Over the weekend, I discovered a stunning lecture given in 1995 by the late essayist Christopher Hitchens. The lecture’s title is “WWII England, and Creeping Fascism in the U.S.”
Hitchens gives two examples to argue that the influences of fascism have existed quietly in American politics for quite some time. The first point he mentions is the hiring of Nazi general Reinhard Gehlen by the Central Intelligence Agency after World War II.
Gehlen’s European intelligence network with knowledge of the Soviet Union, was absorbed by the CIA after the war. Declassified CIA documents accessible through the National Security Archive note “since 1949, the CIA has maintained close ties to the Gehlen Organization, which became West Germany’s BND, or Federal Intelligence Service, in 1956.”
The presence of former Nazi war criminals in America’s post-war intelligence apparatus cannot be understated, as the documents make it clear when they state, “The notion that they (the CIA) employed only a few bad apples will not stand up to the new documentation. Some American intelligence officials could not or did not want to see how many German intelligence officials, SS officers, police, or non-German collaborators with the Nazis were compromised or incriminated by their past service ... It also brought into intelligence organizations men and women previously incapable of distinguishing between their political/ideological beliefs and reality ... such individuals could not and did not deliver good intelligence ... their new, professed ‘democratic convictions’ were at best insecure.”
The second example Hitchens gives is something Ronald Reagan said on a visit to Spain. A New York Times article from 1985 contains Reagan’s remarks, revealing that he said Americans that had fought against the fascist insurgency led by Francisco Franco had “been on the wrong side.” Hitchens points out that this statement by Reagan documents that sympathy for fascism in American politics was “not accidental ... but something bred in the bone ... the ghost of the machine.”
With these two forgotten historical moments in mind, what are we to make of the events of Nov. 8? Liberals want us to remain calm and normalize our situation, while Trump takes control of the NSA’s surveillance state, the CIA’s drone program, the National Defense Authorization Act and tactical nuclear weapons.
These liberals sat on their hands while President Obama expanded executive power and turned the world into a battlefield, doing so through all four of the programs previously listed. These are the MSNBC pundits and New York Times columnists who have alienated the entire country through their smug, Ivy-League elitism, along with their praise of war and global capitalism.
Take Sheriff David A. Clarke, a potential pick for Secretary of Homeland Security, who tweeted that Trump protestors should be stomped out with a “state of emergency, early curfew, ALL non-lethal force, and tear gas.” Who is this man but a pimp of the state and the descendant of Oliver North and Kermit Roosevelt?
A liberal would tell you that someone like this, or a person that draws swastikas and attacks Muslim women, should be reasoned with. Liberals will be steamrolled by fascists every time, and at that point it’ll already be too late.
Hitchens mentions in his lecture the term anti-fascist, and “how sooner rather than later we might have to earn this great title ourselves.” Allies and comrades; that time has come. Differentiating who is anti-fascist and who isn’t is but the first step in creating an identity for the Left in these times.’
It is sadly only the first step.
luwrobin@indiana.edu
