NATO should distrust Turkey and Hungary in the future

After Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at least gave up his opposition to Finland's NATO membership, it is now becoming apparent that the country will join NATO alone - and not, as originally planned, together with Sweden. Because the Turkish decision puts the Hungarian government, which is also blocking, under considerable pressure to at least also agree to the accession of the Finns.

Both states had made a farce of the Nordic countries' urgent application for membership, triggered by the Russian war, and had prevented admission for irrelevant reasons. Erdogan wanted to enforce Sweden's tougher policy towards Turkish opposition groups and was also outraged by an anti-Islam action by a right-wing provocateur apparently paid from Russia, who had burned a Koran in Stockholm. Hungary, on the other hand, wants to blackmail the release of EU funds that had been withheld from the Orbán government because of concerns about the rule of law.

As a result, it has now become more likely that at least Finland, which is particularly vulnerable due to its long land border with Russia, will be able to join NATO in the near future. Sweden, on the other hand, will probably have to wait at least until after the elections in Turkey. North-eastern Europe would thus initially become an area of ​​shared security, with the Finns within the NATO protective umbrella and the Swedes outside.

An absurd situation that NATO owes solely to Hungary and Turkey. At a time when the defense of freedom in Europe has again become a predominant task of our societies, both have willingly ignored the strategic seriousness inherent in this moment in European history. Both countries are also united by a sometimes unseemly proximity to Russia.

And in their turn towards authoritarianism, Ankara and Budapest have also distanced themselves significantly from the community of values ​​for which NATO stands. The alliance is therefore well advised to treat both as partners with reservations. This should include, for example, no longer necessarily sharing certain sensitive data with Turkey and Hungary within NATO.