Vojtech Tuka
Encyclopedia
Vojtech "Béla" Tuka was the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Slovak Republic between 1940 and 1945. Tuka was one the main forces behind the deportation of Slovak Jews
to Nazi concentration camps in Poland
. He was the leader of the radical wing of the Slovak People's Party
.
, Slovakia
. He studied law at universities in Budapest
, Berlin
, and Paris
. He became the youngest professor in the Kingdom of Hungary
, teaching law in Pécs
and—from 1914 to 1919—at the Elizabethan University in Bratislava
. After the dissolution of that university in 1919, he worked as an editor in Bratislava
.
After the founding of Czechoslovakia
in late 1918, he joined the autonomist Slovak People's Party
. It was suggested that he accepted Andrej Hlinka
's offer to enter the Slovak People's Party in order to destabilize Czechoslovakia through radical Slovak nationalism. He served as the secretary of the Hlinka’s Slovak People's Party (HSĽS), a party whose radical wing called for an independent Slovak state, and edited the party's periodical, Slovák. The HSĽS argued that the 1920 constitution had not included the provision for Slovak autonomy alluded to in the Pittsburgh Declaration. Acting on this, the HSĽS introduced a Slovak-autonomy bill in the Czechoslovak parliament in 1922. The bill was rejected, but the HSĽS had established that autonomy was the core of its program. This was significant, since public opinion in Slovakia was drifting towards the autonomists. The growing separatist sentiment would later enable Tuka's rise to power.
In 1910, he was elected to the Presidium of the Countrywide Christian Socialist Party as nominee of the Slovak section. In 1923, he founded the organization Rodobrana
("Home Guard"), an armed milita.
Tuka was a deputy to the Czechoslovak parliament from 1925 to 1929.
According to Czechoslovakist historian Kamenec, post–World War II documents retrieved from Hungary showed that Tuka was in the service of the Hungarian Irredent
; but Kamenec also said that documents do not exclude the claims of Tuka's supporters that Tuka gained support for Slovakian independence from Austria, Poland, Hungary, Italy, Germany, France, and the Soviet Union.
took advantage of this "Homolov Putsch", prompting Jozef Tiso
—the Slovak ex–prime minister and Roman Catholic Monsignor
deposed by the Czech troops—to declare Slovak independence. Tiso refused; Slovak independence was declared on 14 March by an act of the Slovak Assembly, which was convocated by Czecho-Slovak president Hacha. The remaining part of Czechoslovakia was incorporated into the Third Reich as a protectorate.Czech politicians claimed that, as a protectorate, Czechoslovakia was not a part of the Reich, but only a protected state. Alexius Moser, writing in Slovak, noted that a protectorate is part of the German Reich, but that Slovakia, a protected state, was not. Tiso was elected President on 26 October 1939 as president; he immediately appointed Tuka as Prime Minister.
At a conference held in Salzburg
, Austria
on 28 July 1940, an agreement was reached to establish a National Socialist regime in Slovakia. Tuka attended the conference, as did Hitler, Tiso, Joachim von Ribbentrop
, Alexander Mach (head of the Hilnka Guards), and Franz Karmasin, head of the local German minority. As a result of the conference, two state agencies were created to deal with "Jewish affairs".
On 3 September 1940, Tuka convinced the Slovak assembly to enact Constitutional Law 210, a law authorizing the government to do everything necessary to exclude Jews from the economic and social life of the country.
Previous laws had already stripped them of political participation. That November, on the 24th, Tuka and von Ribbentrop signed a protocol entering Slovakia into alliance with Germany, Japan, and Italy.
In 1942, Tuka strongly advocated the deportation of Slovakia's Jewish population to the eastern Nazi concentration camps. His anti-Semitic policies put Tuka in conflict with the moderate Tiso. Together with Internal Affairs Minister Alexander Mach
, Tuka became the leader of the pro-Nazi wing within the Slovak People's Party. This wing—enjoying little support among Slovaks—relied on the Hlinka Guard
, successor to the Rodobrana
revived by Tuka. Tuka was also the vice-chairman of the Slovak People's Party.
The conflict between the moderate Tiso wing and the pro-Nazi wing resulted in the Salzburg Compromise, concluded between Slovakia and the Reich on 28 July 1940, as a result of which Tuka and other political leaders increased their powers at the expense of Tiso and other moderates. The compromise called for dual command by the Slovak People’s Party and the Hlinka Guard (HSĽS). The Reich appointed Stormtrooper
leader Manfred von Killinger as the German representative in Slovakia. While Tiso successfully restructured the Slovak People's Party in harmony with Christian principles, Tuka and Mach radicalized Slovak policy toward the Jews.
, an SS
hauptstrumführer, was sent to Bratislava to act as an "adviser on Jewish affairs" to Tuka's government. With Wisliceny, Tuka composed the Ordinance Judenkodex (Codex Judaicus, or Jewish Code) of 9 September 1941, which comprised 270 articles comprehensively denying rights to Slovak Jews. The Code was longer than the Slovak Constitution. It required that Jews wear the yellow star, annulled all debts owed to Jews, confiscated Jewish property, and expelled Jews from Bratislava, the Slovak capital.
The Slovak episcopate protested some of the laws; in particular, they took issue with the fact that they did not allow for religious conversion. As the Slovak president, Tiso, was himself a clergyman, this was a notable objection; the Church hierarchy in Rome told the Slovak government that it objected to the idea that a country lead by a Catholic clergyman would do such a thing. Section 225 of the Jewish Code satisfied the Slovak bishops by giving the President the right to exempt individuals of his choosing from the code's provisions. Jews who had converted to Christianity were given letters of amnesty by Tiso.
Twenty thousand Jews were to be deported under the German resettlement scheme, for which the Slovak government was to pay five hundred Reichsmark
per deportee.
Tuka issued the directive to deport the Jews without the knowledge of President Tiso or the parliament.
The deportation of Slovak Jews stopped in October 1942, at the order of the Slovak Council of Ministers. A number of reasons for the sudden decision were posited: increased awareness amongst Slovak Jews that "deportation" meant extermination in a concentration camp; bribery of Wisliceny or other high SS officials; the disapproval of the Catholic church; a letter by Slovakia's Protestant bishops to Tiso protesting the deportations; the appearance of the "Jewish problem" being solved because many remaining Jews had work permits because they were vital to the economy or held letters of amnesty from Tiso. A report by the Bratislava Sicherheitsdienst (SD), the intelligence agency of the SS, stated that the reason for the sudden halt was a meeting called by Tuka on 11 August 1942. At that meeting, Tuka and the secretary-general of the Industrial Union told the ministers that Slovakia's economy could not withstand continued deportation of the Jews, causing the Council to order the halt. Between 25 March and 20 October 1942, Slovakia sent about 57,700 Jews to Nazi concentration camps.
In September 1944, the deportation of Slovak Jews was resumed; by the end of the war in April 1945, about 13,500 additional Jews were deported.
In 1944, the Sztojay government suppressed the revival of the Slovak minority in Hungary.
Tuka intelligence network was outstanding from Slovak and Hungarian policy due to illness of its leader. Infiltrators of Tuka in Hungarian policy ( legitimists, pro-minority, in private Slovak parliament members from right wing scene as Belo Jurcsek, O. Andrejka, L. Budinszky and others search since 1944 ways out, or/and ways how in "free alliance" re-unite Slovakia, Hungary, and Croatia as the anti-communist state-union, with prevailing catholic influence. Orientation of this circles to the Tuka and Slovakia as first land of "St.Stephen Crown" for restoration of legitimate Habsburg king decline with the downfall of Tuka influence also in the radicals. Despite it, legitimists interim government in Hungary was widely disputed in US administration in this time. Also Slovak national unity party reaffiliated to the Tiso direction in 1943-1944.
Tuka suffered a severe stroke, which left him in a wheelchair. After World War II, following a brief trial, Vojtech Tuka was executed on 20 August 1946.
That month, the Swiss Bankers Association published a list of World War II–era Swiss bank account holders with dormant accounts; the list included the name of Vojtech Tuka, according to Simon Wiesenthal
, who urged that Tuka's account be turned over to the Swiss fund for victims of the Nazis.
František Alexander, executive chairman of Slovakia's Central Association of Jewish Religious Communities, told The Slovak Spectator that the funds from the account should be allocated by an international council of justice. Jozef Weiss, head of the Association's office, said that the Association didn't believe it had the legal or moral right to take money from Tuka's private account to repay a wrong done by the Slovak government. Instead, Weiss suggested, the money should be used to pay for the upkeep of the graves of Slovak soldiers who died in vain fighting alongside the Nazis against the Russian liberation forces on the Eastern Front.
Ivan Kamenec, a Slovak historian of the war, said that Tuka's multiple posts "were all very well paid"; the offices of Foreign Minister and central committee member of HSĽS both paid over 10,000 Slovak crowns a month, he said. Although Kamenec refused to speculate on the size of Tuka's dormant account, he noted that Tuka's living requirements were modest.
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
to Nazi concentration camps in Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
. He was the leader of the radical wing of the Slovak People's Party
Slovak People's Party
The Slovak People's Party was a Slovak right-wing party and was described as a fascist and...
.
Early career
Tuka, sometimes referred to by the Magyar name Béla, was born in Štiavnické BaneŠtiavnické Bane
Štiavnické Bane is a village in the Banská Štiavnica District, in the Banská Bystrica Region of Slovakia.-Name:The German name of Štiavnické Bane is Siegelsberg and its Hungarian name is Hegybánya...
, Slovakia
Slovakia
The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
. He studied law at universities in Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, and Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
. He became the youngest professor in the Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
, teaching law in Pécs
Pécs
Pécs is the fifth largest city of Hungary, located on the slopes of the Mecsek mountains in the south-west of the country, close to its border with Croatia. It is the administrative and economical centre of Baranya county...
and—from 1914 to 1919—at the Elizabethan University in Bratislava
Bratislava
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and, with a population of about 431,000, also the country's largest city. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia on both banks of the Danube River. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two independent countries.Bratislava...
. After the dissolution of that university in 1919, he worked as an editor in Bratislava
Bratislava
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and, with a population of about 431,000, also the country's largest city. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia on both banks of the Danube River. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two independent countries.Bratislava...
.
After the founding of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
in late 1918, he joined the autonomist Slovak People's Party
Slovak People's Party
The Slovak People's Party was a Slovak right-wing party and was described as a fascist and...
. It was suggested that he accepted Andrej Hlinka
Andrej Hlinka
Andrej Hlinka was a Slovak politician and Catholic priest, one of the most important Slovak public activists in Czechoslovakia before Second World War...
's offer to enter the Slovak People's Party in order to destabilize Czechoslovakia through radical Slovak nationalism. He served as the secretary of the Hlinka’s Slovak People's Party (HSĽS), a party whose radical wing called for an independent Slovak state, and edited the party's periodical, Slovák. The HSĽS argued that the 1920 constitution had not included the provision for Slovak autonomy alluded to in the Pittsburgh Declaration. Acting on this, the HSĽS introduced a Slovak-autonomy bill in the Czechoslovak parliament in 1922. The bill was rejected, but the HSĽS had established that autonomy was the core of its program. This was significant, since public opinion in Slovakia was drifting towards the autonomists. The growing separatist sentiment would later enable Tuka's rise to power.
In 1910, he was elected to the Presidium of the Countrywide Christian Socialist Party as nominee of the Slovak section. In 1923, he founded the organization Rodobrana
Rodobrana
Rodobrana was a Slovak paramilitary organization of the Slovak People's Party. The organization existed from 1923 to 1927 in Czechoslovakia, when the authorities ordered its dissolution, though many of its members continued to function in other party organizations. It was a predecessor of the...
("Home Guard"), an armed milita.
Tuka was a deputy to the Czechoslovak parliament from 1925 to 1929.
Espionage allegations and first jail sentence
On 1 January 1928, Tuka published an article titled "Vacuum iuris", alleging that there had been a suppressed annex to the 31 December 1918 Declaration of the Slovak Nation by which Slovak representatives officially joined the newly-founded state of Czechoslovakia. Tuka argued that the declaration was, by agreement, to be valid for only ten years; after 28 October 1928, he argued, Prague's writ would no longer run in Slovakia without dismissing the existence of the Czecho-Slovak state. The existence of the annex was alleged by well-known declarants: members of the 1918 Slovak national council Andrej Hlinka, F. Juriga, J. Koza-Matejov, Emanuel Stodola, and Joseph Srobar (brother of centralist Vavro Srobar, principal antagonist of Hlinka and Tuka). Without hesitation, the Prague government charged Tuka with espionage and high treason on behalf of the Hungarian government. Tuka was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment; he served about ten years of that sentence.According to Czechoslovakist historian Kamenec, post–World War II documents retrieved from Hungary showed that Tuka was in the service of the Hungarian Irredent
Irredentism
Irredentism is any position advocating annexation of territories administered by another state on the grounds of common ethnicity or prior historical possession, actual or alleged. Some of these movements are also called pan-nationalist movements. It is a feature of identity politics and cultural...
; but Kamenec also said that documents do not exclude the claims of Tuka's supporters that Tuka gained support for Slovakian independence from Austria, Poland, Hungary, Italy, Germany, France, and the Soviet Union.
The Slovak Republic and Tuka's rise to political power
On 9 March 1939, Czech troops moved into Slovakia in reaction to radical calls for independence from Slovak patriots (including Tuka, who had recently been released from prison). On 13 March, Adolf HitlerAdolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
took advantage of this "Homolov Putsch", prompting Jozef Tiso
Jozef Tiso
Jozef Tiso was a Slovak Roman Catholic priest, politician of the Slovak People's Party, and Nazi collaborator. Between 1939 and 1945, Tiso was the head of the Slovak State, a satellite state of Nazi Germany...
—the Slovak ex–prime minister and Roman Catholic Monsignor
Monsignor
Monsignor, pl. monsignori, is the form of address for those members of the clergy of the Catholic Church holding certain ecclesiastical honorific titles. Monsignor is the apocopic form of the Italian monsignore, from the French mon seigneur, meaning "my lord"...
deposed by the Czech troops—to declare Slovak independence. Tiso refused; Slovak independence was declared on 14 March by an act of the Slovak Assembly, which was convocated by Czecho-Slovak president Hacha. The remaining part of Czechoslovakia was incorporated into the Third Reich as a protectorate.Czech politicians claimed that, as a protectorate, Czechoslovakia was not a part of the Reich, but only a protected state. Alexius Moser, writing in Slovak, noted that a protectorate is part of the German Reich, but that Slovakia, a protected state, was not. Tiso was elected President on 26 October 1939 as president; he immediately appointed Tuka as Prime Minister.
At a conference held in Salzburg
Salzburg
-Population development:In 1935, the population significantly increased when Salzburg absorbed adjacent municipalities. After World War II, numerous refugees found a new home in the city. New residential space was created for American soldiers of the postwar Occupation, and could be used for...
, Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
on 28 July 1940, an agreement was reached to establish a National Socialist regime in Slovakia. Tuka attended the conference, as did Hitler, Tiso, Joachim von Ribbentrop
Joachim von Ribbentrop
Ulrich Friedrich Wilhelm Joachim von Ribbentrop was Foreign Minister of Germany from 1938 until 1945. He was later hanged for war crimes after the Nuremberg Trials.-Early life:...
, Alexander Mach (head of the Hilnka Guards), and Franz Karmasin, head of the local German minority. As a result of the conference, two state agencies were created to deal with "Jewish affairs".
On 3 September 1940, Tuka convinced the Slovak assembly to enact Constitutional Law 210, a law authorizing the government to do everything necessary to exclude Jews from the economic and social life of the country.
Previous laws had already stripped them of political participation. That November, on the 24th, Tuka and von Ribbentrop signed a protocol entering Slovakia into alliance with Germany, Japan, and Italy.
In 1942, Tuka strongly advocated the deportation of Slovakia's Jewish population to the eastern Nazi concentration camps. His anti-Semitic policies put Tuka in conflict with the moderate Tiso. Together with Internal Affairs Minister Alexander Mach
Alexander Mach
Alexander Mach was a Slovak nationalist politician.He belonged to the non-clerical wing of the Slovak People's Party, which has been portrayed as the more pro-Nazi of the party's two factions...
, Tuka became the leader of the pro-Nazi wing within the Slovak People's Party. This wing—enjoying little support among Slovaks—relied on the Hlinka Guard
Hlinka Guard
Hlinka Guard was the militia maintained by the Slovak People's Party in the period from 1938 to 1945; it was named after Andrej Hlinka.The Hlinka Guard was preceded by the Rodobrana organization, which existed from 1923 to 1927, when the Czechoslovak authorities ordered its dissolution...
, successor to the Rodobrana
Rodobrana
Rodobrana was a Slovak paramilitary organization of the Slovak People's Party. The organization existed from 1923 to 1927 in Czechoslovakia, when the authorities ordered its dissolution, though many of its members continued to function in other party organizations. It was a predecessor of the...
revived by Tuka. Tuka was also the vice-chairman of the Slovak People's Party.
The conflict between the moderate Tiso wing and the pro-Nazi wing resulted in the Salzburg Compromise, concluded between Slovakia and the Reich on 28 July 1940, as a result of which Tuka and other political leaders increased their powers at the expense of Tiso and other moderates. The compromise called for dual command by the Slovak People’s Party and the Hlinka Guard (HSĽS). The Reich appointed Stormtrooper
Stormtrooper
Stormtroopers were specialist soldiers of the German Army in World War I. In the last years of the war, Stoßtruppen were trained to fight with "infiltration tactics", part of the Germans' new method of attack on enemy trenches...
leader Manfred von Killinger as the German representative in Slovakia. While Tiso successfully restructured the Slovak People's Party in harmony with Christian principles, Tuka and Mach radicalized Slovak policy toward the Jews.
The persecution of Slovak Jews
At the end of August 1942, Dieter WislicenyDieter Wisliceny
Dieter Wisliceny was a member of the Nazi SS, and a key executioner in the final phase of the Holocaust.Wisliceny studied theology without obtaining a degree...
, an SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
hauptstrumführer, was sent to Bratislava to act as an "adviser on Jewish affairs" to Tuka's government. With Wisliceny, Tuka composed the Ordinance Judenkodex (Codex Judaicus, or Jewish Code) of 9 September 1941, which comprised 270 articles comprehensively denying rights to Slovak Jews. The Code was longer than the Slovak Constitution. It required that Jews wear the yellow star, annulled all debts owed to Jews, confiscated Jewish property, and expelled Jews from Bratislava, the Slovak capital.
The Slovak episcopate protested some of the laws; in particular, they took issue with the fact that they did not allow for religious conversion. As the Slovak president, Tiso, was himself a clergyman, this was a notable objection; the Church hierarchy in Rome told the Slovak government that it objected to the idea that a country lead by a Catholic clergyman would do such a thing. Section 225 of the Jewish Code satisfied the Slovak bishops by giving the President the right to exempt individuals of his choosing from the code's provisions. Jews who had converted to Christianity were given letters of amnesty by Tiso.
Twenty thousand Jews were to be deported under the German resettlement scheme, for which the Slovak government was to pay five hundred Reichsmark
German reichsmark
The Reichsmark was the currency in Germany from 1924 until June 20, 1948. The Reichsmark was subdivided into 100 Reichspfennig.-History:...
per deportee.
Tuka issued the directive to deport the Jews without the knowledge of President Tiso or the parliament.
The deportation of Slovak Jews stopped in October 1942, at the order of the Slovak Council of Ministers. A number of reasons for the sudden decision were posited: increased awareness amongst Slovak Jews that "deportation" meant extermination in a concentration camp; bribery of Wisliceny or other high SS officials; the disapproval of the Catholic church; a letter by Slovakia's Protestant bishops to Tiso protesting the deportations; the appearance of the "Jewish problem" being solved because many remaining Jews had work permits because they were vital to the economy or held letters of amnesty from Tiso. A report by the Bratislava Sicherheitsdienst (SD), the intelligence agency of the SS, stated that the reason for the sudden halt was a meeting called by Tuka on 11 August 1942. At that meeting, Tuka and the secretary-general of the Industrial Union told the ministers that Slovakia's economy could not withstand continued deportation of the Jews, causing the Council to order the halt. Between 25 March and 20 October 1942, Slovakia sent about 57,700 Jews to Nazi concentration camps.
In September 1944, the deportation of Slovak Jews was resumed; by the end of the war in April 1945, about 13,500 additional Jews were deported.
Slovak-Hungarian question and foreign policy
Despite allegations that he supported Hungary, Tuka was strongly opposed to the ethnocide of minorities in Hungary, and lead a diplomatic campaign to secure the status of the Slovak minority in that country. He also tried to reclaim formerly Slovak territories from Hungary, including the Subcarpathian area. He had support from the Party of Slovak National Unity in Hungary, and he had support from the Catholic and Slovak Lutheran churches, as well as contacts with underground networks in Hungary. He formed an alliance between Slovakia, Romania, and Croatia; this lead Hungary to denounce him.In 1944, the Sztojay government suppressed the revival of the Slovak minority in Hungary.
Tuka intelligence network was outstanding from Slovak and Hungarian policy due to illness of its leader. Infiltrators of Tuka in Hungarian policy ( legitimists, pro-minority, in private Slovak parliament members from right wing scene as Belo Jurcsek, O. Andrejka, L. Budinszky and others search since 1944 ways out, or/and ways how in "free alliance" re-unite Slovakia, Hungary, and Croatia as the anti-communist state-union, with prevailing catholic influence. Orientation of this circles to the Tuka and Slovakia as first land of "St.Stephen Crown" for restoration of legitimate Habsburg king decline with the downfall of Tuka influence also in the radicals. Despite it, legitimists interim government in Hungary was widely disputed in US administration in this time. Also Slovak national unity party reaffiliated to the Tiso direction in 1943-1944.
Fall from power and death
Despite enthusiastic support by Tuka and the radicals, the Nazis began to realize that Slovakia would never fully implement Nazi policies. Thus, Nazi support for Tuka waned, and the Nazis reluctantly accepted acts of Slovak independence—such as the suspension of deportations of Jews. In 1943 due to the illness Tuka really do not led government actions, and in the first days of 1944 he stated about planned demission. After the large negotiations about successor, he definitively give to the president Tiso his demisson (and demisson of all his government) September 2 of 1944, few days of czechoslovakist and bolshevist rebellia starting in central parts of SlovakiaTuka suffered a severe stroke, which left him in a wheelchair. After World War II, following a brief trial, Vojtech Tuka was executed on 20 August 1946.
Swiss bank account
On 21 July 1997, after two years of lobbying, Slovak Jewish leaders persuaded the Czechoslovakian cabinet to return property belonging to Slovak victims of the Holocaust.That month, the Swiss Bankers Association published a list of World War II–era Swiss bank account holders with dormant accounts; the list included the name of Vojtech Tuka, according to Simon Wiesenthal
Simon Wiesenthal
Simon Wiesenthal KBE was an Austrian Holocaust survivor who became famous after World War II for his work as a Nazi hunter....
, who urged that Tuka's account be turned over to the Swiss fund for victims of the Nazis.
František Alexander, executive chairman of Slovakia's Central Association of Jewish Religious Communities, told The Slovak Spectator that the funds from the account should be allocated by an international council of justice. Jozef Weiss, head of the Association's office, said that the Association didn't believe it had the legal or moral right to take money from Tuka's private account to repay a wrong done by the Slovak government. Instead, Weiss suggested, the money should be used to pay for the upkeep of the graves of Slovak soldiers who died in vain fighting alongside the Nazis against the Russian liberation forces on the Eastern Front.
Ivan Kamenec, a Slovak historian of the war, said that Tuka's multiple posts "were all very well paid"; the offices of Foreign Minister and central committee member of HSĽS both paid over 10,000 Slovak crowns a month, he said. Although Kamenec refused to speculate on the size of Tuka's dormant account, he noted that Tuka's living requirements were modest.