Kind of Blue

This post goes out to Luis, with apologies....apologies because it's kind of a mixed bag....it was an enlightening experience to see how my writing is affected when I have an audience in mind!

In a recent post titled The Avant-Garde, Occultism, and Fascism, I looked at fascist leaders and their connection to the arts and the occult.  In some cases, such as Germany, Italy, and Spain, the fascists controlled their respective countries.  In others, such as the UK and the USA, the fascists were not in power, and the Second World War caused those movements to fold.  That isn't to say that fascism disappeared, simply that the organized fascist parties and their paramilitary wings could no longer operate when their countries were engaged in total war against fascism itself.  They morphed into something more....discrete.  The far right has never gone away, and it's aims and ideals remain as strong as ever among what would seem to be a growing number of people.

Sparked by an exchange with a long-time reader in Portugal, I decided to take a look to see how fascism manifested there.  Portugal has about 10.3 million people, with a large population abroad.  France counts large numbers of Portuguese residents who have come here to find work.  Portugal is not as wealthy as the rest of Europe, so a lot of people leave for brighter pastures, accumulate some money, and return.  When I went to Luxembourg, I visited several bars catering to a Portuguese clientele and was surprised to hear a Portuguese radio station.

At the dawn of the 20th century, Portugal was a constitutional monarchy, which was overthrown in 1910.  The result was the First Portuguese Republic.  The Republic was fragile, the period tumultuous, and in 1926 a coup ended it, resulting in a military dictatorship.  This Ditadura Nacional (national dictatorship) was followed by the corporatist Estado Novo. (follow that link to "corporatism" for more info)

The leader of the "new state" was António de Oliveira Salazar, and he would remain in power until his death in 1970.   Before Salazar came to power, however, there was full-on fascist party jockeying for power.

Francisco de Barcelos Rolão Preto (note the mustachee!)

Some Portuguese fascists were organized into the Portuguese National Syndicalists, commonly referred to as camisas azuis ("Blue Shirts"), led by Francisco Rolão Preto. 

According to the abstract of António Costa Pinto's The Portuguese “Blue Shirts” and Salazar’s “New State”

The Portuguese National Syndicalist Movement was founded during the transition to authoritarianism and unified a “political family” which had played an important role in the crises and downfall of the Parliamentary Republic (1911–1926) but had been marginalized during the establishment of stable dictatorial rule under Salazar at the beginning of the 1930s. National Syndicalism belatedly unified fascist currents arising from the large but divided post-war radical right. It attracted the most radical members of the parties and ideological pressure groups created during the twilight years of the Parliamentary Republic. Before it was outlawed and its leaders exiled in the mid-1930’s, National Syndicalism had set up an organization that included a sizeable army sector and had organized several coup attempts against the Salazar regime. As in other authoritarian contexts, the consolidation of the “New State” of Salazar meant the dissolution and repression of native fascism.

Preto was exiled by Salazar in 1934, who denounced the NS for being "inspired by certain foreign models" (German Nazism).  He also condemned their 

exaltation of youth, the cult of force through direct action, the principle of the superiority of state political power in social life, [and] the propensity for organizing masses behind a single leader.

 

National Syndicalist symbol.

The "corporatist state" envisioned by Salazar was similar to that of Italian fascism and the original corporativismo of Benito Mussolini, but there were considerable differences in their approach to governing.  Salazar admired Mussolini and was influenced by his Labour Charter of 1927, but he distanced himself from Fascism itself, which he considered a "pagan Caesarist political system" with no legal or ethical limits....Salazar also viewed German Nazism as espousing "pagan elements" that he considered repugnant.  Just before World War II, Salazar declared his opposition to '"might over right.". Deeply Catholic, capitalist, and conservative, but not "fascist" in the strictest sense of the term.

Could this denunciation of "paganism" be due to the occult influences on Nazism from Ariosophy and the Thule Society, and the mystical Freemasonry that D'Annunzio embraced?  Or was it the nationalistic mysticism of Nazi (Thule) and Fascist (Imperial Rome) mythology?  Salazar was far too Catholic to accept that stuff, and too pro-Capitalist to accept the "socialism" of his German and Italian counterparts.

Preto and followers

Although some scholars consider Salazar's government fascist, some say it wasn't; conservative and authoritarian, but as one can see in the quotes above, he denounced fascism.  Could we say he was a fascist but not a Fascist?

Not to split hairs, but in these posts I speak of "Fascists" and "fascists".  Fascism is a specific ideology which incorporated many notions often associated with the left.  Hitler, D'Annunzio, and Mussolini were Fascists.  As were Mosley, Pelley, Franco, and Preto.  But Salazar, despite his secret police, authoritarianism, and brutality, was not.  I think.  Fascistic, yes.  But not a large-F fascist.  His Catholicism and Capitalism would seem to preclude it.  In the end, I'm not sure most people were all to concerned with the fine print.  The secret police, repression, and torture were more on their mind.  One should also bear in mind that I'm far from an expert on the subject, and scholars are still debating exactly what constitutes "fascism".  Maybe we should just call a spade a spade, but it's hard to apply the label to a man who specifically denounced it and exiled those who identified as such....I'm open to other points of view and don't really object to applying the label to salazar and O'Duffy.  Hell, I've called Trump a fascist, with a small "f" anyway....

Historian Robert Paxton observes: 

In fascism's heyday, in the 1930s, many regimes that were not functionally fascist borrowed elements of fascist decor in order to lend themselves an aura of force, vitality, and mass mobilization....[Salazar] crushed Portuguese fascism after he had copied some of its techniques of popular mobilization.

Hence the exile of Preto in 1934.  Portuguese National Syndicalism had unified elements from among the post-war radical right.  Preto wrote "our organic syndicalism is essentially the basis of current syndicalist thought among Mussolini’s friends."  Before it was outlawed and its leaders exiled in the mid-1930’s, National Syndicalism had organized several coup attempts against the Salazar regime.  No love lost there.

The Blue Shirts used the so-called Roman Salute and, after the example of other movements, followers called Preto "the Chief" (Chefe).  "Duce," "Fûhrer," "Caudillo," etc...  He was apparently genuinely revered by his followers.  He was in close contact with German and Italian delegates, publicly exalting the fascism of both nations.  

After WW2, however, Preto renounced fascism and joined a left-wing movement.  The idea that the far-left and far-right lead to the same place is not as odd as it may first appear.

After World War II, Rolão Preto abandoned fascism and joined the left-wing forum Movement of Democratic Unity, and he published a volume entitled A Traição Burguesa ("The Bourgeois Betrayal"). The book criticised fascist regimes for becoming victims of social and political compromises with the bourgeoisie. In 1945 he thought that "neither the glorious clarions of nationalist mysticism nor the powerful social projections of Nazi efforts can make us forget what Nazism represented — the deception of the revolutionary hopes that gave birth to National Socialism".

Salazar was not a big-F fascist, he was still brutal dictator.  I have a friend whose father spent 7 years in a Lisbon prison for distributing communist newspapers, where, among other tortures, his captors sought information by pulling off his fingernails.

After his death in 1970, the country fell once again into turmoil.  Fortunately for Portugal, a moderate military faction emerged, staged a coup, and turned the country over to civil authority.  In 1975, the country staged its first election in 50 years and today remains a stable democracy.

Researching the Portuguese Blue Shirts, I also found this was the nickname for yet another group of fascists, in Ireland (and of course, in Spain).  Ireland and Portugal have some similarities.  Both have a smallish population, are historically less wealthy than the rest of Europe, Catholic, and have a large number of citizens living abroad.

Eoin O'Duffy

Ireland was occupied by Anglo-Normans waaay back in 1169.  Jumping ahead some centuries, years of struggle culminated in the Irish War of Independence (1919-1921).  This happens to be the period during which fascism was emerging, and in Ireland, where nationalist sentiment was riding high after a successful guerrilla war against England, it's not surprising fascism found adherents.  

One admirer was Eoin O'Duffy, a veteran of the war, a former commander in the IRA, and a former police commissioner.  A group organized by and for vets, the Army Comrades Association (ACA), asked O'Duffy to lead the group in 1933, and he began to transform the organization along the lines of his fascist principles.

ACA flag

O'Duffy was offered and accepted leadership of the ACA and renamed it the National Guard. He re-modelled the organisation, adopting elements of European fascism, such as the straight-arm Roman salute, the wearing of uniforms and huge rallies. Membership of the new organisation became limited to people who were Irish or whose parents "profess the Christian faith". O'Duffy was an admirer of Benito Mussolini, and the Blueshirts adopted corporatism as a chief political aim....

O'Duffy and the National Guard

The history of the period is too complex for me to summarize, but the quote above indicates some elements O'Duffy adopted from fascists in Italy and Germany.

The uniforms, the "Roman" salute, the rallies, the cry of "Hoch O'Duffy!"  ("Hoch" = "Heil"), corporatism....O'Duffy openly admired Mussolini, and started a newspaper to promote corporatism (like Preto), and voice opposition to "alien" control and influence.

In the early stages of the 2nd Italo-Ethiopian War in 1935, O'Duffy offered Mussolini to send 1000 Blueshirts to help the Italians.  He and some of his men also made an appearance at the 1934 International Fascist conference in Montreux, arguing against antisemitism.  The goal of this conference was to create a Fascist International to oppose the Communist Internationale, and identified fascist movements in 39 countries, including Portugal.  Despite Salazar's reservations about Fascism, he certainly found enough affinities to send a delegation to this conference, oddly the same year he exiled the "hard Fascists" of the National Syndicalists.  The Portuguese delegation included reps from Acção Escolar Vanguarda (Vanguard School Action) and União Nacional, headed by António Eça de Queiroz (future head of the National Radio Station of Portugal).  There were no representatives from Italy, Nazi Germany, or the British Union of Fascists.  From the outset, he conference was divided over the role of Nazi Germany, antisemitism, and role of race in international fascism.  As we've already seen, the Irish delegation opposed antisemitism, as did the organizer of the conference, Eugenio Coselschi.

In 1936, O'Duffy also led a contingent to assist Franco during the Spanish Civil War.  

By this time the Blueshirts had already been banned, changed name, been subsumed by another group, and succumbed to infighting.  After his return from Spain, O'Duffy continued to network with German and Italian spies for the fascist cause, without much success.  O'Duffy's personal affairs had become something of a mess and worsening alcoholism led to his early death at the age of 54 (1944).

It's rather ironic he was taken by drink.  According to Wikipedia 

O'Duffy believed in the ideal of "cleaned manliness".  He said sport "cultivates in a boy habits of self-control [and] self-denial" and promotes "the cleanest and most wholesome of the instincts of youth".  He said a lack of sport caused some boys to have "failed to keep their athleticism, but became weedy youths, smoking too soon, drinking too soon".

Not that sport is inherently fascist, but it does bring to mind the then-current concept of "Muscular Christianity" and the emergence of organized sport and other outdoor activities, such as Scouting.  Nazism was certainly big on athleticism, physical culture, and clean living, at least outwardly.  Hitler was like a pin-cushion of uppers and downers.  But, hey, he was a vegetarian.  

Physical culture was a prominent part of the Nazi propaganda machine.  Fascism is a strange hybrid when it comes to technology; on one hand it exalts nature and hearkens back to a glorious, mythical past, yet it also embraces the might of technology.  Italian Futurism was very influential on fascism in Italy, with its machine-age stylings and love of bells, whistles, electricity, planes, trains, and automobiles; yet fascism in general also placed importance on the relationship of the people (blood) and the natural world (soil).  We wrote about this sort of "green" or "ecofascism" at the beginning of June.  In many ways, fascism was a Romantic reaction to a rapidly-changing world, both suspicious of and taking technology in hand.

1936

In the final season of Peaky Blinders, we find anti-hero Thomas Shelby navigating his way through the interwar political landscape.  One of his adversaries is British fascist Oswald Mosley, (see my previous post), and he also gets tangled up with Irish fascists.  Odd intersection; until researching this post the talk of Irish fascists was new to me.

In one scene, Shelby explains that

Since I've entered politics, I've learned that the line doesn't go out from the middle to the left and the right.  It goes in a circle....You go far enough left, eventually you'll meet someone who has gone far enough right to get to the same place.  Working-class socialists like me, working-class nationalists like you.  The result?  National Socialism.

Well... since I've entered politics, I've learned that the line doesn't go out from the middle to the left and the right. It goes in a circle. I'll show you. You go far enough left, eventually you'll meet someone who has gone far enough right to get to the same place. Working-class socialists like me, working-class nationalists like you. The result? National Socialism. And that's me, in the middle. Just a man trying to make an honest living in a very dark world. You have friends in Dublin, Laura McKee, who are actively fighting for a Fascist Ireland. And you are acting on their behalf, ain't you? When Jack Nelson comes to London, I can give him access to Oswald Mosley and to Fascist sympathisers in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, on both sides of the divide. Fascism is quite the thing... among the very best people. And with your help, I can also offer him Dublin.

Read more at: https://tvshowtranscripts.ourboard.org/viewtopic.php?f=287&t=51644

Well... since I've entered politics, I've learned that the line doesn't go out from the middle to the left and the right. It goes in a circle. I'll show you. You go far enough left, eventually you'll meet someone who has gone far enough right to get to the same place. Working-class socialists like me, working-class nationalists like you. The result? National Socialism. And that's me, in the middle. Just a man trying to make an honest living in a very dark world. You have friends in Dublin, Laura McKee, who are actively fighting for a Fascist Ireland. And you are acting on their behalf, ain't you? When Jack Nelson comes to London, I can give him access to Oswald Mosley and to Fascist sympathisers in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, on both sides of the divide. Fascism is quite the thing... among the very best people. And with your help, I can also offer him Dublin.

Read more at: https://tvshowtranscripts.ourboard.org/viewtopic.php?f=287&t=51644

 

Preto is a good example; after WW2 he denounced fascism and became involved in left-wing politics. In France today, many supporters of far-right leader Marine Le Pen are ex-Communists.  (In yesterday's legislative elections, her party is set to win 90 seats in the French parliament, far beyond expectations).  

Before the Second World War, the explicitly fascist French Popular Party (1936-1945) was founded by ex-Communists.  Putin's guru Alexander Dugin also recognizes this circular model; his "Nazbol" (1993-2007) group, the National Bolshevik Party, used the Nazi flag;  red field, white circle, black icon.  But instead of a swastika, they used a hammer and sickle.

National Bolshevik Party

French Popular Party (like the NS and ACA, a cross)

Not to seem trivial, but I would be remiss not to discuss Slovenian group Laibach, musical outlet of the political art collective NSK (New Slavic Art).  As a country in which both Communism and Fascism have taken their turns, Slovenia is a natural wellspring for explorers of the totalitarian labyrinth.  Like the fictional Shelby, Laibach recognizes the limitations of the left-right axis political model.  

Laibach are often accused of being fascists for their use of uniforms, militaristic icons and imagery, and the martial sounds, and lyrics, in their music.  Despite being accused of having fascist sympathies, they actually have communist roots. They play with the imagery of totalitarianism to point out that authoritarian communism and fascism share as much as they differ.  They are trolling both "sides". 

 

 

Laibach incorporates the aesthetics of social realism, Nazism and Italian Futurism, demonstrating where extremes meet, much as the fictional Thomas Shelby with a water ring on a bar table.  Wikipedia speaks of Futurism emphasizing "dynamism, speed, technology, youth, violence, and objects such as the car, the airplane, and the industrial city."  Hence Salazar's criticism of Facism's "exaltation of youth."

We are fascists as much as Hitler was a painter."  So say the group, rather cryptically.  In the words of musician/journalist Richard Wolfson 

Laibach's method is extremely simple, effective and horribly open to misinterpretation. First of all, they absorb the mannerisms of the enemy, adopting all the seductive trappings and symbols of state power, and then they exaggerate everything to the edge of parody... Next they turn their focus to highly charged issues — the West's fear of immigrants from Eastern Europe, the power games of the EU, the analogies between Western democracy and totalitarianism.

Laibach are not fascists.  Like Pink Floyd and David Bowie, they are partly satirizing the fascistic elements of the rock concert as something akin to a fascist rally.  Interestingly, this rock star as fascist is also accompanied by a mental breakdown; in The Wall, Pink is falling apart.  And Bowie?  A lad, insane.  But I think Laibach are as much concerned with the dangers of capitalism with anything else.  Toying with totalitarian aesthetics, they remind us to take a hard look at authoritarian aesthetics; the rallies of modern North Korea and those of Nazi Germany:  there isn't much difference except the colors and symbols. 

While this was a brief aside when I mentioned McDuffy's remarks about sport, I include the video above for Laibach's song The Whistleblowers.  An homage to Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning, it's pictured as a kind of fascist training program for youth.  The imagery is fascist, but the message is decidedly in favor of those with the courage to break the silence beneath which governments commit all manner of crimes.  Some may think their tactics are in poor taste; I think they're trying to make people really examine their own "democracy."  They are saying that in many ways a capitalist, western democracy is just as capable of committing atrocities as the fascist regimes.  We think of Nuremberg rallies and Communist parades and shudder.  But aren't our cultures also reveling in spectacles we actually pay for?  Spectacles where mindless masses cheer and scream for "heroes" that earn more in a single match or concert than most will earn in a year?  Is a fascist rally any worse than a rock concert or the Super Bowl?  Our "culture" is an increasingly expensive series of "spectacles...."  Hats off to Guy Debord and The Society of the Spectacle.  Written in 1967, it's truer today than ever.  Culture behind a paywall.  Marinetti predicted his future, our past; Debord predicted his future, our present.

While Hitler has become synonymous with human evil, and wearing a swastika in public unthinkable, one can wear a hammer and sickle with impunity.  But in terms of human destruction, Stalin matches Hitler, perhaps exceeds him.  By some estimates Stalin is responsible for 6 million deaths due to mass murder and forced labor.  Others put that at 9.  If famine is included, the figure could be as high as 60 million people.  And Pol Pot, ostensibly a Communist, was unimaginably barbaric, killing up to 2 million Cambodians.

Comparing death tolls like baseball stats is grotesque, but illustrative.  This brief foray into fascism has taught me that left and right are not straight lines, but curved lines that often meet, like circumnavigating a globe.  Like Shelby tracing a circle on a table top.  The lines become something like a fence encircling everyone in the middle hoping just to get by.

The fascist impulse seems to be something which hasn't gone away, merely changed forms.  Before embarking on this series of posts, I only associated fascism with Germany, Italy, and Spain.  We speak of international communism, but not much about international fascism.  But we should.  It may seem counter-intuitive to think of nationalists embracing international coordination, but as the Financial Times reports     

Since being ousted from his position as White House chief strategist in 2017, he [Steve Bannon] has shifted his attention to Europe, helping launch the Brussels-based The Movement, a rightwing think-tank to support nationalist, anti-establishment groups.

Bannon has opened a center in Italy in order to cultivate links between far-right groups and politicians from Italy, Greece, and Hungary, and from across Europe.  Said Bannon in 2019

“Come back here in a few years and you’ll find 100 students; 20 to 25 faculty [staff]. You’ve already had a couple of classes graduate [by then] and people are back in media, back in political campaigns, serving as junior ministers in government and starting to build a network . . . I think this academy will start to build a cadre.”

Something to keep an eye on, despite the skepticism of many European rightwing leaders.  Today's fascists may not wear easily-recognizable uniforms other than black and yellow polo shirts, but their aims are not much different from their early-20th century counterparts.  The digital revolution is as transformative as the technological revolution of years past, and the reactionaries of today are as committed as those of that period.  January 6th may well be a prelude of what is yet to come.

"The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt."

John Philpot Curran (1750-1817)

I know this post is a bit of a jumble, and I'm sure some new color of shirt will pop up soon, but for now, da- da- das ist alles, Völker!

So Luis, what do you think?  Have I got anything dreadfully wrong?  I feel a little out of my depth with this one, so I'd be happy to hear your point of view.  Obrigado antecipadamente e obrigado pelo seu apoio.