NPR (“Across Germany, 25 are arrested on suspicion of planning an armed coup, officials say“):
Thousands of police carried out a series of raids across much of Germany on Wednesday against suspected far-right extremists who allegedly sought to overthrow the state in an armed coup.
Federal prosecutors said some 3,000 officers conducted searches at 130 sites in 11 of Germany’s 16 states against adherents of the so-called Reich Citizens movement. Some members of the group reject Germany’s postwar constitution and have called for the overthrow of the government.
Justice Minister Marco Buschmann described the raids as an “anti-terrorism operation,” adding that the suspects may have planned an armed attack on institutions of the state.
Prosecutors said 22 German citizens were detained on suspicion of “membership in a terrorist organization.” Three other people, including a Russian citizen, are suspected of supporting the organization, they said.
The weekly Der Spiegel reported that locations searched include the barracks of Germany’s special forces unit KSK in the southwestern town of Calw. The unit has in the past been scrutinized over alleged far-right involvement by some soldiers.
Federal prosecutors declined to confirm or deny that the barracks was searched.
Along with detentions in Germany, prosecutors said that one person was detained in the Austrian town of Kitzbuehel and another in the Italian city of Perugia.
Prosecutors said those detained are alleged to last year have formed a “terrorist organization with the goal of overturning the existing state order in Germany and replace it with their own form of state, which was already in the course of being founded.”
The suspects were aware that their aim could only be achieved by military means and with force, prosecutors said.
BBC (“Germany arrests 25 accused of plotting coup“) adds:
The group of far-right and ex-military figures are said to have prepared to storm the parliament building, the Reichstag, and seize power.
A minor aristocrat described as Prince Heinrich XIII, 71, is alleged to have been central to their plans.
According to federal prosecutors, he is one of two alleged ringleaders among those arrested across 11 German states.
The plotters are said to include members of the extremist Reichsbürger [Citizens of the Reich] movement, which has long been in the sights of German police over violent attacks and racist conspiracy theories. They also refuse to recognise the modern German state.
Other suspects came from the QAnon movement who believe their country is in the hands of a “deep state”.
An estimated 50 men and women are alleged to have been part of the group, said to have plotted to overthrow the republic and replace it with a new state modelled on the Germany of 1871 – an empire called the Second Reich.
NYT (“Germany Arrests Dozens Suspected of Planning to Overthrow Government”) adds:
The prosecutors described the group, which they did not identify, as being influenced by the ideologies of the conspiracy group QAnon and a right-wing German conspiracy group called the Reichsbürger, or Citizens of the Reich, which believes that Germany’s post-World War II republic is not a sovereign country but a corporation set up by the victorious Allies.
Many of those arrested had military training and included former German soldiers, including from the army of the former East Germany, and were known to have been heavily armed with weapons acquired illegally. The group was most likely formed in late 2021, the prosecutors said.
Its aim was “to overcome the existing state order in Germany and to establish its own form of state, the outlines of which have already been worked out,” the prosecutors said in the statement.
[…]
The group, which included people who had taken part in demonstrations against coronavirus lockdowns, was fueled by conspiracy theories, the authorities said.
According to the members of the group, liberation is promised by the imminent intervention of the “Alliance,” a technically superior secret coalition of governments, intelligence services and militaries of various states, including Russia and the United States, according to the prosecutors.
Germany’s intelligence services have for years said that the greatest threat to the country came from domestic, far-right extremist groups.
Obviously, all we have at this point is the police point of view, which can often be skewed. It’s not at all clear from these reports how plausible this plot was, in terms of the ability of these people to actually carry it out. I’m highly skeptical on that front.
Still, what’s fascinating to me is how unified far-right conspiracy theories have become across the West. I had no idea before this morning, for example, that QAnon was an international phenomenon. While the “deep state” was originally a Turkish concept, I was unaware of it before Donald Trump made it a part of his messaging here; it has apparently been incorporated among German right-wingers as well. And of course, Russia seems to figure heavily in all of these threads, seen as a willing accomplice to undermine Western institutions everywhere.
