The Turkish ultranationalists are the largest right-wing extremist movement in Germany. The Grey Wolves could use Turkey’s European Championship match against Georgia on Tuesday (from 6 p.m.) for their own purposes.
In July 2023, a photo from a gym caused a stir. It showed former German national player Mesut Özil with a training partner. Özil smiled and revealed a tattoo. Three crescent moons and a howling wolf were depicted on his chest. It is the symbol of the Grey Wolves, an ultra-nationalist Turkish movement. With 18,000 members, it is considered the largest right-wing extremist movement in Germany.
“Football has been a recruitment platform for the Grey Wolves for decades,” says educator Burak Yilmaz, who researches this ideology. “I expect they will make intensive use of it this summer.”
At the European Football Championship in Germany, the Turkish national team will play two preliminary round matches in Dortmund and thus in the Ruhr region, where the Grey Wolves have good connections. The first of these will be on Tuesday against Georgia. Burak Yilmaz thinks it is possible that fans in the stadium will shout nationalist slogans: “The Grey Wolves could also approach young people in the area around the stadium.” On the train, in cafes, on the street. When the Turkish team was welcomed a few days ago in Barsinghausen, some fans waved a flag with symbols of the Grey Wolves – as a video shows.
Right-wing extremist Grey Wolves: Mesut Özil shocks with neo-Nazi tattoo https://t.co/RtesO3dDP8
— ntv news (@ntvde) July 23, 2023
The Grey Wolves are networked in local politics
Burak Yilmaz knows from his own experience how the recruitment attempts work. He worked as a referee for a long time in his hometown of Duisburg. At several youth games he had seen flags, jerseys and banners with symbols of the Grey Wolves. Sometimes, as the teams ran onto the pitch, he heard ethnic marching songs that put the Turkish nation above all others. “Coaches and parents incited the young players and spoke of Turkishness – as if it were a battle.”
Now and again, there were attacks on the pitches. The victims included Kurdish, Alevi and dark-skinned footballers. Yilmaz repeatedly documented the language glorifying violence in match reports. “But there were no consequences,” he says. “The Grey Wolves are networked in local politics. And the football associations have little knowledge of their history and structures.”
The Grey Wolves in Turkey have their origins in the 1960s. They call themselves “Ülkücüler”, idealists, and propagate the historical, ethnic and moral superiority of the Turkic peoples. From the beginning, the Grey Wolves in Turkey were tied to the MHP, the Party of Nationalist Movements. Thousands of Turkish emigrants brought the ideology with them to Western Europe.
For example, to Germany. From the 1970s onwards, Turkish guest workers increasingly tried to join football clubs, but the regional associations of the German Football Association (DFB) generally rejected them. Sports officials at the time shared the widespread opinion that the guest workers would return to Turkey anyway. Integration concepts? There were hardly any.
The guest workers founded their own clubs, especially in the Ruhr region. The guest workers were often accused by the majority society of isolating themselves. But then they replied that their clubs were just a reaction to the racism of the Germans.
The Grey Wolves took advantage of these tensions and became involved in football as supervisors, trainers and sponsors. In the clubs they reach children, young people and their parents of Turkish origin. Many families have lived in Germany for decades, but continue to get their news from Turkish newspapers and television programs.
The Grey Wolves could build on this political disorientation with their ideology, explains political scientist Mahir Tokatli, who conducts research at RWTH Aachen University. The Grey Wolves take up the young footballers’ experiences of exclusion and offer an alternative: Turkish nationalism. One of their mottos: “Become German, stay Turkish!”
Mesut Özil seems like an advertising figure
Against this background, Mesut Özil seems like an advertising figure for the Grey Wolves. For a few years, the 2014 world champion was seen as a beacon of hope for a multicultural German society, but then his decline began in 2018 after a photo with Turkish President Erdogan.
The criticism of Özil was often accompanied by racism. He was a low-profile player among many amateur footballers in Germany, but his hero status grew in migrant sports clubs. A footballer who gives everything for Germany and is still rejected by the majority? Many young people of Turkish origin can identify with this story. It is the Grey Wolves who are seizing on this frustration, reinforcing it with slogans and wanting to direct attention even more towards Turkey.
“When there are polarizing debates in Turkey, the threat level also increases here in the Ruhr region,” says Mehmet Tanli. The social worker has lived in Germany since 1980. As an Alevi, Tanli senses how the ultranationalists take out their anger on people of Turkish origin who do not support Turkishness. For example, in 2016, when Kurdish institutions were attacked in Berlin, Hamburg and Stuttgart after the failed coup attempt in Turkey.
Tanli believes it is possible that the Turkish national team’s games could also become celebrations for the Grey Wolves. Their games are accompanied by a large police presence. “The German authorities and the Office for the Protection of the Constitution have not taken the Grey Wolves seriously for a long time,” says Tanli. “We should invest more in education and prevention.”
Some clubs carry the commitment to Turkish nationalism in their name
There are football clubs in Germany that the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution places in the spectrum of the Grey Wolves, such as clubs that have their commitment to Turkish nationalism in their name, for example Turanspor. Other clubs are more reserved, use the old Turkish script or use symbols of Ottoman culture, including the number 1453. In that year, Christian Constantinople was conquered by the Ottomans.
In the social networks of some German-Turkish clubs, one also comes across connections to the right-wing extremist Turkish party MHP. There are videos of rappers glorifying violence. Or youth players who show the “wolf salute” or leave comments like: “The Turk will be brave and the Jew will be cowardly.”
How can the influence of Turkish right-wing extremists in Germany be reduced? Some football associations are already making sure during the season planning that teams that are close to the Grey Wolves do not play in the same league as Kurdish teams. And at least in North Rhine-Westphalia, footballers can now report attacks by the Grey Wolves to a reporting office.
The educator Burak Yilmaz is calling for a ban on the Grey Wolves. As in France, where the Council of Ministers ordered the dissolution of the Grey Wolves in 2020. But there are concerns of a legal nature. The Grey Wolves are not a central party with fixed membership, but a branched movement. “We need a serious debate,” says Burak Yilmaz. The European Championship could provide the impetus for this.