Why Fascist?

[audace]

Ok, I may be not the first person to ask this, but I was wondering why Russian soldiers during WW2 refered to German troops as Fascist instead of Nazis.

I read it so many times, I didn't even care, but I've never understood why.

Maybe is it something from the Spanish Civil war or something else?

Can some of you enlight me?

thanks

[Nippy]

Because technically Facisim, Communisim, and Socalisim are three seperate political ideals.

Of course, the old Nippster here still beleives Ludwig Von Miss when he says that all three are the same (No civil right, State ownership of Business, and no private property)

[Andrew H.]

The State doesn't own businesses under fascism, and there is private property under fascism as well.

[Phantom Captain]

Nazism is fascism. They are interchangable, one and the same. I think that was what he was asking and/or confused on.

[Jagdwyrm]

Fascism is an Italian word if I'm not mistaken. As stated earlier the Nazi party of Germany governed it as a fascist state.

[WWB]

The term Fascism comes from the latin term fasces, which were the bundle of 10 rods carried about by the Tribunes used to keep the people in check.

I think the term was used by the soviets because of its derogitory connotation, although I could be wrong on that. It sounded nastier and dehumanizing to descirbe the enemy as Fascist Invaders or a Hitlerite Horde rather than the Germans.

WWB

[edited cos my latin spelling is going downhill]

[ September 13, 2002, 10:11 PM: Message edited by: wwb_99 ]

[Guest SnarkerII]

Here's a pretty funny comparison of governments:

Socialism: You have two cows. Give one cow to your neighbor.

Communism: You have two cows. Give both cows to the government, and they may

give you some milk.

Fascism: You have two cows. You give all of the milk to the government, and the

government sells it.

Nazism: You have two cows. The government shoots you and takes both cows.

Anarchism: You have two cows. Keep both cows, shoot the government agent and

steal another cow.

Capitalism: You have two cows. Sell one, buy a bull.

Surrealism: You have two giraffes. The government makes you take harmonica

lessons.

[Len]

As previously stated, Fascism is a political ideal, and Nazism was one implementation of it.

I believe that "Fascism" derives from the Latin word "fasces" - see this link for more info -

fasces

Regards, Len

[Tarquelne]

[QB]Ok, I may be not the first person to ask this, but I was wondering why Russian soldiers during WW2 refered to German troops as Fascist instead of Nazis.

From the Soviet perspective it was the fact that Nazis were _facists_ that made Nazis bad guys, ideologically. Thus, as was mentioned before, "fascist" automatically carries a negative connotation, but "Nazi" doesn't.

Calling National Socialists "Nazis" isn't exactly obvious step for Russian speakers.... and Communists would want to de-emphasize the "Socialists" component, too.

"Nazi" is also very close to a dialect word for goose-down.

[Nippy]

Originally posted by Andrew Hedges:

The State doesn't own businesses under fascism, and there is private property under fascism as well.

True, but in Nazi Germany at any rate, all large buisness owners were members or had ties to the Nazi party. Kind of like how Socalisim says that the means of production belong to the people, but the Government (with the people's best interests in mind of course ) manages it for them.

[Chad Harrison]

Boy, I thought trying to understand our government was hard enough! Reason number 4632 why I was never a political science major.

Chad

[Sargon70]

Originally posted by audace:

Ok, I may be not the first person to ask this, but I was wondering why Russian soldiers during WW2 refered to German troops as Fascist instead of Nazis.

I read it so many times, I didn't even care, but I've never understood why.

Maybe is it something from the Spanish Civil war or something else?

Can some of you enlight me?

thanks

From the communist point of view, the real conflict is not between nations, but between workers and capitalists or communism and capitalism. According to communist doctrine, fascism is only a very radical form of capitalism, in which the capitalists' grip on power is not camouflaged by democratic institutions. Other means of controlling the masses have failed, so the capitalists have to use brutal force as a last resort.

Franco, Mussolini, Hitler: For a soviet communist in the 1930s they were all agents of capitalism who had been given the order to contain socialist movements and the Soviet Union.

This point of view, while overlooking some important details and IMHO not correct, explains two things:

First, it answers your question why the invaders were often called fascists instead of Germans.

Second, it tells us something about the reasoning behind Soviet foreign policy of that time: Stalin thought that Hitler was the tool of other capitalist nations to overthrow communist rule in the Soviet Union. He knew that war with Hitler would be inevitable, but this war would only be one part of the larger conflict between the Soviet Union and a capitalist world.

Remember that during the russian civil war many countries had send troops to Russia, including France, Great Britain and even the US. For Stalin, they were all the same with Hitler only being the most brutal of them.

So Stalin wanted to weaken the capitalist world by helping Hitler with strategic resources while buying time to prepare for the war against Germany. That way he tried to turn around his nightmare that the western allies were using Hitler to weaken the Soviet Union.

So much for the term "fascism" according to paranoid stalinist thinking.

What fascism really means is a different question because "fascist" is also used by many as an invective for their political enemies - which makes it hard to analyze it in a scientific, non-emotional way.

The only thing I know for sure is that I prefer to live in a democracy...

[Eden Smallwood]

Originally posted by wwb_99:

[QB]The term Fascism comes from the latin term fasces, which were the bundle of 10 rods carried about by the Tribunes used to keep the people in check.

Ok, I'm not being nitpicky here, but...

A bundle of rods bound together around an ax with the blade projecting, carried before ancient Roman magistrates as an emblem of authority.

[Latin fasces, pl. of fascis, bundle.]

...in fact fasces is an English word directly. The important point not yet mentioned is that the fasces is demonstrating strength through unity- the bundling of wimpy wimpy wimpy twigs together gets you something hefty hefty hefty you can beat your enemies with. Ooh.. ahh... * symbolism *

Until 1941(?), this same exact Roman fasces was on the back of our, excuse me, the US dime. "United States"... get it? The back of this coin was then changed for pretty obvious reasons to... to whatever the heck it is today.

Eden

[pavlov]

Originally posted by wwb_99:

The term Fascism comes from the latin term fasces, which were the bundle of 10 rods carried about by the Tribunes used to keep the people in check.

Incidently, it is an interesting fact that fasces, to this day, decorate the interior of the United States Capitol building.

[pavlov]

Originally posted by wwb_99:

The term Fascism comes from the latin term fasces, which were the bundle of 10 rods carried about by the Tribunes used to keep the people in check.

Incidently, it is an interesting fact that fasces, to this day, decorate the interior of the United States Capitol building.

[pavlov]

Originally posted by Chad Harrison:

Boy, I thought trying to understand our government was hard enough! Reason number 4632 why I was never a political science major.

Chad

See above for reason number 4633 why the USA is a political and intellectual backwater, and down right moronic to boot.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by pavlov:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Chad Harrison:

Boy, I thought trying to understand our government was hard enough! Reason number 4632 why I was never a political science major.

Chad

See above for reason number 4633 why the USA is a political and intellectual backwater, and down right moronic to boot.</font>

[Nippy]

See above for reason number 4633 why the USA is a political and intellectual backwater, and down right moronic to boot.[/qb]

Pavlov must have caught footage from a Berkley or Harvard political rally again:

"Communisim can work if we just give it a chance!"

"Besides making us the worlds top Military, Political, and Economic superpower, what good has capitalisim done for America?"

I suppose if I lived in a forgien country and saw a bunch of Americans claiming that Pol-Pot and Yasser Arafat were "Freedom-Fighters" I'd think they were all a bunch of morons too.

[Andrew H.]

Originally posted by Nippy:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Andrew Hedges:

The State doesn't own businesses under fascism, and there is private property under fascism as well.

True, but in Nazi Germany at any rate, all large buisness owners were members or had ties to the Nazi party. Kind of like how Socalisim says that the means of production belong to the people, but the Government (with the people's best interests in mind of course ) manages it for them.</font>

[Pvt. Ryan]

Originally posted by Eden Smallwood:

Until 1941(?), this same exact Roman fasces was on the back of our, excuse me, the US dime. "United States"... get it? The back of this coin was then changed for pretty obvious reasons to... to whatever the heck it is today.

The design was changed in 1946 to commemorate the death of Roosevelt. The observse of the "Mercury Dime" to which you refer depicted Liberty with a winged cap, which bore a close resemblance to Mercury, messenger of the Roman gods.

The reverse of the Roosevelt Dime has a torch.

[ September 14, 2002, 11:21 AM: Message edited by: Pvt. Ryan ]

[Schoerner]

Originally posted by audace:

Ok, I may be not the first person to ask this, but I was wondering why Russian soldiers during WW2 refered to German troops as Fascist instead of Nazis.

I read it so many times, I didn't even care, but I've never understood why.

Maybe is it something from the Spanish Civil war or something else?

Can some of you enlight me?

thanks

The answer is quite simple: even today the international socialists and marxists do the same,

to obscure, that Nationalsocialism is a kind of socialism.

Target is to suggest the only possible solution for a socialistic society is INTERNATIONALISTIC socialism.

As everyone nowadays can see, the international socialists and the international capitalists have much more in common than nationalistic movements: ONE WORLD - dissolution of the nations and cultures and replacing with liberal individuals without roots are

1. the best consumers

2. have the biggest potential for revolution, due to no roots/culture (old marxistic plan; very good observable from 1968 on: permissive "education", "all same - all equal", families are unnecessary,...)

With the lost WWII, the international socialists took the monopoly over socialism.

Therefore since 1945 the "socialists" and the capitalists have one thing in common: internationalism.

It's quite amusing to see "antiimperialists" demonstrating against "this kind of globalization". Do they not know, that marxism and capitalism are the two sides of the same medal?

The border is not - like always said - "left" or "right".

This is only part of the old principle DIVIDE ET IMPERA (keeping nations divided into different interest-groups).

A quite good scheme to see how false the everywhere used terms are, is a cartesian coordinate-system:

x-axis goes from internationalistic to nationalistic

y-axis: capitalistic-socialistic

If you use this scheme for analyzation, you'll be surprised, how "pluralistic" our western world really is...

[ September 14, 2002, 12:03 PM: Message edited by: Schoerner ]

[Andrew H.]

The fasces on the dime wasn't removed because of fascism - in fact, if you look here , you will see two fasces to either side of the rostrum in the US house of representatives. (Here is a close up .

France also uses fasces a lot - IIRC, the French EU passport has a fasces on it.

[dor]

Originally posted by Schoerner:

[Therefore since 1945 the "socialists" and the capitalists have one thing in common: internationalism.

It's quite amusing to see "antiimperialists" demonstrating against "this kind of globalization". Do they not know, that marxism and capitalism are the two sides of the same medal?

[dor]

Originally posted by Schoerner:

[Therefore since 1945 the "socialists" and the capitalists have one thing in common: internationalism.

It's quite amusing to see "antiimperialists" demonstrating against "this kind of globalization". Do they not know, that marxism and capitalism are the two sides of the same medal?

Nice touching,Schoerner!

[audace]

Thank you guys.

It's amazing how many things you can learn in this board.