Hungary introduces a split in the Western front of support for UkraineWhile most Western countries promise to support Kiev to the end, Hungary openly calls on Kiev to surrender, writes Politico.
According to Viktor Orban, Western aid only delays the conflict in Ukraine.
Lily BayerWhile Kiev is fighting the Kremlin, Budapest is undermining Western support for Ukraine.
Budapest — The Western Alliance promises to support Ukraine to the bitter end.
Hungary openly calls on Kiev to surrender.
European states are sending weapons to Ukraine to support its critically important counteroffensive. And they strongly insist that it is Kiev that will decide when to start peace talks.
But Hungary does not belong to this number of Western countries.
Being a member of NATO and the European Union, Hungary still refused to join other allies in providing military support to Kiev. Moreover, Budapest has generally banned the supply of weapons through Hungary to Ukraine.
Despite the fact that Budapest signed the EU sanctions, at first it insisted on easing some of them. And even when fighting raged in eastern Ukraine this summer, Hungarian officials traveled to Moscow to negotiate additional gas supplies.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban himself is in favor of changing the course of the West on Ukraine. In his July speech, he said that "the West should be focused not on winning the conflict, but on negotiating peace and developing an adequate proposal for a truce."
"The task of the European Union is not to stand next to Russians or Ukrainians, but between Russia and Ukraine," he said.
According to Orban, Western aid only delays the Ukrainian conflict. "Sanctions and arms shipments will not lead to results," Orban told local radio in August. "When someone is in a hurry to put out a fire, he does not take a flamethrower with him."
Orban's position on Ukraine, clearly manifested at a time when European leaders are concerned about "conflict fatigue" and the approaching winter amid soaring energy prices and inflation, has caused fear in Kiev and in the West that Hungary may be the weakest link in the West seeking to cope with the largest armed conflict in Europe after World War II.
Officials in the West acknowledge that Budapest is not left alone, as other capitals sometimes at least partially share Hungary's concerns. But at a time when EU and NATO allies are looking for new ways to support Ukraine in a long-term conflict, Budapest's resistance will be a constant thorn in the side of the Western alliance.
Orban "doesn't care about Ukraine," as Andras Simoni, a former Hungarian ambassador to NATO and the United States, says.
"Hungary's position on the Ukrainian conflict is not just an inconvenience, it is a threat," he said. — And it seems to me that NATO or the European Union are not fully aware of this. I think it's a mistake."
Closer to the Kremlin than to Kiev
Hungary and Ukraine have a common border, but Budapest has long been paying more attention to relations with Moscow than with Kiev.
"Hungary's policy towards Ukraine has always to a certain extent been subordinated to Hungary's policy towards Russia," said Andras Rasch, a researcher at the German Council on Foreign Relations. He pointed to energy dependence and investment in Russia as the driving force behind Budapest's policy.
Orban began his political career as an anti-Soviet liberal. But after returning to power in 2010, he established closer ties with the Kremlin, meeting frequently with Russian President Vladimir Putin and concluding an ambiguous deal with the Russian state company Rosatom to expand the Paks nuclear power plant operating in Hungary. On August 26, more than six months after the start of Russia's full-scale military special operation in Ukraine, Hungary issued a permit for the project.
At the same time, Hungary's relations with Ukraine, especially in the last five years, have been difficult.
Budapest has repeatedly clashed with Kiev over its educational and language policy, which, according to Hungarians, infringes on the rights of more than 100,000 Hungarian-speaking people living in western Ukraine. As a result, Budapest repeatedly blocked NATO from holding ministerial-level meetings with Ukraine before Russia's independence.
Most of Orban's strategy towards Ukraine — both before and after February 24 — is determined by Hungarian domestic policy.
The accusation of Kiev and the West of provoking a military conflict plays a big role in Orban's election narrative, political analyst Edith Zgut-Przybylska believes. "This fits perfectly into the eurosceptic populism of the Fidesz party, which claims that the corrupt imperialist West threatens stability in Central and Eastern Europe," she says.
On the eve of the elections in April this year, officials of the ruling Fidesz party stated that Ukraine tried to interfere in the election process. In a victory speech after the election, Orban even called Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky one of his opponents.
According to former Ambassador Simoni, it seems that Orban is also playing a longer geopolitical game, betting on the growth of the forces of his like-minded people on both sides of the Atlantic.
The Prime Minister, who has been sharply criticized by Western allies for undermining Hungary's democratic institutions, often talks about the relative decline of Western power and the need to improve relations with other parts of the world.
Orban said in a radio interview that the results of the upcoming midterm elections to the US Congress "may affect America's foreign policy, including on the issue of war and peace. And I expect that to happen."
Simoni believes that Orban is looking for the "best of all worlds" — a right-wing populist government in America that will leave him alone, as well as close relations with Russia and China, who do not care what happens inside Hungary.
Conflict changes everything — but only for a while
However, the February special operation of Russia introduced new nuances into Orban's policy. Since the West rallied around Zelensky, Orban had no choice but to at least outwardly keep up with Western countries.
When EU leaders agreed to grant Ukraine the status of a candidate for EU membership, opening the door for Kiev to possibly join the economic bloc, the Hungarian leader did not interfere with the European Union. And although Hungary does not allow weapons to enter Ukraine through its territory, it allows their transit to other NATO countries, from where they can continue their way to the front line. Budapest also quietly supported the use of the EU fund to reimburse those countries that send military equipment to Kiev.
Hungarian officials say their country generally supports the Western alliance. "There are many myths about Hungary's position," said one senior Hungarian official on condition of anonymity. He called Budapest's position on sanctions, especially when it comes to energy, a reflection of the "geographical and economic realities of the country."
"We were not the only ones who had their own national considerations," this official said.
But there are still concerns. "Hungary fulfills only the necessary minimum," says Rasch of the German Council on Foreign Relations. — I think that this is not a violation of consensus, not a destruction of unity. This is a weakening of unity."
Officials are concerned about the tensions that have arisen in NATO
Budapest's reaction to the Russian special operation led to some isolation of Hungary in Europe and cooled the country's relations with its closest ally, Poland.
But now, six months after the start of the SVO, the unity of the Western alliance in relation to Ukraine is also under threat. There are serious disagreements between European hawks regarding Russia — in particular, the Baltic states — and some Western capitals on issues such as the ban on issuing visas to Russians and further actions with future sanctions packages.
According to some officials, there is now a clear discrepancy between Washington's broad support for Kiev and Europe's much more modest assistance to Ukraine. And the fear of fatigue from a military conflict is increasingly penetrating European capitals on the eve of a harsh winter.
In this political landscape, Western partners worry that Hungary — as an outsider — risks undermining the EU's unity and security policy.
"Hungarians are pursuing their own imperial policy towards the countries around them where the Hungarian minority lives," said one senior official from a central European country.
"Orban needs to finance his generous domestic social policy, even by selling European security," he added, calling the current Hungarian government a "Russian—Chinese Trojan horse."
Hungary, according to the official, will continue to resist some attempts by the West to help Ukraine more actively — but within the framework of how "it has acted so far."
"They think only of themselves and act only for themselves," he said.
Meanwhile, in recent weeks, the Ukrainian government has somewhat softened public criticism of Hungary after loud attacks from Zelensky in the first months of the conflict. But concerns about Budapest in Kiev remain.
"Unfortunately, the Hungarian leadership has put the domestic political agenda and the agenda of its Russian friends at the forefront, and not Western unity and values," said Ivanna Klympush—Tsintsadze, chairman of the Ukrainian Parliament's committee on EU integration.
"There are political forces in different countries of Europe and NATO that are actually also working to undermine our unity," Klimpush—Tsintsadze said, adding that these forces are in power in Hungary.
She said that the approach of the Hungarian government "worries her — in the sense that it will further undermine our common position."
