On the sunny Sunday morning of December 7, 1941, Messman Doris Miller had served breakfast aboard the USS West Virginia, stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was collecting laundry when the first of nine Japanese torpedoes hit the ship.

In the deadly confusion, Miller reported to an officer, who told him to help move the ship’s mortally wounded captain off the bridge. Unable to move him far, Miller pulled the captain to shelter. Then another officer ordered Miller to pass ammunition to him as he started up one of the two abandoned anti-aircraft guns in front of the conning tower.

Miller had not been trained to use the weapons because, as a Black man in the U.S. Navy, he was assigned to serve the white officers. But while the officer was distracted, Miller began to fire one of the guns. He fired it until he ran out of ammunition. Then he helped to move injured sailors to safety before he and the other survivors abandoned the West Virginia, which sank to the bottom of Pearl Harbor.

That night, the United States declared war on Japan. Japan declared war on America the next day, and four days later, on December 11, 1941, both Italy and Germany declared war on America. “The powers of the steel pact, Fascist Italy and National Socialist Germany, ever closely linked, participate from today on the side of heroic Japan against the United States of America,” Italian leader Benito Mussolini said. “We shall win.” Of course they would. Mussolini and Germany’s leader, Adolf Hitler, believed the Americans had been corrupted by Jews and Black Americans and could never conquer their own organized military machine.

The steel pact, as Mussolini called it, was the vanguard of his new political ideology. That ideology was called fascism, and he and Hitler thought it would destroy democracy once and for all.

Mussolini had been a socialist as a young man and had grown terribly frustrated at how hard it was to organize people. No matter how hard socialists tried, they seemed unable to convince ordinary people that they must rise up and take over the country’s means of production.

The efficiency of World War I inspired Mussolini. He gave up on socialism and developed a new political theory that rejected the equality that defined democracy. He came to believe that a few leaders must take a nation toward progress by directing the actions of the rest. These men must organize the people as they had been organized during wartime, ruthlessly suppressing all opposition and directing the economy so that businessmen and politicians worked together. And, logically, that select group of leaders would elevate a single man, who would become an all-powerful dictator. To weld their followers into an efficient machine, they demonized opponents into an “other” that their followers could hate.

Italy adopted fascism, and Mussolini inspired others, notably Germany's Hitler. Those leaders came to believe that their system was the ideology of the future, and they set out to destroy the messy, inefficient democracy that stood in their way.

America fought World War II to defend democracy from fascism. And while fascism preserved hierarchies in society, democracy called on all people as equals. Of the more than 16 million Americans who served in the war, more than 1.2 million were African American men and women, 500,000 were Latinos, and more than 550,000 Jews were part of the military. Among the many ethnic groups who fought, Native Americans served at a higher percentage than any other ethnic group—more than a third of able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 50 joined the service—and among those 25,000 soldiers were the men who developed the famous “Code Talk,” based in tribal languages, that codebreakers never cracked.

The American president at the time, Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt, hammered home that the war was about the survival of democracy. Fascists insisted that they were moving their country forward fast and efficiently—claiming the trains ran on time, for example, although in reality they didn’t—but FDR constantly noted that the people in Italy and Germany were begging for food and shelter from the soldiers of democratic countries.

Ultimately, the struggle between fascism and democracy was the question of equality. Were all men really created equal as the Declaration of Independence said, or were some born to lead the rest, whom they held subservient to their will?

Democracy, FDR reminded Americans again and again, was the best possible government. Thanks to armies made up of men and women from all races and ethnicities, the Allies won the war against fascism, and it seemed that democracy would dominate the world forever.

But as the impulse of WWII pushed Americans toward a more just and inclusive society after it, those determined not to share power warned their supporters that including people of color and women as equals in society would threaten their own liberty. Those reactionary leaders rode that fear into control of our government, and gradually they chipped away the laws that protected equality. Now, once again, democracy is under attack by those who believe some people are better than others.

The once-grand Republican Party has been captured by the right wing. It has lined up behind former president Donald Trump and his cronies, who have vowed to replace the nonpartisan civil service with loyalists and to weaponize the Department of Justice and the military against those they perceive as enemies. They have promised to incarcerate and deport millions of immigrants and children of immigrants, send federal troops into Democratic cities, ban Muslims, silence LGBTQ+ Americans, prosecute journalists, and end abortion across the country. They will put in place an autocracy in which a powerful leader and his chosen loyalists make the rules under which the rest of us must live.

Will we permit the destruction of American democracy on our watch?

When America came under attack before, people like Doris Miller refused to let that happen. For all that American democracy still discriminated against him, it gave him room to stand up for the concept of human equality—and he laid down his life for it. Promoted to cook after the Navy sent him on a publicity tour, Miller was assigned to a new ship, the USS Liscome Bay, which was struck by a Japanese torpedo on November 24, 1943. It sank within minutes, taking two thirds of the crew, including Miller, with it.

I hear a lot these days about how American democracy is doomed and the reactionaries will win. Maybe. But the beauty of our system is that it gives us people like Doris Miller.

Even better, it makes us people like Doris Miller.

Heather Cox Richardson
Notes:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_declaration_of_war_on_the_United_States
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-retribution-agenda-government-workers-schedule-f-rcna78785
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/donald-trump-weaponization-justice-department-political-opponents/
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/17/trump-muslim-ban-gaza-refugees
https://www.voanews.com/a/trump-plans-to-deport-millions-if-he-is-re-elected-says-report/7351479.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/11/politics/trump-stephen-miller-immigration-detention-deportation/index.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/11/us/politics/trump-2025-immigration-agenda.html
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2023-09-24/mcmanus-column-trump-second-term-agenda
https://www.axios.com/2023/11/13/trump-loyalists-2024-presidential-election
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-hints-at-expanding-domestic-role-for-the-military-within-the-u-s
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2024/01/trump-lgbtq-transgender-community-protections/676139/
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/05/us/politics/trump-kash-patel-journalists.html
https://apnews.com/article/trump-policies-agenda-election-2024-second-term-d656d8f08629a8da14a65c4075545e0f

@Phranny I suspect not many here, especially those on the right, will bother to read as it is too long for their limited attention span.

@phranny said
@Phranny I suspect not many here, especially those on the right, will bother to read as it is too long for their limited attention span.

@phranny said
On the sunny Sunday morning of December 7, 1941, Messman Doris Miller had served breakfast aboard the USS West Virginia, stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was collecting laundry when the first of nine Japanese torpedoes hit the ship.

In the deadly confusion, Miller reported to an officer, who told him to help move the ship’s mortally wounded captain off the bridge. Un ...[text shortened]... /apnews.com/article/trump-policies-agenda-election-2024-second-term-d656d8f08629a8da14a65c4075545e0f

@phranny said
On the sunny Sunday morning of December 7, 1941, Messman Doris Miller had served breakfast aboard the USS West Virginia, stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was collecting laundry when the first of nine Japanese torpedoes hit the ship.

In the deadly confusion, Miller reported to an officer, who told him to help move the ship’s mortally wounded captain off the bridge. Un ...[text shortened]... /apnews.com/article/trump-policies-agenda-election-2024-second-term-d656d8f08629a8da14a65c4075545e0f

@wajoma said
I skimmed it, and 'ban muslims' jumped out.

I knew not to waste anymore time on the histrionics.

"Miller received the Navy Cross from Admiral Chester Nimitz on May 27, 1942, but many sailors and naval officers believed that Miller's heroism deserved a Medal of Honor. Miller was nominated for a Medal of Honor by a congressman from Michigan and a Senator from New York, and the Black press enthusiastically campaigned for Miller to receive this decoration. However, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox—who opposed Black sailors serving the United States in any combat role—recommended against Miller receiving the Medal of Honor. Indeed, not a single Black sailor, soldier, or marine was awarded the Medal of Honor between 1941 and 1945, and in 1996 Vernon J. Baker was the only Black veteran of World War II to be awarded this decoration while yet alive." -- Wikipedia

How many here agree with Sec. Frank Knox? Stand up so we can plainly see who the racists are.

@phranny said
On the sunny Sunday morning of December 7, 1941, Messman Doris Miller had served breakfast aboard the USS West Virginia, stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and was collecting laundry when the first of nine Japanese torpedoes hit the ship.

In the deadly confusion, Miller reported to an officer, who told him to help move the ship’s mortally wounded captain off the bridge. Un ...[text shortened]... /apnews.com/article/trump-policies-agenda-election-2024-second-term-d656d8f08629a8da14a65c4075545e0f

@phranny said
@Phranny I suspect not many here, especially those on the right, will bother to read as it is too long for their limited attention span.

@athousandyoung said
I'm on the left and I didn't read it.

@suzianne said
I'd say chances are you already know about it.

Didn't you teach history?

YouTube : Pearl Harbor scene

@athousandyoung said
I'm a science teacher but I know a lot about history too

EDIT Apparently this long block of text is about Doris Miller the Black Navy cook who shot down some Japanese planes at Pearl Harbor with an AA gun. He was played by Cuba Gooding Junior in the Pearl Harbor movie.

[youtube Pearl Harbor scene]QRbvwE-VBoc[/youtube]

With respect to Doris Miller, I think this would be a wonderful opportunity to pause for a moment and give thanks for the great contributions of the Black community to our society. Their peaceful and generous nature make them ideal neighbors, lending testimony to their exceptional family values and parenting skills unrivaled by any other culture. Their commitment to academic excellence enriches our schools and serves as an example to all who hope to achieve prominence as a people. Real estate values are fueled by the mix of African Americans into an area due to their caring and respectful nature of these communities, an example of all they have achieved through their enthusiasm for self improvement by hard work and a self-reliant can-do nature. Without their industrious and creative drive, we would be poorer as a nation.
(Kudos to the originator of the above paragraph)

@jj-adams said
YOU are a science teacher?
At what school?
Animo Inglewood?
Or does that still exist?

@jj-adams said
With respect to Doris Miller, I think this would be a wonderful opportunity to pause for a moment and give thanks for the great contributions of the Black community to our society. Their peaceful and generous nature make them ideal neighbors, lending testimony to their exceptional family values and parenting skills unrivaled by any other culture. Their commitment to academic ...[text shortened]... nd creative drive, we would be poorer as a nation.
(Kudos to the originator of the above paragraph)