When Governments Show Their Cards

Some subjects are hard to look at. This is one of them. The moments before repression rarely feel like the ones that come after; they unfold slowly, politely, even bureaucratically. Yet when we study history closely, we find that governments often reveal their intentions long before the violence begins. They show their cards in budgets, in weapons orders, in “security reorganizations” announced in calm language.

This isn’t about fear, it’s about honesty. Facing how militarization takes shape is part of learning how to protect what is sacred. The signs are rarely hidden; they are simply dressed in uniforms that claim to keep order.

The Militarization of Security — When Protection Becomes Control

One of the earliest tells in any authoritarian turn is when a government blurs the line between defense and policing. In Germany during the 1930s, the newly empowered Nazi state transformed the secret police, or Gestapo, from a regional force into a militarized arm of the regime. The same factories that produced rifles for foreign enemies quietly equipped internal forces. Uniformed men began to patrol not only borders but neighborhoods. The SS, originally a personal guard, was expanded into an armed domestic army. The message was clear even before words turned to violence: the state now saw its greatest threat inside its own walls.

A generation later, Stalin’s Soviet Union followed a similar pattern. The NKVD, an agency born of revolution, grew into an army-within-an-army, with tanks and heavy weapons dedicated not to defense but to internal purges and labor camp control. What began as a call for stability became a machine for fear. Both regimes taught the same lesson: when a government arms itself against its citizens, peace has already been broken.

Arms for “Order” — When Security Budgets Swell in Silence

The next signal often comes quietly, through purchases and stockpiles justified as precaution. In Chile, 1972–1973, shipments of ammunition, tear gas, and small arms began arriving from foreign suppliers. Officials spoke of “maintaining order” amid strikes and protests. Within months, those same weapons were used in the military coup that overthrew President Salvador Allende and inaugurated years of repression. The warehouses had been prepared long before the streets filled with soldiers.

More recently, in Myanmar between 2016 and 2021, the armed forces, or Tatmadaw, dramatically increased imports of weapons and crowd-control equipment from abroad. To the public, these were standard defense acquisitions. Yet when the coup began, those very stockpiles were turned on civilians demanding democracy.

The Rehearsal of Force — When Armies Train for the Wrong Enemy

Before a state turns its weapons inward, it must normalize their presence. It begins with drills. In Beijing, 1989, armored vehicles rolled through the capital under the pretense of security exercises. Soldiers were told they were defending the nation from “rioters.” When students filled Tiananmen Square to call for reform, those same units were deployed against them. The rehearsal became reality.

In Iran, 2009 and again in 2022, similar patterns unfolded. The Revolutionary Guard increased domestic troop movements and stockpiled nonlethal weapons—rubber bullets, drones, gas canisters. Officials described it as preparation for “public safety.” Each time, within months, the equipment was used on unarmed citizens. History shows that when a state’s soldiers are trained to view protest as warfare, the stage is already set for tragedy.

Weaponized Law — When Authority Arms Itself with Immunity

Repression rarely depends on bullets alone. It also requires legal protection for those who carry them. In Chile under Augusto Pinochet, a series of decrees granted the military full authority to “restore order” and shielded officers from prosecution. Overnight, ordinary law enforcement was replaced with command structures designed for war. Political opponents were detained without warrant; courts were silenced by decree.

Yugoslavia in the late 1980s revealed another variation. The federal government quietly began redistributing weapons from national depots to local militias, claiming it was for “civil defense.” When the federation fractured, those arms were used not for defense but for purges and siege. In both cases, the transformation of law into a weapon came before the violence itself. It was the signature of a government arming itself not just with guns, but with permission.

Command and Obedience — When Silence Becomes Policy

Every authoritarian state depends on one final transformation: obedience as virtue. Orders become morality. “National security” becomes synonymous with loyalty to power. In this climate, weapons are no longer questioned, they are symbols of patriotism. The act of arming itself becomes proof of righteousness.

This was the story of Nazi Germany’s 1938 military parades, of Pinochet’s televised troop mobilizations, of the Myanmar generals saluting tanks in city squares. It is the story of every government that mistakes fear for stability. When citizens learn to equate dissent with danger, and power with protection, the stage is set for suppression.

Tending the Hearth

History doesn’t shout these lessons. The blood of the innocent exists as quiet testament. Their message is urgent but waits only for those willing to take the time to investigate. Wisdom lingers in their whispers. Each time a government prepares to fight its own people, it leaves a trail of evidence: budgets, decrees, deployments. The pattern is still visible for those willing to see it.

But awareness is not despair. The study of these moments is an act of care. Around the hearth, we remember that vigilance is not cynicism. It is love for the fragile peace we still possess. When we learn to read the tells of power, we keep the light steady, guarding against the darkness that grows when no one is watching. The time to watch is now.

Sources and Further Reading:

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM). Holocaust Encyclopedia: The Gestapo and the SS. Washington, DC: USHMM, updated 2023.

Robert Gellately. The Gestapo and German Society: Enforcing Racial Policy, 1933–1945. Oxford University Press, 1990.

Sheila Fitzpatrick. Everyday Stalinism: Ordinary Life in Extraordinary Times: Soviet Russia in the 1930s. Oxford University Press, 1999.

Peter Kornbluh. The Pinochet File: A Declassified Dossier on Atrocity and Accountability. The New Press, 2003.

Amnesty International. Myanmar: Deadly Cargo—Arms Transfers to the Military in 2016–2021. London: Amnesty International, 2022.

Spencer C. Tucker. The Encyclopedia of the Cold War: A Political, Social, and Military History. ABC-CLIO, 2007 — entries on Yugoslavia and Iran.

Orville Schell and David Shambaugh (eds.). The Tiananmen Papers. PublicAffairs, 2001.

Human Rights Watch. Iran: Brutal Crackdown on Protesters. New York: HRW, 2023.