The Nizkor Project: Remembering the Holocaust (Shoah)

The Rushton Report


Right-wing Extremism in the Federal Republic Of Germany 1973-1995

A study and analysis of the rise of right-wing politics and attitudes in the FRG over two decades.

by
Reginald M. Rushton
June 1995


Contents

1.0 Introduction and notes

1.1 Copyright

This work is the copyright of R. M. Rushton, 1995. Free distribution via electronic media is permitted, provided that neither this copyright notice nor the document as a whole is altered in any way. Permission to distribute this document in printed form must be obtained in writing.

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1.2 Introduction

The original version of this paper was written as a final year undergraduate dissertation in the Department of German Studies at the University of Birmingham (UK). It is my intention to try to keep this work updated, although I cannot guarantee that updates will be regularly published.

The format of the first half of this paper is principally chronological, detailing important events, such as the founding of individual extremist parties and subsequent government legislation aimed at curbing their activities. The second half of the paper concentrates on the present-day scene in Germany, with particular reference to the reasons behind the popularity of the right-wing extremists and certain parties, the radical right-wingers and skinheads and the reaction of the Government and the public.

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2.0 CHRONOLOGY

In 1973, the founder of the neo-Nazi group Bauern- und Buergerinitiative, Thies Christophersen, published a text entitled Die Auschwitz-Luege (The Auschwitz Lie), one of many such revisionist articles to appear in the 1970s and 1980s, culminating in the infamous Leuchter Report. Also in this year, Joachim Floth founded his Deutsch-Voelkische Gemeinschaft (DVG).

1974 saw the arrival of three new right-wing organisations: the Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann (WSG), the Deutsche Sozialistische Volkspartei and the Unabhaengiger Schuelerverbund. In September of the same year, the Rechtsblock fuer Arbeiter, Bauern und Soldaten was also formed, whilst in November, Gary Rex Lauck, an American revisionist, was arrested and expelled for extolling the virtues of National Socialism.

In March 1975, the Bund Freies Deutschland won 3.4% of the votes in the elections for the Berliner Abgeordnetenhaus. In April of the same year, the Kampfbund Deutscher Soldaten (KDS) was formed in Frankfurt am Main. Its main policy was one of Holocaust denial, possibly sparked off by Christophersen's Die Auschwitz-Luege and similar publications.

In October, the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands(NPD) was deemed to be an extremist party and to have unconstitutional aims. Proof that banning one party did not prevent the extremists is demonstrated by the fact that in December, Manfred Ohl a former NPD official founded the Nationalrevolutionaerer Bund (NRB).

In March 1976 Gary Rex Lauck entered Germany with a false passport and was subsequently arrested in Mainz, before being given a four year jail sentence and fine in July, for spreading Nazi propaganda. He was later expelled from Germany, although he was allowed to return in 1979 to testify at the trial of a neo-Nazi.

May 1977 saw Michael Kuehnen, a former lieutenant in the German army, form the SA-Sturm-Hamburg. This marked the start of Kuehnen's career as a neo-Nazi leader. In November he was to found the Aktionsfront Nationaler Sozialisten. In September the Bund Deutscher Maedel (BDM) was formed in Hamburg to follow the ideals laid down by its Nazi namesake. It was in this year that the former Chancellor Willy Brandt called for a crackdown on neo-Nazi activities. Consequently all states were required to submit a report on extremist activity in their regions. In March 1978, the leader of the Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann was sentenced to imprisonment and fined for assembling an arms cache.

In 1978 and 1979 the Government banned, or prevented the distribution to minors, of over 50 neo-Nazi publications. On March 17th 1979, the Freiheitliche Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (FAP) was founded by Martin Pappe, an unemployed salesman and teacher. During the summer of this year, the Hilfsorganisation fuer nationale politische Gefangene und deren Angehoerige e.V. (HNG) was founded. This was an umbrella group which aimed to provide mainly financial support for neo-Nazis. Considering the benefactors of the work of this organisation, it is quite surprising that it managed to achieve the status of a registered charity.

In September, Michael Kuehnen was arrested for inciting racist attacks and was given a four year sentence, during which he wrote Die Zweite Revolution. Glaube und Kampf (The Second revolution. Belief and Battle), extolling the virtues of a Fourth Reich. His sentence was extended by eight months in April 1992, for sending a copy of this book to Thies Christophersen for publishing.<1> In early December Gerhard Frey founded the Volksbewegung fuer Generalamnestie (VOGA). In 1979 and 1980 a Hollywood television series, entitled Holocaust, was screened throughout Western Europe, including Germany. A survey conducted by a West German television company found that 41% of Germans with televisions saw the final episode of the series, and whilst 75% of these were born after Hitler's rise to power in 1933, and so would have been 12 years old at the end of the war, possibly too young to remember the events in any great detail. The survey also found that 81% of those who watched the final episode discussed it with others and that 65% admitted to being "deeply moved" by it.<2> The series was attacked by the NPD's newspaper, the Deutsche Stimme, and the Deutsche National-Zeitung, the newspaper of the DVU, as being Hollywood propaganda, and led to an increase in neo-Nazi activity throughout Germany.

In January 1980 Gerhart Baum, the Interior Minister, banned the Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann for being anti-constitutional because of its appeal to the young, although in March, Karl-Heinz Hoffmann took his objections to the Administrative Courtin Berlin, which dismissed the complaint on December 2nd. On September 28th at the Oktoberfest in Munich, a 24lb bomb placed near the entrance, killed 12 people, including the bomber, and injured 312. A neo-Nazi group, initially suspected to be the Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann, claimed responsibility, although it was later discovered that the bomber had left the paramilitary group prior to the attack.

On the 24th March 1981, a series of raids on numerous apartments across the Federal Republic, led to the confiscation of a large amount of Canadian and American anti-Semitic material. Wilkinson states that nearly 1,000 homes were raided, although Angelika Koenigseder quotes a figure of about 450.<3> Gary Lauck and Ernst Zündel, a German Revisionist living in Canada, were subsequently arrested and charged with the smuggling and distribution of banned neo-Nazi propaganda. In April tough new laws were introduced, banning the distribution of anti-Semitic propaganda, including Hitler's autobiography Mein Kampf.

On October 24th, 156kg of explosives, 13,520 rounds of ammunition and 1kg of the highly toxic potassium cyanide were found on Lueneburg Heath. In November, Franz Schoenhuber published his book, Ich war dabei (I Was There), celebrating his days in the Waffen-SS. This led to him leaving the CSU, although the right-wing Deutsche National-Zeitung pronounced it to be the "book of the year".

In its 1981 report, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution declared that crime caused by the right extremists was at its highest level since the end of the Second World War, having recorded 1,824 incidents, an increase of 11% on the previous year. Wilkinson states that:

"Two thirds of these were directly linked to the neo-Nazi groups, and over 300 were anti-Semitic."<4>

In January 1982, the Interior Minister, Gerhart Baum, banned the Volkssozialistische Bewegung Deutschlands/Partei der Arbeit (VSBD/PdA), led by Friedhelm Busse, and the Junge Front (JF). In February the Freundeskreis Ulrich Hutten was founded, whilst in March, Friedrich Ring founded the Deutscher Buergerschutz (DBS) in response to growing crime and an increase in the influx of foreigners. In April the Hamburger Liste fuer Auslaenderstopp was formed.

January 1983 saw the merger of the Aktionsfront Nationaler Sozialisten with the Nationale Aktivisten (NA), forming the ANS/NA. On April 1st the Deutsche Freiheitsbewegung (DDF) was formed. In November, former CSU-Bundestagsabgeordnete Franz Handlos and Ekkehard Voigt formed die Republikaner with Franz Schoenhuber. On December 7th, the Interior Minister banned the Aktionsfront Nationaler Sozialisten/Nationale Aktivisten and affiliated organisations. Also in this year, Friedhelm Busse was sentenced to three years and nine months imprisonment for numerous offences involving the possession of firearms.

On 28th April 1984, the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands (NPD) in North Rhein-Westphalia first used skinheads for security at its regional party conference. Vehicles were damaged and political opponents injured. In April, Michael Kuehnen founded the ANS-Auslandsorganisation (ANS-AO), as a precursor to a pan-European extremist movement. On May 26th the Komitee zur Vorbereitung der Feierlichkeiten des 100. Geburtstages von Adolf Hitler (KAH) (Committee for the Preparations for the Celebrations of the 100th Birthday of Adolf Hitler) was formed. At its conference in November, the NPD rejected a motion calling for the party to distance itself from the skinhead movement.

In January 1985, the FAP and the Wiking-Jugend formed an umbrella organisation for nationalist groups: the Volkstreue ausserparlamentarische Opposition (VAPO). In March, Voigt and Handlos left the Republikaner and set up the Bayerische Republikaner and the Freiheitliche Volkspartei (FVP) respectively. Also in March, the Soziale Volkspartei was formed in Berlin. At the Erste Europaeische Fuehrerthing in Paris on September 1st, many right-wing organisations decide to coordinate their activities on a European level. In November, two further organisations were formed: the Nationalistische Front (NF) and the Deutsche Aktionspartei/Bewegung der totalen Ordnung (DAP).

In September 1986, the Gemeinschaft Eisernes Kreuz EK1 was formed by former members of the FAP, whilst on October 12th, the Republikaner won 3% of the vote in the Bavarian regional elections. In November, Gerhard Frey of the Deutsche Volksunion (DVU), founded the Deutsche Volksliste.

On March 11th 1987, the former NPD official Guenter Deckert founded Die Deutschen, whilst on April 17th the Koenigstreue Deutsche Volkspartei (KDVP) was formed.

In late August, neo-Nazis demonstrated in Wunsiedel, awaiting the funeral of Rudolf Hess. In September, two more extremist organisations were formed: namely the Arbeitskreis Junge Familie and the Sturmvogel - Deutscher Jugendbund.

In January 1988, the Deutsch-Nationale Volkspartei (DNVP) was formed. On 5th April, Fred A. Leuchter published the Leuchter Report in the USA. As an engineer and self-pronounced gas chamber expert, he claimed that the mass killings of the Jews in the so-called "extermination camps" could not have taken place. This served to strengthen the beliefs of right-wing extremists, neo-Nazis and Revisionists, that there was no mass-extermination of the Jews under the Third Reich.

The Auto- und Buergerpartei (ABD) was founded in September, followed by Die Demokraten in November. On January 2nd 1989, during the campaign for the elections for the Berlin House of Representatives, the Republikaner showed a television advertisement of Turkish children and, in the background, music from the film Spiel mir das Lied vom Tod (Play Me The Song of Death). In the elections later that month, the Republikaner won 7.5% of the votes. However, in June, they won 7.1% of the votes (i.e. two million votes) in the European elections, with a result of 14.6% in Bavaria. In May of that year, the Munich court ordered the withdrawal of a computer diskette containing a program entitled Arier-Test (Aryan Test).

In July 1990, former FAP activists formed the Nationale Offensive (NO).

After the banning of the Internationaler Revisionistenkongress / Leuchter-Kongress in Munich in March 1991 and the arrest of its organiser Ernst Zündel, 400 delegates protested in the city. On 25th April Michael Kuehnen, "outed" as a homosexual during his three year incarceration between 1985 and 1988, died from an AIDS-related illness.

From 17th to 22nd September radical right-wing skinheads rioted outside a residence for foreigners in Hoyerswerda (Saxony) injuring 30 people. This protest triggered numerous other attacks throughout the country in the following weeks, injuring over 100 people. Indeed, during the weekend of the 28th-29th September, police recorded 43 attacks on foreigners, 22 of which were in North Rhein-Westphalia. On the 3rd October, two Lebanese children were critically injured in a fire-bomb attack on a refuge in Huenxe in North Rhein-Westphalia. On the 13th October, a refuge in Immenstadt (Allgaeu) was destroyed by a fire-bomb, seriously injuring two Kurds.

On March 14th 1992, a Skinhead concert was held near Weimar, with German groups such as Radikahl and Kraftschlag playing alongside American groups such as Bound for Glory. On April 5th the Republikaner won 10.9% of the votes in the regional elections in Badem-Wuerttemberg, whilst in a Berlin district election in May the party won 8.3% of the votes cast. In July, the Foerderwerk Mitteldeutsche Jugend (FMJ) was founded. From August 22nd to 28th there was heavy rioting outside a home for asylum seekers in Rostock-Lichtenhagen, culminating in an arson attack on the home on the 25th.

Between August 29th and September 2nd, there was major rioting outside an asylum seekers refuge in Cottbus. On November 23rd one Turkish woman and two Turkish children were killed and nine others injured when neo-Nazis set fire to their refuge in Moelln (Schleswig-Holstein). Four days later the Nationalsozialistische Front (NF) was banned, as was the Deutsche Alternative on December 10th, the Deutscher Kameradschaftsbund (DKB) on the 21st and the Nationale Offensive on the 22nd. The events at Rostock and Cottbus marked the start of a new wave of violence throughout Germany: from September to December 4167 racially motivated incidents were recorded, both the violent and the non-violent, compared with 2169 incidents in the period from January to August.<5>

On May 29th 1993, an arson attack on a house in Solingen killed five Turkish women and a girl, sparking off a new surge of extremist violence against foreigners throughout Germany. On August 27th Brandenburg became the first state to ban the use of the Reichskriegsflagge, a symbol used by the neo-Nazis to stir up hatred against foreigners. This move was followed only days later by a similar ban in other states. Joerg Petritsch, a singer with the skinhead group Stoerkraft, was given a two-year suspended sentence for spreading Nazi-propaganda. On October 29th, Cologne police arrested Fred A. Leuchter and charged him with Holocaust denial.

On April 14th 1994, when Manfred Kanther, the Interior Minister, published the 1993 Report of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, he stated that he had no intention of banning either the Republikaner or the Deutsche Volksunion (DVU), for fear of driving their 23,000 members underground. Instead, he said, the parties would continue to be carefully monitored by the police. On May 14th, neo-Nazis terrorised foreigners in Magdeburg by shouting "Deutschland den Deutschen" ("Germany for the Germans") and chasing African students into a cafi before beating them with iron bars.

On the 17th January 1995, the trial of three men and one woman began in Gross-Gerau. The four are charged with publishing the neo-Nazi booklet Der Einblick in 1993, containing the names and addresses of about 200 political opponents. Despite being withdrawn, some 180 copies are estimated to remain in circulation. The Dignity Report from February 15th 1994 said the following of the publication:

"On the pages of Der Einblick, the top leadership in German neo-Nazi networks issues a call to "neutralize all anti-German, anti-nationalist forces" and urge followers to "stop squandering the enormous violent potential" of the racist movement and to "mount successful counter actions." The publication contains information on intelligence gathering techniques and urges neo-Nazis to cultivate relations with police so that "data can be gathered without danger to oneself.""

On the 18th January, the Office for the Protection reported that the 1994 figures for right-wing offences in Berlin had risen from 650 in 1993 to 750. On 24th February, the Government eventually banned the FAP, described by Manfred Kanther, Interior Minister, as:

"an anti-democratic group "which disdains human rights and stirs up xenophobia and racism.""<6>

Similarly, in Hamburg, homes of members of the Nationale Liste were raided.

On April 20th scores of neo-Nazis were arrested around Germany for rioting to mark Hitler's birthday. In the same week Guenter Deckert, the leader of the NPD, was sentenced to two years' imprisonment by a court in Karlsruhe for Holocaust denial and incitement to racial hatred.

On March 23rd, Hamburg police raided the homes of those who had ordered and received neo-Nazi propaganda from the NSDAP-AO. Almost simultaneously Gerhard (Gary) Lauck was arrested by Danish police in Copenhagen. After much legal wrangling, the Danish Supreme Court confirmed on Friday 21st June that Lauck should be extradited to Germany to face prosecution under German anti-Nazi law.

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3.0 The popularity of right-wing extremism

The main cause for the rising popularity of the right-wing extremist parties in the mid to late 1980s could, as Betz suggests, be almost completely due to the Parteien- und Politikverdrossenheit (party and political apathy), which swept the country. This can be seen in the fact that at the first elections after reunification, those in 1990, ten million of those registered to vote stayed at home. In March 1989, 81% of all Germans and 90% of Republikaner voters questioned in an EMNID poll believed that the politicians from the mainstream parties were "out-of-touch" with the average person. Similarly, 65% of all voters and 88% of Republikaner voters considered the mainstream political parties to be no longer capable of solving Germany's problems. In the same poll, it was discovered that 43% of Republikaner voters had confidence in the party with regard to housing; 40% with regard to unemployment; 18% over the general state of the economy and 80% over immigration. In 1993 48% of Germans were "very worried" that politicians were no longer capable of solving the urgent problems facing Germany, such as immigration and the economy.<7>

Similarly, in the states of the former East Germany citizens were, after unification, faced with increasing rents coupled with increasing unemployment. This, in turn, led to an increase in crime, which was subsequently blamed on the foreign population, instead of the new policy-makers: the west German government in Bonn.

If the politicians cannot solve these problems, then who can? For as Betz states:

"On this view radical right-wing voters are typical floating voters who don't understand "the intricacies of politics in postindustrial societies" and therefore fall prey to clever demagogues who dress up empty slogans as viable solutions to real problems."<8>

Therefore it can be concluded that a fair proportion of these "floating voters" will be first-time voters. Indeed, the majority of right-wing voters are around 20 years old. Certainly the majority of right-wing extremists are aged between 18 and 30 and are suspected of being responsible for over 75% of extremist violence in 1993. Given this figure, it is not surprising that the largest group among the extremists (33.6%) is that of students and trainees. What is surprising, however, is that the next highest figure is that of the skilled workers and craftsmen, accounting for 28.7% of extremist violence. Evidently, radical right-wing views appear to be something inherent in the younger, educated classes.

But why should extreme right-wing views manifest themselves as violence against foreigners? The obvious explanation is racial purity: just as Hitler extolled the Aryan race, modern right-wing extremists see their own racial identity as being superior and something which they want to preserve at all costs. Perhaps one cause of this is an apparent unwillingness of foreigners to integrate into German society. In 1988 the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung conducted a survey amongst young Turks. It found that 65% of males between 20 and 30 years old socialised with Germans, whilst only 26% of their fathers did. Similarly, Petra Kappert, writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (25:9:1982), stated that an estimated 50% of Turkish schoolchildren in Germany attend Koran classes: a further example of an unwillingness to integrate into German society and determination to preserve their own culture when abroad.<9> Therefore, the supporters of the radical right may regard foreigners as a threat to their own culture and society.

A resurgence of right-wing views could, perhaps, be considered to be an obvious reaction by citizens of a country which lost its own culture and national identity when it lost the Second World War. The occupation of Germany by the allied powers after 1945 led to an influx of English-language literature and film, the latter still being very much in evidence in German cinemas. This loss of national identity can also be seen as a result of the de-nazification process: anyone listening to the anti-Semitic composer Wagner would have been suspected of being a Nazi, as would anyone expressing any form of national pride.

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4.0 The Parties

4.1 Die Republikaner

As has already been stated, Die Republikaner was formed on the 27th November 1983 by Franz Schoenhuber, as a party politically located between the DVU and the NPD, principally right of centre. However, the major problem facing the German Government is whether Die Republikaner is really, as it states, a coalition of democratic patriots<10>, or whether it is just another right-wing extremist party. On the front of their manifesto for the 1994 council elections in Mainz, the party stated:

"We reject extremism and violence in any form!"<11>

However, the party's rhetoric inside the manifesto smacks heavily of right-wing propaganda:

"WE are against the municipal building of accommodation for asylum-seekers, the use of taxes for fraudulent asylum-seekers (about 97%) and the preferential treatment of foreigners in the allocation of state-subsidized accommodation."<12>

Similarly:

"DIE REPUBLIKANER wants: [...] - no foreigners in the police. [...] - the immediate deportation of convicted foreign offenders, crime among foreigners is three times higher than among German citizens."<13>

Whilst these figures are actual statistics, it is clear that the party is using them to its advantage, if not exploiting them. The social policy of the manifesto was designed to withdraw public finance from foreigners' institutions and even the "anti-fascist / anti-racist" groups, which the party considers to be a cover for left-wing extremists. Such suspicions of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution cannot be helped by statements of the party leadership, for example in 1993, Schoenhuber, talking about a wartime propagandist, stated:

"... a Nazi propagandist such as Dr. Kurt Kiesinger could become the German Chancellor."<14>

It seems, as the British left-wing magazine The New Statesman & Society claimed in an article entitled "The hydra-headed monster of Germany", that:

"So far, no member of the right-wing Republican party has been caught red-handed at violence, and its leaders have been careful to dissociate the part from the extremists methods, if not their aims."<15>

Die Republikaner does not outwardly appear to be courting the votes of the extremists and radicals in Germany. Indeed, it even goes so far as to exclude former members of the NPD or DVU from its ranks, but it does seem to be exploiting the political apathy which has swept over the country in recent years. For as Betz states:

"Appealing to wide-spread xenophobia, growing anti-big business and antiglobal market sentiments, and exploiting growing uncertainty and fears with regard to the future it conformed to the image of a populist advocate of the interests of the small people."<16>

Membership of the party grew from 8,500 in 1988 to 25,000 in 1989, but then declined to 15,000 in 1990. The party's increase in popularity after 1989 could be seen to be a result of its relative success in the 1989 European elections, which:

"provided the party with almost #6 million in state election subsidies, enabling it to expand its organisation considerably."<17>

Since 1992, the party has been under observation by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and in eight states the German intelligence services have been called in to investigate it. On Friday March 3rd 1995, Saxony joined the list of states which list Die Republikaner as right-wing extremist and hence anti-constitutional. The Interior Minister of Saxony, Heinz Eggert, said of this:

"One thing is quite clear: the declarations of the Republikaner in its manifesto are appear entirely formal. But the wealth of material has shown that the Republikaner systematically defames the free democratic order, defames its institutions, continually contravening the discrimination laws in the areas of race, belief or nationality and shows very little distance from National Socialism.

Now die Republikaner is classified as anti-constitutional and that means that it will be investigated by the secret service."<18>

On presenting the 1993 report of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution on April 14th 1994, Manfred Kanther, the Interior Minister, said that the Government had no immediate intention of banning the party:

"... in spite of clear signs that it has links with neo-Nazi activists. [...] The reasoning is that a ban would make martyrs of the party leaders and drive the 23,000 active members underground."<19>

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4.2 Die Deutsche Volksunion

The Deutsche Volksunion e.V. was founded in January 1971, by the Munich publisher Dr. Gerhard Frey. The DVU-Liste D was formed as a new party on March 5th 1987, and took over the entire membership of the DVU, although the Liste D was removed in 1991. The membership in 1993 was estimated by the report of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution to be about 26,000, the same figure quoted in 1992, although Dr. Frey insists that the membership is greater.

Dr. Frey publishes two party newspapers: the Deutsche National-Zeitung, which sells for DM1,80, and the Deutsche Wochen-Zeitung/Deutscher Anzeiger, priced at DM2,- , which together had a weekly circulation of 110,000 in 1989. Backes and Jesse compare this figure to the 1986 circulation of the Rheinische Merkur/Christ und Welt, which was 122,000 copies per week.<20>

The DVU appears to be in a relatively strong financial position and managed to spend over #7 million21 in the Bremen regional elections in 1987, mainly:

"Through the sale of its nationalist media products, a book service and the trading of Nazi memorabilia (medals, coins, etc.)"<22>

At a rally in Passau on 2nd October 1993, an auditor declared that the last elections had cost the party DM11,000,000, paid for by Dr. Frey.<23>

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4.3 The Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands

The NPD was created by members of the Deutsche Reichspartei (DRP) on 28th November 1964, under the leadership of Fritz Thielen and Adolf von Thadden. In 1975 the party launched its newspaper the Deutsche Stimme. The overall aims of the party can be best summed up by the NPD regional leader for Lower Saxony, Horst Nolte:

"The system cannot be "improved", it must be superseded! The destruction of the system can only come from forces which develop as its enemies."<24>

The party clearly sets itself Nazi-style aims, with an ideology similar to that of the DVU, and at the party conference in June 1991, Guenter Deckert, a dedicated Revisionist, was elected party chairman, to replace Martin Mussgnug, who left the party in 1990.

According to the 1993 report of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the party owes the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg DM438,000 and the Government DM760,000, exactly the same figures quoted in the 1992 report. The party is required to repay a proportion of the advances made by the Government and the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg for election campaigns, according to paragraph 18 of the Party Law, because of poor results in the 1990 Federal Parliament elections and the 1992 regional election respectively.<25>

In 1992 the party was thought to have about 5,000 members, compared with 6,100 in 1991, although the 1993 figure remains the same as that of 1992. The party would possibly be looking to increase its membership dramatically in the next few years, in order either to be in a position to meet its debts to the authorities, or at least to have a greater membership base with which to fight the next elections.

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