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The fact of Budapest being a rich city is not a surprising one because it was the capital of Hungary that was many times larger than today's Hungary, spreading from Split to Lemberg - to be reduced to "ethnic quarter" of Magyars after WWI. And every monarchy is a very center-leaning entity so the capital would concentrate wealth of the entire - much bigger than today - nation. It was a co-capital of Habsburg Empire on the same rights as Vienna.

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Indeed, having its territory reduced by 73% after the war all but killed her. I mean Hungary was already on a downward trajectory after the 1526 Battle of Mohacs which she lost against the Ottomans, and that downward slope culminated in the Treaty of Trianon, which reduced the country to irrelevance ever since.

What can I say about it? It seems we like to be on the wrong side of history…

And looking at the Hungarian politics and geopolitics it's like you insist on being on a collision course with the majority of your closest neighbors. The odds of anything good coming out of that for Hungary are very slim IMHO.

Indeed. I’d love to better understand why it’s so hard not to side with the baddies every single time.

The best thing that comes out of this is that it’s easy to pinpoint the Nazis because they are the ones in power.

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