A political scientist explained why elections in Slovakia are so important for Russia

The party of the pro-Russian politician Robert Fico, Course – Social Democracy (SMER), won the early parliamentary elections in Slovakia. The country’s ex-Prime Minister Fico is called “a troublemaker for the European Union and NATO.” We talked with political scientist, HSE professor Marat Bashirov about why these elections are so important for us.

“Slovakia is part of the country that was called Czechoslovakia,” says the professor. — Unlike the Czech Republic, it has always been more loyal to Russian culture. And it is in Slovakia that almost all industrial production and the machine-building complex remain. Military-industrial complex enterprises operating according to the standards of the Warsaw bloc are concentrated here. That is, by our standards. The Czech Republic is, to a greater extent, a tourist country.

Slovakia, as the expert says, for a long time could not find itself in the European market.

— After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, huge ammunition depots remained in Slovakia. Some of them, by the way, eventually left for the needs of the Kyiv regime. But the military-industrial complex enterprises maneuvered for a very long time, tried to find orders in the West, and switched to NATO standards. And in fact, the old production according to the standards of the Warsaw bloc was destroyed. But, nevertheless, all the engineering documentation and acquired skills remained. Therefore, when the question arose about the shortage of the same barrels for artillery, mortars, tanks, rocket launchers and equipment repair, NATO generals turned their attention to the factories remaining in Slovakia. And some of the productions were revived.

It is worth recalling that it was Slovakia that was the first NATO country to send fighter jets to Kyiv. Also, the S-300 air defense system was taken off duty for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Robert Fico, in turn, promised “not to give Kyiv a single bullet.”

“This statement means that he will actually stop the policy of interaction with NATO. The SMER party he led gained 22.9%. But, as we know, their government is formed by a parliamentary coalition. Third place in the elections was taken by the Social Democrats of the Golos party, with 14.7%. They still need votes to create a coalition. But it is quite possible that the basis of the parliamentary unification will be the parties “SMER” and “Golos”. They are headed, by the way, by two former prime ministers. Accordingly, this is a threat to the European Union and NATO. This is the emergence of another country, at least neutral in relation to Russia, in addition to Hungary and Serbia. The emergence of such a center is beginning to slowly break down the unity of the European Union in relation to the events that are taking place in Ukraine.

The expert recalls that parliamentary elections will be held in Poland on October 15.

— On October 1, a mass march took place in Warsaw. Opposition leader Donald Tusk led Poles into the streets. He is not for Russia, but he is definitely against the unilateral policy pursued by Poland. And the fact that the current leadership of Poland has recently made sharp attacks against Ukraine is the result of the fact that it sees the results of sociological research. And they say that the Poles are tired.

According to the political scientist, all this, against the backdrop of disagreements between Republicans and Democrats in the United States over the shutdown (suspension of government work) and the allocation of aid to Ukraine, is cracking.

“And at some point this structure may collapse. It’s like in that game, when four people are running and there are only three chairs, someone will be left without a chair and will suffer. It seems that Slovakia, where the parliamentary elections took place, is a very small country. But all these factors are very worrying, first of all, in Brussels, where NATO headquarters is located. We will wait until the elections in Poland to understand the general situation.

The expert points out that there are a lot of elections in Europe this year and next. And so far the ratings that the current leaders of countries have are very alarming for them.

— The population is starting to get tired. What Robert Fico said, that sanctions are destroying their economy and are not destroying the Russian economy at all, and we need to stop doing this, is such a confident trend in the minds of so many European voters.