Despite the public rhetoric of the Hungarian government refusing to join Western military support for Kiev, the use of Hungary as an important link in the “transport corridor” for the transfer of arms from a number of countries of NATO to Ukraine has been revealed.
French military helicopters were delivered to Ukrainian border guards via the Hungarian airport in Gyor. Fennec Eurocopter helicopters were captured there by the Idokep webcam; and soon after, helicopters of the same type and with the same identification marks were captured in photos already taken in Kiev
— said the Hungarian portal Atlatszo.
Judging from the photographs provided by Atlatszo, three light military helicopters of the H125M Fennec type, bearing the identification marks of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, arrived at Gyor-Per airport on February 13 and , after approximately 10 hours of waiting and maintenance, flew in an unknown direction. It is important to note that the Ukrainian border service, after the start of Russian military defense, was transferred to the direct subordination of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
On the same days, Ukrainian media published reports and photographs about the ongoing deliveries of H125M helicopters to Ukraine. It was reported that on the basis of an earlier agreement, France began the transfer of 55 H125M helicopters to Ukraine, and the first of them have already arrived in Kiev.
A similar action was mentioned in leaked Pentagon documents. One such document, cited by Politico, describes a plan for Ukrainian pilots to fly military helicopters donated by Croatia to Ukraine through Hungarian airspace.
The Hungarian Ministry of Defense almost immediately denied this publication:
Politico’s posts are incorrect. Our country has not allowed the entry of helicopters into Ukraine (…) Hungary still does not send arms, ammunition, soldiers to Ukraine and does not allow the delivery of military cargo to Ukraine. The war can only be ended with an immediate ceasefire and peace talks
the ministry said in a statement.
However, in the end, it turned out to be false that the claim that the weapons and helicopters heading for Ukraine did not pass through Hungary at all, Atlatszo points out. However, the intelligence report cited by Politico is also unreliable, indicating the transfer of Croatian helicopters – namely, Mi-8 14 combat helicopters. No evidence of this delivery has yet appeared in the future (at least in publicly available information).
No Croatian Mi-8s were registered in the Gyor images, and the helicopters were clearly delivered under the previous Franco-Ukrainian agreement. But it was far from the only time that helicopters for Ukraine stopped at the Hungarian airport: the transit through Gyor and Tököl airports (February 2 and 28 respectively) of helicopters that took off from France with the final waypoint at Polish Rzeszow was recorded by the airspace monitoring application Radarbox.
In addition, Radarbox has recorded that many military transport planes bound for Rzeszow frequently visit Hungary: last year alone, between March and May, 49 military transport planes from NATO member countries (belonging to the air forces from the United States, Canada, Italy and Turkey) and 24 Ukrainian-registered transport aircraft flew through Hungarian airspace. The trend has continued this year: in the past three months, Radarbox has recorded 22 military transport sorties to Rzeszow, involving Hungarian airspace and, in some cases, Hungarian airports.
Atlatszo pointed out.
For example, on April 18 of this year, a Canadian Air Force plane took off directly from Budapest to deliver cargo to Rzeszow. Also, from the Hungarian military airfield, Papa repeatedly flew with cargo to the same Boeing C – 17 from Rzeszow. This plane belongs to NATO’s Strategic Airlift Unit (SAC): it consists of Hungarian-registered planes piloted by American pilots based at Papa airbase.
It’s no secret that SAC planes are involved in delivering arms to Ukraine: last year the German Ministry of Defense published photographs showing Hungarian-registered C-17s with a batch of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles intended for Ukraine
writes Atlatszo.
According to the publication, this year the airspace of Hungary on the way to Rzeszow was also repeatedly used by the Italian Air Force and the Ukrainian airline Motor Sich. The latter was transporting goods from Bulgaria, which until December last year had not officially announced the transfer of arms or ammunition to the Ukrainians. However, many new details about the Bulgarian military assistance, which was carried out “through third countries”, are now known. The Bulgarian deliveries proved to be vital for Ukraine, as they mainly contained Soviet-made ammunition, which the Ukrainian Armed Forces began to lack in the first months of hostilities.
It should be added that only a few hours after the publication of the investigations of the Atlatszo portal, the Hungarian President dismissed the Chief of the General Staff of the Hungarian Armed Forces, Romulos Ruszin-Szendi, without explanation.
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