Gen. Marcel Stomm, was the commander of the Third Corps in the ill-fated Hungarian Second Army serving on the Don front in 1942-1943. During a post-battle retreat, because of the heavily clogged roadways by German troops, Stomm concluded that small groups of men, rather than their large masses, might be more capable of making headway toward safety. On February 1st, 1943, therefore Stomm disbanded the Third Corps, permitting his men to split up into smaller retreating contingents, which then trudged successfully into safer territory. With a few of his officers, Stomm drove off toward the southwest, suffered debilitating frostbite, had to be thwarted from committing suicide, and was captured by the Soviets. Interrogations, an argument with ex-patriot and Soviet collaborator Communist Mátyás Rákosi, imprisonment in Moscow, the amputation of his blackened lower legs, a stint in a Soviet POW camp, and after barely escaping execution, finally years of postwar confinement in a Budapest Communist prison followed. All told, despite his unorthodox and controversial command decision, General Stomm had done his best under trying circumstances to carry on as an honorable soldier. 

Hungarian General  Marcel Stomm

After a fierce battle in the summer of 1942, the Hungarian army captured the Russian town of Stary Oskol, situated on the Oskol river. On the way to the east, and the Don river, the town was of great importance for both the Hungarian and German armies. The captured town housed two military hospitals, where many lives were saved during the war.
The Oskol river flows through Kursk and Belgorod Oblasts in Russia, and through the eastern part of Kharkiv Oblast in Ukraine, where it joins the Seversky Donets river. 
There are several towns along the Oskol river, Stary Oskol is one of them.


Important town of Stary Oskol

A picture is often worth a thousand words – indeed. But this 1938 photo of Hitler and Horthy riding in an open automobile through Berlin is one of the exceptions. In all too many observers’ minds the image appears as a reflection of a cozy meeting transpiring between the Reich Chancellor and the Regent of Hungary.

But that is far from the truth, as this long story unfolds. In 1938 Hitler was already on the warpath about dismantling Czechoslovakia, but in May of 1938 the threat of military retaliation by France and Great Britain stopped the Fuehrer cold. Seldom at a loss for solution, at this stage Hitler brought Hungary onto the world stage for the sake of helping him out. Hungary was no friend of the new Czechoslovakia and she wanted Slovakia, the former Upper Hungary, returned “home.” This was a convenient opening for Hitler.

Horthy and his top officials were invited to a lavish state visit to Germany, with a naval parade held at Kiel for the former Austro-Hungarian admiral’s benefit. Here Hitler got down to business and proposed a Hungarian invasion of Czechoslovakia, i.e. Slovakia or Upper Hungary, rewarded by her reannexation of the multi-national province. Hitler’s ulterior motive was clever – in that case Germany could intervene to settle the turmoil by his own invasion and occupation of Bohemia-Moravia or “Czechia,” serving as a justification of “peacemaking intervention” toward the West. The Hungarian delegation first salivated then just about chocked in response. No way could Hungary risk a war in 1938 and deal with a Yugoslav military intervention, because “we could not be expected to commit suicide,” so her foreign minister explained.

Both Hitler and Horthy were badly frustrated at Kiel consequently. But the smooth operators they both were, the planned visit continued in Berlin, including an amiable looking open car ride in the morning, see photo above, and a gala opera performance in the evening. There was much more to follow in the two politicians interactions until 1945, but to his credit on this visit and ever after Horthy and his country refused the National Socialist raised-hand salute, because even though subordinated by the Third Reich imperial power, Horthy remained a conservative Hungarian nationalist.

In any case, the above is not the first or last photo to mess with our perception.
