Pete Hegseth is The American Secretary of War. His job title was formerly Secretary Of Defence, before the idea of defending yourself was deemed too ‘woke’ and America decided it was best to give the impression it was happy to throw the first punch in case people on social media thought the entire country was gay.
Last week Hegseth stood with his actual Christian nationalist tattoos concealed beneath his actual clothes on an actual Normandy beach to commemorate the start of the liberation of Europe from the Nazis on D Day in 1944. And he stated “sadly, today, different European beaches are stormed by different dangerous ideologies.”
Whatever comparison Hegseth was trying to make, it was a bit creaky. The Normandy beaches were stormed by the allies, which was a good thing, yes? But Hegseth is saying that today some different things are storming some different beaches, which is bad. Ideally at least one thing in the comparison should be the same as at least one thing in the original example, otherwise it isn’t really a point of comparison. It’s just a whole new idea.
Oh hang on! It’s beaches, isn’t it. There are beaches in both examples. It sort of works. But Hegseth dislikes so many ideologies – including feminism, environmentalism, secularism, gay rights and general ‘wokeness’ - as well as Islam, it was difficult to be certain at first which ideologies he was concerned about. If all the ideologies Hegseth fears arrive on the metaphorical beach at the same time it’s going to get very crowded. Hopefully the Germans will have staked out a few sun-loungers with their towels before breakfast in case feminism and environmentalism try to get all the best spots.
Then Hegseth clarifies it. “Boats and men arrive. When will European capitals do something about that invasion, or is it too late? I pray not, and I believe not.” Well UK net migration is at its lowest level for five years, but clearly it wasn’t appropriate for Hegseth to break off from his Christian Nationalist trajectory to congratulate the Starmer government on making basketcase UK a less attractive destination for the world’s hopeful.
Some of the crosses scribbled on Hegseth's body look dangerously like the ones you're still not allowed to display in Germany. But I'm sure that's just a coincidence
Uncharacteristically, Hegseth, who relishes the idea that his failed operation in Islamic Iran is a ‘Holy War’, stops short of explicitly saying it is Islam that is the ideology that is arriving. The whole thing is such a mess. If he wanted to tie his comments into the beaches thing it would have been better if he just said “Whenever I am on a beach I like to lie on a sun-lounger and think about how much I hate European liberal democracies.”
Ironically, Hegseth’s ideology isn’t that different to the one we fought back at on the beaches, on the landing grounds, in the fields and in the streets, and in the hills, eighty-two years ago. And some of the crosses scribbled on Hegseth’s body look dangerously like the ones you’re still not allowed to display in Germany since those other Nazis got ousted. But I’m sure that’s just a coincidence. It’s all so confusing.
Meanwhile, the vice president JD Vance claimed the young white British boy Henry Nowak’s death was caused by the “mass invasion of migrants" and that our "only response" should be "righteous anger", which presumably is the high-minded American Christian manifestation of Nigel Farage’s rather more brutal “pure cold rage.”
I think the ideal version of what we are supposed to feel would have been a combination of both men’s ideas, perhaps a “pure cold righteous anger.” Maybe in future Hegseth and Farage need to coordinate their speeches so people aren’t confused about what feelings they are supposed to have. After all, you don’t want to be exorcising yourself feeling exhausting “pure cold rage” when you should be exhibiting the steely calm of “righteous anger.” Life’s too short.
The only surprising thing about the American government’s attempts to exploit the tragedy of Nowak’s death, against the express wishes of his grieving parents, is that anyone is still naive enough to be surprised by it. Since retaking office the Trump administration has explicitly stated it intends to destabilise Western European liberal governments and work towards replacing them with systems more amenable to its essentially white supremacist vision. And the helpful social media algorithms of the loyal tech lords who support it, either out of ideological belief or self-interested avarice or both, push its propaganda perfectly. Yet people still act like Trump’s stated positions are just postures designed to provoke, instead of statements of actual policy. He has told European Liberal Democracies he wants them gone. And yet we still talk about a special relationship, like a whipped dog that comes back daily for its usual kicking.
It may as well be Trump, Hegseth and Vance rioting on the Southampton streets and throwing punches at the police, as their views, funnelled and amplified by social media like Elon Musk’s Twitter (currently X), are deliberately driving destabilising unrest. Politicians prevaricate about whether the government should have a presence on Musk’s network when in fact they should be working out how to stop it even having access to our citizens. If people want to see pictures of a female Labour MP being chloroformed before being raped can’t they draw their own, instead of getting Musk’s app to do it for them? At the very least Musk is killing creativity.
The final word goes to Chantal Richard, a member of the Langrune en Commun Association, in the area of Normandy Hegseth visited last week. “This individual promotes values that go against democracy, human rights and peace. The fact that Pete Hegseth is challenging all the international organisations that emerged from the second world war isn’t business as usual. He must be called out for who he is, for the values he represents: colonial, warmongering, racist, far-right values. Silence seems to us to be the worst thing we can do on these issues.”
David Lammy, on the other hand, remains ‘friends’ with JD Vance. Idiot.
Stewart Lee vs The Man-Wulf tours everywhere in the UK and Ireland until the end of the year, with a final November and December London run just announced.
He has programmed, and will be appearing in, a benefit for North London Hunt Saboteurs, Up The Anti, at London’s Leicester Square Theatre, on 6 July, alongside Daniel Fox, Harry Badger, James Gill, Horn Walsh, Sue Jerkins, Shappi Coarse-Angling, Alasdair Bear-Baiting, and Stewart Eel.