Washington Pre-Occupation

As the National Guard overtakes DC, a retired foreign service officer has déjà vu.

Washington, DC is now occupied by the National Guard. It is not under full military occupation, and martial law has not been declared. But if things go on as they have been in recent weeks, it is only a matter of time before these next steps occur.

The Trump administration claims that Washington is in the throes of a crime wave. It is imposing law and order to keep its citizens safe from marauding gangs of thieves and killers.

Washington is my town. I have lived here most of my life. It is true, there is crime here, including violent crime. But it is limited. The claim that Washington is experiencing a wave of violent crime is specious. I have never experienced violent crime. In the list of cities with a high crime rate, Washington is way down the list.

For this administration, Washington’s real crimes are that its citizens regularly vote Democratic in presidential elections; it has a large proportion of Black and Hispanic citizens; and its people don’t like to be pushed around.

Already, Trump is targeting other metropoles with diverse populations and troublesome mayors who tolerate “subversive” activities such as demonstrations. Just this week, he announced plans to send federal troops to Baltimore and Chicago.

This is not going to end well.

I know from experience.

Many years ago I served as an American Foreign Service Officer in East Berlin, then capital of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). This was during the worst days of the Cold War.

East Germany was occupied by the Russian army. The East German regime, Russia’s willing partner, kept a tight lid on any signs of dissent or opposition. The population had risen up in revolt in June 1953, and that was quickly and harshly suppressed. Lesson learned.

So long as Russian troops occupied East Germany, they could keep the regime in power. While I served as a diplomat in East Berlin, I heard no complaints, except implicitly. There were certainly no complaints of the East German leader Erich Honecker, the architect of the Berlin Wall. Critics of the regime stood to lose their jobs or worse. Their families could lose access to housing, food, or schools.

I remember strolling through Berlin one day, watching some government-sponsored event, maybe a march—the East German regime was big on flexing its armed troops. We were on Unter den Linden, not far from Pariser Platz. I was with my son, then a teenager. He was wearing a T-shirt with a logo—probably promoting some rock band popular or an ideogram understood only by other teenagers. A man who I knew must be Stasi—the East German Secret Police were easy to spot—approached us and examined my son’s T-shirt and emblem. He was probably as puzzled by it as I was. Finally satisfied that it carried no subversive message such as favoring freedom or human rights, he left us and went looking for signs of opposition.

In 1991, when the Russians finally withdrew their troops, pent-up opposition exploded, and the wall was torn down. By that time, I was watching as a private citizen.

Now I find my own country trending toward the illiberalism I witnessed abroad. Are we really going to have Homeland Security agents deployed to check for disloyal T-shirts worn by our children? Are we going to punish people who dare to speak out against the Trump administration?

Many are outraged. Many are afraid. But is the outrage, is the fear, being channeled into effective action? We are fatigued. We might be unsure how best to resist. I say: Go out in the streets. Talk to your neighbors. Sign petitions. Donate to organizations already doing the work.

We must stop this—before it is too late.