They hate Churchill and Reagan precisely for what many of us admire them for

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is bringing down many masks. Among those who have lost theirs there is a curious coincidence.

Some wise words from Ronald Reagan in 1964 on peace and appeasement
The repulsive message that a Nation sends if it shows weakness in the face of totalitarians

This coincidence is recently focusing on two of the most admirable conservative politicians of the 20th century: Winston Churchill, British Prime Minister during World War II, and Ronald Reagan, President of the United States from 1981 to 1989.

For some time now, both Churchill and Reagan seem to have become the poltergeists that haunt certain feathers of the anti-globalist right. They never miss an opportunity to refer to both of them and to those who admire them with the aim of ridiculing us. In particular, these two politicians are presented as things of the past, as something outdated that does not fit in with the current moment, in which we should supposedly be more on the side of other referents, without telling us which ones, although it is not difficult to imagine them.

What these guys overlook is that the figures that someone detests are as revealing or more than those that they admire. It is enough to point out, for example, that among this antiglobalist right there are many admirers of even older figures, such as El Cid Campeador, Blas de Lezo or Hernán Cortés, perhaps because they identify in them a glorious past of Spain, without further nuances. These nuances come to light with the detested figures, with those to whom they most frequently dedicate their criticism.

Let’s take an example: I have been denouncing Vladimir Putin’s crimes for 17 years, ever since the dictator invaded Georgia. The tyrant’s record of atrocities is long enough for me to say that I detest him with all my might. However, it is not Putin who some people detest, but Zelensky. They do not detest the invader, but the leader of the invaded nation, someone who could have fled his country but stayed there to lead the Ukrainian resistance. It is not hard to imagine why these Zelensky-haters detest him so much, especially since they almost never dedicate a single criticism to Putin.

The same goes for the aforementioned British Prime Minister. Churchill became the great symbol of British resistance against Nazi Germany. With his admirable speeches, he managed to inspire in many of his compatriots the desire to fight against the Germans, instead of wanting to make a pact or surrender to them. Churchill was one of the architects of the defeat of Nazism, and thanks to him, Europe is no longer subject to that gang of totalitarian criminals who devastated half the continent.

Similarly, Reagan opted for a firm policy against communism, causing its downfall in Europe. He was joined by other figures of his time who also contributed to this happening, such as the Polish Pope Saint John Paul II, the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the German Chancellor Helmut Kohl.

Today, many years after their deaths, the reason why many of us admire Churchill and Reagan is for their courageous defense of freedom in the face of tyrants, for having resisted where others defended appeasement and surrender to totalitarians. That is also the reason why some detest them, why they talk about them as if their memory bothers them. They dedicate to them all the contempt they have never dedicated to a tyrant like Putin, perhaps because the Russian dictator comes closer to their ideal in politics: authoritarianism.

While this anti-globalist right is getting closer to the anti-globalist left (even to those who admire Stalin and those who admire authoritarian fanatics like Dugin), we liberal-conservatives keep alive the legacy of Churchill and Reagan precisely because today, as yesterday, some try to convince us that Surrendering to a tyrant is the right thing to do, they want to convince us that the West does not deserve to be defended, but must submit to the will of its enemies, simply because they share certain aspects of the "anti-woke" discourse, as if that would make up for all the crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine.

For this authoritarian right, defenestrating Churchill and Reagan is essential to ensure that we do not remember what is one of the fundamental divisions of the political map: the one that separates the democrats from the authoritarians, whether they are from the extreme left or the extreme right, which are precisely the margins of the political map where Putin's dictatorship is attracting more followers. Faced with this, I am very clear: more Churchill, more Reagan and less Putin.

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Photo: Yousuf Karsh.