When Russia justifies its aggression on Ukraine in terms of the fight against “Nazism”, few in western countries take this assertion seriously. The murder and rape that Russian invaders undertake damage the image of the country that sent them there. But Russia hails itself as the inheritor of the Soviet Union or the conqueror of the Third Reich. But if the Kremlin aways reaches for the anti-Nazi rhetoric, it reflects its propaganda strength.

It is worthwhile reading the well-reviewed book “Fascism and Communism” (Translated as ‘A Close Enemy, Communism and Fascism in the 20th Century’) by François Furet and Ernst Nolte, recently translated into Polish by the Pilecki Institute in Warsaw. This is a collection of correspondence from 1996 and 1997 between Furet and Nolte, now both deceased. It is a discussion on the controversy surrounding totalitarianism

The starting point is the wide-ranging preface that Furet wrote in his book “The Passing of an Illusion” (which can be read in the above-mentioned “ A Close Enemy”) an essay on the idea of communism in the twentieth century. Ernst Nolte’s thesis developed in the 1960s and stunned Furet. It concerned the roots of German national socialism. In short, it could be argued that if it were not for Nazism there would have been no Soviet communism.

Nolte attempted to rationalise the motivations that directed the Nazis. According to him, Hitler’s project was a reaction to the threat from the Soviet Union and world communism. He maintains at the same time, that the mass extinction policy of the Third Reich against the Jews was modelled on earlier Bolshevik terror: the methods of the regime that the Nazis saw as enemies (hence the title of a close enemy referring to both totalitarianisms).

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  Nolte touched on the taboo subject in the public debate of the West and that of West Germany in particular. He argued a blasphemous proximity between Nazism and Communism. In addition, he maintained that the Nazis as far as genocide went, imitated that of the Bolsheviks. He questioned the status of the Holocaust as an exceptional and specifically German crime. He was attacked by left-wing intellectuals in the German Federal Republic for this reason. It must be remembered that he gained much sympathy from German organisations of post-war expellees, a feeling that he reciprocated.

We need to add that the main current of debate in the West centred around the idea that although the Nazis were the epitome of absolute evil, and that although the communists resorted to violence, at least they had good intentions. Communism was interpreted as an emancipatory/humanistic ideology. It promised the clearance of all class and national barriers and the establishment of all that followed on from this, namely liberty, equality and fraternity. Nazism was treated differently. It was seen as the dark negation of all these noble aspirations.

How did this happen? Well one answer can be found in Furet’s works. His thesis is that Western intellectuals, seduced by the myth of the French revolution were convinced that the Bolsheviks saw themselves as their true heirs.

If this is the case then the counterrevolutionary movements in 19th century Europe could be seen as precursors of later Nazism and Communism, although they were definitely not. Fascism and Nazism, like Communism were revolutionary phenomena. They fed on plebeian resentment against the upper social classes. But this does not mean that fascism and Nazism like communism were left-wing projects. They rejected the emancipatory/humanistic discourse. They formed what could be said a third way as they contained left and right wing components.

Furet praised Nolte in going against he grain. He liked the way that Nolte disabused Communism of its naïve and romantic illusions. He defended him against accusations of antisemitism. Nolte touched on the subject of Jewish participation in the global Communist movements. But Furet debated his assertion that Hitlerism was merely a repeat of a Bolshevik consideration.

The French historian argued it was not possible to reduce Nazism to anticommunism. So Nazism has older roots than Bolshevism. Furet had in mind the anti-liberal and anti-bourgeois currents in 19th century Europe, that brushed with European nationalisms. He feared that by reducing Nazism to anticommunism, Hitler would be portrayed as a defender of Europe against Bolshevism.

Furet and Nolte represented two different political options. The Frenchman was a man of the left; the German, a conservative. But they behaved in a conciliatory manner with each other. Both academics showed a critical and independent thought. They were far from conformism or group thought. This is what gave their correspondence some value.

Their correspondence occurred in the 1990s, a time when Soviet communism was politically, economically and morally bankrupt. But even in a Poland that had been seen as the most “democratic” in the communist camp, intellectual elites in their opposition to any nascent anti right wing movements still reached for their Stalinist cudgels.

Accusations of a fascist renaissance was a tool to blacken a respect for the teachings of the Catholic church that took its inspiration from a conservative world view, or a National Democratic legacy and so on. The supporters of decommunisation and a lustrative reckoning were criticised as being hate filled.

If the current Kremlin terrorises the world with “Nazism” is does not follow that the Western antifascist culture (a term coined by Furet in “The Passing of an Illusion”) has waned. Leftist and liberals intellectuals in the West have their political theology. In their view evil resides where peoples affirm the notion of nationhood, country, family and tradition.

Today, presenting this narrative similar to the Kremlins may prove to be troublesome- calling conservatives fascists. Because progressive European cannot be heard to parrot Putin’s choice of language. Nobody wants to be a “Russian footcloth.”

–Filip Memches

TVP WEEKLY. Editorial team and journalists

–Translated by Jan Darasz

François Furet, Ernst Nolte A Close Enemy, Communism and Fascism in the XX Century, translated into Polish by Zofia Litwinowicz-Krutnik and Kamil Markiewicz, Pilecki Institute Warsaw 2022