Núcleo Nacional: The Internal War No One Wins

Núcleo National and Gladio's gold: the internal war no one wins

What happens when a party presenting itself as an alternative ends up consumed by its own contradictions? The case of Núcleo National and its orbit of polemicists offers an uncomfortable portrait: a project that strives to be inclusive but ends up branding as traitors all who do not pledge allegiance. The recurring trigger is always the same: Gladio, the catch-all accusation used to discredit any criticism. "Gold is Gladio, gold belongs to traitors who don't let them print freely," summarizes one of the slogans circulating in the group.

From political criticism to personal score-settling

The pattern repeats with an almost parodic insistence. A polemicist responds for a year and a half to a twenty-minute video that mocked him, attacking everything that moves. The sequence is always the same: criticism, disproportionate response, and labeling the dissident as Gladio. Some describe the result as "the ridicule of hidden cowards," a phrase that captures the wear and tear of those who confuse debate with trench warfare.

The underlying paradox is more interesting than the spectacle. A party selling itself as Catholic and integrative coexists with a philosophical core that elevates the nation to the status of a secularized religion. The result, according to one of the sharpest descriptions circulating, is "a sort of malformed offspring": Enlightenment pantheism on one side, appropriated Marxism on another, poorly digested Heidegger on a third. All with claims of doctrinal purity.

Why does Marxism appear in the crosshairs?

The accusation of Marxism functions as a throwaway weapon on both sides. From one flank, it is claimed that "Marxism is the refuge of the degenerate, the twisted, and the deviant," a formulation that says more about the accuser than the accused. From the other, polemicists are reproached for attacking Christianity as a Trojan horse while keeping Marx on the shelf without pointing out the contradiction.

The argument has its internal logic: if the entire base of revolutionary nationalism drinks from Marx, coherence would require applying the same yardstick. This is not done. And there appears the rift that many point to: a thinker who presents himself as an unraveler of irrefutable truths cannot bear having his own method applied to him.

The identity issue no one wants to address

The debate frequently shifts to the identity terrain, where positions harden. One current holds that racial identity is only problematized when perceived as threatened, and that the adequate response is unnuanced affirmation. Another warns of the risk of importing categories alien to the European context. Between the two, space for calm analysis shrinks.

The question hovering over all exchanges is uncomfortable: what political project is built on the permanent suspicion of betrayal? When the criterion for belonging is reduced to the answer to a single question about family history, the result is not a political community but a sect at war with the world. And sects, by definition, consume themselves.

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In the end, the most honest conclusion is the one heard least: the problem is not Gladio, nor the gold, nor the Marxism on the shelf. The problem is that no one has yet explained what all this is for. And until it is explained, the internal war will continue. With or without traitors.