In the effort to read the forgotten or underground works of the Cold War, and to try and get as much of a wide point of view as possible, not just the Flemings and the Deightons, I thought it would be very interesting to see what fictional books, posters, fliers etc were produced by the Ku Klux Klan* as they claim to be an anti-communist organisation. Why the Ku Klux Klan? Recently, a lot of fiction I have been reading (I do need to write a lot more reviews on the books/films I have been enjoying), are all about Christianity in 1950s and 1960s America, and this leads into the civil rights movement which divided America. So who better than to ask than the bogeyman?

So I emailed them and I kindly got this response from the Pastor:
The Klan was and is virulently anti-Communist. However we never went around trying to flush the reds like quail. The Klan stood and stands for “Americanism” the polar opposite of Socialism, Communism and dictatorship,

It was felt the best examples of Americanism were the most effective deterrent to the lure of Communism. So we stood for strong public schools, we donated Bibles, flags and flag poles to schools. We worked for and helped to get passed the Blaine acts in several states.

We worked to support and still support the Christian Religion, believing Christianity a certain bulwark against Communism.

There were certainly pamphlets, and drawings, and publications of every sort, sadly most of the ephemera has long ago disappeared, like so much of our Nations history it has been purged. It has been replaced with legends and Hollywood’s propaganda.

In the 1960′s Communism again made a bold play using “civil rights” to push their agenda, This is not some Klan rhetoric, many believed it including J. Edgar Hoover. Sadly we were right but, once again could not prevail.　

Yet the struggle goes on to this hour for we do not face the old Russian style Communism, today we face the reality of Marxism gone wild under the guise of being Earth Friendly, men like Al Gore pontificating how we must pay higher taxes to cure the problem, and president who wants to, “spread the wealth”.

Our educational system is a joke, where teachers, teach to the test, and ONLY to the test, much as it has been done in every Communist Nation, our schools are political indoctrination centers teaching Alinsky politics, and Keynesian economics.

“The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.” – Vladimir Lenin.

Democracy is the road to socialism. – Karl Marx

“We can’t expect the American People to jump from Capitalism to Communism, but we can assist their elected leaders in giving them small doses of Socialism, until they awaken one day to find that they have Communism” – Nikita Khrushchev

Very brief notes to the email:

Are they misrepresented by the media? Probably, aren’t we all, but that is because it is more entertaining and politically expedient to see the baddies represented in their most extreme forms, whether it is the KKK, communists, fascists etc…
Did the USSR support the civil rights movement? It would be a massive missed opportunity for the USSR if they didn’t take the chance to create internal conflict in their main enemy.
Blaine Act – This repealed the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (also known as the Prohibition of alcohol). The repeal was formally adopted as the 21st Amendment to the Constitution on December 5, 1933.
I don’t see how helping the environment is Marxism?
Alinsky, according to wikipedia, is Saul Alinsky who is generally considered to be the founder of modern community organizing and has been compared in Playboy Magazine to Thomas Paine as “one of the great American leaders of the nonsocialist left”.
I actually agree with a lot of John Maynard Keynes theories.

I did read their website, (would I be allowed to under the censorship rules proposed by the Australian government?) and I wasn’t swayed by their arguments, but that is my right not be influenced by them. I do still strongly disagree with their aims and I deplore all forms of discrimination. You may have a fear of Big Brother or Corporate Brother monitoring your net usage, so I thought I would share five facts on their site that you might not otherwise learn about the KKK:

1) They boycott ebay and paypal due to what the KKK term unfair business practices

2) They do not allow homosexuals to be members, yet “The Ku Klux Klan, LLC. has not or EVER will have ANY connection with The “Westboro Baptist Church”. We absolutely repudiate their activities. “

3) “President of the United States, Warren G. Harding was a Klansman and his funeral in 1923 was conducted with full Klan honors and regalia”.

4) “President Woodrow Wilson, the Commander-in-Chief of the United States during World War I wrote in his epic book, The History of the American People, of the Klan as a great and honorable society”.

5) The Ku Klux Klan pay taxes and is not a non profit organisation.

The film industry is full of James Bond smutty pastiches, so why not have a KKK James Bond? You would wonder if he seduces ladies who are not white in order to save the world, or does he let the world go up in flames rather than compromise his beliefs? Would he have plastic surgery and wear makeup to pretend to be Japanese? Would he betray the world and help the goals of Moonraker be achieved? Would it be socially awkward if he is playing baccarat in Monte Carlo dressed in his robes? What are the names of the women? I can also see a whole range of James Bond posters with the Klansman instead of Bond. If you have the time and nothing better to do please feel free to submit your artwork or suggestions of the KKK Bond Universe.

Anyway, if you are a Klansman and you want to send me your anti-communist posters, or books where the protagonist is a KKK member involved in the Cold War, please get in touch. This also applies to all others from all sides of the political spectrum too, this is a neutral website. For instance in Australia is very hard to get books which were written from the communist point of view. I exclude “But the dead are many” by Frank Hardy as this seems to be in every second hand bookshop.

And just to re-iterate, this website does not support the KKK, Fascism, Communism, Marxism, or any other ism. By showing their posters, if they had any, am I giving them a voice? No, do I don’t believe I am! We should all be immune to 1960s propaganda and for historical purposes it would be interesting to see. Yet I do realise that I might be giving them a voice by publishing their email above, but surely that one email wont suddenly covert you to the KKK.

*When I refer to the Ku Klux Klan I refer to the Ku Klux Klan LLC as they seemed to be the most organized, have more of a public face, and lets be honest, far less scary than some of the 500 or so groups which fall under the KKK banner.

Hello fellow Cold War aficionados,

It is stated that the cold war lasted from 1945 to 1991, however do you think it could have started earlier in this fictional universe. Why do I think that?
Seven days to Petrograd by Tom Hyman follows the story of an American agent hired by the British to kill Lenin aboard the sealed train to Russia in 1917, however is this a World War 1 story as really the British are trying to stop the Russians from pulling out of World War 1 rather than a battle of ideology?
Where does Tintin in the Land of the Soviets fall? Published in 1929/30 it is an attack of the Soviet style of government.
Also, reading the book Friendly Fire: The Secret War Between the Allies, it seemed that Churchill knew that beating the Nazis was only the first step before moving on and fighting the real enemy the Communists. Roosevelt came across as naive and was interested in only destroying the British Empire and thought he could split the world between him and Stalin, where Stalin saw an opportunity to get Europe under his control, so did the Cold War start say 1940 at the end of the Battle of Britain?

Off the top of my head, I can’t think of any World War 2 books by a British or American agent targeted against the Russians after the dissolution of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Do you know any? Should they be classified as Cold War Fiction?

Cuba under Castro and his brother are still very much suffering the effects of the Cold War, I’m thinking of the embargo that is against them by the US and therefore can I classify the Renko book Havana Bay by Martin Cruz Smith as a Cold War books?

Interested to see your thoughts!