Habersack, Sabine - Puşcaş, Vasile - Ciubotă, Viorel (szerk.): Democraţia in Europa centrală şi de Sud-Est - Aspiraţie şi realitate (Secolele XIX-XX) (Satu Mare, 2001)
Ivo Samson: Security Policy of the Slovak Republic: Meeting NATO Criteria before Madrid and after Washington
One has to admit that the security position of the Visegrad countries (and Slovenia)33 was not quite comparable. In security matters, their outcome positions are different in such a divergent measure that the way to cooperate effectively had to be seen as blocked a priori in all spheres except the economy. Bringing the Central European countries into one bloc following one identical global orientation resembling that of the original EFTA-countries in the last decade before entering the EU has been unrealistic. The security connotations of foreign policy betrayed conflicting interests. By substituting several variables we can scheme nothing more than several two-bloc conceptions within the Visegrad/CEFTA group furnishing proof of internal affinities or mutual inconsistencies that could influence the possibility of a “bloc admission” to NATO (and/or EU/WEU)34. Whereas the bloc concept failed in the case of NATO, a block admission of the former Visegrad partners (and Slovenia) is an imaginable, although not a very realistic scheme. The ambiguous orientation of Slovakia lied with specific features of the development. The orientation strategies were unstable - they proceeded very quickly and Slovakia could be regarded as hardly liable to concrete typologizing among the post-Marxist states.35 According to the level of achieved transformation, of domestic political development and of transformation processes of Central Eastern European economies we can differentiate between at least two groups of postcommunist states in CEE. First of all, we have the former communist countries that have already passed the crucial point in both domestic, and foreign policy, as well as economic policy. The countries that represent this group already have the political system stable and strong enough to accommodate even significant shifts of political orientation within governments. They can allow the usual right-left shifts on the domestic political scene without casting doubts on the sincerity of their security orientations. We speak about the Czech Ivo Samson 33 Slovenia, although not a participant to the Visegrad agreement of 1991, has developed to a partner of Central European countries during the mid-nineties. 34 The “bloc approach” vis □ vis EU and NATO was at the basis of the original Visegrad Three. Soon Poland and Hungary (in 1991) and finally the Czech Republic (following the Copenhagen Summit in July 1993) ceased to cooperate with the other member-countries. Poland and Hungary returned to the group immediately, the Czech Republic has remained “stubborn” until the Madrid Summit in 1997, following a “solo” trip to Western economic and security structures. 35 Gabal, I.: Five Years after. The Post-Communist World. Crisis or Evolution? In: Perspectives, No. 5/1995, Prague, pp. 47 - 48. 200
