The first buildings, completed in early1941, were the embassies of Germany’s Axis allies Italy and Japan, described by a Russian aristocrat out for a stroll as “in the pretentious monumental style which is to characterize the new Nazi Berlin.”

“Not much of Germania was actually built,. and what was constructed was mostly destroyed by Allied bombs,” Buruma writes. Which brings to mind President Trump’s grandiose plans well underway to remake our nation’s capital in the same gaudy grandiose imperial style more fitting for a monarchy than a democracy.

Consider: In the first year of his non-consecutive second term, Trump has paved the Rose Garden, demolished the East Wing, begun construction of a $400 million gilded ballroom (the cost and who pays keeps changing), demanded an arch taller than the Arc de Triomphe that would irreparably block the sight line between the capital and Arlington National Cemetery, and a so-called “Garden of Heroes,” to replace the West Potomac Park long used as a soccer and cricket field. He is destroying the historical integrity of the reflecting pool, painting it blue. Trump’s glaring visage can already been seen hanging from the front of federal buildings, supposedly in anticipation of the nation’s 250th anniversary this July. Happy Independence Day!

There is another chilling parallel. In Hitler’s Berlin, as elsewhere in Germany, the Gestapo simply arrested people on public streets and private homes, with no due process or formal charges. Trump’s private army, ICE, is engaging in the same thuggish and unconstitutional behavior here and now. Vanishing citizens and the documented, along with the undocumented law abiding residents.

When Hitler’s Gestapo and storm troopers were rounding up political dissenters and especially German Jews, Buruma writes, life as usual went on for most non-Jewish Germans. Those inclined to resist faced dire consequences, including death. The “No Kings” protests that are sweeping the nation would have been unthinkable in Nazi Germany. In the midst of our current national nightmare, that is a beacon of light.

In the darkest days of World War II, before the United States entered the conflict, and after most of Europe had fallen to the Nazi blitzkrieg, the British bore the brunt of Germany’s aggression from the air in what became known as the Battle of Britain. They did so with remarkable calm, self-confidence and good humor.’

In my collection of Second World War ephemera is a slim book entitled “Adolph in Blunderland.” First published in December 1939, it is, as the dust jacket says, “an amusing political parody of Lewis Carroll’s classic” that was first broadcast as a radio play over the BBC on Oct. 6, 1939, just a month after Hitler invaded Poland. “It is one of the most hilarious take-offs of Hitler and his henchmen that has appeared…”

But it’s no joke. Ultimately. Adolph’s blind followers (as guinea pigs) have an epiphany. As the play ends:

A Guinea Pig. We won’t be suppressed! Gives us food, not guns! … Give us peace, not promises! We don’t want to fight the world just because you think you’re another Napoleon…” (The other guinea pigs rise with menacing shouts of approval.)

Adolph. Storm Troopers, shoot those guinea pigs!

A Man. Shoot our own wives and mothers? You must be mad!

Guinea Pigs. Mad? Mad? Of couse he’s mad! We’ve been led by a madman for years! Why haven’t we seen it? Rise against him! Turn him Out!

(There is a great commotion. Cries of “Down with Adolf!” “Down with the Gestapo!” “We’ll be free again!” rise in tumult, drowning even the hysterical, high-pitched screaming of little Adolph, leading us to believer that they are leaving very little Adolf.)

EPILOGUE

The Mother. Well, Junior, that’s the end of the story.

Junior. My goodness! Little Adolph came an awful cropper, didn’t he?

The Mother. Yes, Junior. And when you grow up, if you become a dictator like Adolph, just remember this story, and learn either to straddle the fence or to sit peaceably in your own garden. Because the world doesn’t like tyrants, Junior. It doesn’t like them at all. They’ve never survived, Junior. They never have and they never will.!

FINIS