With the Unión Nacional Sinarquista in Mexico City
Last year while living in Mexico City I had the opportunity to visit the Unión Nacional Sinarquista (UNS) headquarters in Mexico City and meet with several of their leaders to discuss ideology and the history of their movement.
The UNS have been referred to as "Mexico's Nazi Party" and the development of their movement was undeniably paralleled by the rise of fascism across the Western World, as is evident by their use of brown shirts and red armbands reminiscent of the brownshirts and falangists. Their ideology has been described as "ultra-Catholic fascism"1 and they had the distinction of being Mexico's only political party to firmly support the Axis powers during the Second World War. Despite never gaining any major political success (at the height of their popularity they achieved 3% of the popular vote) they, alone out of all the fascist movements of the last century, have continuously existed as an organization to this day. Knowing this, I was curious to see how such an organization was able to survive into the present day, what it looks like now, and what the future has in store for it. For these reasons I was very grateful to be able to meet with them.
Calle Lucerna is a sleepy street located in Colonia Juárez, a short walk from Mexico City's downtown. Only blocks from the Secretaria de Gobernación. It is a run down part of the city, and many of the surrounding apartment buildings are boarded up and covered in graffiti. The Mexican State employs an army of street sweepers to clean the roads and sidewalks every day, but the decaying buildings on all sides speak of a neighborhood which has fallen into abandon and neglect.
The entrance to their headquarters is an imposing metal gate, above which is hung a bright red banned reading “UNION NACIONAL SYNARQUISTA” and “COMITE NACIONAL”. Beyond its large swinging doors a gravel driveway leads deep into the tangle of buildings forming the block between Lucerna and Calle Gral. Prim. The entrance to the driveway has been fitted with a table and several chairs, a small side table stands in the corner on which is perched several cups of mosaic Jello and a coffee pot. A middle aged man and woman are standing around talking, and turn to me as I approach.
There is an initial amused surprise as I introduce myself. My impression is that they don't get a lot of visitors. However they great me with grand smiles and perfect Mexican hospitality. The man, who introduces himself as A.C. shakes my hand vigorously and the woman, who introduces herself as M.L., offers me a coffee and asks if I would like a Jello cup which I am happy to accept. Both of them are noticeably older and darker than the average citizen of CDMX, I would guess in their early forties and with indigenous features that, while not striking or unusual, stand out against the primarily castiza population of the capital.
Without wasting any time, A.C. motions to offers me a chair and I sit down across from him. He is curious why a Canadian is interested in their organization, and I explain that I have translated several fascist authors while stressing that I was “a friend” and wanted to learn more about the history of their organization. He laughs and remarks that even most Mexicans are not interested in the UNS, and complains that the youth in Mexico today are apathetic towards politics. He explains that the UNS is a political organization formed by members of the Catholic clergy is order to preserve Catholic ideals and oppose the "Judeo-Masonic world order" imposed by Anglo-Saxon imperialism. I chuckle at this turn of phrase, to which he adds "but of course Spain also has a long history with the Jews". The Jews of History and the Jews of Conspiracy may as well be two entirely different races, the first a source of pride, an living link to the Patriarchs of old; the later the "Synagogue of Satan", a secretive cabal operating from the shadows of Parliament. His eyes light up as he talks about the history of Moorish Spain, the Sephardic communities which long found a peaceful refuge Iberia, and the glories of Al-Andalus. There is little mention of the Reconquista or the excesses of the Inquisition, and watching him beam with pride I am struck by the extent to which Hispanic culture transcends race and religion, even among ultra-Nationalists.
Pushing further on this point, I mention that Mexico has a dual heritage, which is not only European but Amerindian as well. He nods, Mexico City in the oldest continually inhabited city in the Americas and there is hard to ignore the Aztec heritage which permeates every corner of the city. Many districts and streets have preserved their Nahualteca names from the old days, and the volcanic brick which makes up many of the old Cathedrals tell a story of ancient pyramids torn down and repurposed according the needs of Christendom. The Aztecs were a cruel and oppressive people, he explained, who often kidnapped and murdered youth from other tribes in a brutal performance of royal power. When Hernán Cortés arrived in Mexico and made his intentions known, many of the surrounding tribes which had long suffered from oppression under the Aztecs banded together to support him in overthrowing Moctezuma.
This is a story I have heard many times, but what he said next surprised me. For many of these tribes Catholicism was embraced as a liberatory theology, an end to the practice of human sacrifice which had long formed an essential part of the religious mysteries of Mesoamerican cosmology (I was informed by a PhD student studying ritual practices in Chiapas that such sacrifices still occur secretly in some far-flung and remote villages, usually involving the murder of young girls who are kidnapped by practitioners looking to gain spiritual power). For many Mexicans there is a love-hate relationship with the Catholic Church, where the veneration and love of Jesus and the Virgin Mary is tainted by an oppressive feeling of resentment against the Church authorities and hypocrisies of organized religion; this was the first time I had heard such an unequivocally positive assessment of the Church. On raising this point, A.C. countered that it was simply the leyenda negra which had been concocted by the enemies of the Church, especially the freemasonic liberals, and had been used as propaganda by the Mexican State to seize Church property.
I asked him to expand on this, and he explained that in the old days most of the land in Mexico was owned by the Church. This land was leased to poor farmers who would live there as tenants in exchange for some of their agricultural output. This surplus was then used by the Church towards charitable endeavors, the result of which was a system where poor, predominately indigenous rural farmers could live a comfortable and secure life, and be sure that they would be taken care of in their old age. This changed around the turn of the 20th century, when the liberal ruling class in Mexico city decided to impose a secular regime on the Mexican people whereby the State seized much of the rural agricultural lands being held by the Catholic Church. In theory the Mexican State should have assumed the social obligations and responsibilities towards the poor that had previously been shouldered by the Church, but in practice much of this land was sold off at a low price to political insiders while the poor tenant farmers who had previously lived there were pushed off their land and left to starve, if not outright murdered by the secular authorities.
It's the memory of this gross abuse of power which forms the basis of UNS ideology, which seeks to return the Church to it's rightful place in Mexican society. They are "opposed to both capitalism and communism", seeking instead a "third way" where the economy is developed under the moral guidance of the Church and free enterprise is counterbalanced by decentralized social welfare programs which are overseen by the Catholic clergy. The separation of Church and State and the rule by secular, liberal, democratic authorities must come to an end, and only then will Mexico be free from the endemic corruption and poverty which prevents her full growth and development.
"But Mexico is developed" I countered, and offered the example of several factories which I had visited, as well as the Mexico City metro which offers rides at a very affordable price to anywhere in the city, with trains running every three minutes and servicing millions of people daily. This opinion caught him off guard. Mexicans, with a few enterprising exceptions, often underestimate their own economy while overestimating that of the West. I explained that since the 70s America and Canada have been experiencing a rapid and thorough de-industrialization, and that the many independent manufactories, the abundant skilled labour, and the relatively low cost of doing business in Mexico is something that no longer exists in much of the so-called "developed" world. He thought about this. "It's true Mexico is a very rich country" he conceded, "we are robbed by a new government every six years and still manage to survive".2
Our conversation then moved to immigration, a favorite complaint of conservatives everywhere. There is a massive influx of wealthy Americans, mostly working in tech and finance, moving into Mexico city. Often working remotely, they benefit hugely from being able to convert their paycheck into Mexican pesos; to the dismay of actual Mexicans who are finding themselves priced out of the very city that they created. “Gringos have always complained about Mexican immigrants, but now their gentrification is pushing Mexicans out of our own capital.” I assured him that these bourgeois rich kids are just as hated back home in America. Having met several of them at this point, I can say without exaggeration that they are human parasites, leveraging their immense wealth and privilege to buy up organic communities and then sell it back to their rich friends as a consumer product.
As we talked, I noticed a third figure hanging around and listening to our conversation. A gaunt and bespectacled man, he motioned that he would like to talk to me and we shook hands. He introduced himself as G.E., and sat down next to A.C., who excused himself and retreated with M.F. to the coffee table. I immediately noticed that he was a lot more measured and careful in his speech, avoiding conspiratorial speculations, and sticking to verifiable facts. He struck me as politically savvy, somewhat suspicious but diplomatically polite, and for this reason much more dangerous. Without any preamble he launched into a detailed history of the Unión Nacional Sinarquista from it's founding into the present day.
The UNS directly traces its formation to the Christero movement, from which it emerged and to which it sees itself as a direct successor to. To understand the Christero movement it's necessary to understand the Mexican civil war, and the series of sweeping reforms that came about as a result of the 1917 constitution of Mexico.
The various factions and causes involved in the Mexican civil war could take several books to cover, so I will not try to explain it here. It is sufficient to say that there were many competing interests, but the liberal Constitucionalistas ended up victorious betraying the more radical Zapatista faction which sought for agrarian reform among the peasantry. The resulting 1917 constitution was drafted by the Constitucionalistas without the consultation of these other factions, and by design it did much to sideline factions of Mexican society deemed either too radical or too conservative.
In particular a series of articles pertaining to secularization and separation of powers were weaponized against the Church under the leadership of Álvaro Obregón, who used them to seize church land, ban religious organizations, and bar Catholic priests from participating in government. In several states Catholic churches were closed down entirely and banned from operating. The oppression eventually culminated in Pope Pius XI issuing an encyclical against the Mexican State entitled Iniquis afflictisque in 1926, decrying the treatment of clergy as criminals. The Church formally reached out to the Mexican government asking them to allow Catholics to participate in public life, however the government doubled down on the repression of Church authorities, closing Churches and publicly torturing and executing several Catholic priests. The systematic use of rape against nuns was also employed as a tool of oppression.
Since many of the rural peasantry had previously been tenant farmers on Church estates, this did not only effect the religious elites but the entire society of rural Mexico. This mixture of prosecuted religious elites and dispossessed rural peasants proved a fertile ground for rebellion, and while the now unemployed and starving farmers took up arms the conservative traditional circles within the Catholic Church provided a logistical network for coordinating their activities and an ideological basis for their struggle.
Although initially formed from several uncoordinated uprisings, the guerillas quickly became known as the Christeros, due to their battle cry of "vivo Christo rey". A secret society of Catholic women, Las Brigadas Femeninas de Santa Juana de Arco (The female brigades of Saint Joan of Arc) which was comprised “initially of students, and later the wives, mothers and sisters of the guerilla fighters” was formed to support the war effort by providing medical aid and trafficking weapons to the male guerillas fighting in the forests and mountains.
"The struggle continued in the mountains and forests," G.E. said with a large grin on his face "but we understood that it was necessary to bring the war here, to the capital." It was the young radical José de León Toral, "a great martyr for our cause" who finally accomplished this. The man responsible for much of the worse oppression, Álvaro Obregón, had been elected president. Before he could be sworn in however, "José de León Toral approached him in a crowd, and before he could react…", G.E. made the sign of a gun with his hand, beaming as though he himself had pulled the trigger, "bam". "That’s when they realized they were not untouchable, not even the president."
This high profile assassination provided the necessary pressure to end the war. The interim president Emilio Portes Gil wasted no time in reaching out to Catholic authorities to negotiate a peace treaty. Tensions remained high, but the Mexican government ended it's harsh prosecution of the Catholic church in exchange for the Church withdrawing support for the Christero guerillas.3
Although the Church was no longer persecuted to the extent that it had been, the peace talks did little to solve the underlying material causes of the revolution, which had to do with the distribution of land. It also failed to accomplish the goals of more radical members of the clergy, who sought to not just end persecution but reverse entirely the secularization of Mexican society and restore society to the "rightful control of the Catholic Church." It was these unhappy elements of the Christero movement which formed the base for the nascent UNS.
Son of a wealthy landowner, José Antonio Urquiza contributed much of the financial support necessary for the founding of the organization, which he foresaw as a Catholic civic organization. Although Urquiza was himself fairly apolitical, many of his allies were influenced by the emerging Falangalist and Fascist movements in Spain and Italy, and following his murder the UNS adopted an aesthetics and political ideology more in line with Spanish Falangismo, canonizing Urquiza as the ideological founder of the organization. To this day it's common to see his photograph displayed on party propaganda and at rallies.
This ideological proximity to fascism would end up hurting the UNS during the Second World War. Although Mexico was formally neutral, there were practical considerations having to be had due to their proximity to the United States, and in 1944 the UNS was barred from holding meetings in Mexico. In America, somewhat bizarrely, Pachucos (a Chicano subculture in Los Angeles) were confused with the UNS and accused of being Axis subversives by the State Un-American Activities Committee, and targeted for harassment by US servicemen and the FBI.
The effective outlawing of the UNS during the war did much to kill the momentum of their movement. However, with the postwar rise of communism G.E. explained somewhat cryptically that they were able to transform their relationship with America and become "friends" in the 70 and 80s, which helped them rebuild influence in Mexico. I understood this to be a reference to Operation Condor, which saw many right wing organizations throughout Latin America provided with material support by the CIA. It would certainly explain the conspicuous proximity of their headquarters to the Secretaria de Gobernación (Secretariat for Home Affairs). I cannot find any evidence to confirm this, but declassified OSS documents do show that American Intelligence was taking an active interest in their activities. 4
During this time they fielded several political candidates across Mexico, but did not achieve much electoral success. In face of a general apathy from the population, they have since withdrawn from politics to and reformed to be closer in line with José Antonio Urquiza’s original ideal of a civic and cultural organization.
Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the UNS has seen a marked decline in relevance. This is partly due to their own success and partly due to the overall decline in religiosity among the Mexican public. The excesses of secularism which inspired their formation during the 1920s is no longer a question, and the secularism of Mexico's younger generations is one of apathy and resentment towards the Catholic church, not one of outright persecution. The specter of communism no longer hanging over Mexico, the UNS finds itself without any clear enemies to oppose, and their ideological commitments towards establishing a Traditionalist Catholic order in Mexico would be political suicide and is repulsive to the younger generations of Mexicans who have mixed feelings at best towards the Catholic Church. The lack of appeal their organization has to younger people is evident from the fact that everybody I met in the UNS seemed to be in their forties, which is striking given that the average age in Mexico is around thirty. "We have achieved what we needed to" says G.E., with a kind of sad look on his face, "now we wait until we are needed again".
As I leave their headquarters, I take a copy of their official party newsletter, a periodical titled “ORDEN”. The front page article, titled “Desde la Patagonia hasta Norteamérica… EMPIEZA A RETROCEDER LA IZQUIRDA” contains a political map of Latin America predicting a leftward swing in upcoming elections in nearly every country save for Argentina, Panama, and Ecuador. The first paragraph speaks of the “triumph of ultraright Javier Milei… putting an end to the tragic period of leftism which has pushed the country to financial ruin” and it would be easy to confuse this newspaper with any other right-wing press if not for the subsequent paragraph declaring “it seems that the remedy will be worse than the cure”. Unfortunately democracy in Latin America is often the choice between two terrible options, and the writer laments that “ideological radicalism, be it left or right, inevitably points in a single direction: towards dictatorship”. The article ends with a simple deceleration of “neither communism nor capitalism, long live Christian Socialism!”
Another article speaks of Pope Francis’ encyclical “On the care for our common home”5 and I can’t help but feel sympathetic towards them. But the ideals of voluntary exchange, tempered by a moral concern for the poor, demands a humility that most people are incapable of. Gradual social improvement does not inspire moving slogans, even if it is the right direction.
There is a page of advertisements contained in the periodical as well. All seem to be small independent shops, probably owned by members of the party. One advertises artisanal woodwork, another natural health remedies; a juice bar and a Catholic bakery are also present. In their prime the UNS received not only financial but also logistical support funneled through German and Japanese embassies. During the cold war I can only imagine that their “friendship” with “the gringos” came with financial benefits as well. At present Mexico is far too neutral and far too stable to attract that type of foreign investment. Short of a third world war, I expect that the UNS will continue to closer resemble a small church organization than the “500,000 strong” army of brownshirts that once terrorized the imagination of the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
My final impression of the UNS was that it reminded me of attending Sons of Italy meetings with my grandfather. The organization seems mostly to be composed of older people, who were themselves born into the organization. It is a social club for veterans of a long-forgotten war, a vanguard which paved the way for future struggles but has itself declined into irrelevance.
From the jungles of Jalisco to the doorstep of the Secretaria de Gobernación, it's true that the UNS has come a long way. In many ways a victim of their own success, they have outlived all their enemies, and now must contend with the much more difficult struggle of providing a positive vision for society, one which has public support. Christianity has always flourished under repression, from the floor of the Colosseum to the Soviet gulags, and the Synarquists' special brand of ultra-militant Catholicism is no exception. However, in the absence of injustice, what is left? The vast majority of Mexicans don't want to live under a theocracy, and have mixed feelings at best towards the Catholic Church.
Nor is it possible to campaign for such a theocratic order. Mexico is still a secular state, and any political platform seeking to end that secularism would be a crime against the constitution. Organizations like the UNS are thus restricted to the domain of social organization, while related political movements such as the secretive El Yunque6 must operate in the shadows of Mexican democracy.
Unless the extreme right can articulate a vision for society which appeals to the vast majority of ordinary people, they will remain Reactionaries in every sense of the word, occasionally advancing in opposition to the excesses of opposing ideologies, but incapable of ever truly seizing institutional power or effecting systemic change.
An example on this point, I met with some Canadians gold miners working in Mexico. The government is so friendly to resource 'development' that a mining company merely needs to prove that 1) a piece of land has gold reserves under it, and 2) that the company has enough money to finance it's extraction (while paying kickbacks to local government officials of course), and the Mexican state will provide licenses to that company without any regard or consultation towards the people living atop the land- and even send police and military to evict "trespassers". In practice the eviction of poor, rural, and indigenous farmers never stopped, it has only become more profitable.
The Christeros themselves were not consulted in these negotiations, and a further 30,000 Cristeros were murdered in government raids after the peace talks had formally concluded.
The existence of this organization is contested, but it is certainly an interesting rabbit hole to go down. There is a purported video circulating online of an El Yunque initiation ceremony, and the the aesthetics as well as alleged ideology is certainly extremely similar to the UNS.