“Terrorism And Nuclear War Are The Pornography Of Security Policy”

We are having this conversation in an office of the Centre for Strategic and Defence Studies in the Hungária körút building of Zrínyi Miklós University of National Defence. Is the institute a part of the university?

The legal predecessor of the institute was established nineteen years ago, in 1990. We have been operating here, in the facility of the national defence university – which was called military academy back then – almost since the beginning. And even though we belong to Zrínyi Miklós University of National Defence (ZMNE) in the organizational structure, it was not always like that. There was a period in our history when we were operating as a background institute of the Ministry of Defence, and there was one when we were working at a foundation. Naturally, our name has also changed in the last nearly two decades, there was a time when we were called bureau, and in another period we were called centre. I was always convinced that it is not our position within the organization or our name that matter, but the activity. Fortunately, it has been relatively constant in the past few years, just like the team.

How long have you been working for the institute?

I arrived to the predecessor of the Centre for Strategic and Defence Studies (SVKI) sixteen years ago, in 1993, before that I had been an assistant professor at the faculty of political science at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE). I got my first management position in 2001, when I was appointed as the scientific deputy director-general of the Bureau of Strategic and Defence Studies. And in 2003 – when the bureau was renamed centre – I have became the leader of the team.

Let us mention what sort of tasks the SVKI has…

Since its establishment, the institute has been engaged in security and defence policy research, primarily for the command of national defence, but occasionally for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Office of the Prime Minister as well. Furthermore we conduct sociological surveys concerning the Hungarian Defence Forces. Our organization carrying out security policy researches is the only one in the country the operation of which has always been and is still funded by the state. It is a typical feature of our work that in the past nineteen years, there practically were no important security and defence policy documents in the completion of which the colleagues of the institute were not involved in one way or the other. In addition to that, we also have several other areas of research, naturally.

What are these?

The most important one is the analysis of the security policy situation of Hungary and the immediate vicinity of the country. In my opinion, Hungarian and Central European security is the area where we are really strong, and what we have to say in this matter is relevant on international level as well. Of course, today the NATO and the European Union also constitute an integral part of Hungarian security policy. I would mention that our institute offered considerable help and support for the country in the preparations for the NATO accession: we were the first to publish the NATO handbook and the Allied documents in Hungarian. The five volumes of the security and defence policy documents of the European Union were also published by us, just like the course book titled Security policy, issued in 2001 and still sought after by the students. By the way we would like to update this course book and publish the new edition soon. In addition, we also carry out researches on the new types of challenges that have emerged in the first years of the 21st century, such as asymmetrical warfare and terrorism.

By the way terrorism. You are considered not only a security policy expert but also an expert on terrorism…

Even though I am not too pleased with that. For I am convinced that today in Hungary there are no experts on terrorism yet. Since an "expert" should know better the international literature of the given area of specialization, the international researches carried out into this topic, or even the history of terrorism itself. Maybe I have been dealing a bit more with this topic than the Hungarian average because I was the editor and one of the authors of the two books that have already been published on terrorism, and a few of my writings on this subject were also published. Probably that is why the terrorism expert title has also stuck to me.

In my opinion the expression security policy expert on the other hand is no exaggeration at all, if we examine what you do. Today’s public, however, still does not really know what this expression means. In fact who security policy experts are?

They are not always the same people who are considered security policy experts by the press or the public… In Hungary, there are only a few experts who deal with security on a scientific level. This is a "small club" the members of which know each other well and they also know which areas the others are researching into. The only way my generation or those who are older than me could become security policy experts in the beginning of the 1990s was self-education, for when we were at university, security policy was not an accepted discipline in Hungary. I would note in brackets and only softly that in the academic sense, this discipline is still not fully accepted. It is also very exciting to examine where today’s security policy experts have come from. A part of them were interested in military policy as professional soldiers, and after retirement they started to deal with security policy professionally. The other part – and I also belong to this group – started as historians, political scientists and ended up in this area as a result of studying international relations. Naturally, there are advantages and also disadvantages to that. A big advantage is that as historians and political scientists we have been reading a lot since the beginning, which is one of the most important requirements of the work of a security policy expert. And because back then there was no internet, Google or Wikipedia, we really had to read the books and the articles in the thematic periodicals and we had to take notes.

How did you become a security policy expert from a historian?

I started my university studies almost thirty years ago, in 1980. I was majoring in History and Scientific Socialism at ELTE. The reason why I had applied to the latter was terribly simple: since I come from a half Polish-half Hungarian family, I also speak Polish. Therefore – to take advantage of my situation – I had decided that I wanted to deal professionally with post-1945 Central Europe and within that, with Poland in the first place. And back then the best opportunity for that was majoring in Scientific Socialism, considering that the education of history basically stopped at 1945. Thinking back to it now my choice of major had given me an unbelievably big advantage. More particularly it was that one read a vast number of works of ideological nature and soon realized that ideology is nothing else but the tool that legitimates real politics. In other words, we had learned to peel the ideology off of every issue, and first of all see the real politics in the events. But majoring in History was also very useful for me because I had a chance to learn from excellent professionals for years, for example Géza Komoróczy, István Hahn, György Szabad, and István Diószegi. What they had taught me in the first place was that regardless what one is dealing with, the most important thing is that he should be thorough and should have high standards. And we must not forget either that back then, the student–teacher relation was also absolutely different, it was much more personal than it is today. I was also lucky that I started to publish my works relatively early. And not only scientific writings but in the weekly ’Beszélõ’ for instance I published articles on foreign policy, moreover for a year and a half, starting from 1994, my writings about the events in Hungarian politics regularly appeared in the Polish daily called Gazeta Wyborcza. During the years I have acquired relatively good writing skills, and even today I prefer writing down my thoughts to saying them aloud. Compared to that, I speak way too much… I believe if one wants to be focused, first he has to write down what he wants to say. This is why I have published and still publish a lot. My name can be associated with more than 250 articles, 80 studies that were published in volumes or periodicals, and 8 books, as an author or co-author. I personally believe that publications are much more important than media appearances. And of course, I am also aware that the reason why I am on television, radio, or in the papers so often is not that I am the best or the cleverest but it is because for the journalists, I am one of the most known security policy experts, perhaps I am the one who is the most easy to deal with. There is a special story about why it happened the way it did…

I hope you will tell me…

I was already working for the predecessor of the institute, when – between 1994 and 2000 – I had a second job as an editor/reporter, an outside colleague of the minorities’ studio of the Hungarian Television. Naturally, I was mainly dealing with Poland again. I was lucky, for there was a very good team and I was given an unbelievable opportunity to learn about those problems of Poland that I had never dealt with before. I visited people with AIDS and asylums for the poor. I interviewed the employees of the sports office on football, leading Polish politicians on various issues, I had a conversation with playwright S³awomir Mro¿ek, and I shot a report on the Roma people in Poland. In other words, I learned the technique of how to appear in the media. For example I know what the useful time of an interview given to a news program is. So I already had a close relationship with television before the commercial television channels arrived, and on a few occasions I had to express my views on security policy issues. And later I went over to the other side of the microphone completely.

Do you remember your first interview given as an expert?

I admit I don’t. What I do know on the other hand is that after 9/11/2001, I was called in for the first time by several television stations to tell my opinion about what happened in New York. This date is probably a milestone for a number of security policy experts, because before that, we did not receive too much invitation to television studios, but after that day it has become a regular thing. In all probability, it was also the time when the media realized that it is useful to ask the opinion of experts in some issues, instead of the channel’s own faces. Partly to avoid that viewers see the same faces, and partly because to some extent, an expert meant and still means a professional trademark for the channel. In other words, the media verify the news with us.

Do you agree with that?

I have issues with the experts, rather than the media in the first place. For I believe that the most important task of a security policy expert is not media appearance but to create something valuable in the profession. Therefore one has to aim at creating a balance between media appearances and professional activity. Among the security policy experts there are some who can find this balance, and there are also a few who have significantly more media appearances than we would assume on the basis of their scientific activity. And naturally, there are also a few who have a considerable scientific performance and they appear in the media only a few times because they do not want to appear or they cannot learn its technique. If I analyse this question strictly objectively, I have to say that there are much better "media workers" than me in this field. There are people who can speak very expressively about a current event or problem even when I do not have anything new or relevant to say about it. One would like to give interviews only about his own area of specialization because it is what he knows thoroughly, and the final material will be much more authentic. Professionally speaking, there are no universal security policy experts, in other words, there are no people who are equally proficient in everything – only the media create one or two such persons for themselves. For today’s media use celebrities for everything, they believe this is entertaining and this can be sold. And probably this is what they think of security policy experts as well. And for us, for this profession – and also for me – it is a very serious problem. While I am convinced and I accept that the security policy profession needs good marketing, and today one of the most efficient methods of that is appearing in the media, I do not want to become a security policy celeb. It is not my intention that it is always me everywhere who is giving an interview. So it happens quite often that I turn down an interview request by saying: it is not my area of specialization, please turn to X or Y, he/she is really competent in that. The problem is that there are channels that can accept this, and there are some that cannot. The latter ones tend to insist on the well-known names, and it is another sort of principle for the commercial media.

In addition to Poland, what are the areas you consider yourself an expert on?

The most important thing is not what I believe I am an expert on, but what the professional community I live and work in thinks about me and in what does it refer to me. My situation is ab ovo special for I am leading an institute, which means that before giving an interview I can ask what my colleagues think about a certain issue. Moreover, I am the editor-in-chief of the periodical titled Nemzet és Biztonság (Nation and Security), therefore I read plenty of writings that do not belong to my area of research, it is also my duty. Besides that I often work together with others: I have written studies and books in cooperation with people who work in entirely different areas of security policy or international relations, and in a certain sense this makes it easier for me to give interviews. But I do not want to ignore your question: I have quite good references as regards Central Europe – the Visegrád countries and the Balkans. In addition to that – as I have already mentioned – I am also "familiar" with the topic of terrorism, but I would not call myself an expert on terrorism.

How often do you appear in the various media?

I do not keep track of it. But it is probably a fact that in security policy issues, it is the colleagues of the SVKI and the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs who appear the most on television, radio, various newspapers, internet sites. And from a professional point of view, I am very glad that this is the case.

Can you transfer the knowledge you have accumulated to someone else?

In this respect – I admit – I am not too optimistic. What I see is that there are a lot of enthusiastic young people, but only few of them are really prepared professionally or have a thorough knowledge. I always say that I wish I could see the successors, I wish they were gasping for breath behind our backs to take the relay from us. Of course, this is not the mistake of the youth in the first place. The current system of education, the narrow institutional network of the profession does not really favour students who want to become researchers. Naturally, there are quite a few talented young people who may have a great future, provided they are given opportunities and are not forced to give up their ambitions in research early. At the universities where I teach I can see the growing interest in foreign and security policy, however, I can see less real sacrifice…

Which are these universities?

The ELTE, the Szent István (Saint Stephen) University of Gödöllõ, and the Zrínyi Miklós University of National Defence.

You have mentioned earlier that more than 300 of your publications were released in the past. Which are the ones that are the closest to your heart?

The volumes, without a doubt, but there is a very simple reason for that. I am one of those people – and in scientific life, it is a disadvantage in a certain sense – who like to work in team. There are three volumes I consider very important in my career. These are the following: The anatomy of the Kosovo crisis; Iraq – Sentenced to war; and Whose peace? War and peace in the Balkans; written roughly by the same core group. I should mention the names as well: László Valki, József Juhász, István Magyar, László Márkusz, László Andor, and myself. But I believe that the studies written together with Ferenc Gazdag, Erzsébet N. Rózsa, or the colleagues of the SVKI are also important. This kind of joint work is very good because – as I have already mentioned – I do not believe that a man can be universal, therefore I think if a few people who are good in various areas come together, they can achieve a much better result, a more relevant message than one man could by himself. Moreover, I am very glad that I can be the editor of the book series titled Security in the 21st century. Even though this year no new volumes will be published, so far we have managed to release six books.

And what about the articles?

Articles are considered a more difficult case because they are primarily targeted at wider audiences and not the profession. And those who know a bit about the world of the media will know that audience ratings and visitor numbers can be heavily influenced. In other words, a lot can be done in order that the author and the medium can have a good result in the news contest. You do not need more than a few words selected on purpose that will draw the reader’s attention to the given article. Several researches have found that for instance the description of sexual organs or sexual intercourse in the titles makes a given newspaper article several times more read. That is why I usually say that terrorism and nuclear war are the pornography of security policy. For the reader pays more attention to these articles, mainly if he or she reads them in the title of an article. I also have a personal experience: sometimes I write a short opinion about certain security policy issues for one of the economic dailies. There was a time when in the online edition of the paper they were monitoring what the most read articles were, and the articles of the column I write for could never get among the most read ones. Until I wrote an article titled "Security policy porn". The note was about nothing more but the question of a possible war against Iran, and about the problem I have already mentioned. But because of the title – which was chosen by the editor and me on purpose, it was a kind of a test – a lot more people have read this article than any of my earlier commentaries. And I got into the Top 10 with that…

What is it that still drives you?

The fact that I still believe that the topic I am dealing with is exciting. Of course, it is also necessary that my interests change from time to time. In the beginning, there was the Poland-period, then a Central Europe-period, and after 9/11, first it was followed by a "history of terrorism"-period, then with the Iraq war, another period arrived. What I am the most interested in today is the problem of subjective security. The question how a society perceives its own security, and to what extent does this reflect reality. In my opinion it is a very exciting and important area. In addition to that, it is also important that in the SVKI and at the other places I can be a member of a very good professional community, it simply feels good to work with them because one can learn an awful lot from the colleagues.

All we have discussed so far was your work, so let us mention in just a few sentences what you do when you are not leading the SVKI, not teaching, and not a security policy expert.

I never liked to talk about myself because I believe it is my work that is important and not my personality. But once you asked the question, I tell you that in my free time I like to play tarot. I do that with a group of friends that has not changed in nearly thirty years, I have known them since I was a university student. Unfortunately, these days there is less and less time for this game. Besides that, I raise my daughters together with my wife and lead an absolutely ordinary life. I do not have specific hobbies like travelling or gardening. I like to read though, but I prefer scientific literature to fiction. Therefore in the past few years I had no choice but to ask one of my mates from the university days, who is a literary man, to write down a list of 10-15 books I must read in a year so that I would not get lost in fiction totally. And I watch quite a lot of movies to relax. I cannot say that these are always the most valuable works of art, since action and fight can also unwind me. What is more, I tend to watch the same film again from time to time because it never engages my interest enough to remember every detail precisely. My family often remarks on this in a critical way. I can say that I live an ordinary, even a boring life in a certain sense, but of course it is not in the least boring for me.