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By Tom O'Connor

Deputy Editor, National Security and Foreign Policy

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As President Donald Trump's efforts to reach a negotiated settlement to the Russia-Ukraine war meet resistance from European capitals, Hungary's top diplomat has outlined to Newsweek what he believed to be a concerted effort by the European Union to undermine peace talks and spark an open confrontation with Moscow.

It's a premise that turns the rhetoric emanating from the EU on its head, as the bloc and many of its leaders—including those of France and Germany—have accused the Kremlin of being the party to eschew good-faith discussions in favor of coercive military confrontation and even wage a hybrid war against both EU and NATO members.

But that's not the case, according to Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto of Hungary, a member of both EU and NATO that has emerged as Trump's closest ally on the continent given the alignment between the U.S. leader and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Szijjarto, who just last week met with Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov, says it's not Moscow but Brussels that's pushing for a direct conflict.

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"The stakes are pretty high, because the European leaders have not only decided to try to prevent President Trump from making peace, but they kind of made a decision to bring the entire Europe into a war against Russia," Szijjarto told Newsweek. "So, they speak very clearly that the Russians want to attack Europe, which I think is not true. Why would they? I mean, if they reach such a slow forward progress in Ukraine, then why would they attack the entire NATO, which is definitely more overpowered compared to them."

"So, our major concern is that the Europeans have not only decided to put obstacles on the way towards the peace efforts, but they really want to bring the entire European continent into a war against Russia," he added. "And this is something that can only be avoided in case there's a U.S.-Russia agreement, including how to make peace in Ukraine. That's the only way."

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The Fight for Europe's Future

As to why the EU would seek to take on Russia, Szijjarto identified the plan as linked to a broader effort by the bloc's leadership and most influential powers to impose a federalized vision for the continent that would effectively constitute a "United States of Europe" under centralized rule.

Since its establishment in 1993, the EU has sought greater integration among member states, which now include 27 out of the 44 nations in Europe. These efforts include the establishment of a common currency, a collective parliament and standardization of laws and regulations on various issues, including sensitive topics such as immigration, data management and LGBTQ+ issues.

In this way, the EU constitutes a supranational entity whose institutions have direct weight on member states while sharing jurisdiction with the national laws and policies of member states, which remain independent nations. Critics, however, argue that EU decisions have trended toward eroding the sovereignty of individual member states in favor of a system more akin to the United States of America or the Russian Federation.

Szijjarto, among the most influential critics within the system, envisioned an opportunity for the EU to accelerate such a project through laying the groundwork for a decisive conflict with its traditional foe in Moscow amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

"What I think is behind this approach is the following, that even way before the war had been launched, there had been a debate there for long time in the Europe on how the future of the European Union should look like, whether this should be a United States of Europe with a headquarters in Brussels, and all competencies from the national level being brought to Brussels and degrade the member states into provinces or regions, or the more sovereigntist approach, which we represent, which is that the EU should be an alliance or integration of strong member states," Szijjarto said.

"These are the two, let's say, options and the big countries, the Western Europeans, plus the elite in Brussels, the establishment, definitely want the European Union to be somewhat of a United States of Europe," he added. "And I think what they see is that the war brings a chance for them to transform the European Union more into a United States of Europe, because in case there's a war, then a centralized leadership, a centralized decision-making procedure is something to which they can argue."

One of the driving forces he viewed to be behind this line of thinking was the fact that European leaders lacked a "proper answer" to the question of "what is the EU?"

"The EU is not a competitive economy now. The EU is not leading the role technologically. The EU is not the concept of peace currently, so then what is the European Union for? Well, the European Union is for war," he said. "And I this is the reason for now."

Moreover, he asserted, that the EU has "isolated itself in international politics" by pursuing combative approaches to top world powers, including Russia, China and even the U.S., which counts 23 EU member states as NATO allies.

"The EU has isolated itself from the U.S. by bashing President Trump, big time," Szijjarto said. "It isolated itself from China by putting tariffs on the automotive industry and considering China as a systematic rival, which is stupid. It isolated itself from Russia by the sanctions, no question."

"And it has isolated itself from the world of the future, I might say, so this Asia-Africa belt, by putting things which have nothing to do with trade and economy as a precondition for trade and economic cooperation, LGBT stuff, Green Deal," Szijjarto added. "So, these ideological things and the European Union, Brussels, is simply confusing ideological stuff with economy and trade, and they are considering things in an ideologized way, instead of approaching them in a way as they are."

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Budapest Versus Brussels

Hungary's divergence from EU doctrine on key issues has resulted in another kind of battle emerging between Budapest and Brussels, one manifesting in an array of critical statements, legal challenges and the withholding of funds.

Last week, the European Commission announced it would formally charge Hungary with failure to comply with the EU media statutes enshrined in the European Media Freedom Act, drawing backlash from Budapest. On Monday, Hungarian Justice Minister Bence Tuzson announced that the country would be suing the EU Court of Justice over a $200 million fine issued last year over Budapest's break with the bloc on migration and asylum practices, with additional a daily $1 million penalty now bringing the total sum owed beyond $700 million.

Szijjarto said such measures represent just a part of the pressures his country is facing "every day" from the EU and its leading members, which also seek to rein in Hungary's opposition to open-ended aid to Ukraine as Kyiv's forces struggle to fend off a Russian invasion nearing its four-year anniversary in February.

Yet another dispute has recently emerged in Hungary refusing to greenlight an EU plan to use portions of nearly $250 billion in frozen Russian assets, most of it held by Belgium's Euroclear, to generate a loan for Ukraine. As the EU prepares to vote on the matter Thursday, Orbán has referred to the tactic as "no less than an open declaration of war" against Moscow.

The conflict also extends to debates about Ukraine's aspirations to join the EU, which Kyiv applied to join just four days after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the so-called "special military operation" on February 22, 2022. Candidate status was granted that June, though negotiations continue regarding lingering concerns, including over Ukraine's corruption problems.

As the EU seeks to proceed with Ukraine's membership process and reports indicate such a development may be linked to a negotiated end to the war, Szijjarto asserted that Hungary would continue to block any effort to integrate Kyiv into the bloc.

"As long as we are in office in Budapest, it will not happen, because major steps require unanimity," Szijjarto said. "Regardless of how they try to overcome these things, there are things which definitely do require unanimity, and we will never vote in favor of Ukraine becoming a member of the European Union for many reasons, but strategically speaking, we simply do not want to belong to the same integration with Ukraine."

"Because currently, if Ukraine is being integrated into the European Union, that's the end of the European Union," he added. "Because they take all the money, they bring in the war, they bring in the Ukrainian mafia. They bring in the low-quality food stuff. So, they basically kill the European economy, and they kill the European integration as well."

Newsweek has reached out to the EU's External Affairs Action Service and the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry for comment.

Hungary's Trump Card

Conservative Hungary remains outnumbered in its clash with mainstream, predominantly liberal leanings of the EU. But the situation appears to be shifting somewhat in Budapest's favor.

Among the most notable developments on this front has been Trump's return to office after four years of President Joe Biden's administration, which largely backed the EU in its efforts to ostracize Hungary. Trump, on the other hand, expressed nothing but praise for Orbán, who has led since 2010 and previously from 1998-2002.

"The basis for their friendship is loyalty, which is very rare nowadays, because these two leaders are maybe the most attacked leaders currently in the world," Szijjarto said. "They are suffering from the most political and media and those kind of attacks, and in certain situations, it might have been more comfortable or easier for one or the other, you know, just to walk away, but they have not done so."

"So, even in the worst times, they remain loyal to each other, and this loyalty, I think, is the best and most stable basis for a friendship between the two" he added, "and this friendship is the great basis for the state-to-state relations."

The ideological bonds between the two leaders were on full display last week when the White House released its new National Security Strategy, which, among other things, took warned that Europe's "real are even deeper" than "insufficient military spending and economic stagnation," extending to the "stark prospect of civilizational erasure."

"The larger issues facing Europe include activities of the European Union and other transnational bodies that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence," the document read.

"Should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less," the document continued. "As such, it is far from obvious whether certain European countries will have economies and militaries strong enough to remain reliable allies. Many of these nations are currently doubling down on their present path. We want Europe to remain European, to regain its civilizational self-confidence, and to abandon its failed focus on regulatory suffocation."

The National Security Strategy also explicitly identifies "cultivating resistance to Europe’s current trajectory within European
nations" as a primary goal of the U.S. and further commits Washington's diplomatic power to "managing European relations with Russia ... both to reestablish conditions of strategic stability across the Eurasian landmass, and to mitigate the risk of conflict between Russia and European states."

The impact of the strategy, according to Szijjarto, led to "a big scandal in Europe among the political leaders."

"They were so frustrated, because what has been written there is simply true," Szijjarto said. "So, Europe is being faced with a civilizational crisis by letting the illegal migrants in, by creating parallel societies in the western part of Europe, by this very aggressive secularism, pushing back the Christian roots of the continent, by pushing these crazy ideologies, as if they were the mainstream, LGBT and stuff. So, with these, Europe is facing a civilizational crisis, and that's how we see."

With Washington also pursuing stronger bilateral cooperation with Budapest on a number of fronts, including record-level investments, exemptions for Hungary buying Russian oil and gas as well as ramped up supplies of U.S. gas and nuclear fuel, he said Trump's support has proved crucial in the ongoing feud with EU leadership.

"It's better for us now than it used to be four years ago, in that four years ago we had Brussels and Washington against us, and now it's only Brussels," Szijjarto said, "so it's a bit better."

And when it comes to putting an end to the war in Ukraine, Szijjarto commended Trump's "tremendous endurance in pushing for peace."

"I think this endurance and this commitment of his is basically the only basis for hope," Szijjarto said. "If he gives up, then the hope for peace is basically totally over."

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A 'Patriotic Revolution'

The change of government earlier this in Washington is not the only political shift that Hungary is watching with delight. Right-wing movements are gaining ground across the continent, scoring historic turnouts in nations such as Austria, France, Germany, the Netherlands and even the EU's heartland of Belgium.

Each party has its own platform and collectively, these forces have been referred to by many descriptors, including nationalist, populist and even, in some cases, far-right. In many cases, they have been kept out of power through scrambled coalitions led by mainstream parties and a variety of other rivals.

Hungary has another name for these movements, "patriotic parties," and warns that the EU's efforts to suppress their momentum would only beget greater backlash, both from the White House and from within.

"What frustrated the Europeans most was that the NSS speaks very clearly about the need to cooperate with the patriotic forces," Szijjarto said. "Now, this is suicide in Europe, because the European Union is being overruled by a very aggressive and very extremist liberal ideological approach, it's liberal mainstream, and they were very comfortable with the former [Biden] administration because they were a liberal administration as well."

"But now they are confronted with the fact that this global patriotic revolution got a new, you know, stamina, or new speed with Trump, President Trump, being elected," he added.

He also took credit for Hungary's role in this historic upheaval sweeping the continent, as "the whole thing started from Budapest by winning four elections in a row, then last year it continued in Brussels by creating the Patriots of Europe as the third largest group in the European Parliament."

Following the establishment of this conservative coalition in the EU legislature, Szijjarto said that the next step emerged in the form of electoral victories. Now, he said, it was only so long before foes could maintain the blockade of allowing these parties to rule, noting the recent swearing-in of right-wing populist President Andrej Babiš, whose "Czechs First," slogan bears the hallmarks of Trump influence.

"With President Trump as a leader, so the number one superpower of the world led by a patriotic revolutionist, that gives a totally different context," Szijjarto said.

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The Homefront

Soon Hungary will face a test of its revolution at home as elections loom in April. Already, Szijjarto claimed to have witnessed a litany of efforts by EU institutions to support Orbán's ousting as his pro-European rival, Péter Magyar, climbs the polls.

Should Orbán's 16-year reign come to an end, Szijjarto warned the consequences would be dire not only for Hungary but for the continent as a whole given his suspicions of what the EU had in mind once the bastion of resistance in Budapest had been neutralized.

"There has already been and there will be an extraordinary interference into our elections," Szijjarto said. "You can take it for granted. Why? Because, in many aspects, we are the only obstacles for the liberal mainstream in Europe to push through its will to drag Europe into a war against Russia, in bringing the migrants into Europe, and in LGBT, we are countering the gender propaganda."

"On these three major intentions of Brussels, we are basically the only serious obstacle," he added. "And they think that if they get rid of us, then they can bring Europe into the war, they can bring Ukraine into Europe, they can bring migration into Europe. They can spread gender all over, and then they are done. So, that's why they see us as the last obstacle. That's why they are mobilized all their capacities, I would say, to push us out, money, political interference, media, NGOs, it's tremendous."

Given the stakes he outlines, Szijjarto said "the very historic election we are facing in Hungary" could mark the most consequential event of the upcoming year.

"As Europe is intending to go into a war with Russia, this might be the last election before this happened," Szijjarto said, "and now it will be decided upon whether the country will stay out of such a conflict or will be dragged into such a conflict."

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