Bush in brief Budapest visit. Mission ? Accomplished ?

Bush met Hungarian President Laszlo Solyom, who linked the world's battle against terrorism to the need to be "in line with international law and to honor international human rights" - an allusion to European perceptions that the U.S. anti-terror campaign often transcends legal norms. He also publicly raised the ticklish matter of US visas for new entrants to the EU.

Like Europeans elsewhere, many Hungarians are critical of;

1. America's continuing presence in Iraq
2. The U.S. prison at Guantanamo for terrorist suspects
3. Reports of secret CIA prisons in Europe and rendition flights some of them through Hungary
4. Abu Ghraib torture and deaths
5. Haditha massacre

The Civilians for Peace are arranging to protest, in Pest's Szabadság tér (home to the US Embassy) at 4pm, followed by a concert.

Amnesty International , the Engish speaking Hungarian branch have held demonstrations on Clark Ádám tér, Andrássy út and Bajcsy-Zsilinszky utca, Oktogon and opposite the New York Palace Hotel, where Bush and his entourage are allegedly booked to stay. Police claim to have mobilised 3,000 and Helicopters drone endlessly over the city.

Before making a speech at the heavily guarded Buda Castle before an invited audience Bush placed wreath at the small black marble Eternal Flame Memorial in honor of those who died in the 1956 revolt. (No more protests like those nasty democratic Austrians in Vienna)

His Father had been here before, the first US President to do so on July 11, 1989, before the fall of the Soviet Empire. Bush praised Hungary's role in NATO, its presence in Afghanistan and earlier role in Iraq but overlooked the fact that Hungary pulled out its 300-strong contingent from Iraq in late 2004.... now being followed by the Japanese and Italians.

Bill Clinton visited Hungary twice - in 1994 for an international summit on human rights and democratic transition in Europe, and two years later to visit U.S. troops due for peacekeeping duty in Bosnia from a military base Taszár Air Base,Southern HUngary, approximately 35 kilometers northwest of the city of Pécs. Hungary, Which is where Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress bodyguards, soldiers were trained and formed his entourage when he finally returned to Baghdad.

Taszar was a Soviet airfield during the Cold War, it became the primary staging post for peacekeeping forces coming and going into the Balkans in December of 1995. It was the closest airfield to the Balkans capable of landing strategic aircraft and was an excellent ground hub as well, with good rail and road links.

The base then evolved into the first site for unmanned Predator aircraft missions, a rest and recreation site for Balkan based soldiers, a training ground for armored units and a home base for aircraft that made reconnaissance and bombing runs to stop ethnic-cleansing in Kosovo.

In more recent times it hosted the largest special operations exercise in Europe and served as the site for training the Free Iraqi Forces.


The base closed 30 June 2004.

Mr Bush and his beautiful and charming wife returned to the US tonight. The POTUS's washroom attendant Condileezza Rice was of the party and smile a great deal even when Gunatanamo Bay was emntioned ... endlessly.