At the very end of last year, I wrote a post on here about the lessons we can draw from German history in the 1930s. At the time I wondered if perhaps I was reading too much into Trump’s idiotic and incendiary rhetoric but I see that if anything I was understating the risk. The astonishing press conference he delivered on Tuesday looks like a foretaste of what's to come. His seemingly off-the-cuff comments about taking over Canada, Greenland and Panama by economic or military force were not so much dead cats as live hand grenades, designed perhaps to unsettle and cower his political opponents.
In The Atlantic magazine, I noted an article by Timothy Ryback, a historian and director of the Institute for Historical Justice and Reconciliation in The Hague. He has apparently written several books on Adolph Hitler, most recently Takeover: Hitler’s Final Rise to Power. The article speaks of the way Hitler was able to “dismantle” Germany’s democratic structures and processes in less than eight weeks in early 1933. Trump and the Republicans aren’t mentioned in the article but it’s pretty obvious who Ryback has in his sights. Why publish this on 9 January 2025?
I suggest reading the piece yourself but here are a few quotes to give you some context and to see the similarities between now and then:
"What follows is a step-by-step account of how Hitler systematically disabled and then dismantled his country’s democratic structures and processes.... "
Project 2025 already talks of "dismantling" the administrative state.
"He [Hitler] believed that an Ermächtigungsgesetz (“empowering law”) was crucial to his political survival. But passing such a law—which would dismantle the separation of powers, grant Hitler’s executive branch the authority to make laws without parliamentary approval, and allow Hitler to rule by decree, bypassing democratic institutions and the constitution—required the support of a two-thirds majority in the fractious Reichstag."
Immediately after being appointed Chancellor by President Hindenberg Hitler held a meeting of his nine man cabinet by "boasting that millions of Germans had welcomed his chancellorship with 'jubilation,' then outlined his plans for expunging key government officials and filling their positions with loyalists."
This is precisely what Trump intends to do.
The 'empowering law' would allow him to "make good on his campaign promises to revive the economy, reduce unemployment, increase military spending, withdraw from international treaty obligations, purge the country of foreigners he claimed were 'poisoning' the blood of the nation, and exact revenge on political opponents. 'Heads will roll in the sand,' Hitler had vowed at one rally."
Again, this is Trumpism to a tee isn't it?
"When Hitler wondered whether the army could be used to crush any public unrest, Defense Minister Werner von Blomberg dismissed the idea out of hand, observing 'that a soldier was trained to see an external enemy as his only potential opponent.' As a career officer, Blomberg could not imagine German soldiers being ordered to shoot German citizens on German streets in defense of Hitler’s (or any other German) government."
Trump would do this in a heartbeat. And what about this one:
"Hitler had campaigned on the promise of draining the “parliamentarian swamp”—den parlamentarischen Sumpf—only to find himself now foundering in a quagmire of partisan politics and banging up against constitutional guardrails. He responded as he invariably did when confronted with dissenting opinions or inconvenient truths: He ignored them and doubled down."
Trump's life in a nutshell.
"A Schiesserlass, or 'shooting decree,' followed. This permitted the state police to shoot on sight without fearing consequences. 'I cannot rely on police to go after the red mob [Communists] if they have to worry about facing disciplinary action when they are simply doing their job,' Göring explained. He accorded them his personal backing to shoot with impunity. 'When they shoot, it is me shooting,' Göring said. 'When someone is lying there dead, it is I who shot them'.”
These were German citizens he was talking about. Remember that when Trump pardons the 6 January rioters.
It was thought "Hitler was merely a brownshirt strawman for Hugenberg [his economics minister] and a conspiracy of industrialists who intended to dismantle worker protections for the sake of higher profits. (The industrialist Otto Wolff was said to have 'cashed in' on his financing of Hitler’s movement."
Think of that when you look at the 100s of $millions pouring into Trump's coffers from US billionaires who would happily ditch what limited employment rights US workers have now.
And when things start to go wrong with the American economy, as they most certainly will, remember this one:
"If anything, things had gotten worse. Hitler’s promise of doubling tariffs on grain imports had gotten tangled in complexities and contractual obligations. Hugenberg informed Hitler during a cabinet meeting that the 'catastrophic economic conditions' were threatening the very 'existence of the country.' 'In the end, Vossische Zeitung [a newspaper] predicted, 'the survival of the new government will rely not on words but on the economic conditions.'
"By late February, the question on everyone’s mind was, as Forward [a left wing paper] put it, how much longer would the aging field marshal [President Hindenberg] put up with his Bohemian corporal? That Forward article appeared on Saturday morning, February 25, under the headline 'How Long?' Two days later, on Monday evening, shortly before 9 p.m., the Reichstag erupted in flames, sheafs of fire collapsing the glass dome of the plenary hall and illuminating the night sky over Berlin."
It was this which allowed Hitler to get an emergency decree passed giving him "tremendous power to intimidate—and imprison—the political opposition. The Communist Party was banned (as Hitler had wanted since his first cabinet meeting), and members of the opposition press were arrested, their newspapers shut down."
New elections were held, Hitler's Nazi party got 44% of the vote but since he had banned the Communists he was able to get the empowering law passed with a two thirds majority by forming a coalition in the Reichstag with everyone except the Social Democrats and....
"The next day, the National Socialists stormed state-government offices across the country. Swastika banners were hung from public buildings. Opposition politicians fled for their lives. Otto Wels, the Social Democratic leader, departed for Switzerland. So did Heinrich Held, the minister-president of Bavaria. Tens of thousands of political opponents were taken into Schutzhaft ('protective custody'), a form of detention in which an individual could be held without cause indefinitely."
And so the Nazi reign of terror began.
"When he became chancellor himself, Hitler wanted to prevent others from doing unto him what he had done unto them."
Trump doesn’t understand the reasons behind the separation of powers or the need for an independent judiciary and press. I’m not convinced he understands the Constitution or even the rule of law applying equally to everyone.
And the GOP shouldn’t forget that people are watching and learning. The SCOTUS is setting precedents on immunity and tenuous legal rulings that Democrats might use against Republicans if they ever return to power.
Trump is to be sentenced today in the New York hush money case despite a lot of legal effort on his part to block it. His legal team applied to the Supreme Court which rejected a motion to delay sentencing but only by 5-4.
Donald Trump can be sentenced in his hush money case on Friday, the Supreme Court said in a 5-4 ruling.
— CNN (@cnn.com) 10 January 2025 at 00:21
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Four Supreme Court Justices though Trump should escape without consequences. Think about that.
