On 8 May 1945, the Nazi regime, which had ruled Germany since 1933 and spread genocidal terror across Europe, unconditionally surrendered to the Allied Powers. The denouement of the Nazi regime was of their own creation: With the launch of Operation Barbarossa, the Third Reich sought to push Lebensraum farther east and in order to achieve their twisted dream of an ethnically German world. Communists had opposed the Nazi Party from the very beginning, but the Reds’ alarm fell on deaf ears as the bourgeoisie aided and abetted fascism under the belief that international capital could use fascism as an attack dog against the proletariat. However, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics refused to let that stand. While Western Europe experienced an eight-months-long “Phoney War”, the East knew that it was all too real.
From 1941 to 1945, the Red Army and its allies held strong against the Wehrmacht and its allies. 8.7–10 million Red Army soldiers and 18–24 million civilians – men and women all – sacrificed their lives in the name of pushing back the Nazi war machine. The Battle of Stalingrad marked the turning point as the German Army was put on the backfoot and chased out of the east. From there, the Soviets advanced all the way to the Battle of Berlin. There, the world’s first socialist state unleashed the power of the working classes against a regime which had consolidated power by decimating the German proletariat – detaining and killing communists, socialists, trade unionists, and ethnic and religious minorities – so that far-right ethno-nationalism could reign supreme. What the Nazis got instead was the Soviets at their door as defeat was all but inevitable. A moment is history which was immortalised by Yevgeny Khaldei’s photograph, Raising a Flag over the Reichstag. However, the defeat of fascism in 1945 was but one episode in a war that we have yet to cease fighting.
From the Cold War on, the USSR’s contributions to the war effort have been diminished as the other Allied nations elevated their roles in the Second World War. While they did play their parts, it was only after the bourgeoisie of the United States, United Kingdom, France, and so on actively aided and abetted the German bourgeoisie in the Nazis’ rise. In the interim, neo-Nazism and adjacent nationalism became rampant in many Allied nations who did little or nothing to supress these forces from festering beneath the surface of civil society as they viewed the containment of communism as being too important to ignore. This being in stark contrast to the USSR and other Eastern Bloc states where great pains were made to supress neo-Nazism and crypto-fascism from installing itself into social life. An endeavour which fell apart when communist Europe dissolved. A tragedy which we are still paying for to this day.
Since the fall of the USSR, international socialism has now found itself on the backfoot. The Western world, which prides itself in having put an end to Nazism, finds itself seduced by fascism now more than ever before. Global capitalism is at the precipice as it continues to bleed the planet and the people dry to line the pockets of the bourgeoisie. The proletariat is fractured and struggles to unite along common class interests as false consciousness, cultural hegemony, and revisionism push many away from class struggle and towards class collaborationism. The bourgeoisie makes objects out of human lives for both profit and twisted pleasure. The USA, faced with the decline of its hegemonic power as the People’s Republic of China rises, is lashing out domestically and internationally: Killing its own citizens on home territory, fishermen in international waters, and school children in Iran. While also taking on active roles in the devastation of Palestine and Cuba. The United Kingdom, following the USA in lockstep, is in the throes of anti-migrant madness as the “Labour” Party betrays its roots in favour of continuing the austerity regime and raiding the Tories’ and Reform’s platforms in a bid to chase that mythical median voter by cautioning that they are the lesser of all possible evils. Now, comrades, is the time of monsters we were warned about!
There is only one way to combat the fascist wave and the capitalists bankrolling it: A united, internationally-minded proletariat following the dictates of Marxism-Leninism. We must organise and act as one in times when individualism is the dominant thought. We must study socialism’s successes and failures from the past, re-adapt them to suit our modern contexts, and put theory into practice. It is our duty to push back against the bourgeoisie whilst elevating the consciousnesses of the proletariat; to combat misinformation that attacks the most vulnerable members of society; and to empower the workers of the world to take their place as the owners of the means of production as defined by historical materialism.
Just as the USSR brought down the Nazi regime, we must bring down modern day fascism. Just as fascism consolidates power through the destruction of working classes and socially marginalised, socialism consolidates power through building bridges across peoples, cultures, and identities in the name of solidarity. Fascism cannot and will not be defeated by any one person, by loose connections of vaguely progressive organisations, or by just voting at every election. To believe that individualism, decentralisation, and electoralism are the means to combatting fascism is incorrect. Communists know who our true enemies are and what is to be done to thwart their aims. However, we must first reach out to the masses, build real networks of solidarity and support, and elevate the consciousness of said masses rather than engage in tailism as the Economists had. Comrades, this Victory Over Fascism Day must be both a celebration of past victories and an opportunity for future ones. Let us honour those who gave their lives against Nazism and prepare to bring down today’s fascists and their bourgeois masters with proletarian power. It is a choice between socialism or barbarism, and we all know that only one of those options will create a bright future of all humanity.
Manjit Toor, is a member of the YCL’s Merseyside Branch
