Sixth Column

Sixth Column', also published as The Day After Tomorrow, is a Robert A. Heinlein novel with the premise of fake religion to cover an underground rebellion in Sixth Column against Asian occupiers of the United States. The 1949 novel, derived from a 1941 magazine publication. uses racial stereotypes that might be found objectionable today. Its title contrasts the Fifth Column of traitors in the Spanish Civil War with a "sixth column" of patriots taking back their country.

Several informal reviewers have suggested that Sixth ColumnJohn W. Campbell, and another novel by Heinlein was closer to his own style. The latter work revolved around the attempt to overthrow a cynical and corrupt priesthood of Fundamentalist Christians in the relatively obscure "If This Goes On—", a part of his Future History series.. It is set in a future United States. He wrote that he had considered, as part of the Future History, stories about how the religious dictatorship came to be, in a list of "stories never written", "The Sound of his Wings" and "The Stone Pillow" simply being too depressing to write.

Its scientific premise is that just before the United States was occupied, a researcher at a secret Army laboratory both establishes a unified field theory, and goes beyond to build devices combining electromagnetic and gravitic spectra to give near-miraculous powers. The developer and most personnel are killed by the first test of a device using the principles.

The occupier, called the "Pan-Asians", is never precisely identified, but has aspects of 1940 perceptions both of Japanese militarism and the Soviet "Red hordes". Their colonial occupation policy holds that the occupied nations will be more peaceful if they are allowed to practice indigenous religions, so the occupiers do not object when they encounter a new religion, the cult of "Mota". It spreads rapidly across the country, providing social services that are a relief to the occupier, who does not know that the food and medical treatment come from the advanced technology. The priests are United States Army officers, and the churches hide bases of the underground.

The denoument does include examples that there can be American heroes of Asian ethnicity, as well as crazy Americans of the majority.