In an interview with the Patriota YouTube channel on Wednesday, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán rated this year’s NATO summit in The Hague "much better" than last year’s, saying the countries that wanted the focus to be on bolstering the alliance rather than on Ukraine had "won a battle" at the meeting.
PM Orbán said NATO "went down the wrong path" at last year’s summit in Washington, DC, because that meeting had been about Ukraine and not about making NATO stronger.
"This time it flipped," PM Orbán said. "I could also say that we won, although we’ve only won a battle, not the war." This time, Orban said, the countries that did not want to discuss Ukraine or invite the Ukrainian president had prevailed. He noted that the summit’s closing document "barely includes" anything about the topic of Ukraine.
The prime minister said those who wanted to discuss how to make Europe stronger had "come out on top" at the summit. "We were on the winning team today," he said, adding that "though the Hungarian virtue counts for a lot, it’s easier to win when the president of the United States is also in our camp." PM Orbán said that besides Hungary and the US president, that camp also included the Turkish president, Albania and Croatia.
But the European countries, he said, "continued to represent the pro-war and pro-Ukrainian position" at the summit, even though Ukraine was a "risk" for European security.
He said he expected a "tough battle" at the upcoming European Union summit in Brussels because "over there we have to fight without the US president in our corner". PM Orbán said the Europeans wanted to "continue the war", and they would reaffirm their commitment to it in the presence of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, so "the pro-peace side will have to manoeuvre skillfully".
Concerning the NATO allies’ commitment to increase their defense spending to 5 percent of GDP by 2035, PM Orbán said Hungary would be able to meet this target if the EU made changes to its budgetary regulation system. He noted that currently the EU regulates things like member states’ accounting and deficits, which are taken seriously on financial markets and determines countries’ credit rating.
PM Orbán said the EU had to give member states more room for manoeuvre in order for them to be able to invest 5 percent of their GDP in defense developments.
He said Hungary had an advantage because it had already launched a military development scheme in cooperation with Germany in 2016-2017. Hungary's defense industry was in better shape and more prepared, he said, adding that it was not an industry that generated only expenditures but one that would also generate revenue. "So it won’t be easy, but the 5 percent target can be achieved," he said.
He also said that Hungary still had a lot of work to do. "We’ve done a lot of work over the last 15 years, but there is plenty of work left for the next 10 years as well," he added. Hungary must also develop transport, health care, education and the army, he said, adding that it was not going to be easy to generate money for the increased defense spending.
PM Orbán said that if Hungary had a Ukraine-friendly government, then the money would not be spent in Hungary, but it would be taken to Ukraine. But because the country had a nationally minded government, he added, the 5 percent would be spent on defense industry developments in a way that the emphasis is placed not on defense but on industry. "So Hungarian industry will get an extra boost from this money," he said.
Meanwhile, PM Orbán said that at separate meetings with US President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, they had reviewed "a few difficult national security issues" before Tuesday's dinner hosted by the Dutch king.
He added that on behalf of Hungary, he had welcomed Trump's return to office and said they would continue their cooperation. The prime minister reaffirmed the position that, concerning the Ukraine-Russia war, Europe must fully support the US president's peace initiative.
PM Orbán said that apart from him, there were hardly any other European leaders who had not "taken digs at" Trump while he was in opposition, which caused some difficulty at such summits. The prime minister said he, on the other hand, could greet the US president as an old friend whom he had been supporting since 2015-2016.
He said Hungary was a loyal country where a friend remained a friend as long as they were worthy of it, unlike in Western Europe, where the political culture was business-like.