Among some groupings of the oppositional left there have been recurring discussions and warnings that the Bush regime is moving the USA towards a fascist dictatorship. The model, and the fear, are based upon Nazi Germany, our most recent and horrendous example of a democratic and capitalist nation that transformed to imperialistic war abroad and severe repression at home. There are many similarities. During Hitler’s consolidation of power the Reichstag became irrelevant and the government came to be run by decree. The Gestapo and Propaganda Ministry were formed to dominate the culture and populace both in the large and in minute detail. Patriotism and racial purity became guides, seemingly different from the aiding
and abetting terrorism crackdowns of contemporary America, at least at first glance. The law became whatever Hitler or the Nazi Party or the Ministries claimed law to be. One difference is the perspicacity of our new totalitarians who pass laws – with a still extant though seemingly extraneous legislature – and issue decrees that exempt themselves from legal sanction. On the other hand, Hitler’s extreme chauvinism and extermination campaign (5.1 out of an estimated 11 million European Jews, 2.5 out of an estimated 4 million Roma (Gypsies), and his hatred of subhuman Slavs, over 20 million Soviet citizens killed) seems unique. Depending upon one’s standards or perspective, the USA has not yet begun wholesale slaughter of brown-skinned Muslims.
The United States does have a history, however, of chauvinistic suppression, murder and rule: Indians and slaves. It took until the 20th century for the voting franchise to be extended to all adults 18 and over. And the US’s treatment of other countries, their sovereignty, has usually been in name only, as on Indian reservations or that newest big one: the Iraqi reservation. The imperialistic chauvinism of the USA is so deep and wide that it becomes unquestioned; witness Congressional calls for replacement of Iraq’s Prime Minister, or Obama’s and Edwards’ commitment to bombing Pakistan. Bombing another country is an act of war, yet for all the carping about Bush, the Democratic candidates only want to do the warmaking themselves. And the neo-cons are quick to push the
Islamofascist threat bucked up by polemics such as The Clash of Civilizations and the idea of generational warfare: the latest 1000 year Reich. Of course fascism is merely a variant of capitalist rule and historically grew out of liberal democracy and economic crisis, not religious fundamentalism. But that is a different essay.
What distinguishes fascist rule from its more liberal counterpart is its overt brutality and its disdaining the “cover” of the legitimacy of law. And there have been many fascist dictatorships in the past 60 years. Greece post-WW II with the Colonels. Most of Central America: this is what the Somoza (and then the Contras) vs. the Sandanistas was about. Battista in Cuba. Pinochet in Chile. The Shah in Iran; even Saddam when he was “our” boy in the
Iraq-Iran war. Even today US pundits talk of the Salvador option for Iraq: kill all the agitators and community leaders and terrorize the population into submission. Fascism really has been the norm in US client states, particularly in the Americas. But it takes a deep crisis for the rulers to turn to fascist brutality in the homeland. And such a crisis seems to be looming. When circumstances and historical trends heighten the conflicts, the contradictions within a capitalist country, rulers seek out other
means of fortifying and extending their domination. Repression of the populace and destruction of the productive forces, i.e., war, are the
norm.
Hitler didn’t begin his rule in 1933 with war or extermination or even separating and expropriating the Jews. The rhetoric was there but it took some years before going to war or even the widespread use of concentration camps. Given the state of the state in the USA, with its draconian laws and decrees, a legislature which is either as warmongering as the current junta or totally bankrupt both morally and politically, a citizenry propagandized into total confusion and feeding off chauvinism against Arabs and Muslims and even Mexicans, it would seem that the USA is already fascist. What awaits us are the complete collapse of electoral democracy, perhaps through a coup, severe repression at home and the extension of the wars abroad. If a
further crisis occurs or the worst elements simply get their way, the fangs and claws will be exposed and the fascist question will be moot. None of us can foresee the future; otherwise, man-made disasters would never happen. And just as the Germans didn’t have it together to stop Hitler it is unlikely that people in the USA will get it together to stop fascism here.
The point being that totalitarian rule has begun in the USA; it has been immanent in our political culture since McKinley’s seizure of the Philippines during the Spanish-American war and then the growth of Presidential power under Roosevelt and his largely command economy during the depression and the build-up to WW II. Having produced an economy that now looks to make money from money and where money has become debt and that debt spirals ever higher awaiting major collapse and economic dislocation affecting the lives andlivelihoods of many millions of Americans, the financiers and their henchmen, the elected officials, need to grab for global domination of resources through destruction and mayhem. Just think of all the money to be made rebuilding a destroyed world.
