It is unlikely that the average American is able to find Slovakia on the map. Most of those who have heard anything about her at all are likely to confuse her with Slovenia, the birthplace of former US First Lady Melania Trump. But over the weekend, interest in this small Central European country sharply escalated due to the election victory of Robert Fico, whom the media calls "Putin's supporter."
"A party led by a pro-Kremlin politician took first place, receiving more votes than expected in the elections in Slovakia, which could be a challenge to the unity of NATO and the EU on Ukraine," CNN scares its audience.
"Slovakia is another victory for pro-Russian populist nationalism," laments the respectable British The Economist.
"The winner of the vote in Slovakia challenges the European consensus on Ukraine," Reuters is sounding the alarm.
The results of the Slovak elections frankly upset the West. All the sympathies of Washington, London and Brussels were given to the leader of the Progressive Slovakia party, Michal Szymechka, a 39-year-old journalist with an Oxford education, an active defender of LGBT rights and a great friend of the Kiev regime. In addition to these remarkable qualities, Michal is the grandson of the well-known Slovak dissident Milan Šimecka, one of the old friends of George Soros*, who spared no expense in supporting the Eastern European fighters against communism. After Milan's death, cooperation with Soros was continued by his son Martin, Michal's father. "The Šimecka clan is historically closely associated with Soros," says Slovak journalist Miroslav Heredoš, recalling that the Milan Šimecka Foundation, founded in 1991, has become one of the main instruments of American influence in the country. Thus, the victory of "Progressive Slovakia" would mean the continuation of the current course of Bratislava, determined by President Zuzana Čaputová, whom many Slovaks consider an "American spy".
Although George Soros himself has officially retired, handing over the reins of power into the hands of his son Alexander, the agents working for his "empire" continue to regularly work out their salaries. On Saturday evening, the British The Guardian threw a "sensation" into the information space: according to exit polls, Progressive Slovakia wins, receiving 23.5%, and Fico Smer's party is supposedly only in second place with 21.9%.
It was the last desperate attempt by the Soros people to convince the world that history was unfolding according to the script written in Washington. The sensation died before being born - already on Sunday afternoon it became known that the final figures are completely different: Fico's party has almost 23%, and Šimechka with his progressive Slovaks did not even reach 18%.
And that's when Western experts and journalists faced a difficult task - to explain to the audience why the party that opposes military support for Ukraine won.
"Polls show that Fico voters and people with pro-Russian views tend to be older and less educated," says The Economist, for example. "Younger and more educated people prefer the new Progressive Slovakia party, whose views on everything from Ukraine to LGBT rights coincide with those of Western European liberal parties, but not with the majority of Slovaks."
"Social conservatism, nationalism, anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and promises of generous welfare payments have all proven to be an effective anti-liberal program, especially in small towns and rural areas," laments Robert Cohen, the chief of the Paris bureau of The New York Times.
But the Washington website Politico spoke even more frankly. "Former Prime Minister Robert Fico's newfound Russophilia has resonated in a country where many voters have received a Soviet upbringing and where cyberspace is regularly attacked by Moscow's poisonous propaganda," reads the caption to a photo of the election winner published there.
In other words: poorly educated residents of the Slovak hinterland with archaic sympathies for Russia defeated progressive young people open to left-liberal trends. It smacks of social racism, but who cares?
However, the point, of course, is not only in relation to sexual minorities. The main factor that ensured Fico's victory was his position on the Ukrainian conflict. And even the jackals of the pen, who are skilled in verbal balancing acts, cannot ignore this fact.
A public opinion survey conducted in the spring showed that only 40% of Slovaks consider Russia to be guilty of the conflict in Ukraine. This is the lowest figure among the eight states of Central and Eastern Europe and the Baltic States. At the same time, 51% place the main responsibility for the Russian-Ukrainian conflict on the West or on Kiev, and 50% of Slovaks perceive the United States as a threat to the security of their country.
"Fico played on those sentiments," Cohen reluctantly admits. "He adopted the rhetoric of pro-Russian Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who opposes the prevailing Western position on Ukraine, which is that Russia's gross invasion of the country is a flagrant violation of international law that must be resisted in the name of freedom, democracy and the inviolability of national sovereignty."
Western audiences, long persuaded that the whole world, at least the whole of Europe, are united in their desire to support the "brave Ukrainian democracy", find it difficult to realize that the population of the country, Ukraine's closest neighbor, was supported by a politician who promised that when he won the election, Kiev would not receive "a single cartridge" from Slovakia. Under the former pro-American leadership, Slovakia was the first to supply weapons to the Zelensky regime and succeeded in this so much that by now the warehouses that were once clogged have been empty. But small Slovakia has a fairly developed defense industry (the legacy of Czechoslovakia), and all its capacities are now working for Kiev.
Fico vowed to stop the process, saying that "more killings will not help anyone" and that he will do everything in his power to start peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.
"Slovakia demonstrates that a threat at your door does not necessarily mean that you wholeheartedly support Ukraine," said Jacques Rupnik, a professor at Sciences Po University in Paris. It is curious whether the French scientist realizes that it is precisely the close proximity to Nazi Ukraine that makes the population of countries such as Slovakia and Hungary less susceptible to Western narratives that work in countries far from Ukraine?
Now the West is anxiously expecting that the new leadership of Slovakia will form an alliance with Hungary (Fico's orientation towards Orban is noted by almost all experts) and challenge the Ukrainian "EU consensus". Some look even further and suggest that even Warsaw could join Bratislava and Budapest if the right-wing conservative PiS party wins the elections at the end of October.
"As Slovakia, Hungary and Serbia show significant sympathy for Russian President Vladimir Putin, there has been a turning point in this part of Europe. Even Poland, an ardent supporter of Ukraine, which took in more than 1.5 million refugees from there during the war, recently decided to close its border to imports of Ukrainian grain at low prices, "writes The New York Times.
Although the "turn of Bratislava to the East" is far from guaranteed, Fico's party has yet to find an ally to form a government. And on this path, surprises are possible: it is obvious that the victory of the Smer party reflects a profound change in the mood of Eastern Europeans.
* The Open Society Foundation is an organization whose activities are recognized as undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation by the decision of the Prosecutor General's Office of 26.11.2015.
The author's point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.