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If 2025 was already shaping up to be the worst year in modern history regarding the international system established after WWII, recent days proved to be its most destructive week yet. Israel further ignored obligations toward global agreements by sending 10 fighter jets to Qatar, striking a Hamas delegation participating in ceasefire talks in Doha. The final significant platform for diplomatic negotiation may now have gone up in smoke.

No fewer than 19 Russian drones violated the territorial skies of Poland. For the first time, Nato airpower were deployed to counter hostile objects within the borders of a member nation. Regardless of if this violation was a technical mishap or deliberate probing from Russia, according to analysts in the West, it represented the nearest the world has come to open conflict since the second world war,” Poland’s prime minister, the head of government, stated.

Subsequently, Charlie Kirk, an outspoken right-wing figure and close Donald Trump ally, was shot dead during a speech to college students and Maga supporters at a Utah university. Without evidence regarding the perpetrator or intentions, Trump immediately blamed “those on the radical left,” accusing them of rhetoric “directly responsible to acts of terror that we’re seeing across the nation today.”

When questioned about the divided nation could heal after Kirk’s assassination, he responded he was indifferent”. The reasoning provided proved alarming: Right-wing extremists are radical because they oppose criminal activity … The radicals on the left are the problem – being vicious and horrible and strategically clever.” In this manner political division transforms into group mentality. Thus cycles of hostility rush headlong into irreversible conflict.

Actually, over 75% of deaths linked to extremism in the US over the last 10 years have come from individuals on the far right, with the radical left accountable for just a small number of them. Trump condemned political violence in general the following day – but did not acknowledge the recent spate assaults against Democrats, including several killings. To him, the problem is always “them”, never the “wonderful Americans” who make up his core followers.

The political and cultural aftershocks of Kirk’s death will no doubt unfold in the coming weeks, but the biggest danger in a polarised climate involves the shooting becomes the Reichstag fire of our age. The deliberate burning on 27 February 1933 signaled Germany’s shift from fragile democracy to outright dictatorship. The Nazi leader, newly appointed as head of state, capitalized on the incident to eliminate basic rights under previous governance – free speech, press, association, public gathering.

“Anyone who stands in our way will be cut down,” he said, inspecting the arsoned building. Thousands of communists found themselves imprisoned, even elected representatives within the legislature. Once opposition was suppressed, the ruling party swiftly consolidated power.

In today’s US, Kirk’s death has captivated the nation, galvanising the Maga movement and loyalists, and he knows it. The white supremacist, a controversial commentator, demanded detainment of all opposing lawmakers, explicitly labeling the killing as the movement’s turning point.

The reality is, here is the event that could rescue a struggling administration scarred by significant declines in employment figures, currency devaluation, and a housing crisis. Trump mourned Kirk as though he were family, but the rhetoric implied it might become as much about pursuing Trump’s enemies rather than justice. Immediately following the assassination, Trump promised to go after all individuals involved directly or indirectly in this tragedy … even groups providing backing.” He singled out George Soros, a donor to liberal causes and Democrat donor. He is dangerous,” Trump told NBC News, he deserves imprisonment.”

The motive behind Kirk’s killing are still unknown. The political views belonging to the attacker, a young individual, appear as muddled as those of another recent perpetrator, a young man who attempted to assassinate the former president in Pennsylvania. Is this truly left-wing extremism targeting the radical right – or is it an obscure online culture of online niches entering reality? The slogans etched on to the bullet casings in Utah read less like an ideological manifesto and more like a mix of puerile memes and virtual world allusions.

But it is hard not to fear that suppression of “unwilling” academics, lawyers, media workers, civil servants, armed forces members, and judicial figures in the US will intensify. Thus far, online responses resulted in multiple instances of sackings and US state department officials have cautioned foreign nationals against endorsing or make light of the murder, instructing consulates to take “appropriate action” against any foreigners who do.

Trump has long thrived amid turmoil and instability. Where real crises do not exist, he fabricates them – including imagined crime pandemics in Los Angeles, Washington DC and urban centers. Manufactured unrest advances his ambitions. Currently, he possesses chaos on a silver platter. It is understandable he couldn’t care less about national unity.

The shooting provides the perfect pretext for tightening his grip, muzzling opposition, and centralizing authority – so that his successors to assume total governmental power, regardless of personal appeal, qualifications or mandate. After all, any autocratic system must be established initially; once entrenched, it becomes far easier to maintain.

Democratic systems and the rules-based global order are far from perfect, yet they provided stability, advancement and prosperity – the very opposite of authoritarianism. Implying that America, the architect of the postwar order, could soon slide into full-blown autocracy, with rulers adopting like Nazis in 1933, could appear unlikely.

But from another vantage point, it is not far-fetched at all. Totalitarianism was still within living memory when many of us of individuals within modern democratic Europe were growing up. Across European states, most families retain memories of fatalities, devastation, hatred and poverty that authoritarianism leaves behind. To safeguard their near future, they should examine our recent past.