This is a codicil to my recent article, Nine Turks Good, Ten Turks Bad. I am finding, in the press commentary, people who agree with the article's main thesis on Germany's national (but not nationalist) resurgence. The title of this article says it all: 'Europe, facing abyss, embraces German might as the only way to save its way of life' (Associated Press, 2/12/2011).
Here are a few choice quotations from that article:
BERLIN (AP) -- For more than half a century, the legacy of World War II has meant that the mere mention of a new rise of German power sent shudders through European nations. Now, Germany is increasingly calling the shots for the entire continent — and few seem to mind.
Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski — whose nation lost millions of people in the Nazi invasion and occupation — shocked many this week when he made a dramatic appeal for greater German influence.
"You know full well that nobody else can do it," he told a largely German audience in Berlin. "I will probably be the first Polish foreign minister in history to say so, but here it is: I fear German power less than I am beginning to fear German inactivity."And:
Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann, whose nation often lives in the shadow of its giant northern neighbor, dismissed out of hand any worries about renewed German dominance.
"I'm really happy," he said of Merkel's initiatives for saving Europe.
Some Europeans have also contemplated with horror what would happen if Germany got fed up with Europe's debt shambles and simply walked away.
"What is left of the euro if Germany says goodbye? A house of cards," Lennart Sacredeus, a lawmaker with the Christian Democrats in Sweden's governing coalition, wrote in the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet.Further:
Finance Minister Francois Baroin this week talked about a "Franco-German political impulse" to save the euro. He noted Germany's economic successes compare favorably to France's debt difficulties, and concluded in a radio interview: "Germany is a model that interests us."
France's political opposition, meanwhile, has attacked Sarkozy for letting Merkel call the shots.
"For months, it's been Madame Merkel who decides and Nicolas Sarkozy who follows," Socialist presidential candidate Francois Hollande said this week.
But Europeans seem increasingly inclined to support Germany's leadership — or at least to go along with it.
"This government is not afraid of Germany," Italian political analyst Sergio Romano said of Rome's new regime of technocrats tasked with solving the nation's debt crisis.
"It hasn't said so explicitly, but would say the same thing Sikorski did: We are more afraid of a powerless Germany than a powerful Germany."
While former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi bristled at German interference, new Prime Minister Mario Monti has called the German culture of stability one of its "better exports."
"I have always been considered to be the most German among Italian economists, which I always received as a compliment, but which was rarely meant to be a compliment," Monti said at a recent event.Does the Bundesrepublik itself like this new state of affairs? Of course not:
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble has acknowledged the dilemma, telling foreign correspondents this week in Berlin that the government feels like it's being pulled in opposite directions: criticized by some for not being aggressive enough, and by others for pushing its agenda too strongly.
"I feel like the firefighter," Schaeuble said, "who is being attacked by the arsonist."This isn't to say that the hapless, bungling Merkel's policies aren't disastrous: they are. It isn't to say, either, that Germany is now a "nationalist" country, which other white nations should emulate: it isn't. What it does prove is that politics is not static. Sovereign countries which were strong once, and then fell into a period of weakness (like Germany and Turkey) can become strong again; countries which were, for a long time, under a period of foreign domination (Tunisia and Egypt) can, of their own accord, throw off the yoke; countries which were, for a long time, pursuing an independent course can, all of a sudden, tilt towards a sovereign foreign power, and then fall into its orbit entirely (Libya after 2003).
All countries have certain geopolitical situations which are peculiar to it, and can't be removed - no matter the dominant ideology. Hungary and Romania, for instance, remained traditional enemies, even after their turn towards communism following the Soviet invasion of 1944-45. There is a kind of DNA, geopolitically speaking, at work here. Hitler, in his Secret Book, goes into great detail regarding the 'geopolitical DNA' of nations such as Germany, France, Russia and Britain. French governments may come and go, he tells us, but French foreign policy ambitions remain the same. Ditto Russia...
One part of the German 'geopolitical DNA' is strength, and a dominating power - that is, a power which tends to dominate the Continent (especially the eastern half). Where does that strength, in the case of Germany, come from? From the 'national virtues', Hitler would say (although he would not use that term), which, in turn, stem from Germany's racial characteristics.
In the post-war period, the Allies, and the Soviets, attempted to brainwash the Germans - and succeeded. They managed to implant a great many false ideas into the heads of Germans (and just about everyone else). One false idea was that the German 'national virtues' never existed, and that Germany's supposed strength - in the military, political and economic realms - was phoney. Hitler and the National Socialists sold the German people (and the world) a false bill of goods. Hitler taught the Germans (what we would today call) 'positive thinking' - but that positive thinking wasn't based on reality. It was all lies. The classic made-for-TV American movie, The Wave (1981), shows that: the teacher in the film, as a classroom experiment, imbues his students with the old "Nazi" virtues - strength, discipline, respect for authority, punctuality, neatness, saluting, uniforms, a willingness to (in Nietzsche's words) 'command and obey'. The students' enthusiasm for their school work improves, as so does the enthusiasm of the school's football team, which becomes dedicated to improving its performance. But, in the end, it's all shown up to be bunk. The football team performs badly, despite all the motivational psychology pumped into its heads, and loses the big game. In the novel, by Morton Rhue, one character explains that all that positive thinking on the part of the football team was fine, but didn't substitute for experience and skills. (Obviously, this lost football game is a metaphor for Germany's military performance in WWII. Similarly, the 2003 German film, The Miracle of Bern, uses a sporting analogy for war. The Germans can't believe that they'll win the World Cup in 1954, because of their defeat in the last war). Naturally, the film The Wave is a liberal anti-fascist classic, which is shown in schools in Germany as an illustration in the evils of fascism. (The film is so useful for that purpose that a German remake appeared in 2008).
Leftists, for as long as leftism has been around, have always been attracted to the idea that man is determined by his material circumstances - i.e., his environment. Change the material circumstances, and you change the man. Hence, certain laws of economics and agriculture are suspended under socialism: workers can produce miraculous results, simply because they are now labouring under a socialist state of affairs (as opposed to a capitalist one); hence the tremendous results, in terms of production, expected by Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, from their 'five-year plans'. Man is infinitely malleable... All one needs is socialism and relentlessly positive thinking. And Mao, Pol Pot and Stalin were relentless optimists, who hated "defeatists" so much that they had them shot.
To return to the German example. The Left (German and non-German) has always viewed the Germans, particularly under Prussian and National Socialist rule, as a vicious, depraved people: hence its desire to change the German people through a program of indoctrination and "re-education". The German people could be remoulded into a decent, peacable, liberal democratic citizen of Europe, which no longer sought to bully other, smaller European nations - or conquer the world.
So, it was drummed into the heads of the German people, again and again, that Hitler's ideas - regarding the German 'national virtues' were just motivational psychology, 'master race' bunk and self-deception. The Germans were never as strong, or talented, or resourceful, or hard-working, as Hitler said they were. But the Germans, in the 1930s, believed Hitler, and so became swollen with pride. When a nation like Germany becomes convinced that it can run Czechoslovakia or Poland better than the Czechs or Poles can - well, it's a slippery slope to invasion, annexation and war. (The same goes for the swell-headed Italians, who had the temerity to believe that Italians could run Ethopia better than the Ethiopians). Obviously, decent nations have to unite and knock the stuffing out of Germany, and then re-educate it.
It's a simple narrative, this one, and it has a million holes in it. But, for decades, it was believed, and for one reason only: Germany lost the war. The proof is in the pudding, and the undeniable fact that Germany lost shows that Germany wasn't good enough. Germany's early successes were flukes, but, in the end, it was ground down by Allied military and industrial might. This is despite all the German military's undoubted skill, tenacity, bravery (and even liberal, anti-German commentators state that the German military possessed these qualities).
In Germany and Europe since the war, there have been two ideas: one is that Germany doesn't deserve to lead Europe (or at least, the Continent); the other is that Germany is weak and can't lead. The latter idea has now, in 2011, been blown out of the water.
To understand why, we have to take a detour into the history of left-wing theory.
Stalin's collectivisation of the Ukraine and southern Russia, Mao's Great Leap Forward, Pol Pot's plan to boost Cambodian rice output to extraordinary levels, all failed, because, in the main, they ignored the realities of human nature. Which is to say, the Left has long been used to ignoring reality, shutting out facts which don't fit their theses, and suppressing those who happen to think differently. Indeed, critics are castigated as doomsayers, reactionaries and pawns of capitalism - or agents in the pay of foreign powers. (One can see, of course, the similarities between the communists and today's Left, in how they treat dissenters. In one era, they repressed, violently, the critics of collectivisation; in today's era, the critics of multiculturalism).
The Left ignores the reality of race, and 'national virtues', all the time, of course. Racialists may allege that x, certain ethnic group (which I won't name here), has certain racial characteristics: a tendency to violent crime; alcoholism; drug abuse; mendacity and welfare dependency; having children out of wedlock; low levels of educational and professional attainment; living in filthy and squalid surroundings (which they make filthy and squalid); etc. Leftists will angrily reject such negative characterisations, and put them down to white supremacist propaganda: in effect, whites, and "capitalism", put out lies, regarding this particular x ethnic group, in order to oppress and exploit them. In other words, it's a case of whites attempting to brainwash x ethnic group - and attempting to brainwash themselves, Hitler-style, by telling themselves that they are somehow a racially superior group, another "master race". (The Left tells us that these stories of race-supremacy are "capitalism". Race-supremacy fills whites with a false pride and sense of superiority, and so legitimates the oppression and subjugation of x ethnic group. This is a swindle, which prevents working-class whites from overthrowing their oppressors, the capitalists).
The realities of race, however, are quite different. Common sense tells us that whites, and x, are very different, in the aggregate. One doesn't need statistics on brain and skull size, or IQs, or even crime and educational attainment, to show this: everyday life shows it. One merely has to go to a country where whites and x racial group live together. The true nature of x as a racial group 'bursts through'.
The post-war indoctrination of Germany was very much a left-wing project: the fact that Americans took part in it so enthusiastically shows us to the extent to which Americans, and communists, are alike (as Alex Kurtagic says, Americans have always been liberals, and America's "conservatives", who idolise George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, idolise liberals). But, just as in my hypothetical example of racial minority x, the true nature of Germans, as a racial and national group, bursts through. It turns out that Germany is a strong nation, and a leader, after all.
A global call for the use of German power was not what anybody thought they would ever hear again. And Germans themselves are only slowly waking up to the fact that they are now seen as Europe’s “indispensable power,” as the historian Timothy Garton Ash wrote. So grave is the crisis of the common currency that it now represents the third moment in 100 years when Germany has unilaterally determined the fate of Europe — after 1914 and 1939. It’s that history that weighs on German action or inaction.
['Why isn't Germany stepping up to save the euro zone?', The Washington Post, 2/12/11]The Germany they are speaking of here isn't Turkish, or Muslim, Germany, of course. So maybe Hitler - who had an enduring faith in the German people, right to the end of the war - wasn't so wrong after all. Maybe Germans do possess strength, despite their appalling political leaders. Facts will out, reality will out, and no amount of leftist indoctrination and double-talk will change that.
But, one may say, isn't this just economics? The victors of WWII - America and Britain - are economically weak. But, supposing that the American economy picks up again? Won't Germany be relegated (again) to second-class status? Won't Turkey, Egypt, Tunisia, drift back into the American-Israeli sphere of influence?
This is a good question. It's true that the Americans (in the 20th century) seemed to have nine lives. America went through a catastrophic period of weakness following its defeat in Indochina in the 1970s. Then Reagan was elected and steered the country to greatness again. Half of Germany, and all of Eastern Europe, fell into the American sphere without a shot being fired. American, and Israeli, power soared to undreamed-of heights in the late 1990s (as did the American stock market - this is no coincidence). America, by the late 1990s, built a global 'co-prosperity' sphere. The American example showed that, if you wanted to succeed, you had to become part of the American economic system. Even Russia and China had to become part of that system. The only alternative was mass impoverishment and starvation along North Korean lines.
It's clear that many American "conservatives" (and many Americans, full stop) are hoping for a Reagan moment - that is, for a new national saviour to appear. (The eighties, in the West, were a time for messianic politicians: Reagan, Thatcher, Hawke, viewed themselves as national saviours, redeeming their countries from ruin). Economic and geopolitical power are intertwined, and it's possible that another US president may cut taxes (especially capital gains taxes) and trigger off another huge economic boom, like Reagan and Clinton in the 1980s and late 1990s respectively. That is, Americans are very good at making money (this is one of their 'national virtues') and may, in this scenario, get on top again. Reagan and Clinton understood, intuitively, that tax barriers stood in the way of Americans trading and investing; so the answer was to lower those barriers. They also understood that strong economic growth was the best propaganda for the American political (and economic) system. Obama, of course, doesn't understand this, which is why he's been such a dismal failure.
As to whether Obama will be replaced by a new Reagan or Clinton is another story. I myself am divided as to the merits of an American economic revival. On the one hand, I don't like to see my fellow whites in America suffer from growing impoverishment and unemployment; I also happen to have an (intellectual) dislike of the Keynesian and monetarist schools of economics which Obama represents; on the other hand, I don't want to see a strong America, or Israel.
(Will a revived America, a new American ascendancy, hurt nationalism? There is an old, left-wing myth (one which liberals have adopted) that the nationalist vote goes down in periods of prosperity, and up in periods of recession. The media repeats this cliché again and again, but is it true? Surely the vote for the German NPD, or the British National Party, was better years ago - when their respective countries were doing better, economically?).
What is at stake here are two competing economic systems: an American 'co-prosperity sphere' and a European (that is, German, or Franco-German). The American sphere dominates the world, and when the American-Tel Aviv axis is politically strong, opting out of the American 'co-prosperity sphere' seems insane. Which is why, among other reasons, European nationalist parties such as the NPD appear to the average European as being quite out of touch with reality. That is, the idea that Europe could turn back to the wartime, Hitlerian economic system, during 1940-1945, seems ludicrous. This is even though the German-led system, at the time, was quite successful (the liberal, communist and Jewish coalition of anti-German propagandists will insist that that economic system was all built on slave labour and the pilfering of gold teeth from the mouths of gassed Jews; but we can take these stories with a grain of salt). Now, though, a German-led system doesn't seem like such a crazy idea: in fact, it is becoming a reality (and the inception of the EU, and the euro, laid the foundation for that reality). This is not because the German economy is so strong (and Merkel's policies are poison, economically speaking); it's just that it is strong relative to the rest of Europe right now. And this is without any swastikas, jackboots, invasions of Poland and the rest. Germany has reached this position by default. Germany always was a strong country, Germans always were a hard-working, disciplined, conscientious, productive and technologically-innovative people; the old realities have reasserted themselves.
We can see the UK's predicament. The UK, of course, always has had a strong aversion to the idea of one country dominating the Continent. In the 1920s, it was France; in the 1930s and 1940s, Germany. Which is why certain segments of the British political class (including the British Far Right, e.g., Enoch Powell) were extremely hostile to the EU from the beginning. They realised that Europe, over time, become a centralised power under Belgian, French and German rule; then French and German rule; then German rule. And, following that, an alternative economic system - an alternative to the dominant 'Atlanticist' one - would appear.
Australia's problem, of course, is not Germany and the Continent, but Asia: that is, fear of either Chinese or Japanese domination, either through Chinese labour, Japanese capital or (now in 2011) Chinese labour and capital. But, assuming that all nations revert to their geopolitical DNA, so to speak, Australia will eventually revert to type - and adopt economic and political policies towards Asia in accord with those of the past. There is hope.
But what of America (and Israel's) prospects? It is impossible to predict the future in politics with any degree of accuracy, but... My guess is that America, and Israel, right now, are down for the count and down for good. Either Obama will be re-elected, and America will continue its decline; or some 'consensus' Republican candidate, such as Romney, will be elected and continue the same anti-growth economic policies as Obama. (Romney's economic platform really is mediocre, and is derided by many right-wing economic commentators). It is true that the American electorate is intolerant of failure, and tends to take chances on untested candidates during times of uncertainty (which is why Obama was elected). There is a possibility that a new Reagan or Clinton may spring out of the woodwork. On the other hand, perhaps natural justice is asserting itself... American economic and military strength, which won the war for them (and dominance over Western Europe and most of Asia), was based on the Anglo-Saxon virtues and the gold standard; once it abandoned both (and it now has definitely abandoned both), it fell into decline.
Possibly, America will be Brazilianised in the future. That is, it will become a pyramidal society with a Hispanic majority, a Black and (native American) Indian underclass, and a small white minority (with Jewish-Americans at the top); there will be favelas (Brazilian shanty towns, full of Hispanics, poverty, crime, gangs, and squalor) everywhere.
The question then becomes: does Europe (and the West) want what America stands for now - Wal-Mart and Zionism? Or is there something else? The question then becomes one of a choice, not between two economic systems (Anglo-Saxon capitalism or 'European style' socialism) but between two contrasting ways of life...
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