Dome Sztojay

Biography

Born in Vrsac in a Serb family as Dimitrije Stojakovic (Serbian Cyrillic: Dimitriјe Stoјakoviћ), Sztojay joined the Austro-Hungarian Army as a young man and served as a colonel during World War I. After the war, Sztojay served in Admiral Miklos Horthy’s counter-revolutionary army, specializing in counter-espionage. After Horthy became Regent of Hungary, Sztojay was promoted to general and served as a military attache in Berlin from 1925 to 1933. He Magyarized his name from Sztojakovich to Sztojay in 1927. From 1933 to 1935, Sztojay served in the Ministry of Defence. In 1935, Prime Minister Gyula Gombos named Sztojay as Hungarian ambassador to Germany, a position he would hold until 1944. As ambassador, Sztojay formed strong ties with the Third Reich and often voiced support for German policies to his superiors in Hungary.

In Operation Margarethe in March 1944, the German Army occupied Hungary and forced Horthy to remove Prime Minister Miklos Kallay from office. Kallay, like Horthy, knew that Germany was losing the war, and had put out numerous feelers to the West, a course which didn't sit well with Berlin. The Germans then gave Horthy a choice between choosing a new prime minister who would cooperate with the Germans or undisguised occupation. Knowing that the latter would likely mean a gauleiter who would treat Hungary in the same manner as the other Nazi-occupied countries, Horthy chose the former. The German Plenipotentiary for Hungary, Edmund Veesenmayer, proposed that former prime minister Bela Imredy (who had, ironically, a Jewish great-grandfather) be given the post again. However, Horthy balked at appointing the strongly pro-German Imredy and suggested Sztojay instead. Though Sztojay had been ambassador to Berlin for a decade and was known to be pro-German, Horthy believed that at bottom he was a soldier first and would not totally give in to German demands. The Germans readily approved of Horthy’s choice, and on 23 March 1944, Sztojay was appointed Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs.

As prime minister, Sztojay legalized Ferenc Szalasi’s Arrow Cross Party, increased Hungarian troop levels on the Eastern Front, dissolved the nation’s labor unions, jailed political opponents, and cracked down on left wing politicians and activists. He also significantly ramped up the pace of forced deportations of Hungarian Jews, but at the same time tried to reduce the consequences. Horthy quickly became appalled by Sztojay’s actions and demanded his removal as prime minister, but Veesenmayer, backed by Adolf Hitler, sternly refused to do so. Horthy refused to give in entirely, however, and used his influence to stop the deportations of Hungary’s Jews and to force Imredy out of Sztojay’s cabinet. The Germans finally submitted to Horthy’s pressure in August 1944 and Sztojay resigned as prime minister in favour of Geza Lakatos.

When Horthy was removed from power by the Germans in October 1944, Sztojay was not reappointed prime minister due to poor health. Sztojay subsequently fled Hungary when the Germans were driven out of the country by the Red Army in April 1945. Sztojay was later captured by American troops and extradited to Hungary in October 1945, after which time he was tried by a People’s Tribunal in Budapest. He was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against the Hungarian people, sentenced to death, and executed by a firing squad in Budapest in 1946.