Slovakia

Slovakia or the Slovak Republic, Slovak Slovensko , republic (2005 est. pop. 5,431,000), 18,917 sq mi (48,995 sq km), central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic in the west, by Austria in the southwest, by Hungary in the south, by Ukraine in the east, and by Poland in the north. Bratislava is the capital. Slovakia became an independent nation on Jan. 1, 1993, when Czechoslovakia was dissolved.

Land and People

Most of Slovakia is traversed by the Carpathian Mts., including the Tatra and the Beskids. Gerlachovka (8,737 ft/2,663 m) in the High Tatra, is the highest peak. S Slovakia is a part of the Little Alföld, a plain. Its fertile soil is drained by the Danube and its tributaries, notably the Váh. Several of its rivers have been dammed for hydroelectric power. Major cities include Bratislava and Komárno , which are the major Danubian ports; and Košice , Trnava , and Nitra .

Slovaks comprise more than 85% of the population; other groups include Hungarians (about 10%), Gypsies, and Czechs (who are ethnically and linguistically related to the Slovaks, but have a separate history and cultural traditions). A law passed in 1995, and strongly opposed by Hungarians and other minorities, made Slovak the sole official language. Hungarian is also spoken. About 70% of the population profess Roman Catholicism, and there are significant Protestant (mainly Lutheran), Eastern Orthodox, and Uniate minorities.

Economy

Farms, vineyards, orchards, and pastures for stock form the basis of S Slovakia's economy. The main crops are wheat, barley, potatoes, sugar beets, hops, and fruit. Pigs, cattle, and poultry are raised. The mountainous part of Slovakia has vast forests and pastures, used for intensive sheep grazing, and is rich in mineral resources, including coal, high-grade iron ore, copper, manganese, lead, and zinc. There are also numerous mineral springs, notably at Piešt'any, and many popular resorts. Slovakia has undergone considerable industrialization and urbanization since World War II. Its industries produce metals and metal products, foods and beverages, electricity, oil and gas, coke, nuclear fuel, chemicals, synthetic fibers, machinery, paper, ceramics, motor vehicles, textiles, electrical and optical instruments, and rubber products. Exports include vehicles, machinery, electrical equipment, metals, chemicals, minerals, and plastics. The main imports are machinery, transportation equipment, manufactured goods, fuels, and chemicals. Its main trading partners are Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, Italy, and Poland.

Government

Slovakia is governed under the constitution of 1992 as amended. The president, who is the head of state, is elected by popular vote for a five-year term and is eligible for a second term. The prime minister, who is the head of government, is appointed by the president with the approval of the legislature, as is the cabinet. The unicameral legislature, the National Council, has 150 members who are popularly elected by proportional representation for four-year terms. Administratively, the country is divided into 8 regions.

History

The Slovaks in History

The area now constituting Slovakia was settled by Slavic tribes in the 5th-6th cent. AD In the 9th cent. Slovakia formed part of the great empire of Moravia , under whose rulers Christianity was introduced by Saints Cyril and Methodius . From the Magyar conquest of Slovakia early in the 10th cent. until 1918, Slovakia was generally under Hungarian rule. German and Jewish settlements in Slovakian cities date from the Middle Ages; most of the Slovaks remained peasants in the countryside, although some became burghers. Czech-Slovak contacts, broken after the demise of the Moravian empire, were restored by the 14th cent.; and the 15th-century Hussite movement in Bohemia enjoyed influence in Slovakia.

After the Ottoman Turkish victory at Mohács in 1526 over Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia, Slovakia, along with western Hungary, fell under Hapsburg rule. It thus escaped Turkish domination but became a stronghold of the great Hungarian nobles, who owned most of the land and treated the Slovaks with contempt. Slovakia, however, played an important political role, with Bratislava serving as the Hapsburg capital, until all of Hungary was finally freed from the Turks in the late 17th cent. Slovakia also enjoyed more religious toleration than much of the Hapsburg empire, and Protestantism thrived.

In the 18th cent. Maria Theresa and Joseph II pursued religious freedom and social reform in Slovakia but greatly intensified Germanization. This policy spurred a Slovak national revival, which grew steadily in the 19th cent. The Catholic clergy, which constituted the only sizable body of Slovak intellectuals, exercised the main leadership of the nationalist movement. L'udovít Štúr became the father of the modern Slovak literary language. During the anti-Hapsburg revolutions of 1848, Štúr joined Czech representatives in a Pan-Slav congress at Prague. Also in 1848, the Slovaks formulated a set of demands for increased political and linguistic rights.

Some clashes between Slovaks and Hungarians occurred, and Magyarization lessened temporarily; but after the Ausgleich establishing the dual Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1867, Magyarization again intensified, thus further heightening Slovak nationalism. Large-scale immigration (1900-1910) of the landless Slovak peasants to America gave the Slovak independence movement considerable support in the United States during World War I, during which the Slovaks and other nationalities of the Hapsburg empire agitated for freedom.

The Birth of Czechoslovakia

The so-called Pittsburgh Declaration, signed by Czech and Slovak patriots in May, 1918, provided for a united Czechoslovak republic, in which Slovakia would retain broad autonomy, with its own governmental institutions and official language. On Oct. 30 the Slovak National Council formally proclaimed independence from Hungary and incorporation into Czechoslovakia. The new republic's boundaries, established in 1920 by the Treaty of Trianon, encompassed areas where more than one million Hungarians lived. Hungary, meanwhile, continued to claim at least part of Slovakia, while a large Slovak People's party, led by Monsignor Andrej Hlinka, accused the Czechoslovak government of denying Slovakia the autonomous rights promised. Indeed, from 1918 until 1938, Slovakia held the status of a simple province, although the Slovak language was official within its boundaries.

The minority problem was complicated by religion: the majority of Slovaks were Catholic, while the Prague government was distinctly anticlerical. Monsignor Hlinka and his successor as leader of the Slovak People's party, Father Jozef Tiso, demanded full autonomy for Slovakia on a basis of complete equality for both Czechs and Slovaks. After the Munich Pact of 1938, Slovakia became an autonomous state within reorganized Czecho-Slovakia, with Father Tiso as Slovak premier. At the same time a large part of S Slovakia was ceded to Hungary and some northern districts to Poland. When the Prague government dismissed (Mar., 1939) Tiso as premier, he appealed to Adolf Hitler, who used this appeal as a pretext for making Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia a German protectorate.

Slovakia became a nominally independent state under German protection and Tiso's one-party rule. Tiso allowed German troops to occupy Slovakia in Aug., 1939, and entered World War II as Germany's ally. A Slovak underground movement gained strength, however, and powerfully aided the Soviet troops who drove the Germans out of Slovakia late in 1944. The Allied victory in 1945 restored Slovakia to its territorial status before the Munich Pact, and the constitution of 1948 recognized Slovakia as one of the constituent states of a reestablished Czechoslovakia; the other state was composed of Bohemia, Moravia, and a small part of Silesia. The constitution also established separate government organs for Slovakia.

The Rise and Fall of Communism

The accession in 1948 of a Communist government in Czechoslovakia revived the old antagonism between Czechs and Slovaks. The Catholic clergy in Slovakia, militantly opposed to Communism, was persecuted, and the Slovak government came entirely under the control of the Czechoslovak Communist party, which began to transfer authority from Bratislava to Prague. In 1960 a new constitution seriously curtailed Slovakia's autonomy. The liberal Communist regime of Alexander Dubček , which came into power in 1967, responded to Slovak discontent by promising federalization of Czechoslovakia.

Despite the invasion (1968) of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union, the new Socialist Federal Republic came into being on Jan. 1, 1969; the constituent Czech and Slovak republics received autonomy over local affairs, with the federal government responsible for foreign relations, defense, and finance. The fall of the Communist regime at the end of 1989 revived Slovakia's drive for autonomy. Dissatisfied with their minority status in the federal government, many Slovaks called for a loose confederation of the Czech and Slovak Republics, while others advocated complete independence.

An Independent Slovakia

In 1992, as free-market reforms brought on economic problems and widespread dissatisfaction, nationalists led by Slovak premier Vladimír Mečiar came to power. A constitution for an independent Slovakia was approved and on Jan. 1, 1993, the country became independent. An inefficient and obsolete industrial base, rising inflation, and high unemployment were among the problems facing the republic. Mečiar was ousted in Mar., 1994, and Jozef Moravčík became prime minister. Following elections in Oct., 1994, Mečiar returned to power at the head of a coalition government.

A continuing stalemate between Mečiar and Slovakian president Michal Kováč hindered Slovakian efforts to win credibility abroad and join the Western community. The Mečiar government was criticized for its handling of the privatization of state-owned businesses and for its backing of controversial legislation, including a law making Slovak the sole official language. Slovakia's inefficient, defense-oriented industrial base contracted, and the country did not receive needed foreign investment. When Kováč's term was up in Mar., 1998, a divided parliament was unable to appoint a successor; the constitution was amended to allow for direct election of the president.

The Mečiar government was defeated in Sept., 1998, by a four-party center-right coalition, and Mikuláš Dzurinda became prime minister. Mečiar ran for president in 1999, but was defeated by Rudolf Schuster, who pledged to steer a more pro-European course. Dzurinda's government overhauled the tax and social welfare systems and worked to attract foreign investment; the economy subsequently experienced significant growth. Dzurinda's coalition retained power after the 2002 parliamentary elections.

Slovakia became a member of NATO in Mar., 2004, and of the European Union in May. In April, Ivan Gašparovič was elected as Schuster's successor. Mečiar again mounted a campaign for the presidency and won the first round of voting, but he was soundly defeated in the runoff. In the June, 2006, parliamentary elections the leftist party Smer [direction], led by Róbert Fico, won the largest number of seats, and the following month Fico became prime minister of a coalition government that included Mečiar's party and the right-wing Nationalist party.

Bibliography

See J. Lettrich, History of Modern Slovakia (1955); G. L. Oddo, Slovakia and its People (1960); E. Steiner, The Slovak Dilemma (1973); S. J. Kirschbaum, Slovak Politics (1983); B. Chnoupek, A Breaking of Seals: The French Resistance in Slovakia (1988).

Slovakia, the eastern part of Czechoslovakia, emerged as a semi-independent client state of Nazi Germany in the wake of the Munich agreement of September 1938, with Slovak nationalists, led by a Roman Catholic priest, Mgr Josef Tiso (1887–1947), gaining autonomy for Slovakia from the Czechoslovak government. This realignment shifted the future of Slovakia out of the hands of Prague and to those of Berlin. With the first of the Vienna awards, Germany sanctioned the loss of Slovakia's southern belt of territory (containing a Magyar majority) to Hungary (see Map 49), but for Slovak nationalists German policy also had its benefits. With the German occupation of the rump of the Czech lands in March 1939, Slovakia gained, with German support, nominal independence.

From the very beginning, independent Slovakia was in the firm grip of Nazi Germany. In March 1939, it adhered to a ‘Treaty of Protection of the Slovak State by the German Reich’. This instrument subordinated Slovakia's foreign and military policy to Germany and based German troops on Slovak soil. Economically, Germany exploited the territory for the benefit of the German war effort. The German minority in Slovakia obtained a privileged legal position and the right to form paramilitary units known as ‘Ordners’.

Tiso, now the Country's president, and his clerical-fascist Slovak People's Party dominated the domestic politics of the new Slovakia. The political system and body of law introduced under the Tiso regime closely emulated Nazi Germany. The Slovak People's Party had its own paramilitary force, the Hlinka Guards, named after the cleric who shaped the political party. It also had its junior Hlinka Youth, modelled on the lines of the SS and Hitler Youth. Reflecting Slovak anti-Semitism, the Tiso government adopted Nazi-style legislation, which placed great disabilities on Slovakian Jewry, and eventually it collaborated openly with the German Final Solution leading to the elimination of Slovakia's 100,000-strong Jewish community.

Although Tiso's regime satisfied one of the central impulses of Slovak nationalism—a Slovak state—the population's disillusionment with Germany grew as the war progressed, and traditional pan-Slavic sympathies with the USSR asserted themselves. Germany's invasion of the USSR in June 1941 (see BARBAROSSA) saw the commitment of more than 50,000 Slovak troops to the Eastern Front, resulting in enormous Slovak casualties and mass surrenders to the Red Army.

As the war progressed, popular discontent increased and eventually culminated in the Slovak rising in August 1944, the advance of the Red Army into Poland in early 1944 creating the political and military conditions necessary for its outbreak. Senior officers in the Tiso regime's Slovak army established clandestine contact with the Soviet authorities. They sought agreement to co-ordinate a rising with the Red Army's military operations and planned to secure key mountain passes in the Carpathians for it. Slovak hopes rested on the rapid entry of Soviet forces in order to minimize destruction and loss of life at the hands of the Germans.

However, events in Slovakia pre-empted the army's planning. The Tiso regime's loss of control of many parts of the country, coupled with intense partisan activity which disrupted vital railway communications, prompted direct German military intervention. The rising began prematurely on 29 August 1944 when Slovak units clashed with advancing German forces.

Despite a chaotic start, Slovak regular and partisan forces seized control of a large area of central Slovakia. Banská Bystrica became the centre of the uprising with Lt-Colonel Ján Golian assuming command of the insurgent forces. Later, General Rudolf Viest, dispatched by the Czechoslovak government-in-exile, took over command, with Golian becoming his deputy, but the rapid German advance quickly overcame the Slovak army's best equipped units in the extreme east and west of the country and deprived him of his potentially most valuable forces.

Throughout September and into October, the insurgent forces maintained a precarious hold on central Slovakia, but German attacks in mid-October led to their final collapse, though some remnants fought on as partisan groups in the Tatra mountains until liberation by the Red Army in March 1945.

The Czechoslovak government-in-exile under Beneš sought Allied help for the Slovak insurgents, but American and British aid was constrained for political and operational reasons as Slovakia lay at the limits of the range of Allied air forces without access to Soviet airfields. The USSR, with the Red Army and airfields closest to the rising, was in the best position to help. Soviet aid, however, was grudging and Stalin's attitude toward the Slovak insurgents was not dissimilar to his response to the Warsaw rising of August 1944. Soviet help eventually came with the insurgents' forces being augmented by elements of Svoboda's 2nd Czechoslovak Airborne Brigade under the command of Lt-Colonel Vladimír Přikryl. From mid-September it was flown in from Soviet territory, but it took some six weeks for the airlift of this largely Slovak unit to be completed.

Even at the peak of their strength, the Slovak insurgent forces never exceeded 50,000. On the German side, elements of five divisions and numerous independent units were committed to counter the rising and German forces enjoyed an overwhelming superiority in men and matériel. Slovak deaths numbered at least 25,000 through military action and German reprisals. Among the victims were the leaders of the uprising, including Viest and Golian.

The Slovak rising showed the bankruptcy of the Tiso regime and marked the beginning of the end of ‘independent’ Slovakia. The advancing Red Army liberated it and returned it to the Czechoslovak state, and Tiso was tried and executed. A product of Hitler's ‘new order’ in east-central Europe and Tiso's Slovak People's Party, wartime Slovakia represented a tragic experiment for Slovak nationalism.

Paul Latawski

Bibliography

Letrich, J. , History of Slovakia (New York, 1955).
Mikus, J. A. , Slovakia A Political History: 1918–1950 (Milwaukee, 1963).