SNP and the struggle for the character of the state – Essay – PRAVDA.sk

According to the evaluation of the inhabitants of Slovakia, the Slovak National Uprising is also the most important national historical event. It might seem that there is no reason to defend the Uprising in this statement. Nevertheless, as is the case with groundbreaking revolutionary events, there are also conflicting assessments based largely on the original human attitude to this event.

Stanislav Mičev, director of the SNP Museum

08/29/2021 06:00

War veterans arrive at the reverential act of laying wreaths on the occasion of the celebrations of the 75th anniversary of the SNP outbreak. The picture is from the SNP Museum in Banská Bystrica from August 29, 2019.

The most important scientific institutions dealing with research into anti-fascist resistance, SNP and liberation agree in the evaluation. The Institute of History of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Political Science of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, the Military History Institute and the SNP Museum have published a number of valuable and well-founded publications since 1989.

The authors criticizing the Uprising referred to the plurality of opinions and criticized the “unilateral” evaluation of the resistance and the SNP from the authors of the mentioned institutions. The whole process started immediately after November 1989, when exiled authors such as František Vnuk and Milan Ďurica returned to Slovakia. They were joined by some domestic historians, often doing somersaults.

The essence of the Uprising has not changed in any way

Of course, the discussion of the meaning and mission of the SNP was a natural phenomenon after November 1989. However, nothing has changed on the very essence of the Uprising. It remained an expression of disagreement with the occupation of Slovak territory by a foreign power, although at that time a human ally. It continued to be an expression of disagreement with the long-standing and already unsustainable collaboration with Nazi Germany, as well as an expression of disagreement with the people’s domestic and foreign policy. With that policy which, unlike the countries of the former Nazi allies, did not seek a way to an anti-Hitler coalition even at these critical moments, but remained faithful to the bone to the alliance with Adolf Hitler.

If the ruling party did not have the strength or willingness to find a way to the years to come, on the contrary, the opposition illegal political representation found this strength and merged, despite considerable ideological differences, into a common programming concept expressed in the Christmas Agreement of December 1943.

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After November 1989, the plurality of opinion spread very quickly to the domestic stage. There was a sharp criticism of some practices of the Slovak Union of Anti-Fascist Fighters by Milan Žitný on the pages of the student magazine Zmena. A kind of detonator was a lecture by the historian Jozef Jablonický at Comenius University. It sounded in front of a multi-member auditorium on the eve of the announced television dialogues on the topic of the SNP. However, the expected dialogue of Jozef Jablonický with Viliam Plevz did not take place in the end. Many renowned historians also refused to participate in the discussion on television, so Anton Hrnko represented the historical community on behalf of the Institute of History of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and I on behalf of the SNP Museum, while the representation of participants in the anti-fascist resistance was really representative.

The discussion met with unexpected public interest and its originally planned minutes were eventually doubled. Few were aware of this at the time, but the struggle for the character of the Slovak political scene began to take place on this soil. It began to be a question of whether Slovakia subscribes to the legacy of the Slovak state or to the legacy of the Uprising. This struggle culminated in the first half of the 1990s and became one of the key political problems, especially with the establishment of the Slovak Republic.

Massaging the public

Writing about defending the ideas of the Uprising might seem unnecessary and may be meaningless, but it is not. The call for the discovery of white spots, the constant massaging of the public of “new truths” about the resistance and the SNP, already established in the propaganda of the Slovak state, has been received against them and is constantly still present as a pedestal of interest to part of the public. As Ivan Kamenec wrote at the time in connection with the initiatives of a group of young historians, which were presented through several anthologies entitled The Slovak Republic 1939 – 1945 through the eyes of young historians.

A number of interesting and stimulating studies were published in this edition, often innovative with their own topics. Nevertheless, some of these authors slipped into a confrontational position. Ivan Kamenec, who is seldom confrontational and tends to have a factual discussion, stated: In the absence of relevant arguments, they will label their opponents as Marxist, non-Slovak or anti-historians… “

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These tendencies have been evident since the early 1990s and persist to this day. They have been taken over by some historians from the public and can now be seen on social networks. This is how I recently got the term “extremist historian”, which culminated in an interesting thought by one of the participants: “Michev has always acted like an extremist, fighting Tis’s merits in rescuing his companions – citizens of the Jewish community.” historical consciousness.

Defeat is a fact, but it does not diminish the importance of the SNP

The opposite of these tendencies is the senseless heroization of the Slovak National Uprising. We have recently been reminded that we are reducing the importance of the Uprising in the exhibition because we say it has been defeated. The defeat of the Uprising is a historical fact that does not diminish its significance in any way, there is no need to mythologize it and create unsustainable legends.

From a political point of view, the most important thing was to promote August 29 as a national holiday. This match took place against the background of the division of Czechoslovakia between 1992 and 1993.

Debates in parliament were not easy at all. Deputies who were not identified with the proposal kept saying that the time had not yet come. It was clear that the vote for or against would be decided between the then members of the HZDS. At that time, this movement already calculated with the votes of supporters and opponents of the proposal, and in its ranks were also the so-called nationally oriented MEPs. However, Radomír Žingor, the son of the partisan commander Viliam Žingor, was also there, and in my opinion it was he who convinced his colleagues that the support for this proposal was correct.

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This struggle of opinion took place then, but it continues to be the same today, and it still holds true, what Ivan Kamenec stated a few years later: “Let’s not make illusions they exchanged plus and minus signs in them. This phenomenon is the responsibility not only of historians, but also of several politicians who, in the pursuit of electoral votes and problematic popularity, ostentatiously participate in SNP celebrations on the one hand and overtake institutions and allegedly national forces calling the Uprising an international coup. What should a citizen choose from such an approach? ”This statement is valid to this day, and perhaps even more so in recent years than before.