Hungary: A Historically Apolitical Military

Abstract

In Hungary, the military has traditionally not played a significant political role since the country became independent following the First World War. Though various changes of regime and political transitions have taken place, these did not involve the military in any notable role. Even when the historical context offered an opportunity for the military to gain a determining political role (i.e., during the 1956 revolution or possibly the 1989 regime change), apolitical traditions, institutional checks, and civilian control, as well as a lack of will from the armed forces, prevented such outcomes. The main reason why Hungarian armed forces have never interfered in politics is not the historical traditions of civilian control over the armed forces, but actually the lack of them. Before 1989, the armed forces have always been directly subordinated to the actual highest political leadership, which was above everyday party politics. Consequently, the armed forces too have historically stayed out of everyday politics, with the partial exception of the Communist era, when the army was heavily politicized according to the Soviet model. Nevertheless, the periods when the armed forces became politicized or played an active political role have later always been considered as anomalies by the subsequent political systems. After 1989, along with the democratic transition a full-fledged, functional system of civilian control over the armed forces was established. Early-21st-century norms and practices of civilian control over the Hungarian Defense Forces (HDF) are institutionally fully aligned with the practices of any democratic North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or European Union (EU) member state in this regard, prohibiting the possibility of any political participation of the HDF or even its members. Legal and institutional checks, as well as the apolitical socialization of service members support this tradition.