Who Is The Fascist In Germany?

What is going on in Germany now is deeply ironic, given the left-leaning German coalition government’s penchant for criticising India at every turn. It does so, supported by its leftist media like Der Spiegel and DW, using slanted, prejudiced, badly-researched, false, and spurious information.

It calls India out on its alleged communalism, human-rights violations, the ‘occupation of Kashmir’, repression of Khalistanis, Hindu majoritarianism, persecution of minorities, including Christians and Muslims. They could not find a way to criticise India’s economic handling, because it will very soon overtake Germany, growing as it is, at a good rate of 7% p.a. compared to Germany’s 0.2%.

You would be forgiven to assume that Germany must be a paragon of virtue. And yet, it is clear that it cannot stomach criticism coming its own way. It cracks down just like the former Nazi fascists it accuses the Far-Right of admiring.

Nevertheless, the German left, government and media alike, tend to believe their own lies. It is seen they do not listen to our protests or mend their ways. Left-run Germany also does not care for India’s neutral stance on the Ukraine War, and indeed its close bilateral relationship with Russia.

So much so, that Germany has been reluctant to share high technology for submarines with India. This has changed now because of its economic desperation.  

Now Germany has taken a U turn and is very keen to collaborate with us on the submarines, despite a very close relationship with China, its largest trading partner. Which, of course, probably has something to do with the supercilious  anti-India stance in the first place.

On the other hand, highly admired German luxury cars are sold widely in India and are much in demand.

While Olaf Scholz is Chancellor now, and visited India recently during the G20 Summit in New Delhi, the four earlier terms of arch-leftist Angela Merkel were anti-Indian too. At the same time Germany’s trade with China boomed, albeit in China’s favour.

Merkel also let in millions of refugees from war-torn Syria, partially to address a labour shortage for the menial jobs. So, in a very real sense, it is the excesses of the long-serving Leftist governments that have given rise to the Right today.

Inevitably, the immigrants are now asserting themselves. Many have moved up the ladder from the menial jobs. Ones shortly off the boat are more rough and ready. They assert their Islamic identity quite vigorously, even violently, to the dismay of the local White population.

And yet, its Right Wing wants the Americans out and not just the immigrants, and friendship with Russia in its place. Perhaps it is they, now being persecuted by their own government, who understand the shape of the future rather better. Germany has been suffering, more than others, with high gas prices, after being forced by  an outdated NATO to cut off the Russian gas, for example.

The latest move of this left-liberal German government is to crack down on the anti-immigrant, anti-refugee, and anti-minority movement, mostly amongst growing numbers of White Germans.

Suddenly, two days ago, the government acted. It caused a sensation in the international media, when it shut down a right wing magazine, calling it anti-semitic to boot. It conducted fascist-style raids to close down the print, online and film organisation and ban its operations. It was blatant state-sponsored censorship. 

Earlier the German government, made up of three left-leaning parties, also froze the bank accounts of people who donated money to any group the government declared to be ‘far right’.  

The causes for the crack-down are probably deeper. The German Federal Government’s Interior Ministry, is rattled by an upswing in support for the Right Wing political party Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD). That is why it raided and shut down the most influential right wing Compact Magazine. It also shut down its associated film production company Conspect Film.

This action, which may be held illegal by the courts, also flies in the face of Germany’s ‘counterspeech doctrine’ that was meant to allow contrary viewpoints in the interests of democracy.

Raids were conducted at the offices and homes of Compact functionaries to confiscate assets and evidence.

Compact Magazine had a print run of 40,000 copies and a much larger online following of around 350,000. Justifying the closure, Interior Minister Nancy Faesar called Compact a ‘Mouthpiece of the far-right extremist scene’.

Compact was cited as a ‘nexus’ for various right wing extremist and xenophobic groups including not only the very popular AfD, but also the Pegida and Identitarian movements. AfD came second in the European parliamentary elections recently and ran at first place in most of the East German states. So it cannot be dismissed as irrelevant from the political landscape.

While the German government cited threats to the constitution by closing down and banning Compact and Conspect, it actually has an Article 5 that guarantees freedom of speech, expression, and opinion to its citizens.

How bogus rankings can be, is illustrated by the 2008 Freedom in the World  report by the US funded Freedom House  that gave Germany a score of ‘1’, the best possible, for both political rights and civil liberties. The German press freedom index number for 2024 was 83.84, ranking it 10^th globally.

The reason for banning and shutting down Compact now is thought to be because German federal elections are coming up soon and the Left Wing wants to weaken AfD.

Editor-in-chief Jurgen Elsasser of the erstwhile monthly Compact magazine liked to irk the government by using slogans like ‘Americans go home’ and ‘Friendship with Russia’ at events of the far right.  

The shut-down and ban is unlikely to quell the unhappiness of the general public with the way the leftist governments have been handling things, and their lacklustre performance. It may seem decisive now but it could come back to haunt them.

(972 words)

July 18^th, 2024

For: Firstpost/News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee