The remnants of the Czechoslovak Army abandoned the newly-formed republic, and Carpatho-Ukraine tried to defend itself by local self-defence groups, organised by the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists as Carpathian Sich.

Beginning in 1939, the anti Jewish laws passed in Hungary were extended to the newly-annexed territories, including the rest of Carpathian Ruthenia.

[12] Hungarian authorities conscripted Jewish men of working age into slave labor gangs in which a high proportion perished.

[13] In March 1944, Operation Margarethe had German forces overthrow the Hungarian government and install Döme Sztójay as prime minister.

In October 1944, Carpathian Ruthenia was occupied by the Soviet army and the German and Hungarian military forces were expelled from the region.

Merely two weeks after the entrance of the Soviet armed forces tens of thousands of Hungarian and German male civilians were deportated to the death camp of Svaliava (Szolyva).

Soviet military forces prevented both the printing and the posting of the Czechoslovak proclamation and proceeded instead to organize the local population.

On 19 November, the communists, meeting in Mukachevo, issued a resolution requesting separation of the territory and the incorporation into the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.

The Soviet Union agreed to postpone annexation until the postwar period to avoid compromising Beneš's policy based on the pre-Munich frontiers.

Deportation of the Hungarian and German adult male population started from the 17th of November, 1944 to the Szolyva (Svalyava)[16] concentration camp.