Orban’s Delusions of Grandeur

Britain has one big chain of stores – WH Smiths – which sells newspapers, magazines,  reviews, books, stationery and other related products.  Its shops are found on high streets, railway stations and airports.

Regular users of WH Smith have in the last few years been puzzled by a new addition to the weekly magazines on sale. The Hungarian Conservative Review is a hefty, handsomely printed 120-page journal – rather like university review journals aimed at a specialist audience.

No one seems to buy a copy. It is by any yardstick dull and unreadable – unless you are interested in the nationalist, religious, identity vaporings of Budapest-based rightists who are light-years removed from the Anglo-Saxon tradition of tolerant, let-and-let-live conservatism.

A Hungarian Stalin?

Viktor Orban, the autocrat who runs Hungary as a corrupt personal fiefdom, is no Stalin. But like the Soviet leader, he shares the same approach to great Hungarian chauvinism and dislike of cosmopolitan rootless thinkers like the Jewish George Soros who Orban has driven out of Hungary and back into western exile.

Orban also seems to have a list of what Lenin called “useful idiots” – well-placed intellectuals and politicians in the West who, in true believer fashion, would report that they had seen the future in Hungary and it would work.

Viktor Orban, still only 60 this year, has been Prime Minister of Hungary since 2010, and was first elected Prime Minister in 1998.

Orban has brilliantly focused on political power. He is not really interested in economic growth. As a result, Hungary’s GDP, at $177 billion, is barely one-third of Austria’s $471 billion.

Corruption? You bet…

What Orban is keen on, though, is doling out the “goodies” among his cronies. Hence, Hungary is prey to the endless political corruption that befalls small autocracies.

On top of that, Orban is currently wracked by a major paedophilia scandal involving his Fidesz party, and its effort to cover up sexual predators on young children close to Orban.

Today, none of the far-right parties in Europe talk about leaving the EU. Viktor Orban never calls for Magyarexit. He likes EU money too much – as do, coincidentally, Georgia Meloni in Italy or Marine Le Pen in France.

At the same time, Orban is a puffball. He is forever threatening to block EU business, or veto Sweden joining NATO or funds for Ukraine.

On his own

Orban’s difficulty is that his idea of modern European right-wingism is all about keeping Hungary removed from partnership with neighbouring countries.

The Slovakian nationalist rightists in power headed by Robert Fico quarrel endlessly with Budapest about the large Hungarian minority in Slovakia.  They are encouraged by Orban to vote in Hungarian elections, and to see themselves as Hungarian, not Slovak citizens.

Fico is willing to sell arms and ammunition to Ukraine, as does Turkey. But at least so far he refuses to support or participate in EU-wide funding for arms for Ukraine.

The Fico case illustrates that, in contrast to Orban, some countries’ leaders apparently remember their own national history well enough.  In light of the Kremlin’s 1939 type invasion of Ukraine, they are able to switch off their previous pro-Putin inclination.

Orban and farce

Orban’s pretensions to lead a new rightist revolution against the EU turned into farce recently when a conference of big-mouthed politicians, journalists, academics and even a German cardinal who rants against Pope Francis was due to take place in Brussels.

The event had to move from venue to venue, as local hotel-owners and local community politicians made clear that they did not want the Orban band of 1930s nostalgics to help make worse the already divided and sectarian communal politics of the Belgian capital.

Orban’s yesteryear men – from the UK and France

The English neo-cons sent Nigel Farage to praise Orban, and attack the EU. The rest of Europe now sees that Brexit has turned into an economic disaster for the British Tories, who are about to lose power to a revived Labour Party.

Farage is yesterday’s man and British rightists are of no use to Orban now that they are outside the EU.

The French Orbanites sent Eric Zemmour, the far-right candidate against Emmanuel Macron in the French presidential election in 2022. Zemmour considers Marine Le Pen a sell out-out as she has dropped her calls for Frexit and returning to the French franc.

Zemmour says that he ”dreams of a French Putin,” and he said France should refuse to take in any refugees from Ukraine.

But French collaborators with Putin extend well beyond Zemmour. Le Monde just published a detailed survey of the number of times Marine Le Pen’s deputies in the French parliament have voted to endorse Kremlin policy positions.

Orban is Putin’s number one supporter in government in the EU

The Orbanites were counting on Trump-supporting U.S. Republicans as allies in their pro-Putin affiliation. President Biden’s win in Congress to get massive military aid voted for Ukraine leaves Orban ever-more isolated as Putin’s useless idiot.

Meanwhile, the Czech government has handed over to the European Parliament the names of MEPs it considers to be on the Kremlin’s payroll.

Orban’s vain hopes squashed

Orban had hoped to lead a nationalist, anti-immigration pro-Putin counter-revolution against Europe.

All he has got for the millions he has spent is an unreadable magazine and failed politicians who turn up at his events because no one any longer listens to them in their home country.

Orban clearly aims for a Balkanized Europe of Catholic states, with as few Jews or Muslim or atheists as possible.  His ultimate goal is for governments to be run by strong male leaders who are obeyed and revered by their people.