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Nazis, Marxists, and the History of Ideas
While Hitler and Mussolini both expressed their opposition to and hatred of “Marxists,” they nevertheless embraced a leftism that was only marginally different from that embraced by Lenin and Stalin
In light of recent events and discussions attempting to rehabilitate the historical reputation of Germany’s Nazis, it might be worthwhile to re-examine the foundations of the ideology that underpinned National Socialism and its close cousin fascism. Those who embrace the revisionism that excuses the Nazis’ crimes appear to believe that by doing so, they are defending themselves and their ideological brethren from unfair and ahistorical attacks by the broader left. They think—or at least seem to think—that because fascism is considered a “right-wing” ideology that was specifically pitted against both Communism and Western liberalism, it can hardly be as awful as has been assumed and that its association with unvarnished evil is mere propaganda.
They are wrong. Indeed, the very foundations of their sentiments are mistaken and result from the radical mischaracterization of history and the evolution of ideas in the two centuries after the Enlightenment.
The simple truth of the matter is that the standard depiction of National Socialism and fascism as right-wing ideologies is inarguably false. While Hitler and Mussolini both expressed their opposition to and hatred of “Marxists,” they nevertheless embraced a leftism that was only marginally different from that embraced by Lenin and Stalin. Their hatred was a practical matter, a question of power rather than ideas. Both economically and socially, the Nazis and their Italian cousins were inheritors of the leftist traditions.
Almost from the moment he put pen to paper, Karl Marx’s enemies, as well as his friends, set about explaining why his theories about and solutions to the conflict between capital and labor had no serious application in the real world. Marx was a fantasist, and everyone—save perhaps his occasional partner in crime, Friedrich Engles—knew it.
