Trump actions repeat mistakes that led to World War II
There is a foreboding similarity between Trump's actions and those that led to World War II.
The aftermath of the Great War saw a cascade of destabilizing events: the Spanish Flu pandemic devastated populations worldwide, American isolationism took hold, the Great Depression crushed economies, and fascism rose from the ashes of economic despair. Today's parallels are startlingly similar: the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump's protectionist policies, American withdrawal from global leadership, and the rise of MAGA extremism with its authoritarian undertones.
Woodrow Wilson, though responsible for designing the League of Nations as a global peacekeeping body, couldn't convince his own nation to join it. The rejection of Japan's racial equality proposal in the League's covenant—opposed by the US, Australia, and South Africa—sowed seeds of resentment that would later bear bitter fruit. This retreat from international cooperation marked the beginning of a dangerous pattern that would continue through three successive Republican administrations between 1921 and 1933.
The parallels with wealthy industrialists of that era and today's tech oligarchs are particularly disturbing. Andrew Carnegie funded eugenics research that fuelled discrimination and led to over 60,000 forced sterilizations in America. The American Eugenics Society had ambitions to sterilize ten percent of the US population, with proposals even extending to euthanasia using mobile gas chambers. Henry Ford, celebrated for his efficiency and innovation, was also notorious for his antisemitism and anti-labour stance, earning Hitler's admiration in Mein Kampf.
Today, we see Elon Musk, who has given Nazi salutes, addressed German far-right political conferences, and decimated workforces at Twitter and government agencies with seemingly little concern for consequences. Trump's repeated references to "good genes" and superior bloodlines echo the eugenics movement, while one of his political appointees openly called for mass sterilization of "low quality humans"—rhetoric that would not have seemed out of place in 1930s Germany.
The geopolitical parallels are equally troubling. The 1938 Anschluss, when Germany annexed Austria, bears striking similarities to Russia's annexation of Crimea. The Munich Conference that carved up Czechoslovakia mirrors Trump's transactional approach to Eastern Ukraine. The 1939 partitioning of Poland between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia finds its modern echo in Trump and Putin's discussions regarding Ukraine's fate. In both eras, as America retreated into isolationism, dictators expanded their reach and fascism spread unchecked.
Domestically, the signs are equally disturbing. The burning of books in Florida schools echoes Nazi book-burning campaigns. Trump's relentless demonization of mainstream media as "fake news" and "enemies of the people" mirrors totalitarian tactics. The proliferation of misinformation through social media creates a distorted reality for millions. Even the sight of brown-shirted ushers dragging hecklers from public meetings in North Dakota bears an uncomfortable resemblance to the intimidation tactics of Hitler's Brownshirts.
By the time Franklin D. Roosevelt introduced the New Deal in 1933, the machinery of war was already in motion across Europe. Hitler had become Chancellor of Germany, and Stalin had consolidated his power in the Soviet Union. The window for preventative action had closed.
Winston Churchill famously warned that those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Property developers like Trump understand this principle well—they prefer predictable cycles they can capitalize on. But the cycles of history carry grave consequences for ordinary citizens when they lead to conflict and suffering.
The Republican administrations of the 1920s and early 1930s championed isolationism, deregulation, and nationalist economic policies while turning a blind eye to the rising threat of fascism abroad. Historians now recognize these as critical missed opportunities to alter the course of events that led to global catastrophe. As similar patterns emerge today—withdrawal from international agreements, growing authoritarianism, empowerment of dictators—the echoes of that consequential period become increasingly difficult to ignore.
