We go through our lives with basic assumptions that we often never question. Some of those assumptions are small, relatively insignificant; others involve reality on a global scale.

Take for instance the Cold War: growing up, I never thought it would end. And yet it did. I never would have conceived of the Soviet Union not existing; and it's been gone close to thirty years now.

What about the threat of Germany? We mostly thought some kind of far-right resurgence could never happen -- at least I always thought that. At least in my adulthood. In my childhood -- that's a different story. At any rate, an interesting article appeared in the New York Times the other day about just what I have thought all my adult life is impossible:

One central motivation of the extremists has seemed so far-fetched and fantastical that for a long time the authorities and investigators did not take it seriously, even as it gained broader currency in far-right circles.

Neo-Nazi groups and other extremists call it Day X — a mythical moment when Germany’s social order collapses, requiring committed far-right extremists, in their telling, to save themselves and rescue the nation.

Today Day X preppers are drawing serious people with serious skills and ambition. Increasingly, the German authorities consider the scenario a pretext for domestic terrorism by far-right plotters or even for a takeover of the government.

“I fear we’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg,” said Dirk Friedriszik, a lawmaker in the northeastern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where Nordkreuz was founded. “It isn’t just the KSK. The real worry is: These cells are everywhere. In the army, in the police, in reservist units.”

New York Times

I'm such an anti-conspiracy theorist that I forget that people actually do conspire sometimes...