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Bundeswehr soldiers in uniform
Photo: Paul-Philipp Braun / IMAGO
The Bundeswehr secret service MAD has asked all soldiers who are privately involved in the right-wing extremist youth organization AfD to immediately declare their membership to their employer. In a message from the military counterintelligence service on the force's intranet on Monday, it was said that membership in a right-wing extremist organization that is known to be secure is always viewed as an "actual indication" of efforts against the free-democratic basic order.
On the same day, a court confirmed that the AfD cadre factory Junge Alternative (JA) can be described as “certainly right-wing extremist”. The MAD warns that every JA member in the ranks of the Bundeswehr will be assessed as a suspected intelligence case. In addition, any soldier who is a member of a regional AfD association that is classified as right-wing extremist must report this “immediately.”
In principle, it is part of a soldier's duty to advocate for the preservation of the free basic order, both on duty and privately. This is already violated if a soldier "does not clearly distance himself from efforts that attack, fight or defame this state and the current constitutional order."
At the end of the report it says quite clearly: "Simply silence is not enough at this point!" The JA is specifically trying to recruit members of the Bundeswehr as members. The head of the JA, Hannes Gnauck, is a soldier himself. However, the AfD MP was banned from serving before he entered the Bundestag.
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