Magyarország II. világháborús szerepvállalása
The Role of Hungary in Wold War II

Summary/Abstract: The role played by Hungary in the Second World War is still in the focus of public attention, although the generation which actively participated in the events does rarely appear in public life. The present study analyses the participation of Hungary in World War II between the coordinates of historical choice and necessity. It re-examines five issues, still widely misunderstood by public opinion, from this double perspective: the performance of the Hungarian Honvéds and of the military industry, the question of going to war, the attempts to make peace and the choices leading up to the Holocaust. This examination is also motivated by the fact that Hungarian military and economic participation was far from being an issue of secondary interest from a German point of view, and it even counted as unavoidable in some periods during the war. Neither can the participation of Hungary in the war be regarded as a simple matter, as because of its revisionist goals formulated in a contradictory manner this country effectively became a belligerent already in the spring of 1941. The circumstances surrounding the attempts to make peace which condemned these efforts to failure from the very beginning are still relatively unknown. The most debated issues among the historical events pertain to the genesis of the Holocaust and the question of Hungarian responsibility associated with this. The present review of these issues attempts to bring new contributions to their interpretation.

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