Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Protocol 05
Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion
Protocol Number 5 : Despotism And Modern Progress
PROTOCOL NUMBER FIVE
1. What form of administrative rule
can be given to communities
in which corruption has penetrated everywhere,
communities
where riches are attained
only by the clever surprise tactics
of semi-swindling tricks;
where loseness reigns:
where morality is maintained
by penal measures
and harsh laws
but not by voluntarily accepted principles:
where the feelings towards faith and country
are obligated by cosmopolitan convictions?
What form of rule is to be given to these communities
if not that despotism which I shall describe to you later?
We shall create an intensified centralization of government
in order to grip in our hands
all the forces of the community.
We shall regulate mechanically
all the actions of the political life of our subjects
by new laws.
These laws will withdraw one by one
all the indulgences and liberties
which have been permitted by the goyim,
and our kingdom will be distinguished
by a despotism of such magnificent proportions
as to be at any moment
and in every place in a position
to wipe out any goyim who oppose us by deed or word.
2. We shall be told
that such a despotism as I speak of
is not consistent with the progress of these days,
but I will prove to you that is is.
3. In the times
when the peoples looked upon kings on their thrones
as on a pure manifestation of the will of God,
they submitted without a murmur
to the despotic power of kings:
but from the day when we insinuated into their minds
the conception of their own rights
they began to regard the occupants of thrones
as mere ordinary mortals.
The holy unction of the Lord's Anointed
has fallen from the heads of kings
in the eyes of the people,
and when we also robbed them of their faith
in God
the might of power was flung upon the streets
into the place of public proprietorship
and was seized by us.
4. Moreover,
the art of directing masses and individuals
by means of cleverly manipulated theory and verbitage,
by regulations of life in common
and all sorts of other quirks,
in all which the goyim understand nothing,
belongs likewise to the specialists
of our administrative brain.
Reared on analysis, observation,
on delicacies of fine calculation,
in this species of skill we have no rivals,
any more than we have either in the drawing up of plans
of political actions and solidarity.
In this respect the Jesuits alone might have compared with us,
but we have contrived to discredit them
in the eyes of the unthinking mob
as an overt organization,
while we ourselves all the while have kept our secret
organization in the shade.
However,
it is probably all the same to the world
who is its sovereign lord,
whether the head of Catholicism
or our despot of the blood of Zion!
But to us, the Chosen People,
it is very far from being a matter of indifference.
5. For a time perhaps
we might be successfully dealt with
by a coalition of the "goyim" of all the world:
but from this danger we are secured
by the discord existing among them
whose roots are so deeply seated
that they can never now be plucked up.
We have set one against another
the personal and national reckonings of the goyim,
religious and race hatreds,
which we have fostered into a huge growth
in the course of the past twenty centuries.
This is the reason why there is not one State
which would anywhere receive support
if it were to raise its arm,
for every one of them must bear in mind
that any agreement against us
would be unprofitable to itself.
We are too strong
- there is no evading our power.
The nations cannot come to even an inconsiderable private agreement
without our secretly having a hand in it.
6. Per me reges regnant.
"It is through me that Kings reign."
And it was said by the prophets
that we were chosen by God Himself
to rule over the whole earth.
God has endowed us with genius
that we may be equal to our task.
Were genius in the opposite camp
it would still struggle against us,
but even so,
a newcomer is no match for the old-established settler:
the struggle would be merciless between us,
such a fight as the world has never seen.
Aye, and the genius on their side
would have arrived too late.
All the wheels of the machinery of all States
go by the force of the engine,
which is in our hands,
and that engine of the machinery of States is
- Gold.
The science of political economy
invented by our learned elders
has for long past been giving royal prestige to capital.
7. Capital, if it is to co-operate untrammeled,
must be free to establish a monopoly of industry and trade:
this is already being put in execution
by an unseen hand in all quarters of the world.
This freedom will give political force to those
engaged in industry,
and that will help to oppress the people.
Nowadays it is more important to disarm the peoples
than to lead them into war:
more important to use for our advantage
the passions
which have burst into flames than to quench their fire:
more important to eradicate them.
The principle object of our directorate consists in this:
To debilitate the public mind by criticism;
to lead it away from serious reflections
calculated to arouse resistance;
to distract the forces of the mind
towards a sham fight of empy cloquence.
8. In all ages the people of the world,
equally with individuals,
have accepted words for deeds,
for they are content with a show
and rarely pause to note,
in the public arena,
whether promises are followed by performance.
Therefore we shall establish show institutions
which will give eloquent proof of their benefit to progress.
9. We shall assume to ourselves
the liberal physiognomy of all parties,
of all directions,
and we shall give that physiognomy a voice in orators
who will speak so much
that they will exhaust the patience of their hearers
and produce an abhorrence of oratory.
10. In order to put public opinion into our hands,
we must bring it into a state of bewilderment
by giving expression from all sides
to so many contradictory opinions
and for such length of time
as will suffice to make the "goyim" lose their heads in the labryinth
and come to see that the best thing is
to have no opinion of any kind
in matters political,
which it is not given to the public to understand,
because they are understood only by him
who guides the public.
This is the first secret.
11. The second secret requisite
for the success of our government
is comprised in the following:
To multiply to such an extent
national failings, habits, passions,
conditions of civil life,
that it will be impossible for anyone to know
where he is in the resulting chaos,
so that the people in consequence
will fail to understand one another.
This measure will also serve us in another way,
namely, to sow discord in all parties,
to dislocate all collective forces
which are still unwilling to submit to us,
and to discourage any kind of personal initiative
which might in any degree hinder our affair.
There is nothing more dangerous
than personal initiative:
if it has genius behind it,
such initiative can do more
than can be done by millions of people
among whom we have sown discord.
We must so direct the education of the goyim communities
that whenever they come upon a matter requiring initiative
they may drop their hands in despairing impotence.
The strain which results from freedom of actions
saps the forces
when it meets with the freedom of another.
From this collision arise grave moral shocks,
disenchantments, failures.
By all these means
we shall so wear down the "goyim"
that they will be compelled to offer us
international power
of a nature that by its position
will enable us without any violence
gradually to absorb all the state forces of the world
and to form a super-government.
In place of the rulers of to-day
we shall set up a bogey
which will be called the Super-Government Administration.
Its hands will reach out in all directions
like nippers
and its organization will be of such colossal dimensions
that it cannot fail to subdue
all the nations of the world.