“Hungarian leaders have made no secret of their belief that the future belongs to American decline. “They make no secret of how they are preparing for American weakness and betting on our failure,” Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday regarding NATO. According to a statement from the U.S. Embassy in Hungary, McConnell first spoke about Chinese influence in the Senate, then went on to say that America’s European allies are increasingly concerned about the flaws in the Chinese economic model, “and they are increasingly concerned about tying their partnership to China.” The vehicles for a totalitarian system that stifles innovation, discourages free thinking and makes free enterprise more difficult.
Yet this caution is not universal. “China may not be a safe trading partner, but it remains an attractive proposition for many economies… including within NATO. (…) I have already spoken of Hungary’s drift over the decades into the arena of more determined opponents of the West. This is a worrying trend. And no one—especially American conservatives, who are increasingly forming a cult of personality around Prime Minister Viktor Orbán—can pretend not to see what is happening. Hungary’s leaders are throwing stones at Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran, and they are doing so loudly and openly.”
According to McConnell, the Orbán government welcomed China’s view of a “European beachhead” in Hungary as the perfect complement to its declared “Eastern Opening” policy. The chairman of the Republican caucus in the US Senate said of Viktor Orbán regarding Russia: Orbán describes the regime as “hyper-rational” and has sacrificed tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of Russian lives and more than $200 billion in military power against Ukraine, an unprovoked and, so far, unsuccessful aggression.
But this NATO prime minister doesn’t just like Putin. He helps him. His government is intervening on Moscow’s behalf, obstructing European and transatlantic efforts at every turn to counter Russia’s unlawful aggression. (…) European allies provide more aid to Ukraine than the United States, but Americans who complain that the EU isn’t doing more to help Ukraine need look no further than Budapest’s efforts to attract more EU aid aimed at preventing that,” McConnell said, also raising Hungary’s relationship with Iran.
“Shared values with Tehran. I also believe that American conservatives are the ones who are returning to shared values with the Hungarian government party. Has Orbán’s government forgotten its constituencies on this side of the Atlantic? No. Hungary’s leaders have made no secret of their conviction that the future belongs to American decline. They make no secret of how they are preparing for American weakness and betting on our failure. There is no difficulty in submitting to authoritarians. “America’s leaders have nothing to gain from praising those who do,” said the Senate Republican leader.
