The Holocaust deniers
Some fascists try to undercut the argument of their critics by denying that the Nazis
had in fact brought about the Holocaust. The leader of the Belgian fascist movement
during the Second World War, Degrelle, argued to the Pope in 1979 that Auschwitz
could not have exterminated large numbers of Jews, travellers, etc. and that, anyway,
the terror bombing of the Allies and the gulags of Stalin put into perspective any
human rights abuses the Nazis might have caused. The term ‘final solution’ did not
mean extermination – this is another of the deniers’ contentions – and that during
the war, other nations had concentration camps too (Griffin, 1995: 330–7). Irving,
an historian who has built his reputation on ‘reassessing’ the Holocaust, admits the
terrible atrocities of the camps, but argues that these took place against the
instructions of Hitler who merely wanted to have Jews transported to Madagascar,
an island off the African coast (Griffin, 1995: 330–7). To deny the existence of the
Holocaust is a criminal offence in Germany, although it could be argued that
obnoxious contentions like these should be exposed through argument rather than
crushed by law.The critical fascists
Oswald Mosley, the leader of the British Union of Fascists before the Second World
War, argued that Hitler had overreached himself – tried to achieve too much – and
this was the reason for his downfall. The concentration camps and the sacrifice of
the youth tarnished an otherwise noble ideal. Mussolini had badly miscalculated
when he entered the war, but the harshness of his squadristican be excused by ‘the
incredible savagery and brutality of the reds’. Chesterton, the first chair of the
National Front, admits that fascism failed disastrously, and the ‘excesses’ of Hitler
in particular discredited the cause (Griffin, 1995: 323–4).
Some like Ernest Niekisch (1889–1967) argued that the fascist revolution had
been hijacked by demagogues (i.e. leaders who appeal to prejudices for support)
like Hitler, who was a travesty of the spiritual elite really required (Griffin, 1995:
319).Eurofascism
The European Social Movement, founded in 1951, sought to unite Europe against
communism, with Evola, an Italian fascist, arguing that such a Europe must be an
empire. Mosley, on the other hand, spoke of the need for Europe to become a
nation, with a pan-European government using Africa as a resource base (Griffin,
1995: 333–5). A number of those associated with what can be called a ‘New Right’
(not to be confused with the neo-liberalism of free marketeers) speak of the need
to regenerate Europe so that it stands apart from communism and capitalism which
in its liberal form, eradicates identity and imposes a vulgar and soulless ‘rule of
quantity’ upon life (Griffin, 1995: 351).300 Part 2 Classical ideologies