Vienna, 30 August 1940 - Award or Diktat ?

The assumption being that if France had taken the offensive in Rhineland during Poland's invasion things would have been dramatically different. Given the state of France armies at the time, I think the forces left by Germany to guard the borders were adequate to manage at least a one month stalemate, more than enough to finish off Poland and turn back with a vengeance. I think that such an offensive, while creating a temporary crisis, would only have precipitated France downfall yet faster if possible. France was not even in a state to defend herself against a more advanced doctrine, not to mention mounting a hasty offensive with inadequate composition of forces. France was doomed. It had neither the time (granted to the British) nor the operational depht (enjoyed by the Soviet Union) to learn and adapt.

This post has been edited by Chandernagore on March 06, 2005 10:24 pm

From my info the Germans had only 25-30 divisions in the West during the Polish Campaign, and the West Wall. The French 4th Army tried to attack the wall but failed. I have no info about the attack itself, but I believe it wasnt a very convincing effort. Nevertheless the Allies had around 110 divisions.
Jacques de Launay quotes Jodl as saying they had a munition shortage after the Polish Campaign, which could be accurate given that Germany was hardly on full war production! The preparation for the French campaign lasted more than 5 months.
Compare it with the periods needed by the US today to replenish its stocks of smart bombs in preparation of new campaigns.
I think the attack against France would have been successfuly preempted and delayed. Maybe the outcome would have been the same, but then again...

I agree that France had fewer tanks and airplanes and they used them badly.
But on top of that they made lots of diplomatic mistakes before the war. Overstretch. Too many commitments with not enough capabilities in too many corners of Europe.

The French army was very weak indeed but the Germans weren't fully aware of that. And as long as France was still intact, Hitler wouldn't have deployed his army in the east only to satisfy Hungary. Poland and Czechoslovakia were a different story, as Germany itself had territorial claims on these countries.

I think you mean "the phony war", not funny war

Exactly. Sorry for that, I always mix those up...

Mr Imperalist like your name you have an "imperialist opinion". It is very easy to judge now. I ask you what have you done if you was in Romanian leadership' stead at that time?

Fratello

Imperialist is not my name.
Saying that people should have fought for their land is an imperialist attitude? Wow!
You ask me what was do be done? How can you ask me such a thing? Its like saying, 'well, Romania is whole today but you know, if bad days come, we will debate the issue and see what province we can give up so as not to be the underdog in a fight. we fight only when we can win, the rest of the time we debate and we give up'
Any sane person would have told you then and now that fighting was the right thing to do. The rest is philosophical debate. Oh, but the russians surely would have crushed us, the germans, the bulgarians, even the carthaginians....
Those are excuses. How can a people search for excuses for forfeiting their land without even trying to defend it?

Sorry if my tone sounds aggressive, its directed against the 'politicians' of the '30s, not against you.

So I guess people in the '30s loved their country less than people do now? How can a judgment regarding the integrity of the country change with time? Or they did not have all the data we have? What more data did they need? They wanted to see the maps and debate whether they were redrawn correctly?


take care

Mr. Imperialist (sorry, this is your nickname not name)
First I said that you have an "imperialist attitude" because you encouraje Mr Denes in his "ideea" about 30 August 1940 "award". Really I don't know what was Mr. Denes concerned about when he started tis topic, Romania or Hungary?
Here is about international policy games not fighting. So, first you have to know the international political context, than draw conclusions.
To fight at that stage would have been madness. Romania would have ended up like poland: devastated and with casualites in the range of houndred of thousands or milions even...probably fore some of os here this would have suited just fine...

Fratello

This is childish!

Which one of you (except Denes, of course ) would like to have the responsability of the Romanian leaders in 1940.... to sign with your own hands the death-sentence of hundred of thousands of Romanians?
Now it's easy to play Pazer General type of games and all sorts of what-if scenarios, but please consider that many of us wouldn'd have been here debating this, as many Polish,Yugoslav and Finnish found out...Romanians , while servile and duplicitary, are smart people, remember the saying "Capul ce se pleaca sabia nu-l taie"( something like the bowed head is spared) and indeed history showed that after all we went out of the WWII RELATIVELY well , considering the alternatives...What you seem to forget is that other PROUD (Poland and Finnland for example ) countries that didn't bow their head still lost many many more people and lands.
Saving lives is the most important task for a leader, think that any person killed could have been your grandfather...
So i think that what the Romanian government did , while perhaps perfidious and cowardice, the only viable option. Scopul scuza mijloacele.

This post has been edited by 109 on March 07, 2005 06:31 pm

The history - as Denes pointed - is somehow an science of precision, if only thinking of a simple timeline, pointing facts and that's all.

IMO we talk here also of a history of politics in the countries mentioned, Europe and world in general.

Why can't I comment the deeds of romanian leaders of those times? This means I should not comment any other decisions of any other leaders, including Ceausescu, Stalin, Hitler and so on. And they were deadly wrong!!

We all are FREE TO COMMENT or go home, shut our mouths and accept anything will happen.

Don't call names one to each other. For my part, as, I think, any of you, I will try to find out what you think behind the lingvistic and technical term of diktat or Award.

Even if I am Romanian and I like to "comment" a lot I think the "diktat/award" issue is FALSE because:

1. Tehnically IT IS AN AWARD because Romania through it's leaders and representatives signed and accepted an arbitration. Other aspects like our representative didn't have the opportunity to speak (the Hungarian representative spoke?) or he couldn't read the text because he was ill are details of less importance.

2. Morally IT IS A DIKTAT because Romania had no allies in that moment and Germany and Italy impossed this solution: ROMANIA LOOSES TERITORY and HUNGARY GAINS TERITORY

Who had the right to do this or that is another discussion.

Cheers,

Barbosu

This post has been edited by Barbosu on March 07, 2005 09:29 pm

Even technically it's debatable, since the treaty was not internationally ratified (the Allies and the Soviet Union never ratified this act).

Even technically it's debatable, since the treaty was not internationally ratified (the Allies and the Soviet Union never ratified this act).

What do you mean by "internationally"?

The Vienna Resolution needed the ratification of only the four directly involved countries, namely Italy, Germany, Rumania and Hungary. To my knowledge, all these countries ratified the treaty, so it became legal.
Therefore Barbosu's note is correct.

Gen. Dénes

At that time the international policy games were all over. It was war, fighting and resistance. See, one cannot ignore the fact that something very suspect occurred at that time. The British had their "we will fight them on the beaches", the French had their Resistance (yes, later on, but nevertheless). And Romania? No "we will fight them in the 'mountains' ", no sabotages, no whatever... Why? I think because the government presented it as a diplomatic agreement, albeit an unfavourable one or one signed under pressure. The gov did not animate the masses with patriotism etc., it kept its "business as usual" attitude.

Secondly, we must see that Poland and France fought to the death because they were faced with total conquest and "regime change".
In Romania the regime was asked to hand over a piece of territory and it would have been spared. The regime also knew that resisting would have meant war and possible "regime change". I wonder if there wasnt a small element of selfishness involved in the decision too... Ofcourse the decision caused the internal weakening of the regime, but I bet Carol thought he can handle the romanians better than the German Panzers. Lets not forget Carol was a dictator afterall... !

Thirdly, your argument that a lot of people would have died is, sorry to say, irrelevant. In Romanian history there are hundreds of instances where men died heroically and defended their country. Suddenly in the '30s the politicians are worried about casualties so much that they forfeit territory won with the blood of hundreds of thousands in WWI!!!
What about THOSE casualties? Following that trail of thought in 1916 Romania was obviously insane to risk hundreds of thousands of deaths for... "a piece of land".
Lets not confuse political cowardice with "international policy games/diplomatic skills etc."
For me the regime of Carol will always stand out in infamy in Romanian history for that decision. Sorry for being so blunt.



p.s. imagine that today a similar situation would occur. the government takes the decision to allow the 'regionalisation' in Harcov, and it will mumble something about international pressure, US, EU etc. what would you do? would you want to fight (whatever that would be, the moderators should not interpret it as incitement) or accept it and let future generation to vehemently say it was a Diktat? Or, knowing all odds are against you, you would anyhow fight for history, both future and past and for dignity?

take care

Even technically it's debatable, since the treaty was not internationally ratified (the Allies and the Soviet Union never ratified this act).

What do you mean by "internationally"?

The Vienna Resolution needed the ratification of only the four directly involved countries, namely Italy, Germany, Rumania and Hungary. To my knowledge, all these countries ratified the treaty, so it became legal.
Therefore Barbosu's note is correct.

Gen. Dénes

You're right Denes, but only for the period before the Axis Powers collapsed.
Germany had no international authority to arbiter a conflict between Hungary and Romania, nor did it have the necessary objectivity.
Therefore, the Award was valid as long as the arbiter nation (Germany) maintained its authority based on force (not on international law), and it was valid only between the signing parties, not having world-wide recognition.
Naturally, after the defeat of Germany, the Allies felt free to revert the effects of the Award and reject it as having no international law validity.

I agree it was an Award, but it has no international law value today.

I mentioned several times on this forum that one of the most common errors someone studying history can commit is to use hindsight.
When one studies a particular historical event, he/she should take into consideration the realities of those times and not regard that particular event in the light of those many-many years have passed since. The historian can/should comment on those historical events, but cannot/should not change/twist them to fit the current ideology.
Unfortunately, few people actually listened to this. Some, but commendably not all, see in this very topic something evil, or a hidden agenda. I can assure them, there is none, they can relax. It's only history we are talking about, not politics.

I also understand that to some this is the first time they see the topic put in another light, instead of the version published and taught in Rumania for many years about the "odious diktat", etc., repeated over and over again, starting with the Communist times. Therefore, they are suspicious and even hostile to any approaches different they are used to, including what I try to show here - which mind you is not a carbon copy of the version given by the Hungarian historiography.

At the time when the Vienna Resolution/Arbitration was signed in 1940 and ratified by all pertinent parties, it was legal. One can/should explain the particular circumstances surrounding the signing of the treaty, but that does not change the historical fact.
The fact that those parties lost the war and thus ALL treaties were annuled is another matter (one interesting exception is the treaty between Bulgaria and Rumania - two Axis powers - for the Quadrilateral, or Southern Dobrudja, which remained valid even after the war).

Finally, a correction. The Vienna Resolution/Arbitration was done by two parties, Germany and Italy, not Germany alone. And, Mr. Imperialist, why would you think Germany - at that time - had no international authority to arbiter a conflict between Hungary and Rumania? Germany was the relevant power in Europe of those days (alongside the expanding Soviet Union). Moreover, it was Hungary and Rumania who asked Germany (and Italy) to issue a binding arbitration of the issue, which they would accept a priori...

Gen. Dénes

This post has been edited by Dénes on March 07, 2005 10:22 pm