Lacks Discipline, Must Try Harder

You don't meet the requirements. You don't do what you are supposed to." These tough words — from NATO Secretary-General George Robertson, no less — greeted Hungarian Defense Minister Ferenc Juhász during his second week in the job. On a visit to the alliance's Brussels headquarters fresh from his Hungarian Socialist Party's general election victory last April, Juhász was shocked: "I was expecting more cooperative language. All the other countries were unfriendly. They questioned our seriousness in the fight against terrorism. They questioned our trustworthiness as an ally."

What went wrong? When Hungary was admitted to NATO in...