German neo-nazi terror and the secret service

By Dietmar Henning in Germany:

Germany: Neo-Nazi terror and the secret service

24 December 2011

Every week new details emerge about the murders carried out by the three far-right terrorists from Zwickau, responsible for killing nine immigrants and a police officer, three bomb attacks and 14 bank raids between 2000 and 2007. These details can lead to only one conclusion: Uwe Mundlos, Beate Zschäpe and Uwe Böhnhardt acted under the very eyes of the German security authorities and were partially aided by them.

The group called itself the “National Socialist Underground” (NSU). In reality, it was not very deep underground. Its members attended demonstrations, concerts and other events, several times holidaying on the Baltic Island of Fehmarn, travelled abroad, and had many supporters and accomplices in right-wing circles—and apparently also within the secret services.

Of 20 supporters of the three terrorists that are now known, all were members of the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), or were in close contact with it. Inside the NPD, there are more than 130 undercover agents working for the secret service, some in its upper echelons.

Nevertheless, the security authorities claim that they had no knowledge of the existence of the NSU terrorist group until 2011; indeed, they supposedly had no inkling of its existence. Although the murders involved one Greek and eight Turkish small business owners, all following the same pattern and using the same weapon, the prosecution authorities refused to conclude that there was any far-right motive. Instead, they accused the victims and their relatives of having links with Mafia-like networks.

In contrast, the far-right scene knew all about it—and not only in secretive leadership circles. For example, the singer Daniel Giese and his band “Gigi and the Brown Town Musicians”, well known in neo-Nazi circles and to the secret service, recorded the song “Doner [kebab] Killer” in 2009. In it, Giese celebrated the murders of the Zwickau terrorist cell and demanded: “Nine is not enough”.

The CD on which the song appeared was banned in 2010 by the authorities. And yet, they claim not to have noticed the existence of the terrorist cell!

The far-right scene in Thuringia, the home state of the three NSU members, had been under surveillance since the early 1990s by the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution (LfV), as the secret service is called. Between 1993 and 1995, the authorities in Thuringia recorded 1,257 right-wing extremist crimes. From the start, Böhnhardt, Mundlos and Zschäpe were under the eyes of the police and secret service. The same applies to many others who now are considered to have helped the three during the past 15 years, including Tino Brandt, Ralf Wohlleben and André Kapke. These three were all members of the “Thuringian Homeland Security”, in which the three terrorists were also active.

From 1994 to 2004, Tino Brandt was an informer for the secret service in Thuringia. During this time, he received 200,000 deutschmarks from the secret service, which by his own account he used to build up the right-wing organization. From 1999, he was NPD state spokesman, and was deputy chairman from 2000.

Ralf Wohlleben joined the NPD in 1999, founding its Jena District Association, of which he was chairman. From 2002, he was deputy chairman of the Thuringia NPD and was also its press spokesman. In September 2010 he left the NPD.

André Kapke was active in the far-right scene in Thuringia since the early 1990s. For a time, he worked for the right-wing newspaper Neues Denken (New Thinking), which was founded in 1997 with DM23,000 start-up assistance from the Thuringia Ministry of Social Affairs. For two years, he was a member of the NPD.

Holger G., who has since been arrested, also moved in those circles. He rented vehicles for the terrorist trio, including mobile homes, used by Mundlos and Böhnhardt in the murder of the policewoman Michele Kiesewetter in 2007 in Heilbronn, and in a bank robbery in Eisenach in November this year. The car, with which the perpetrators fled following the murder of Mehmet Kubasik in Dortmund in April 2006, was also rented in his name.

Ex-SS officer in West German secret service: here.

Germany: The Lübeck arson attack and the Zwickau neo-Nazi terrorist cell: here.

David Wnendt’s debut film, “Combat Girls,” goes behind the scenes of right-wing extremist gangs in eastern Germany and hits a bit too close to home. Audiences are left both shocked and bewildered: here.

German government report highlights Nazi past of public officials: here.

The persecution of anti-Nazi demonstrators in eastern Germany paves the way for the use of similar anti-democratic measures against working class opposition to the growing social crisis: here.