Consider This from NPR - How A Foiled Coup In Germany Came To Be

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

This week, authorities in Germany arrested more than two dozen suspected far-right extremists over a plot to violently overthrow the government.The plotters were reportedly inspired by QAnon conspiracy theories. NPR's Rob Schmitz walks us through the latest.And German historian and author Katja Hoyer explains why members of Germany's far-right can seem invisible.In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This message comes from Indiana University. Indiana University is committed to moving the world forward, working to tackle some of society's biggest challenges. Nine campuses, one purpose. Creating tomorrow, today. More at iu.edu. This week, German special forces arrested at least 25 suspected far-right extremists over a plot to violently overthrow the government. One of the things they were allegedly planning to do, use force to storm the German parliament, the Bundestag, and kill political leaders. This is probably one of the largest domestic terrorist operations ever undertaken by the German intelligence agencies.

This is something very serious, and it was a full-fledged coup attempt in Germany. That is Heidi Beirich, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, speaking with the PBS NewsHour. Authorities say the plot involved a movement called Reichsbürger, or Reich Citizens. The movement's core belief is that Germany's modern democratic government is not legitimate. Here's Beirich is that Germany's modern democratic government is not legitimate. Here's Beirich again. There's no question that the Reichsburger movement is very similar to some of our anti-government movements. For example, they would issue their own driver's license passports. They reject the authority of the federal state. That sounds like our

anti-government activists here in the U.S. And there is one specific anti-government movement in the U.S. that is believed to have inspired this German group, QAnon. Which is a crazy conspiracy theory, American-created, that has migrated across the world, including into Germany. So those links exist, both on the ideological front and in terms of the aims of what these organizations are trying to achieve. And of course, the plot itself included at least one element that will sound very familiar to Americans. The conspiracists were led by the notion that if they stormed the federal legislature, the Bundestag, in a sort of repeat of January 6th, the storming of the capital, that they could then overthrow the government.

That's Constanze Stelzenmüller, speaking with my colleague Rachel Martin. She's a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and an expert on German foreign and security policy. I think that is wildly underestimating both stability of Germany's institutions and, I think, the mood in the German public. The leader of the German group is said to be Prince Heinrich XIII, and authorities say the plot called for him to be installed as the country's new leader. He's a descendant of Germany's monarchy, which of course was abolished by the Weimar Republic a century ago. But this ringleader rejects any form of German republic

and doesn't recognize the fact that his title is meaningless in today's Germany. NPR's Esme Nicholson, who has been following the story. Prosecutors say that he had started to nominate ministers for a post-coup government, including a former German army paratrooper as head of his military arm. As we now know, that plan, that coup attempt, was foiled. Consider this. Far-right, deep-state fringe movements are on the rise internationally. But this one group in Germany grew to a point that a top German intelligence official said it presented a high level of danger. Question now is, does that danger remain? From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly. It's Friday, December 9th.

Support for NPR and the following message come from Carnegie Corporation of New York, working to reduce political polarization through philanthropic support for education, democracy, and peace. More information at carnegie.org. It's Consider This from NPR. The two dozen or so people arrested this week in Germany on charges of plotting to overthrow the government come from all different backgrounds. They include a prince, a judge, a doctor, police officers, and several people with links to the German military. They were members of various far-right extremist groups, some of them QAnon-inspired conspiracy theorists. Here to tell us more about what is known about this group and their alleged plot is NPR's Central Europe correspondent Rob Schmitz. Hey, Rob.

Hey, Mary Louise. Okay, I want to hear more about exactly what this group is alleged to have been plotting. So prosecutors say this group of more than 50 people were allegedly planning a violent coup against the German government. They were planning on allegedly killing senior politicians and public servants as part of an overall storming of the parliament building in Berlin. And if they accomplish that, which is a big if, they allegedly were going to install a new German leader who, according to prosecutors, is a 71-year-old man who calls himself Prince Heinrich XIII of Reuss. Reuss is located in the present German state of Thuringia. And it should be noted here, the present-day House of Reuss, which is a thing,

currently headed by Heinrich XIV, has been quick to distance themselves from Heinrich XIII, calling him a confused man peddling in conspiracy theories. Okay, all kinds of layers to sift through here. Just to get my head around the numbers, you said a group of about 50, but there were only, what, like 25 people who were arrested? That's right. There were more involved in an overall investigation into this group's activities. Okay. How did they all come together? As I said, they came from all different backgrounds.

This has been a long-evolving process. They've come together over years of protesting together in public for various reasons that they hold dear. Some of them are coronavirus deniers, some believe in QAnon-inspired conspiracy theories, and many of them are coronavirus deniers. Some believe in QAnon-inspired conspiracy theories. And many of them are so-called Reichsbürgers, which is a fringe movement in Germany that does not recognize the German state and wants to abolish democracy there. Okay. And you said when you were talking about if they were able to overthrow the government, that that was a big if. How big a threat do they pose? Did they pose? Well, they should be taken seriously

because they are considered dangerous and have had access to weapons in the past. And it's important to note here that among those arrested this week, a couple were active duty soldiers in the German military and a few police officers were among those under investigation. So they would have had access to weapons like guns and explosives. So they certainly posed a threat in terms of waging violence and taking lives. But if a group is trying to take over a government as large as Germany's, they eventually need popular support to stay in power. And I think it's fair to say this ragtag group of conspiracy theorists did not have that. So as someone who lives in Germany, reports on Germany, how surprised were you by the reports this week of this big operation foiling what German authorities say was a legitimate terrorist plot?

I wasn't surprised. And I think that many people who are following this space in Germany were not surprised either. It is disturbing that these extremist groups exist and are plotting to overthrow the government. This week's nationwide raid is a sign, I think, though, that democracy is working the way it should be in Germany. Germany's democracy is obviously far from perfect, but the German government has agencies like the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, known in Germany as the Verfassungsschutz, that is in charge of identifying threats to the German constitution and has the power to order police to monitor these threats closely. This particular group, for example,

was under surveillance since September from that agency. Their phones and their emails had been tapped for months, and police made the raid after they had evidence of a credible threat. And it's kind of interesting, these types of protections exist in Germany because of the country's history with right-wing fascism. Several other Western democracies do not have these levels of protection. So in many ways, this week's raid is, I think, confirmation that Germany's democracy is working as it is intended to by protecting itself against internal threats. That was NPR's Central Europe correspondent Rob Schmitz. Germany's head of domestic intelligence says the Reichsburger has grown in the last year substantially and presents a high level of danger. While I spoke with Katja Hoyer earlier this week to give us more context,

she's a German historian and author, and I asked if she agrees with the assessment that this group is growing and dangerous. I think it is. I mean, the new thing that we've seen today is that it is sort of increasingly organized in terms of getting hold of weapons, in terms of networking with influential people, getting hold of funds, and that's a new level of professionalism that previous incarnations just didn't have. Is it a cohesive movement? Do they have a clear leader? No, not at all. And this is, I think, something that has previously led to people underestimating it because it is very fractured. Some believe the German Reich didn't

fall at the end of the First World War and needs to be reinstated. Some of them set that date much later during the occupation after the Second World War, and some of them have got outright neo-Nazi tendencies. Others want to restore the monarchy. So it's a very disunited movement that currently doesn't have one centralized leadership. I was reading some of your excellent writing on this, and among the points you make, which intrigues me, is that these people don't necessarily fit the stereotype you might have. They don't look like whatever your image of a neo-Nazi is. Who are these people?

Yeah, that's right. And that's also, I think, one of the more dangerous elements of this is that they're not angry young men with shaved heads and black boots, you know, who go out and march. But a lot of the people, for instance, that were arrested today are judges, lawyers, teachers. That makes this movement somewhat invisible. So this might be the person that, you know, lives next to you or that teaches your children. So they've evolved, I would say, into a much, much more socially diverse movement from, you know, what people considered to be neo-Nazis in the 1990s. Are there connections between groups like this in Germany and the American far right and conspiracy theorists, groups like QAnon, for example? Yeah, QAnon is an interesting one

because Germany is in fact the second largest community for the movement online. So in terms of the amount of people subscribing to QAnon channels, Germany is quite prolific in that respect. But it combines this idea that the state isn't legitimate with a pre-existing kind of conspiracy theory that you see with QAnon. So many people followed Trump and Trumpism in particular and sort of believed that Trump would finally come and sort of liberate Germany from foreign occupation. And he was the savior figure in many ways, as he is with the QAnon movement in the US. Fascinating. Germany, of course, has a unique relationship with the far right, a unique history. I was born in Germany. I've spent time there. I have always been struck by how

generations of Germans have worked to distance themselves from the Nazi party, from World War II history. When you look at Germany today, what strikes you about the ability of the far right to find traction? Well, I think what you just said about, you know, the post-war culture of Germany is true for the vast, vast majority of Germans. It's easy to forget now in the kind of media coverage created by the arrests this morning that they are in fact still relatively small amounts of people that we're talking about here. The reason I think why it's still a sizable movement, those conspiracy circles, is because many communities in Germany feel somewhat disenfranchised.

There's a long history, as there is in the U.S., of skepticism towards centralized government. I think that's a residual thing that always exists, and it breaks out at times of crisis like we are currently experiencing. That was German historian and writer Katja Heuer. Her latest book is Blood and Iron, the Rise and Fall of the German Empire, 1871 to 1918. It's Consider This. From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly.