The Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the German government are not fighting against the far right, but rather strengthening it—in Germany and internationally. This was emphasised by the meeting between Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Argentina’s fascist president, Javier Milei, in Berlin on Sunday.
Milei is a fascist who openly defends the bloody military dictatorship that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983. During the election campaign, he regularly appeared with a chainsaw and threatened to cut all social spending and suppress any opposition to it.
This is exactly what is happening now. While Scholz rolled out the red carpet for Milei in front of the Chancellery, the Argentine security forces were brutally cracking down on protests in Argentina to enforce the dictates of the banks against the growing working class resistance.
Scholz’s government is not much different. Students, academics, those working in culture and workers protesting against Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the return of German militarism are being censored and violently repressed.
Like the fascist Milei, the Scholz government is also waging a war against Marxism. The Office for the Protection of the Constitution (as Germany’s secret service is called) first branded the Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei (Socialist Equality Party, SGP) “anti-constitutional,” naming it as “left-wing extremist.” Now, it has also included the SGP’s youth organisation IYSSE in its report, in the tradition of Bismarck’s anti-socialist laws.
Milei’s reception in Berlin is in every way a warning to workers and youth: the German government will continue to intensify its militarist and anti-working-class agenda, relying on the most right-wing forces.
Before the meeting with Scholz, the neoliberal Hayek Society awarded Milei a medal. Among the 200 or so cheering participants were the far-right former president of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Hans-Georg Maassen, and far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) parliamentarian Beatrix von Storch.
Milei and Scholz also see eye to eye on foreign policy. Both are among the most aggressive supporters of the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians and the NATO war against Russia in Ukraine.
One of the few heads of government who received Milei before Scholz is the extreme right-wing Israeli prime minister and genocide perpetrator Benjamin Netanyahu. The Ukrainian president and dictator Volodymyr Zelensky had already paid his respects to Milei at his inauguration last December.
In addition to the escalation of war against Russia and in the Middle East, Scholz and the parties in his coalition government hope that the relationship with Milei will also open up new sales markets and sources of energy and raw materials for German imperialism in Latin America.
It was “agreed” that the negotiations on the free trade agreement between the EU and the Latin American MERCOSUR states “should be concluded swiftly,” announced government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit after the meeting between Scholz and Milei. The media are even more open about what is at stake: “Argentina has many raw materials, such as lithium, which is needed for German industry,” explained broadcaster Deutschlandfunk in a news item.
Scholz’s solidarity with Milei confirms what the World Socialist Web Site wrote at the weekend about the fight against the rise of fascist forces, which is being promoted by the entire ruling class:
The fight against the AfD requires the unconditional rejection of the SPD, the Greens, the Left Party, the BSW and the trade unions allied with them, which themselves advocate an extreme right-wing programme and suppress the class struggle. It requires the development of an independent movement of the working class and youth that combines resistance to war, fascism and social inequality with the struggle against their cause, capitalism.