Nationalism has often served the cause of Communism; Communism has never served the cause of nationalism, to my awareness. You are either a Communist or a nationalist. You cannot be both.
A good example is Ho Chi Minh, which of course was the name he adopted when he became a Communist in the early 1920’s/late 19-teens.
Stupid people sometimes argue that he had to compromise with the Soviets/Chinese, after the Americans let him down. The reality is that he joined the Communist International in the early 20’s, and spent the decade trying to further the Communist cause in Asia. He spent most of the 30’s in the Soviet Union with Stalin, and he had dozens of political rivals executed in the 1940’s. In the 1950’s, when he got control of North Vietnam, he had at least 10,000 people executed as “bourgeoisie”. His close followers, in their memoirs, are very clear that he never deviated from his desire to implement Communism in both North and South Vietnam. He pretended temporarily to put Communism aside, but several hundred people knew then, and wrote later, that that was a ruse.
It makes me angry that people would argue even for a moment that he was ever anything but a red fascist. It is not possible to be well meaning and make this argument. It is not possible to be diligent and make this mistake. I conclude that those who do make this argument are themselves fascist apologists.
I will add that there are many ways for elites to take power.
Communism can use the hatred of foreign imperialism to hand power to a fascist elite.
Socialists can use the hatred of the “rich” to hand power to a fascist elite.
Environmentalists can use the fear of environmental disaster to hand power to a fascist elite.
Militarists can use the rage and energy of war to hand power to a fascist elite.
America, by design, discourages the formation of elites. We distrust them culturally, and our system of government–when operated properly, as it has not been for some years–makes it hard for any one group to gain too much power by any means. This is all too the good, since history is replete with examples of those who can taking what they want.
I’ll have more to say about Vietnam after a while, but the net is that is now nothing more than the same corrupt, nepotistic regime it was before, except that the elite has more power than it did under Diem or Thieu. Things are much worse, which was an utterly predictable outcome.
The more I live, the more I hate intellectuals. They have caused so much unnecessary pain, and they never accept responsibility.