In the centuries before our times, the Western nations called outstanding works in art and philosophy works of genius.
Ironically, Russia had been producing creators and thinkers of genius until genius in art and philosophy had been killed before Stalin’s death (1953) by Stalin and his propaganda, according to which there was one source of genius: Russian nationality.
In Russia, human beings at the age of 16 were issued “Soviet passports,” certifying Russians as against Georgians, Ukranians, Belorussians, and whoever else was born and living in Russia. To be a Russian became more important than being a Communist.
The “name” Stalin (which connotes in Russian “Man of Steel”) was not his name. He was a Georgian, his real name was “Djugashvili,” and he spoke Russian with difficulty and a Georgian accent. But he started and led Russian nationalism as a sign of new noble Russian superiority to all other nations (such as Georgians) in Russia and in all other countries.
Next after Russia, my example is German nationalism in its initial 45 years of the twentieth century.
There is a predominant opinion in all free countries that Germany contributed more strongly to the beginning of WWI than did her opponents. Few deny the role of German nationalism in the National Socialism (Nazism) of Hitler’s Germany.
To be just to Hitler, let me recall that before he became the “leader of Germany,” he was not an anti-Semite, and he became such only after a “ruling group,” on which his power depended, told him that he should persecute Jews if he wished to stay in power.
Hitler lost his war with Russia, and that was the end of him. On the other hand, in the Versailles Treaty, the Allies disarmed Germany to such an extent that more Germans supported Hitler as the only hope of defense after WWI.
As for Stalin’s post-WWII elevation of all Russians whose passports said they were Russians to the stature of supermen (and superwomen), that relied on the fable that only Russians are true patriots, while other nations are prone to wave, to betray, to spy, and so on.
Shortly before his death, Stalin decided to decorate his fairy-tale of Russian nationalism with a bit of reality. First, Jews were fired, and then they were to be shipped via rivers to a huge concentration camp in Soviet Asia to be put to death there. As for Stalin, preparations were afoot to turn him into God, with statues and all. Stalin’s death, however, prevented the ultimate triumph of both projects.
On the other hand, nationalism developed vigorously in China, named by Mao in 1949 the “People’s Republic of China,” or PRC.
To begin with, many Chinese had believed in the inborn superiority of Chinese, just as many Germans and Russians believed this with respect to themselves. This belief of many Chinese in their inborn superiority will be useful to the future Chinese owners of the globe, just as Germans and Russians were expected by Hitler and Stalin, respectively, to help them to conquer and rule the world.
A global Chinese aggression, in which most participants will fight for their egos, is to become an unheard-of slaughter, and peace will be impossible to achieve by those attacked.
Once upon a time it was assumed that a slave should fulfill the slave-owners’ order as efficiently as a machine. But after Stalin, Hitler, and Mao, it began to be assumed that a perfect slave fulfills the order not like a machine but like a musical instrument, giving an expected accord. The slaves must relive the order, and hence scream in their delight to kill and be killed.
Add mentally more weapons than the battles so far have seen and hence more casualties in polyglot massacres of nations to prove that “I am here to represent the world’s best nation, next to our God in flesh.”