symbolizes an innocent Hungarian (and evidently Catholic) nation. Unfortunately for Orban, real memory still
exists. Miklos Horthy, the leader of Hungary through
most of World War II, was an ally of Hitler’s until 1944. Horthy sent divisions into Russia, some of which were encircled at Stalingrad. When
the Nazi’s got wind that Horthy’s ardor was cooling due to the progress of the
Soviet Army, they moved some troops into Hungary. 430,000 Hungarian Jews were then deported to
death camps, but with only tangential help from the Nazis. The Hungarian Arrow Cross were put in power
in the last year of the war, and drove Hungarian politics to its logical conclusion
- with the help of the existing Hungarian state. Eichmann, the mastermind behind the
Holocaust, was impressed by how efficient the Hungarian authorities were in
rounding up Jews.
Admiral Horthy had been an anti-Semite since his crushing of
the Budapest Soviet in 1919, and the identification of communism with Judaism. Many anti-Jewish laws were passed while he was
in power as a virtual military dictator, dominating Hungarian politics for 25
years. Fidesz supports the restoration
of his memory, which is the subtext of this very statue. Fidesz denies that Horthy had anything to do
with the Holocaust, or that even any Hungarians had anything to do with the
Holocaust. Or that Hungary was in a block with the German state. Denying that the Hungarian Holocaust
was linked to Horthy or the Arrow Cross is like being a grave-digger, but
claiming you had no role in putting the body in the ground – or shooting it. It’s just all those Nazis… It’s a bit like U.S. southerners thinking that the
U.S. Civil War was about ‘states rights’ and not slavery. A white-washing of history.
The Hungarian Jewish organization Mazsihisz,
officially-recognized artists and a prominent art historian have opposed the
statue – the latter two on cultural grounds.
Mazsihisz has pulled out of any event to dedicate the statue. Even 32 U.S. senators sent a letter
opposing the statue – though they were all Jewish, which is a typical culture-war ethnic mistake. (Yeah, only the "Jews" care!) Activists dismantled
the scaffolding of the statue for several days, so now police ring the
construction site at all times. Jobbik backs Fidesz in supporting the design. They are an anti-Semitic and anti-Roma
organization, at this point a pale reflection of the Arrow Cross. Jobbik
recently put up a statue of their own to Horthy near a right-wing Catholic church
in Budapest. Meanwhile, nearly all the statues to the
Soviet Army, the 1919 workers’ councils and the Hungarian workers state have
been relegated to a park outside town.
Politics is now fought through monuments. I wonder when they will tear down the statues
of the poets that dot Budapest
and put them in a ‘park’ in the suburbs – to be replaced by statues of Fidesz television
stars!
Red Frog
May 27, 2014
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