Nationalism rises from the grave.
It was supposed to be dead, with the stake of history driven through its heart. I, too, wrote of the end of ideology, of humanity’s return to wars of faith and ethnicity. Those wars will remain with us, especially in less developed regions, but historical identities and religion are once again fermenting into the murderous brew of xenophobic nationalism, the only ideology to murder as many human beings as Marxism and its brood of deformed offspring.
But if some of us have recognized the resurgence of hate-wielding nationalism from Russia to India, from Eastern Europe to East Asia, our governing elite refuses to face it (the more expensive the degree, the less the graduate seems to see). Confronted by venomous anti-Western rhetoric from Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, the American president responded by dismissing Putin as having no ideology. Our president doesn’t know history or Putin, who’s a rabid Great-Russian nationalist.
Putin’s belief in a mystical Russian destiny to be furthered by any means necessary inspired his aggression against Ukraine (and, earlier, Georgia). Putin grasped the failure of Communism – he doesn’t long for Lenin – but he strongly believes that Russia deserves the empire assembled by the czars. Eastern Europe may be gone, but, in Putin’s view, the conquests of Generals Suvorov and Skobelov came with permanent deeds.
Now Russian nationalism has reawakened Ukrainian nationalism. And so it goes.
In Hungary, a right-wing party with a fascist odor has risen to power. In India, the Hindu nationalist party, the BJP, with beliefs rooted deep in the past, appears to be the party of the future. That party is led by a man who turned a blind eye to the massacre of Muslims in his home state of Gujarat. Even Japanese nationalism has been making a creeping return, while in France hard-right, anti-immigrant, anti-Europe candidates have been winning more elections. Turkey’s neo-Ottomanism is nationalism with a regional appetite. And Greece, which suffered terribly under the Nazis, now has a Nazi party of its own, the “Golden Dawn.”
Of course, we saw savage nationalism in the Balkans 20 years ago, but it seemed to be a curtain call, not an overture. Now it seems that nationalism is a perennial hit, co-starring anti-Semitism – even in countries with few surviving Jews.
There’s nothing wrong with taking pride in one’s country (one wishes Americans took more pride in ours, instead of forever whining). Problems begin when an exclusive version of national identity excuses the violent suppression of internal minorities and external aggression. A heritage pageant at the Olympics is one thing, advancing tanks another.
Nationalist extremism exploits hard economic times, friction with unassimilated minorities, destabilizing social change or the shame of defeat. In Russia, all four factors applied as Putin rose to power: the nation’s patrimony stolen by oligarchs; an influx of non-Slavs; the social chaos that followed the Soviet collapse, and a sense of having been cheated by foreign powers (Putin has fostered a Russian version of the Dolchstosslegende, the stab-in-the-back theory, that helped Hitler’s rise to power).
Nazi Germany rose from defeat and penury. Hindu nationalism manipulates age-old hatreds, religious fanaticism and fear of social change – such as anti-caste-system policies that threaten a social order that ruled for millennia. Hungarian nationalism has been facilitated by economic stagnation and a quest for renewed identity. And the Confucian-tinged nationalism that has replaced Communism in all but name in China should give our leaders plenty of sleepless nights.
Human beings crave a greater identity. Nationalism is the ultimate fan club.
But our elite refuses to see the threat of extreme nationalism – just as its members refuse to acknowledge Islamist fanaticism. Our leaders insist that reasoned discussion can solve all the world’s problems.
You might as well negotiate with cancer.
WATCH: Will our leaders stand up to armed-and-dangerous nationalist extremism?
CRISIS WATCH BOTTOM LINE: Forget the TV zombies. Fear the undead waving flags.
Ralph Peters is a longtime member of the “Armchair General” team and the author of the Civil War novels “Cain at Gettysburg” and “Hell or Richmond.
Originally published in the September 2014 issue of Armchair General.
