Is Russia’s President a Fascist?
(Photo: AP)
Can you call Russia “fascist”? Do you maybe even have to? If you take the usual criteria for fascist regimes, Russia under President Vladimir Putin fulfills most of them:
- authoritarian rule tailored to one person at the top – ticked.
- Elections that only serve to confirm the regime – ticked.
- An exaggerated nationalism based on the myth of humiliation and resurrection of one’s own people – tick it.
- A masculine glorification of strength and physical violence, both internally and externally – tick it.
The devaluation of political and military opponents who are denied elementary human rights… you guessed it. And the list could go on.
There are experts on fascism who see the term as historically linked to the regimes of the 1930s, particularly in Italy and Germany. However, most scientists understand it to be a timeless form of rule.
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In Germany, however, we find it difficult to describe Russia under Putin as what it is according to the textbook definition – a fascist state. We immediately associate the word with National Socialism and think: But Putin is not a second Hitler, is he?
He’s definitely not. Which is why it is wrong, for example, to hastily label the murders of Ukrainian civilians by Russian soldiers as “genocide”. In contrast to the German Wehrmacht’s war of annihilation in the east, Russia is not murdering in the Ukraine to destroy a population classified as inferior, but probably for tactical reasons: fear and terror are spread in order to make the civilian population compliant.
However, this motive for murder is only possible because Moscow has previously labeled the Ukrainian opponents as criminals against whom any means is justified. The fact that the fascist Putin discredits his Ukrainian opponents as “Nazis” of all things is one of the particularly bitter twists of history.
Military aggression as the essence
The degree of leader cult, conformity and internal terror in Russia is far removed from the excesses of National Socialism. The crimes committed by Germans during this period are and remain historically unique and should not be used lightly for historical comparisons – especially not by Germans.
But fascism does not just begin with the reign of terror of the National Socialists. When classifying the Russian policy of conquest, for example, it can definitely help to realize that military aggression is at the heart of fascist regimes, because they need it to legitimize their rule internally.
Anyone who understands this can guess that Russia under Putin will probably not suddenly become a peaceful country if the West takes account of Russia’s supposedly legitimate territorial security interests.
Conversely, one can be skeptical as to whether the Western economic sanctions will have a quick effect, because the essence of fascist rule also includes disdain for material increases in prosperity: at least in the official propaganda, it is the service to the nation that makes people happy, not the Netflix subscription .