The Left Berlin News & Comment

This is the archive template

The alliance of Widersetzen” (“Resist”)

Is it possible to expand an anti-fascist action alliance?

Angelika Stepken
01/02/2026

What has “Widerstzen” achieved?

After Giessen comes Erfurt. For over a year and a half, the alliance “Widersetzen” (Resist) has been organizing acts of civil disobedience against AfD party conventions and the founding of the new AfD youth association. Previously in Essen (June 2024), Riesa (January 2025), and Giessen (November 2025), they succeeded in disrupting and delaying travel to and the staging of party meetings on a massive scale. With great media coverage, the message was: no room for the right wing.

“Widersetzen” operates locally at a high level of logistical expertise. This must coordinate the nationwide arrival of buses and the traffic blockades of the various “fingers” / demonstration groups despite the police presence. [editor’s note: the Fünf-finger Strategie (five finger strategy) involves several demo blocks trying to break through police lines simultaneously. It was developed at anti-capitalist protests such as that against the G8 in Heiligendamm in 2007)].

At the same time, they use a high level of social competence in the preparation and follow-up to train the participants’ awareness and give them a sense of security in collective structures. “Widersetzen” thus generates self-efficacy in times of fear and “action gridlock.” ‘Widersetzen’ sees itself as part of “movement building” with its “networks of solidarity.” Its “campaign logic” and focus on the AfD (Alternative for Germany) triggers both criticism and discussion.

Widersetzen does not organize demonstrations, but rather it organizes civil disobedience by means of blockades. This means that participants need a dose of courage to physically position themselves on streets and intersections and thus literally resist the large contingent of AfD personnel and police. They also have to put up with hours of night-time travel in all kinds of weather. The group focuses on coalition politics, bringing in activists, trade unionists, for example Omas gegen Rechts, among others. This has to do with the urgency of the motivation, but also with the way the action alliance addresses, welcomes, and supports them.

Widersetzen is a relatively new action alliance that has carried out three campaigns in less than two years, but has had—with quite spectacular results. Fifteen thousand people traveled to Riesa and Giessen, significantly delaying the AfD events. Eighty-five thousand people now follow “Widersetzen” on Instagram. Around a hundred local groups have been activated nationwide., and sStrategic discussions are being held in specific working groups. For example: “How can an anti-fascist movement in Germany grow and act efficiently without falling into rituals of exclusion?”

Especially – after the brief mobilization following Correctiv’s investigation into the secret plan (early 2024) and the Brandmauer discussion in winter 2025. – grow and act efficiently without falling into rituals of exclusion?

How does ‘Widersetzen’ organize itself and its supporters?

Anyone who wants to participate takes part in action training. This instructs a large group of people, both precisely and kindly, on the various legal aspects and strategies of joint protection and resistance behavior. Those who attend these meetings learn and are prepared for joint action. The collective preparation leads to joint action and allows a follow-up, both personal and political. Such interactive care behavior is unusual for a political initiative, especially since it involves thousands of people, some of whom have no experience of resistance. The introductory meetings are about imparting experiential knowledge, care, and practical training. This is not a theory course nor one on the history of civil disobedience, nor to debate strategies for anti-fascist resistance. This makes it easy to get started immediately without arguments between different political positions. The focus is on the obvious action: no room for the right wing. Many can agree with that.

The homepage “Widersetzen” (resist) suggests neither an anti-fascist theoretical organ nor a militant left-wing project. In April 2024, the first online-meeting took place with 170 participants, who decided after 90 minutes to organize a nationwide resistance. After only 10 weeks of mobilization, around 7,000 people took part in their first actions.But the group also acknowledges its own weaknesses. Initially insufficient resources led to “unstructured work to defend against repression.” There was a lack of systematic legal review of the protests and clear agreements. Almost all processes were improvised spontaneously (www.widersetzen.com).

Learning from this, six months later, preparations for the blockades of the AfD federal party conference in Riesa were more thorough., Many, many preparatory action trainings took place nationwide, in union rooms, left-wing centers, and social spaces. They drew on the experiences of a network of movement-oriented action trainers in the run-up to and during the 2007 G8 summit in Heiligendamm.

On the website skillsforaction.noblogs.org, they offer their knowledge in the form of workshops, comprehensive manuals, and handouts. This knowledge transfer increased individual and collective capacity for action, and reduced fears and new things were learnt collectively. Anyone who wanted to board the buses to Riesa at 2:00 a.m. at the Berlin bus station had the chance to be prepared. They knew about the idea of civil disobedience; communication structures among themselves; mutual protection during the action; how to behave in the event of police intervention; the contact numbers of the investigative committee; practical equipment, and the action sticker. These preparatory meetings, some of which were attended by 60 to 80 interested people, already generated a feeling of group spirit, reliability, solidarity, and resistance “at home.”

Widersetzen is a network in the making. An activists’ conference was held in Leipzig in October 2024. Thereafter structures became more professional, large digital planning meetings were introduced, and a clearer division of labor was established within the nationwide network. In addition to the network of local groups allowing decentralized anti-fascist initiatives, working groups meet to discuss awareness, repression, press, etc.

Formally, “widersetzen” has no legal form; it is a donation-based alliance. Almost 100,000 euros were raised for the action in Giessen. In terms of press law and accounting, the VVN / Association of Victims of Nazi Persecution – Federation of Anti-Fascists e.V. is listed in the imprint. In Berlin, a group of about 80 people now meets weekly forming.As Mila from the Berlin group reports, it is:

“a completely separate local group with its own understanding of political work. Like many other local groups from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Rostock, Hamburg, and Greifswald, we supported the protest against the Nazi march in Demmin, but also last fall’s migrant-led We’ll Come United caravan from Thuringia to Berlin… “Widersetzen is an action alliance of groups that work in very different ways and have different political analyses, but nevertheless say: we can at least agree that we see the AfD as a great danger to democracy, to social cohesion, to solidarity, and that with the AfD, fascism is becoming increasingly likely. Mass civil disobedience is important because demonstrations alone no longer have any effect. There are a lot of people who no longer know: what can I actually do? Widersetzen offers them a collective space.”

How have “Widersetzen” activists assessed the organisation themselves?

Back in June 2025, Raul Zelik asked in an article “Drivers of Fascism” whether fascism stems from fascist movements, or whether it “represents a deepening of existing power relations, in which the self-restraint of sovereign power (…) is lifted in the face of a crisis?”

However in issue 720 from last November, Antifa AG of the Interventionist Left warned against underestimating the independent danger of organized fascism, and sees Widersetzen as more than just as a one-off campaign.

“Through its reach and networking, ‘Widersetzen’ is more than an action alliance. It is a place for discussion, strategy development, and anti-fascist (initial) organization. (…) An anti-fascist movement must be able to build social counterpower. But that takes time and movement building.”

In December, the group “Demos neu denken” (Rethinking Demos) criticizes that the greatest strength of ‘widersetzen’ is also its limitation, namely its “campaign logic”. It calls instead for demonstrations to be understood as “movement publics” and “spaces for collective opinion-forming,” promoting self-organization and small groups. On January 20, Mine Pleasure Bouvar writing for a&k 722 summarizes these critiques with a 1932 quote from the German communist Ernst Thälmann:”The Anti-Fascist Action was too focused on demonstrations, conferences, and the offensive against Nazi terror, which undoubtedly has a good revolutionary side; but the Anti-Fascist Action was not sufficiently oriented toward strategic work in the factories and at the stamping stations.”

What is the current focus of work?

January 26, 2026: Just seven months before the state elections, the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt presented a 156-page draft of its election program, which is to be adopted at the state party conference in April.The party wants to counteract the alleged “extinction of the German people,” as it says verbatim, and to no longer provide state support to churches. A proposed “voluntary citizens’ watch” is to be introduced, subordinate to the public order office. Authorities are no longer to check the political views of gun owners. The State Agency for Civic Education is to be abolished as a “left-wing indoctrination institution.” Inclusion is to be ended, and children with disabilities are to be placed in special schools. History lessons are to teach the origins and “success story of this state.” The “normal family consisting of a man and a woman, from which children are born” is to be the model, and rainbow flags will be banned in schools. Associations should only receive funding if they have made “a credible commitment to the democratic order and a patriotic attitude.” Etc.

The AfD currently enjoys 40% voter support in Saxony-Anhalt. Regardless of differing analyses of fascism and capitalism, resistance – Widersetzen is necessary: now!

Between the nation-state and the citizenship state

A leftist reading of the Kurdish national project

Rezgar Akrawi

Introduction

The Middle East has witnessed bloody national conflicts that have left millions of victims and displaced persons. The Kurdish question represents one of the most important of these conflicts, as Kurds are distributed across four countries: Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria. The fundamental question is: What is the possible solution now? Is it in building separate nation-states, or in struggling for a citizenship state with equal rights?

There has been and still is blatant national oppression against the Kurds. In Iraq, brutality reached its peak with the Anfal campaigns, the chemical weapons bombing of Halabja, and “Arabization” policies. In Syria, the Arab Belt and the 1962 census that stripped hundreds of thousands of their citizenship, and today in January 2026, this path is renewed through military attacks on areas led by the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Turkey has classified Kurds as “mountain Turks” and destroyed thousands of villages. In Iran, compound repression, executions, and economic marginalization continues.

However, these policies did not target Kurds alone; the dictatorship that crushes Kurdish identity is the same one that oppresses all citizens. The struggle against national oppression is part of the general struggle against tyranny. Confronting real oppression is not achieved by replacing one dominant nationality with another, but by dismantling the foundations of the exclusionary nation-state itself and building a democratic state based on equal citizenship.

From “Oppressed Nationality” to Ruling Authority

In the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, the “oppressed nationality” transformed into a ruling authority facing accusations of repressive practices and organized corruption. The two main parties established familial-tribal rule. A bloody civil war erupted (1994-1998) in which thousands of Kurds were killed, caused by the struggle for influence and resources. To this day corruption is rampant, salaries are cut off, and demonstrations are suppressed, while the two parties continue to monopolize wealth.

In Syria, the SDF transformed into an authority with a centralized character, with limited margin for pluralism. Despite progressive reforms in social aspects and women’s participation, these remained governed by a certain class and political ceiling. Human rights violations were recorded, including child recruitment and arrest and suppression and torture of opponents.

The nationalist discourse transformed into an ideological cover to justify tyranny and reproduce relations of domination. Historical national victimhood does not grant any authority absolution to practice oppression. The transformation of “oppressed nationality” into a “tool of oppression” represents the great moral defeat of the liberationist project, and proves that the flaw lies in the structure of the exclusionary nation-state itself.

Marginalizing Class Struggle and the Danger of Civil Wars

National conflicts push societies toward fanaticism and civil wars, in which the toiling masses become fuel for conflicts that do not serve their interests. Exclusionary nationalist discourse transforms the conflict from a class conflict between the toiling masses and the ruling classes into a false national and identity conflict. National conflicts are a tool for weakening class struggle and distracting the masses from their daily issues related to rights, work, wages, services, and social justice.

Under the cover of defending nationality, class struggle is marginalized, exploitation is justified, and authorities are immunized from accountability. The left’s mission is to rely on human and internationalist identity and solidarity with the suffering of all civilian victims of dictatorship and wars, regardless of race or religion. Selective solidarity is inhumane thinking which contributes to entrenching fanaticism and weakening any liberationist project.

Is the Nation-State Possible Now?

Objective conditions are not suitable for a Kurdish nation-state project. Kurdish areas are surrounded by hostile regional powers, and national movements lack real international support. American support is circumstantial and linked to immediate interests. Even if a Kurdish state were achieved, what guarantees its survival or prevents its transformation into a new dictatorial model? The experience in the Region and Syria is evident: tribal-partisan rule, tyranny, corruption, and human rights violations.

It is necessary to speak clearly about a demographic reality: many areas do not have a single national majority. How can a national project be built on lands where part of the population is from other nationalities? This problem creates acute tensions and opens the door to accusations of practicing “Arabization,” “Kurdification,” and “Turkification.” It is difficult to build a nation-state in multi-national areas without creating new national injustice.

Betting on America

Some Kurdish national movements have built their projects on American support. America, as the largest capitalist power, supports reactionary regimes and has never been on the side of oppressed peoples. Its alliance with Kurdish forces came to fill a vacuum resulting from the absence of large American ground forces. Recently, the alliance in Syria shifted toward Ahmed al-Sharaa and the central government, despite him being on the terrorism list, revealing that America cares only about its interests.

American policy stems from its strategic interests, as shown by experiences of abandoning its allies: the Kurds in 1975, and the Afghans after the Soviet withdrawal. Betting on major capitalist powers is betting on a “political mirage.” These powers see national movements as “pawns” on a geopolitical chessboard.

Citizenship State and Rights with Human Identity

A distinction must be made between demanding cultural, linguistic, and administrative rights, and demanding a separate nation-state. These rights are legitimate demands that every leftist should support. Struggling for them is more appropriate within the framework of an equal citizenship state transcending nationalities and religions. Today’s possible alternative lies in a citizenship state that neutralizes nationality and religion from power, and restricts the formation of parties on national or religious bases.

This transition is a gradual path requiring clear constitutional mechanisms. The model of geographical federalism emerges as an alternative to national federalism, whereby regions are granted broad powers, which empties the conflict of its ethnic charge. This must be coupled with “comprehensive constitutionalization of identities” and building supervisory institutions and an independent judiciary.

International experiences prove the possibility of building this model; Switzerland succeeded in accommodating four official languages, South Africa chose citizenship, and in India, Bolivia, and Spain there are attempts to manage diversity. These examples confirm that the alternative is not a utopian dream.

It may be said that the citizenship state is a utopian dream, but the separate nation-state project is more utopian. Talk of an independent, stable Kurdish state surrounded by hostile states, without international support, and in multi-national areas, is a distant dream. The citizenship state is a gradual project that begins with concrete steps: constitutionalizing national rights, building democratic institutions, applying decentralization, and enhancing the rule of law.

Right to Self-Determination and Realistic Rationality

While fully supporting the legitimate right of the Kurdish people and all peoples to self-determination including secession, I do not see that conditions are suitable now for declaring new nation-states. We must reject forced unity and support voluntary unity based on equal citizenship, while supporting the right to self-determination if it will provide more rights, equality, and better life.

This position is not hostility to Kurdish national liberation, but rather a defense of the essence of liberation from the distortion inflicted by bourgeois national projects. In current circumstances, the toiling masses are dragged into wars and national conflicts, and will face deeper crises for entities that may face the danger of transforming into another authoritarian model.

As Marxists and leftists, we must deal with scientific rationality and study conditions, power balances, and realistic possibilities. We must avoid dragging the masses into losing and destructive wars. Reliance on rationality is necessary, not on “national heroism” and “national pride.” This discourse drags the masses into more wars and destruction.

The Left’s Tasks

Our mission as leftists is to separate our line from all parties to national conflict, and struggle for a state based on citizenship, equal rights, and social justice, not on national or sectarian basis. The road is long and difficult, but it is the only road to reach a real and sustainable solution.

The left can organize itself practically by building cross-national and cross-sectarian organizations, starting from the shared interests of workers, linking the struggle for national rights with the social battle against exploitation, corruption, and tyranny. This requires complete independence from bourgeois forces with nationalist discourse.

Peoples are not in a state of innate conflict, but are victims of organized national mobilization, where masses are pushed into bloody conflicts, so that popular sacrifices become fuel for consolidating the thrones of bourgeois cliques. Our main battle is to dismantle the shackles of tyranny and exploitation, and build a democratic socialist human space. The path to the Kurd’s rights and freedom passes through the rights and freedoms of his Arab, Turkish, Syriac, and Iranian neighbor, under a state that does not ask the citizen about their origin, guarantees them bread and freedom, and respects their human dignity.

Rezgar Akrawi is a Kurdish Leftist from Iraqi Kurdistan.

Defense team for the ‘Ulm 5’ demands immediate release from pre-trial detention

Germany continues to repress Palestine solidarity, using pre-trial detention to silence dissent

Roser Gari Perez
30/01/2026

Editor’s Note: On 12th December 2025, The Left Berlin published a report by Roser Garí Pérez about the harsh pre-trial conditions of the Ulm 5, facing trial for a non-violent action against arms manufacturer Elbit Systems, which is complicit in genocide in Gaza. On 26th January, the Ulm 5 filed an appeal. Here we publish a statement by their lawyers, preceded by a summary by Roser of their current condition.

The pro-Palestine movement in Germany has been brutally repressed and persecuted for decades, but since October 2023 the state’s physical, psychological, and legal violence has intensified.

Invoking Germany’s Staatsräson—the unwavering defense of Israel, a state currently on trial at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for committing a textbook genocide in Gaza—German police have arrested thousands of people, with hundreds of cases now moving through criminal courts across the country. In Berlin alone, police claim to have initiated more than 11,000 proceedings.

People prosecuted for minor offenses such as trespassing, chants, or symbols are treated as dangerous criminals, with cases often heard in high-security courtrooms.

While state violence is largely ignored, or even encouraged, by the political elite and significant parts of the population, activists opposing its most extreme expression—Germany’s complicity in the genocide of the Palestinian people—are criminalized and dragged through lengthy, exhausting legal procedures. Few cases illustrate this political persecution more clearly than that of the Ulm 5.

Further restrictions

Despite the nonviolent and highly targeted nature of their action—which posed no threat to public safety—the German state appears determined to make an example of the Ulm 5 and has denied them bail.

Since their incarceration, they have been subjected to disproportionately harsh treatment. Beyond the abuses documented in my previous report, the Ulm 5 have faced severe restrictions on communication and contact, as well as inhumane detention conditions, including the following:

One individual is completely denied phone contact with lawyers, family, or friends.
Others are permitted phone calls only with legal counsel, with all communication with family and friends prohibited.
In-person visits are severely restricted: one person is allowed two one-hour visits per month, while another is permitted only one hour per month, divided into two 30-minute sessions.
Video visits are rendered largely ineffective due to poor internet quality, reducing a scheduled one-hour visit to as little as 20 minutes. Some visits take place behind floor-to-ceiling glass, with all physical contact prohibited.
All visits by family and friends are monitored by police and a translator.
There is a systemic failure to properly communicate visit and phone-call arrangements to both prisoners and their families, resulting in missed connections and significant distress.
Incoming mail is poorly photocopied, often rendering letters difficult or impossible to read.
One individual was initially placed in a shared cell they felt was unsafe and was later moved.
In another case, an incident occurred in a nearby prison corridor in which a person took their own life.
Prisoners report inadequate food, with individuals stating they often feel hungry.
Heating and clothing provisions are insufficient; warm clothing sent by families arrives extremely slowly or is turned away entirely.
During holiday periods, individuals were at times confined to their cells for entire days due to staff shortages.

They also suffer arbitrary restrictions on personal items and information:

One individual has been restricted to ordering only three books in the four and a half months since their arrest, with no books permitted to be sent from outside.
Access to newspapers and general information about the prison system is withheld, while explanations provided by staff are often sarcastic or unhelpful.
Individuals are prohibited from discussing their case with family members during visits, including relaying updates from their lawyer.
All visits are surveilled by police representatives and a translator.
All written correspondence is monitored by the prosecutor or presiding judge.

The activists also face inadequate access to legal counsel and basic procedural rights. Phone calls and meetings with their lawyers—legally unrestricted—have been repeatedly cut short by prison staff, in apparent violation of the law.

Some individuals report being denied adequate healthcare despite having potentially serious medical conditions.

The trial dates currently offered by the court span nearly three months, from late April to late July. As a result, pre-trial detention may extend to as long as 11 months, exceeding the standard six-month maximum without adequate justification. The court has scheduled hearings non-consecutively over several months, creating significant logistical and financial barriers for lawyers, families, and supporters attempting to attend.

The disproportionately punitive treatment these activists are facing appears designed to punish and isolate them before their trial has even begun—while also serving as a warning to others in Germany who might consider challenging the state’s Staatsräson.

By preemptively punishing those who seek to uphold international law and prevent genocide, Germany adds yet another chapter to its complicity in Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people.

Press release: 26 January 2026

Dear Sir or Madam,

We, the defence lawyers for the ‘Ulm 5’, have today lodged an appeal against their detention. Our clients must be released from pre-trial detention immediately.

The clients have now been in pre-trial detention for almost five months without interruption. The stricter conditions continue to apply. This includes strict control of telephone calls, visits and letters, confinement to their cells for up to 23 hours a day, and restricted access to books and communal events.

The enforcement of pre-trial detention was disproportionate from the outset. The act was clearly aimed at a legitimate goal, namely, to end the killing of civilians in Gaza. Only material damage was caused in this context; no people were injured. Elbit Systems Deutschland GmbH & Co KG is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Israeli company Elbit Systems Ltd. The latter profits considerably from the war in Gaza and supplies a large proportion of the drones used there. However, no investigation was conducted into this line of defence based on justifiable emergency assistance, and a corresponding request by the defence was ignored by the Attorney General’s Office. The investigating authorities are obviously primarily concerned with making an example of our clients, who are committed to fighting occupation and genocide.

On top of that, now that charges have been brought, the Stuttgart Regional Court is violating the principle of expeditious proceedings, which must be given special consideration in detention cases (Art. 5(3) sentence 2 ECHR; Sections/§§ 121, 122 StPO). The main hearing is not scheduled to begin until the end of April 2026 and is expected to last until at least the end of July. The Regional Court is legally required to begin the trial by the beginning of March 2026 at the latest. The unlawful detention of our clients is thus being prolonged indefinitely, which constitutes a significant violation of their fundamental right to liberty.

All defence lawyers have therefore lodged an appeal against detention with the Higher Regional Court of Stuttgart today.

The signatories are available to answer any questions.

Yours sincerely,

Solicitor Dr Maja Beisenherz, Munich, Info@beisenherz.eu, 0177 / 70 95 812

Solicitor Mathes Breuer, Munich, breuer@kanzlei-abe.de, 0175 / 52 46 963

Solicitor Benjamin Düsberg, Berlin, mail@rechtsanwalt-duesberg.de, 0157 / 30 30 8383

Solicitor Rosa Mayer-Eschenbach, Munich, eschenbach@kanzlei-abe.de, 0176 / 65 35 9443

Solicitor Christina Mucha, Memmingen, info@kanzlei-mucha.de, 08331 / 69 08 136

Solicitor Nina Onèr, Berlin, kanzlei@ninaoner.de, 01520 97 33 278

Solicitor Matthias Schuster, Berlin, mail@anwalt-schuster.de, 0176 / 24 75 8230

Solicitor Martina Sulzberger, Augsburg, kanzlei@anwaeltin-sulzberger.de; 0821 / 50 87 3850

(This press release was written in German. Translation: Ana Ferreira. Reproduced with permission)

Red Flag: Germany Is Already Quite Trumpian

In his weekly column, Nathaniel Flakin looks at the similarities between Minneapolis and Berlin.

Nathaniel Flakin
28/01/2026

The world watches with horror as ICE agents murder people on the streets of Minneapolis. Even Germany’s right-wing politicians like Jens Spahn (CDU) are “following developments with great concern,” as he told the BILD tabloid (which I won’t link).

Yet even as German liberals look down at the chaos on U.S. streets, the Federal Republic of Germany already applies many of the anti-democratic rules that Trump is trying to introduce with brutal force.

Masked Agents

In the United States, it is widely considered a scandal that agents of a law enforcement agency are wearing masks. Liberal pundits point out that this prevents any accountability—and if officers are not accountable, then there is no government by the people. The New York Times published this op-ed:

Until now, law enforcement officers in the United States rarely masked their faces… it’s just been accepted that masked policing isn’t consistent with a democratic society. We want law enforcement officers to see themselves as accountable to the community. And we want community members to see officers as approachable… Masks undermine both. They instill fear in the community and encourage a menacing aura of infallibility among officers.

Go to any demonstration in Berlin, and cops will almost always be masked—and will simultaneously attack demonstrators for wearing masks. I’ve never heard a justification, aside from a right-wing fantasy about police officers being a particularly endangered group, in spite of all evidence. As the Times pointed out, this is about instilling fear and creating a menacing aura.

The law in Germany says that citizens expressing their views in public must be accountable to police, or be subject to assault. But police are not expected to be accountable to citizens. How is this, by any definition, rule of the demos? Yet I have never seen a German liberal call for democratic norms.

Absolute Immunity

Fascist gremlin Stephen Miller has claimed, falsely, that ICE agents enjoy “absolute immunity” as they carry out their campaign of terror. In Germany, police enjoy an immunity that is near absolute—one expert called them “legally untouchable.”

If you are illegally assaulted by police in Germany, the only agency you can turn to is the police themselves. And as soon as you try to press charges, they will press charges against you, in order to justify their violence. The cops will then investigate themselves and in something like 99 percent of cases will close the investigation without any result. Then your only option is to sue the public prosecutor in an attempt to force them to press charges. If you do make it to court, judges will almost always believe the police.

So even in the most disturbing cases, like when German cops shot and almost killed a 12-year-old deaf girl two months ago, the officers will not face any consequences. Again in the Times, the conservative columnist David French criticizes the “web of immunities” that prevents citizens from suing when the federal government violates their rights—yet such discussion is mostly absent from Germany’s political scene.

This is why the far-right group Turning Point UK can gloat: “German police give a masterclass in how to deal with ANTIFA!” Germany already has the kind of lawless police violence that Trumpians dream about—and virtually no pushback in the public square.

Deportating Children

As Daniel Bax points out in the formerly left-wing newspaper taz, Germany is also in the midst of a “deportation frenzy”—the previous government of Olaf Scholz promised to “finally deport people on a large scale,” and the current government of Friedrich Merz promised still more deportations.

Before Trump, ICE agents were not allowed to wait outside courthouses to snatch people who were pursuing legal status. In Germany, however, it is absolutely normal to trick people with an appointment at the immigration office—and detain them on the spot for deportation. And while ICE thugs lurk outside schools hoping to grab parents, German police will often go into classrooms and kidnap small children.

Germany’s citizenship laws are straight out of a Trumpian fever dream: while Trump is trying to eliminate birthright citizenship, which was secured in the constitution after the defeat of the slaveocracy, the Federal Republic has never used any legal principle but the “right of blood.” This means that people who were born in Germany and have never lived anywhere else can be deported to countries they’ve never set foot in—the kind of “remigration” that Nazis aim for.

Strikes

If Spahn is indeed “concerned” about the scenes on U.S. streets, then he should introduce reforms to stop such brutal state violence from taking place here. We need full citizenship rights for everyone who lives here and basic accountability for police.

The images from Minneapolis are horrifying—but it is no less inspiring to see countless people of all backgrounds coming together to defend the entire community against state terror.

Racist campaigns, whether from Trump or from Merz, are intended to divide the working class, so that we can be more easily exploited by capitalists. Yet we can stop these racist policies ourselves. It doesn’t help to vote for parties like the Greens or Die Linke, who oppose racism in speeches but then carry out deportations once they’re in office. Instead, the strike in Minneapolis last Friday showed the enormous power of the working class to unite and shut down production. That’s how we can beat back this Trumpian assault, both in the U.S. and in Germany.

Red Flag is a weekly opinion column on Berlin politics that Nathaniel has been writing since 2020. After moving through different homes, it now appears at The Left Berlin.

30 January 1968: Tet Offensive

This week in working class history

AJ Emerich
27/01/2026

By early 1968, more than 500,000 U.S. troops were deployed in Vietnam, with bombing levels eventually surpassing three times the total of World War II. Forty thousand Americans were dead, hundreds of thousands wounded, and Vietnamese casualties were exponentially higher. Though opposition to the war existed from the start, it was the Tet Offensive that turned simmering dissent into mass resistance. On January 30 and 31, North Vietnamese People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) and its Viet Cong (VC) launched coordinated surprise attacks on more than 100 towns and cities across South Vietnam during the Lunar New Year (Tết Nguyên Đán). The campaign intended to trigger political instability, defections, and rebellions across South Vietnam. Over 80,000 fighters took part in the largest offensive of the war to date. However, militarily, Tet failed to spark the mass uprising and collapse of the South Vietnamese government that Hanoi had hoped for. Politically, however, Tet was decisive.

From 1964 to 1972, the wealthiest and most powerful nation in the world unleashed nearly its entire military arsenal—short of the atomic bomb—against a tiny, peasant country already decades into its struggle against imperial domination. After a successful Communist revolution in 1945 led by Ho Chi Minh, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam was established and briefly united from North to South. Promised self-determination under the Atlantic Charter, Ho Chi Minh appealed directly to U.S. President Harry Truman for aid to stave off postwar famine. His letters went unanswered. Vietnam, having already resisted colonial France, fascist Japan, Nationalist China, and the British Empire, now faced the rising power of U.S. capitalism.

Post WWII, the United States financed and armed France’s attempt to reclaim its colony from Ho Chi Minh’s Viet Minh. Publicly, this was framed as a necessary stand against Communism in Asia. China’s 1949 revolution and the Korean War soon followed, feeding Washington’s fears of a collapsing Pacific order. If Vietnam fell, the “domino theory” warned, Laos, Cambodia, and beyond would follow. As usual, ideology masked material reality: land and resources—rice, rubber, coal, iron ore—were at stake. When France failed to suppress the overwhelmingly popular movement, a peace agreement and withdrawal were reached in 1954.

The United States moved quickly to block Vietnamese reunification, backing the “democratic” Ngo Dinh Diem’s repressive and deeply unpopular puppet government regime in the South. Presidents Kennedy and later Johnson sold this intervention as a defense of “freedom” and a fight against Communism. After the assassinations of Diem and Kennedy, Johnson escalated dramatically to quell growing Northern support, using the fabricated Gulf of Tonkin incident to justify open war. As with Cuba just years earlier, the U.S. government lied to its public to manufacture consent—or at least indifference—for imperial violence.

The Tet Offensive shattered the carefully cultivated myth that U.S. victory was near. The scale of the offensive exposed official lies and shocked the American public, accelerating the collapse of support for the war as casualties mounted and draft calls expanded. Peace negotiations and troop withdrawals soon followed. The streets filled with protesters. “LBJ, LBJ, how many children have you killed today?” echoed across the United States. Tet marked the moment when millions saw through the war’s justifications—and when organized people proved they could resist, and ultimately defeat, an organized war machine.