Polish-Hungarian relations are in crisis over their polar opposite approaches towards Ukraine, which already just ruined their 700-year-old brotherhood at the state-to-state level and continues getting worse. Tensions had been building since the start of Russia’s special operation, but they finally exploded after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban criticized Poland on Saturday for hypocritically attacking his country over its Russian oil imports and radically reshaping the European balance of power.
This was followed by Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Teofil Bartoszewski suggesting on Sunday that Hungary should withdraw from the EU and NATO in order to form “a union with Putin”. Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto responded to that by doubling down on Orban’s claims that Poland is hypocritical and provocative while also conveying to Warsaw that Budapest’s patience is wearing thin. Readers can learn more about their dispute from this analysis here that was published on Monday.
It turns out that the Warsaw-based Visegrad Insight published an interview with Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski later that same day in which this top diplomat continued his deputy’s attacks against Hungary. He practically mocked Orban for not having any support for his peace mission and then scandalously claimed that Szijjarto initially supported his proposal to hold the next EU Foreign Affairs Council in Ukraine as a compromise between Budapest and Brussels before eventually vetoing it.
Sikorski’s other attacks against Hungary inclined throwing shade on its East-West balancing act and implying that newfound cooperation with the Chinese police imperils national sovereignty. Szijjarto was once again pressed to respond to these Polish provocations, which he did in two Facebook posts here and here. He accused Sikorski of lying, clarified that Orban’s peace mission was a national initiative unrepresentative of the EU, and expressed hope that Poland will one day return to Central Europe.
The last part showed that he’s nobly taking the high road by refusing to stoop to Sikorski’s level with lies and smears, which would have amounted to dirtying himself by wrestling with a pig while his Polish counterpart squeals with delight. Poland wants to provoke Hungary into behaving undiplomatically since that could then be spun to discredit the conservative-nationalist opposition that looks to it for guidance on non-Ukrainian-related issues like illegal immigration and still treasures their brotherhood.
Apart from not wanting to deal a deathblow to this relationship at the people-to-people level among those in Poland who still appreciate it, Hungary also doesn’t want to discredit itself in the eyes of its non-Western partners like Russia and China by acting like a typical European country does nowadays. Those two and others respect that Hungary conducts itself differently than its peers, which is why they’d be hugely disappointed if it was successfully provoked by Poland into behaving just like the rest of them.
Hungarian diplomacy is sophisticated enough to never sully the state like that, which is why it’s expected that its representatives will continue taking the high road no matter what Poland says or does, even if Sikorski and others get a lot nastier. This’ll likely take the form of them continuing to explain how far astray Poland has gotten from its post-Old Cold War mission of turning their Visegrad Group with Czechia and Slovakia into a third center of influence in Europe alongside the Franco-German axis and Russia.
Hungary wants to remind Poland that the greater geopolitical good is served by returning to this mission instead of continuing to contribute to continental instability by serving as the Anglo-American Axis’ wedge between the aforementioned traditional power centers. Polish policy won’t change as a result, but Polish patriots will know that Hungary has Poland’s best interests in mind no matter what the ruling liberal-globalist coalition claims, thus keeping their brotherhood alive at the people-to-people level.
