“I would wager that never has the Hilton hotel been so full of Europeans who love America and Americans who love Europe,” said the moderator of the Globsec Forum panel entitled “Central Europe’s moment” at the security conference’s final day in Prague on September 1.

Central Europe’s foremost security shindig – now in its 19th year – has always drawn a smug, hawkish, Atlanticist crowd, but since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine the forum has been even more convinced of its own importance and the rightness of its warnings about Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

Its rising profile has helped attract top global leaders to the forum – this year EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Danish premier Mette Frederiksen and Finnish President Alexander Stubb were the most prominent political leaders from outside Central Europe; last year French President Emmanuel Macron made a key speech in which he tried to persuade sceptical East Europeans that they had nothing to fear from a Europe that was more self-reliant in security.

But the forum's narrow range of views and growing self-satisfaction also makes it prey to groupthink and prone to tub thumping. This is a serious weakness when the Ukraine war is so finely balanced and sober analysis is more essential than ever.

No panel speaker dared contemplate the possibility of a Ukraine defeat – except as a dire warning to encourage the West to give more support – or even suggest that peace talks might be a good idea. The Globsec bubble insisted that Ukraine was winning the war, and final victory over Russia was achievable. Saying anything else was viewed as potentially giving succour to the enemy and encouraging cowards to withhold support.

On the panel “Lessons learned from Ukraine”, when Karel Rehka, chief of the Czech general staff, timidly concluded that “militarily, no-one is really winning right now”, he was immediately contradicted by retired US general Ben Hodges of Globsec. “Of course Ukraine is winning the war,” he insisted to applause. “Even without us being committed, the Ukrainians are winning this war and Russia is in big trouble.”

Ukraine’s Kursk offensive was applauded as a bold manoeuvre that had boosted Ukrainian domestic morale, turned the propaganda tide internationally, thrown the Russian attack off balance, created strategic uncertainty as well as domestic problems for Putin, and gained a bargaining chip for prisoner exchanges and potentially a more advantageous peace deal. 

Kursk had also exposed Russian weakness and exploded the threat of Russian nuclear escalation.

“The bear has very weak legs and arms,” said Piotr Błazeusz, commanding general, Eurocorp. “Ukraine has shown that you can stand up against the bear and he is not as big as we all thought.”

In another panel entitled “Ukraine’s Nato membership: we’ve come to the bridge, let’s cross it”, former US ambassador to Nato Kurt Volker declared: “Kursk is a demonstration that Russia is at the limit of its capabilities. It can’t defend and attack at the same time. Russia does not have the ability to escalate.”

There was virtually no discussion of the potential strategic risks of the Kursk offensive or even the danger posed by the simultaneous Russian advance towards Pokrovsk. The herd instinct made an honest discussion of these tough topics impossible, with sceptical voices unwilling to raise their heads above the parapet.

“I missed a proper conversation about Ukraine,” said one think-tanker who asked for their name to be withheld. "In this crowd it is difficult to have this kind of conversation.”

As well as a shared wishful thinking about the current military position, the Globsec bubble was united over what the West should do to help: build up its own armed forces and defence industries to combat the Russian threat, step up military deliveries, and also extend Nato air defence cover into Ukraine and allow Kyiv to send Western missiles deeper into Russia, both of which might be regarded by Moscow as escalatory.

“If we want the Ukrainians to prevail, we have to let them bring the war to the Russians,” said Rehka.

The forum also voiced strong support for Ukraine to join Nato, while admitting that unfortunately this was not yet a position whose time had come, even in Washington DC. 

Some panellists even turned the warning of the sceptics on its head by arguing that Ukraine joining Nato could end the war rather than provoke Russia.

“You can’t think about Ukraine joining Nato as something that happens after the war ends,” said Volker. "It must be seen as a way to end war.”

He went further: “If we don’t stop Putin we will have WWIII; If you bring Ukraine into Nato then you won’t have WWIII.”

As well as downplaying such risks, the conference never really got to grips with the looming threat that Donald Trump could win the US election in November and drastically cut US military and economic aid, as well as end any talk about Ukraine joining Nato. Beyond calling for Europe to step up to the plate to help Ukraine in the US’s place, this threat was essentially ignored.

The Globsec Forum has always been much more interested in the US than the European Union, and has often been suspicious of moves to develop a European defence pillar. Ironically, an American right-wing president may now dispel Globsec’s transatlantic dreams and force it to switch its focus back to its home continent. 

The Hungarian elephant in the room

The conference also displayed a similar blindness on Central Europe. The region has recently attracted much more attention because of its proximity to Ukraine but also because its warnings on Putin were proved right. Yet the forum virtually ignored the region’s main challenges, notably the rise of authoritarian populism. 

It failed to tackle the elephant in the room: that under Viktor Orban, Hungary is no longer rated a full democracy and has become in effect a supporter of Russia. 

Hungary is now backed by Slovakia – prompting the forum’s move from Bratislava to Prague – and could be joined by Austria this autumn if the far-right FPO wins the election and is able to form a government. Czechia could even go over to the populist side next year if Andrej Babis returns to power with far-right allies, something that might complicate the forum’s presence in Prague.

Former Slovak foreign minister and presidential candidate Ivan Korcok highlighted this lacuna at the final day’s panel on the region.

“At this historical moment … the most divisive line in Europe is within Central Europe and Visegrad,” he pointed out, adding “because of the two prime ministers of Hungary and Slovakia we are deeply divided”.

He declared that because of this, the Visegrad Group of Central European states was “clinically dead” and the region “is depriving itself of the ability to be a powerful entity in the EU”. 

Korcok also warned that the region's democratic leaders had some work to do to convince their disgruntled citizens to back Western foreign policy, adding: "we have to do it in a way that doesn't make us look like American agents".

Rather than tackle the issue of populist authoritarianism by, for example, bringing on some Hungarian opposition politicians – alongside the Slovak ones it promoted and the released Russian dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza – Globsec instead gave a platform to Balazs Orban, his namesake’s political director, as well as disgraced Austrian ex-premier Stefan Kurz, who is facing corruption charges and who supported the FPO by forming a government with them and following their agenda. 

(Nevertheless, Orban came off worst in a clash with Volker. When Orban said that Trump would “leave us alone with the problem of Ukraine”, he was roasted by the former US ambassador, who pointed out “Europe would be faced with a problem called ‘Russia’, not a problem called ‘Ukraine’”.)

Yet until Globsec gets its own values straight in its own region, it is hard to take seriously its touted faith in the relevance of Western liberal democratic values across the world. A wider pool of opinion at the conference would help to avoid such blind spots.