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Comment by rich_sasha | Hacker News Reader

Vetos are somewhat overrated. Agents may have the right to veto, but might not have the power to deal with the consequences.

Russia has a UN veto and uses it, because they can weather the consequences.

Could Hungary piss off all of its allies, trade partners, basically everyone but Russia? Doubtful. Hungary is playing a skillful, if somewhat devious, game of balancing between Russia and the West. But an outright FU to a (clearly) US-sponsored NATO expansion? I can't see them weathering this.

Signalling a veto is often rather a negotiation step.

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The hungarian leading party (fidesz) has already declared they will not veto Ukrain's adoption to the EU so I personally really doubt they would veto Finland's entry to the NATO. They are playing a double-game (sorry, this probably doesn't make sense in english, it's a hungarian expression): Orban had a famous quote he said to EU leaders "don't listen to what I say, only to what I do", which in practice means alienating the EU in rhetoric but not so much in practice. Of course this is not so simple as other EU members also care about the rhetoric too but it still summarizes Orban's geopolitics fairly well. This is not unique either, Merkel had similar "two-faced" approach to Russia and even toward Hungary, Orban is just significantly less popular in the west due to his populist anti-democratic tendencies.

To stray from the topic, the double game phrase does make sense to me, possibly because it's also a Hindi phrase

I think the English equivalent is "playing both sides of the fence." Double game makes intuitive sense too though.

And one of the Hindi phrases my mom uses "thali ka baingan" literally translates to "eggplant of the plate" doesn't make any sense in English but I love it xD. Hindi is a pretty beautiful language and people use so many colourful metaphors it's incredible!

Same for me as a Brazilian, jogo duplo means literally double-game and it's a pretty popular expression. Probably in Portugal and other Portuguese-speaking countries as well.

Same in Romanian, "joc dublu". I suspect it's common in latin based languages or maybe all indoeuropean languages, seeing how it's the same in Hindi.

> "don't listen to what I say, only to what I do",

There is a close enough express in English that it translates. "Do what I say, not what I do", is something parents tell kids when the parents want the kids to behave better than the parents do! For example, if a parent smokes, they may tell their kid "don't smoke, do what I say not what I do."

I think the closer expression is "actions speak louder than words."

We don't have that phrase in English but it translates very clearly. Interestingly, your description of Orban's behavior exactly matches a somewhat famous game theoretic analysis of international leaders' behavior called "the two-level game." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-level_game_theory

He's not unique in this regard. Every national leader has to consider the interests and perceptions of their domestic power base when negotiating with international leaders. Very often a mismatch between their rhetoric and actual behavior indicates that they are trying to sell an unpopular but necessary international agreement to the people back home, or that they must accept an international reality that does not match their domestic political framework.

For example, Putin finds himself in a difficult position right now because he has convinced his people that the Russian military is invincible and the Ukrainians are dominated by a small number of Nazis who need to be removed from power. Meaning, his domestically acceptable "win set" only includes scenarios in which Ukraine cedes large swathes of territory and makes at least some notional concessions around governmental reform toward "de-nazification." Anything else admits the political framework he uses to justify his power is premised on falsehoods and risks destabilizing his regime.

These positions are of course not consistent with reality and therefore not within the Ukrainian win set, and so no agreement will be reached until something changes. I suspect that is why Russian journalists/propagandists have recently started recasting the war as a conflict against NATO, because that will make defeat more palatable to the Russian people. Getting beat by NATO doesn't mean the Russian military was horrifically incompetent and their government deeply corrupt, but rather that it was an unfair fight sprung upon them by evil westerners. It feeds their sense of grievance while excusing Putin and his lackeys from any personal responsibility for the widespread military failures.

While the framework of differentiation between intranational and international interests fits, it is certainly not "for the good of the people" in this case. Orban antagonized the EU because it was unlikely that he would be punished for it. This is textbook right wing populism: make an enemy out of some group that is unlikely to hit back and you can appear strong. This is often done against minorities but the EU is perfect for it as it is powerful enough to actually look like a threat but has no means to punish small "violations".

While you might be right in that there has been a recent shift in emphasis in Russian domestic coverage, in general Ukraine was being branded (and/or perceived) as having mild "NATO/EU/CIA interference" since the mid-2000s when the first serious aspirations to align with the West emerged. This escalated in the 2012-2014 period, with the Maidan movement painted broadly as heavily "NATO/EU/CIA orchestrated". The war in Ukraine has been waged "against the USA and The West" for its entire history.

What would be realistic fallout from vetoing their application?

Well, plenty of potential things. In strictly defence terms, they buy weaponry from US and Germany. Hungarian air force operates Swedish Gripen fighters and thus most likely relies on Sweden at least for spare parts (which military jets need lots of) so here's another pressure point. They are big beneficiaries of EU funding (not a NATO thing but this is all intertwined) and already at odds with EU rules, which could push them towards not getting the funding - there are plenty of reasons to implement that already, just lacking political will right now. They can find themselves sidelined for new EU spending, political nominations, and so on.

The question would of course be if EU/NATO want to do that. It's part of the usual political horse-trading game.

For sure, in the extreme scenario if US/EU/main partners really wanted Finland and Sweden to join and Hungary vetoed, it could be made to pay an unaffordable price.

Sweden not selling them parts would be the end of Sweden selling planes to anyone.

Sweden entering NATO could be the beginning of Sweden selling planes to NATO.

I don't think there is much demand for JAS Gripen in Nato countries at this day. 4th gen fighters do not have much lifetime left in them, and F35 is increasingly taking the role of the current-gen fighter for advanced nations.

But Sweden is already member of the Cuture Combat Air System (FCAS) initiative to create a 6th gen air war system of systems, alongside nato members. And this kind of colaboration will be even more natural when/if they join Nato.

Dunno. If it was something else, I'd be tempted to agree. But Sweden deciding to join NATO, everyone but Hungary agreeing, Sweden stopping parts? Not sure. It's a, well, minor act of military... aggression? Extreme unhelpfulness for sure.

Also the real question would be, would Hungary see it as a credible threat. Were they to go ahead with that, they'd find themselves with no airforce and unhappy allies. That sounds like a raise they couldn't afford to raise.

Didn’t the US/EU take the high moral of self determination for every country, when supporting Ukraine’s actions? So, if Hungary “self determines” to veto access to NATO, which is its right according to NATO’s rules, why punish it and suffer consequences? It would be the same as Russia invading Ukraine to punish it for “self determining” its choice to join NATO or the EU. I don’t care about rhetoric and window dressing. I want to argue the raw facts. I feel most people here are hypocrites. Let’s agree that the US and EU are equal bandits as Russia. Let’s all drop the hypocrisy.

If you consider vetoing another country “self determination”, then you can consider punishing a country for its veto “self determination” too.

I agree. Each one of them is taking actions to self-determine their future. Ethical right and wrong are orthogonal to the issue of self determination.

Something along these lines:

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20220405-top-eu-body-laun...

Probably much more severe than that, at least if they were not able to provide a good excuse for the Veto, and this is seen as them forming a 5th column more loyal to Putin than Nato.

In such a case, Nato could in principle invoke Article 60 of the Vienna convention, and if all other members agreed, they could expel Hungary from Nato. Similarly, if their conflicts with the EU continue to escalate, they may be expelled from the EU in a similar fashion.

This would be a catastrophe for Hungary.

Not that I believe that it would ever come to this. Just a hint of this from key Nato/EU countries should be enough to make Hungary back down.

More likely, if Hungary wants to buy some favour from the Kremlin, they would drag out the expansion process by a few months.

> they could expel Hungary from Nato

I don't think anyone wants that big hole on the alliance's border. Hungary might not be as critically positioned as Turkey, but it's still in a pretty awkward place.

But as you say, Orban could drag his feet a bit. Chances are his party enjoyed direct funding from Moscow, like others in their orbit all over Europe.

Maybe I'm biased as someone living much further north, but it seems to me that Sweden and Finland have more strategic geographic importance than Hungary, at least as long as Ukraine doesn't fall completely (ie as long as Russia doesn't get a common border with Hungary).

Without a shared border with Russia, Hungary's usefulness in a conflict would be relatively limited for Russia. On the other hand, for it would be highly dangerous for Hungary to willingly align with Russia, as that would make it likely that a future conflict would be fought on their territory.

As long as Sweden and Finland remain neutral, they are at risk. Putin has shown that he is willing to use military force to grab land. Should he grab Finland and Sweden, he would effectively control the Baltic sea and also have bases that can reach Western Europe much more easily than he can at the moment.

On the other hand, with Finland in the alliance, Nato has a highly defensible (for Nato) shared front with Russia, in the case of a conflict.

Also, keep in mind that Finland + Sweden together has a greater population than Hungary as well as maybe 5x the GDP, and that while Hungary is moving towards totalitarianism, Sweden and Finland both have long democratic traditions, low corruption, etc.

> Sweden and Finland both have long democratic traditions

Very different ones.

Sweden has been independent forever and a democracy since 1921.

Finland was first a part of Sweden, later an autonomous part of Russia. In 1917 it became independent and a democracy. However, a bloody civil war followed. Although it did not last long, consequences in politics and society remained visble for generations. Between 1945 and 1990 there were limitations to the democracy. They would only do what was assumed not to annoy the Soviets too much. Party leaders and prime ministers were chosen according to that principle. Freedom of the press existed only as long it was not too negative about the Soviet Union.

While it changed with the end of the Soviet Union in 1990, they could join EU 1995, applying for NATO marks only the real end of that period that they could not freely determine the direction of their country.

By your definition (ie universal suffrage), the USA has only been democratic since 1965. So that makes Sweden's democracy twice as old as the US democracy.

But that is not what I mean when I say "democratic traditions". Especially for countries that introduce democracy gradually and (mostly) peacefully, I consider the whole transition period to be part of those traditions. A country like Sweden had more than 100 years (1809-1921) of public discussions and political manouvering to build up the institutions, culture and education that provide stability, legitimacy and public support to such a system.

Finland underwent a similar development from the end of the Civil War to 1990, which mean that in 1990 the democratic institutions and traditions had already been built.

Other Warzaw pact countries had varying amounts of democratic traditions at that point. Some (like Hungary) had seen little democracy. Others, such as Czechoslovakia had been mostly democratic in the interwar period, while most had seen some democracy and some authoritarian rule in that period.

I would argue that those traditions from 100 years ago play a part, even today. And in the case of Sweden vs Finland vs Hungary, Sweden and Finland both have very strong traditions for democracy (even if the age of those traditions are different), while for countries like Hungary and Ukraine, those traditions are still shaky.

In the name of democracy the US would attack Hungary economically, and leverage any dependency that other countries have on the US to force them to also attack Hungary economically or to join them as an official enemy.

I could only see a very mild version of this happening.

More realistically, they could just spin up an alternative alliance between US, Finland and any other willing current NATO member (but excluding Hungary). And over time move more and more importance to this new NATO++, and perhaps even eventually drop out of old NATO.

There's no provisions for kicking countries out of NATO. But everyone else leaving the club is equivalent to kicking one country out.

I don't know if one can be kicked out of NATO?

But even if not, in the most extreme case, everyone else could leave NATO and simultaneously join NATO++, which is just NATO without Hungary, but with Finland.

(And because that kind of process is possible in theory, I would suggest that any organisation with a voluntary exit clause might also want to have a clause that allows the unanimous vote by everyone else to expel one member. Maybe..)

This is all speculation about the most extreme consequences. Other commenters wrote more realistic things about trade in weapons being disrupted.

And, of course, you could set up 'NATO++' as an alliance between US, Finland and other willing nations, without shutting down old NATO. Just like Ukraine receives a lot of assistance from NATO countries these days without being in NATO.

What I don't understand is what Hungary gains from splitting with the rest of the EU and NATO to help Russia. Doesn't seem beneficial to them.

The very short answer is that Hungary benefits both from membership in the Western block and from being Putin's friend inside it. So they presumably don't want to go as far as leave, but rather use that as a credible threat for leverage.

If hungry tried to veto, Nato could evict them, then they would be facing Putin on their own.

Nobody is Putin's friend. When you join his club he send the military in to make sure it goes his way.

While I appreciate the sentiment, as long as Russia doesn't have a common border with Hungary, he won't be able to send the military. Who's gonna let him through?

He didn't have a land border with the Crimea but that didn't stop him.

It's not how it benefits Hungary, but what benefits Orban. He's playing the playbook we're all to familiar with lately of antagonizing allies while warming up with Putin. It allows him to solidify his base while attacking the principles of democracy that might threaten his position.

> what benefits Orban

Orban’s party won reëlection. Orban is popular [1]. We can crib about disinformation and this or that, but holding Hungary accountable for his decisions is perfectly acceptable.

[1] https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-viktor-orban-europ...

> reëlection

I love the use of the diaeresis.

They are snooty as hell, and I'll forever associate them with The New Yorker[1]. That said, I love them too! Now, if only we could do the same for awry and other words that trip up voracious readers.

1. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-curse-of-...

They were once coming in English-language publications but now are seen in only The New Yorker, The Economist, and one other. Can anyone recall which?

Interestingly, they seem to survive most in naïve than in words like coöperate.

Co-operate is much more common than na-ive (which I've never seen). But both cooperate and naive seem reasonably well accepted.

It's more about Hungarian domestic politics. The Orban administration has alienated much of the EU leadership, and is (arguably) in violation of the EU treaties. So they're looking to Russia as a backup option, and as an implicit threat to the EU over having their funding cut off.

Hungary is by far a net receiver in the EU budget.

Right, and as I stated above, Hungary can threaten to establish closer ties with Russia if the EU cuts off their funding. This is a way to resist EU demands for internal political reforms and play towards the Fidesz party base.

Hungary gets 60% of its oil and 85% of its gas from Russia.

And yet Ungary alone is stopping the 6th round of Russia sanctions from the EU. They are not afraid to veto to protect their interests, like any nation should do.

It's not a coincidence that von der leyen wants to change the voting system from hunanimity to majority. They don't like to lose, and the rules are fine only as long as they can do what they want.

So vetoes have more power than you would let us think.

I think it's been convenient to blame Hungary, but the truth is, plenty of countries are unhappy about banning Russian hydrocarbons, with Germany leading the list. They can weather the consequences of their veto, because there isn't much will to make it happen anyway - i.e. there are no consequences.

I can imagine Finland/Sweden being very different. Who benefits/loses from Finland/Sweden joining? These countries are very well-armed, with large, well-trained armies, so they are a welcome addition for most. Baltic states must be delighted. Germany must be realising that hugging Russia for decades hasn't paid off, but it is in a clinch; its army has had decades of peacetime budgets, while they find themselves on the gas/oil hook. Hungary's own immediate neighbours, Romania and Slovakia at least, are quite wary of Russian threat and will welcome at least a diffusion of Russian targets in the area.

Would there be consequences to ruining the plans of US, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Slovakia and Romania, and many other countries? No doubt, and beyond what Hungary is prepared to pay.

But then what do I know? I'm an armchair strategist.

> plenty of countries are unhappy about banning Russian hydrocarbons

But only one is blocking.

It only takes one party to block and there is shame in blocking, why would another country admit that they would have blocked if not for the vote of that shameless Hungarian?

> why would another country admit that they would have blocked if not for the vote of that shameless Hungarian?

This may be true or not. Doesn’t matter. Those others waited. Hungary didn’t.

Simple: there will a lot of focus on persuading that single country to change its position. And once persuaded (or "persuaded") it will be too late (and ridiculous) for the "secret supporters" to voice their opposition.

> Would there be consequences to ruining the plans of US, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Slovakia and Romania, and many other countries? No doubt, and beyond what Hungary is prepared to pay.

You can add Norway and probably Denmark to that list. With Finland and Sweden in Nato, all of Scandinavia becomes significantly more defendable. This would enable all Scandinavian countries to combine their defensive efforts, and would it make it extremely hard for Russia to attack any individual country.

And keep in mind that Stoltenberg is Norwegian....

It is one thing protecting interest and an other abusing a possibility almost all the time, blackmailing allies and distorting group efforts.

Btw. the ruling party - practically means Orbán himself - is more like protecting personal interest than the contry's, likely (very likely) financial interests of self while the country's interest is completely elsewhere concerning both financial and the big picture.

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