A few years after the Nazis came to power in Germany, an alliance of states and nationalistic movements formed, revolving around the German axis. That alliance, the states involved, and the interplay between their territorial aims and those of Germany during the interwar period and World War II are at the core of this volume. This territorial revisionism came to include all manner of political and military measures that attempted to change existing borders. Taking into account not just interethnic relations but also the motivations of states and nationalizing ethnocratic ruling elites, this volume reconceptualizes the history of East Central Europe during World War II. In so doing, it presents a clearer understanding of some of the central topics in the history of the war itself and offers an alternative to standard German accounts of the period and East European national histories.

Dieter Langewiesche was Professor of Modern History at the University of Hamburg from 1978 to 1985 and of Medieval and Modern history at the University of Tübingen from 1985 to 2008.

Introduction: Contextualizing Territorial Revisionism: Goals, Expectations, Practices
Marina Cattaruzza and Dieter Langewiesche

The European Scenario in the Interwar Period Revisionism in Practice The Minorities Issue The manifold problems of the heirs of the empires in East Central Europe An era of Revisionism?

Chapter 1. The Worst of Friends: Germanys Allies in East Central Europe Struggles for Regional Dominance and Ethnic Cleansing, 1938-1945
Istvan Deak

THE ROLE OF MINORITIES

Chapter 2. Minorities into majorities. Sudeten German and Transylvanian Hungarian political elites as actors of revisionism before and during the Second World War
Franz Horvath

Introduction Some remarks on terminology (Minority groups, Revisionism, and Loyalty) Sudeten Germans and Transylvanian Hungarians as Revisionist Minorities Dominating the others. Sudeten Germans and Transylvanian Hungarians as Members of the Ruling Nation (1938/40-1944/45) Conclusion

Chapter 3.Germany turns eastwards: The Volksdeutsche in Central and Eastern Europe
Norbert Spannenberger

Minority Politics and German Volksgruppen in the States of the South Eastern European Region A Sketch of National Socialist Volksgruppen Politics in Practice

REVISIONISM AS A DRIVING FORCE

Chapter 4.Revisionism in Regional Perspective
Holly Case

Revisionism as Ideology Revisionist and Anti-Revisionist Solidarity: The Case of the Little Entente Lessons and Models in the Geopolitics of Revisionism: Bulgaria and Romania Revisionism and Domestic Policy Conclusion

Chapter 5.Hungarian Revisionism in Thought and Action, 1920-1941 (Plans, Expectations, Reality)
Ignác Romsics

Hungarian Revisionist Conceptions after Trianon Hungarian Revisionist Politics by Negotiation and War

Chapter 6.Bulgarian Territorial Revisionism as the Driving Force for its Rapprochment with the Third Reich
Elbieta Znamierowska-Rakk

Postwar Revisionism and Postwar Alliances Germany as the Main Revisionist Power The Recovery of Southern Dobrudja Bulgarias Accession to the Pact of Three Conclusion

PRACTICES OF REVISIONISM

Chapter 7.Politics and Military Action of Ethnic Ukrainian Collaboration for the New European Order
Frank Grelka

Political Collaboration Administrative Collaboration Military Collaboration Conclusion

Chapter 8.Civil War in Occupied Territories: The Polish-Ukrainian Conflict in the Interwar Years and in the Second World War
Frank Golczewski

National Disappointment Hopes set on the Great Powers The Changes of 1941 The Change of the Tide After the War

Chapter 9.The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization and Bulgarian Revisionism, 1923-1944
Stefan Troebst

Vision turned into Politics: The Bulgarian Syndrome of San Stefano Peaceful Revisionism: Official Bulgarian Foreign Policy in the Interwar Period Militant Revisionism: Informal Bulgarian Interwar Balkan Policy Revision AchievedAnd Lost Again: Bulgaria and IMRO in the Second World War Legacies: IMRO in Todays Bulgarian and Macedonian Politics

Chapter 10.Romania in the Second World War: Revisionist Out of Necessity
Mariana Hausleitner

Minorities Policies, Romanization and anti-Semitism in Romania 1918-1941 The Redrawing of the Romanian Borders 1938-1940 The so called "Purification" in the Bukovina, Bessarabia and Transnistria 1941-1944 Who planned and organized the national purification of Romania Conclusion

Bibliography
Index