Fascism

“ Fascism is dramatic and empty, a puerile, vague, violent thing, a young ass to be ridden anywhere by a bold, competent rider. A score of Lenins might die and Communism would go on as though nothing had changed. Without Mussolini the Fascisti might do anything—fall into a torrent, get lost, destroy society, vanish. ”

“ Never more than at the present moment have the nations felt such a thirst for an authority, for a direction, for order. If every century has its own peculiar doctrine, there are a thousand indications that Fascism is that of the present century. That it is a doctrine of life is shown by the fact that it has created a faith; that the faith has taken possession of the mind is demonstrated by the fact that Fascism has had its Fallen and its martyrs. ”

“ Although fascism rallies to the defense of the main icons of a bourgeois ideology that has become conservative (family, private property, moral order, patriotism) , while mobilizing the petty bourgeoisie and the unemployed workers who are panic-stricken by economic crisis or disillusioned by the socialist movement’s failure to bring about a revolution, it is not itself fundamentally ideological. It presents itself as what it is — a violent resurrection of myth calling for participation in a community defined by archaic pseudovalues: race, blood, leader. ”

“ Do all fascists speak only German, Italian or Japanese—or do some of them speak our language? Will military victory in this War automatically kill fascism? Or could fascism rise in the United States after it's been crushed abroad? What can we do to prevent it?
Perhaps we ought to get to know the answers. If we don't understand fascism and recognize fascism when we see it, it might crop up again—under another label—and cause another war.
Fascism is a way to run a country—it's the way Italy was run, and the way Germany and Japan are run. Fascism is the precise opposite of democracy. ”

“ The basis of fascism is, as I have noted, the feudal hope of a fixed unchangeable form of society which will last forever; the basis of democracy is change (which we call progress) . Hitler announces that nazism will last a thousand years; the Japanese assert that their society has lasted longer; and the voice of Mussolini, when it used to be heard, spoke of Ancient Rome. We who are too impatient of the past, and need to understand our tradition, are at any rate aware of one thing—it is a tradition of change. ”

“ By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions -- by abandoning every value except the will to power -- they follow in the path of fascism, and Nazism, and totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way, to where it ends: in history's unmarked grave of discarded lies. ”

“ It binds the Fascisti legions; a sacred and intangible bond keeps close the faithful of the Littorio. It is the sacred bond of our dead. They are hundreds. Youths. Mature men. Not a party in Italy, nor any movement in recent Italian history can be compared to Fascism. Not one ideal has been like the Fascist—consecrated by the blood of so many young souls. ”

“ Meanwhile, we had anti-Fascist assaults and ambushes. This was a stormy year. It must be regarded as a period of settling and one of difficulty. I had to guard Fascism from internal crises, often provoked by intrigue and trickery. I succeeded in this by being always inexorably opposed to those who thought they could create disturbances and frictions in the party itself. Fascism is a unit; it cannot have varying tendencies and trends, as it cannot have two leaders on any one level of organization. ”

“ Feudalism is a walled town; democracy is a ship at sea and a covered wagon. The capitalist pioneer gaps every wall in his path and his path is everywhere. The defender of the wall must destroy the invader before he comes near. In commercial terms, the fascists must conquer us in order to eliminate us as competitors for world trade. We can understand the method if we compare fascism at peace with democracy at war. ”

“ We have seen how, by its economic and political structure, fascism means war. Fascism—whether in Germany or Japan or Italy—has never been secretive about its glorification of war and its aim of world conquest. With the conquest of Ethiopia, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Manchuria, Poland, Norway, Denmark, Greece, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Bulgaria, Rumania, Yugoslavia—fascism came close to achieving its goal. This was one time when fascism meant to make good its promise. ”

“ But we may be forced to defend democracy without the violence of arms, and to defend it against interior decay and boring from within. Even if we fight, or perhaps because we do, we may be faced with the necessity of resuscitating democracy from the almost lethal dose of wartime measures. Even if we win a defensive war, fascism may still reign among our enemies, and we shall be too morally and spiritually weakened to combat their success story, the triumphant march of totalitarian ideologies. ”

“ My Fascist friends live always in my thoughts. I believe the younger ones have a special place there. The organization of Fascism was marked and stamped with youth. It has youth’s spirit and it gathered youth, which, like a young orchard, has many years of productiveness for the future.
Though it appears that the obligations of governing increase around me every day, I never forget those who were with me—the generous and wise builders, the unselfish and faithful collaborators, the devoted soldiers of a new Fascist Italy. ”

“ Fascism, furthermore, does not march against the police, but against a political class both cowardly and imbecile, which in four long years has not been able to give a Government to the Nation. Those who form the productive class must know that Fascism wants to impose nothing more than order and discipline upon the Nation and to help to raise the strength which will renew progress and prosperity. The people who work in the fields and in the factories, those who work in the railroads or in offices, have nothing to fear from the Fascist Government. ”

“ The secret societies, the opposition press, and deceitful political cults had only one aim: it was to hit the chief of Fascism, [240] so that all Fascism should be hit. The entire movement that dominated Italy they believed turned on one pivot, on a name, on a lone man. All the adversaries, from the most hateful ones to the most intelligent, from the slyest ones to the most fanatical, thought that the only way of destroying Fascism was to destroy its chief. ”

“ This galaxy of political elements, more despicable than riffraff, these inert, wasteful, hopeless forces which in the past had massacred every liberty and had trampled in every imaginable way on our morals, our peace, our efficiency, and our order, could not have done a more illogical, a more unjust, a more offensive and provocative act toward Fascism and the Italian people. ”

“ Surely we can profit in America by the experiences of other countries. Must we go through fascism in America to realize the menace of fascism and the importance of fighting against it? Do we have to go through the actual physical agony and material destruction of fascist occupation, see our homes destroyed, our women raped, our Jewish-Americans and Catholic-Americans murdered because of their religion, our books burned, our labor unions smashed, our cities despoiled and our government become a puppet state? ”

“ Like every concrete political conception, Fascism is thought and action. It is action with an inherent doctrine which, arising out of a given system of historic forces, is inserted in it and works on it from within. ”

“ As trade is the basic activity of our time, nazi-fascism is revolutionary; it is also reactionary; and there is nothing in the world more dangerous than a reactionary revolution. The Communist revolution was radical and whoever had any stake in the world—a house, a car, a job—shied away from the uncertainty of the future. But the reactionary revolution of Mussolini and Hitler instantly captivated the rich and well-born; to them, fascism was not a mere protection against the Reds, it was a positive return to the days of absolute authority ”

“ In the idea of humanity, the human idea, the sense for the past and that for the future, tradition and revolution form a strange and, to my mind, infinitely attractive mixture. The slogan of the "conservative revolution" has played a pernicious part; fascism has seized it as it seized the myth, and has pretended to be the conservative revolution. ”

“ In order to orient oneself in the most elementary manner in politics, one must not throw everything into a single heap but instead distinguish between the social democracy and Fascism which represent two poles of the bourgeois front—united at the moment of danger—but two poles, nevertheless. ”

“ And are we in uniform any more certain what fascism is—where it came from—what made it strong? Do we know how fascism leads men to do the things done to people at Maidanek? Do we know how it leads them to attack helpless nations? Are Maidaneks and war inevitable results of fascism? ”

“ And here, while applying our tactics, we come in conflict with not only the Fascists, but also reformists. In order to make the slogan of the fight against Fascism understood by the masses, it must be made concrete. The laboring mass feels the oppression of Fascism where it has conquered, but where it has not yet conquered, wide circles of labor do not comprehend what Fascism is. Here the question of anti-Fascist propaganda plays a big role in the sense of ideological mobilization of the wide masses. ”

“ I predict that we will not conquer Fascism, although we may defeat Hitler; we will have a Fascist dictatorship under the name of Democracy upon us I predict that Germany and Russia will make a separate peace and that England, as always, will fight only for herself and we will be left to fight the world. ”

“ There will be moments when our doubts rise and our hopes recede. But let’s always remember that we, as a people, have been here before. There were times when our revolution itself seemed altogether improbable, when the union was all but lost, and fascism seemed set to prevail. ”

“ At a certain period when fascism took over politically in Germany and Italy, when nationalism became the focus and universal expression of all these tendencies, I was convinced that nothing but war and general destruction could be the final outcome of the irrationalistic orgy, and that in short order. What seemed necessary was the memory of other values, of the idea of democracy, of humanity, of peace, and of human freedom and dignity. It was this side of human nature that needed our help. ”

“ Italian and German people made just this fatal mistake of tolerating the activities of Mussolini's and Hitler's gangs until they grew strong enough to seize power and crush every sign of democracy.
There is no reason why a great people, attacked by a pernicious ideology, cannot counteract such propaganda with greater and more intelligent propaganda to educate our people to the advantages of democracy—to what fascism really means to everyone, including the big industrialists and financiers, some of whom have been flirting with fascism. ”

“ Beside creating the self-defense groups and active agitation and propaganda, we advocated the creation of anti-Fascist Committees of Action. These Committees of Action, according to our opinion, had to embrace the workers of all tendencies, because, war and Fascism are of equal interest to the working class as a whole and to all its political groupings. But this idea of creating Committees of Action, the strong agitation and propaganda, the pressure of the whole international proletariat against Fascism—always meets with opposition from the Social-Democrats. ”

“ Though we were still living in an atmosphere incandescent with passion, with polemics and violent battles, it seemed hardly possible that only a few days after the opening of the Twenty-seventh Legislature, a group of men of position could carry through an enterprise which, begun as a jest, was to conclude in a tragedy. I always have had harsh and severe words for what happened. But despite the faithful and energetic behavior of the central government, there now burst out an unparalleled offensive against Fascism and against its leader. ”

“ Their just rights will be protected. We will even be generous with unarmed adversaries.
“Fascism draws its sword to cut the multiple Gordian knots which tie and burden Italian life. We call God and the spirit of our five hundred thousand dead to witness that only one impulse sends us on, that only one passion burns within us—the impulse and the passion to contribute to the safety and greatness of our Country.
“Fascisti of all Italy!
“Stretch forth like Romans your spirits and your sinews! We must win. We will.
“Long live Italy! Long live Fascism!
“The Quadrumvirate.” ”

“ For this reason Fascism is opposed to Socialism, which clings rigidly to class war in the historic evolution and ignores the unity of the State which moulds the classes into a single, moral and economic reality. ”

“ I knew that if they could they would have ignobly used the corpse of the Socialist deputy as an anti-Fascist symbol and flag. But their ghoulish politics passed the bounds of my imagination. Besides these speculators, there were those on the timid and flabby fringes of Fascism. They let themselves be led astray by the political atmosphere. They did not perceive that an episode is not the stuff of which history should be made. In the name of a sentimental morality, they were willing to kill a great moral and political probity and knife the welfare of an entire nation. ”

“ As soon as these methods had won them enough of a following to form their Storm Troops, the fascists began using force to stifle and wipe out any opposition. Those who saw through the false front of fascism and opposed them were beaten, tortured, and killed.
The fascists knew that all believers in democracy were their enemies. They knew that the fundamental principle of democracy—faith in the common sense of the common people—was the direct opposite of the fascist principle of rule by the elite few. So they fought democracy in all its phases. ”