“Reviving the warrior culture” of England by posing as a sports club.
That is what a far-right group linked to a violent white supremacist group is doing that has been recruiting young people to achieve that goal, according to a BBC investigation.
The members of “Active Club” consider that the Nazi leader of World War II, Adolf Hitlerhe is a hero.
They describe themselves as a “peaceful and legal” group, focused on friendship and male physical activity.
But they have ties to the Rise Above Movement, which played a key role in the far-right riots in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.
Alexander Ritzmann, an expert on extremism, says the group is using “the image of a sports club” to build a “militia” destined for “organized violence.”
Since the founding of the first Active Club at the end of 2020, it is estimated that more than 100 clubs in the United States, Canada and Europe.
The group arrived in the UK in 2023 and has since expanded with branches in Northern Ireland, Scotland and several regions of England, including the capital London.
A BBC North West investigation found that Active Club groups in the UK had more than 6,000 subscribers on the encrypted app Telegram.
Telegram has closed the group’s page in England at least four times, but the last one that was created in mid-August already has almost 1,600 subscribers.
Your content on social networks
The Active Club social networks contain:
- Photographs of its members celebrating Hitler’s birthday with a cake covered with a swastika.
- Images of members wearing t-shirts emblazoned with the term Waffen-SS, the name of the Nazi fighting branch during World War II.
- Evidence of recruits carrying racist signs in public places.
- Messages following the knife attacks in Southport, England, encouraging people to “not stand by”.
- Tips to avoid being detected by the police in the riots that occurred after the knife attacks.
Various neo-Nazi fight clubs have been promoted under the name Active Club since 2020 by American far-right activist and founder of the group Rise Above Movement, Robert Rundo.
Rundo was arrested in Romania in 2023 following a warrant issued by US authorities.
He was accused of assaulting a police officer, organizing violence and conspiring during the wave of violence in the United States in 2017.
Only white men of European descent
In a 30-minute phone call that was secretly recorded by the BBC, an Active Club coordinator said they were looking for “guys who take things seriously.”
He asked the BBC journalist his ethnicity, physical fitness, religion, boxing ability or practice martial arts and if he could drive.
He then added that the group only recruits men who are “white and of European descent” and that there were “guys literally everywhere and in every region of England.”
“We are trying to build a mass movement of strong, physically fit and capable men,” he said.
He added that the group was “peaceful and legal” and wanted to avoid being shut down because its members “They could not save their families, their friends and their people from prison“.
However, messages posted by Active Club page administrators frequently include references to future violent conflicts and the need to “revive our nation’s warrior culture.”
One post also urges members to “take to the streets… or risk having your lineage disappear.”
A “sophisticated operation”
Alexander Ritzmann, researcher at the international organization The Counter Extremism Project and advisor to the European Commission’s Radicalization Awareness Network, says that “I have never seen a far-right network grow so quickly.”
He described Active Club as a “sophisticated operation” and warned that if it were allowed to “continue to operate and multiply, the probability of selective political violence would increase“.
He added that his goal was “to build a kind of militia hidden behind the image of a sports club, but that in reality it is preparing for organized violence.”
“Its members and groups will not publish a manifesto after committing acts of violence,” he explained.
“It is different from other types of far-right terrorism, where after an attack a manifesto is published with all kinds of explanations and theories.”
He explained that if Active Club committed violent acts, I would do it “disguised” and he would not let in “any information about his true intention.”
“Maybe they’ll want to pass it off as a bar fight or a fight on a bus or a train… to avoid being exposed,” he said.
In research published in early 2024, the counter-extremism campaign group Hope Not Hate claimed that Active Club had members who had made bomb attack threats and participated in marches National Action, a British neo-Nazi group classified as terrorist by the authorities of that country.
For an act to be formally considered terrorism in the UK, it must meet a number of legal requirements set out in the Terrorism Act 2000, such as serious violence or damage to property, and aim to intimidate or promote a political cause. , religious, racial or ideological.
Nick Aldworth, former chief detective and UK national counter-terrorism co-ordinator, claims Active Club’s UK posts had been “carefully crafted” to avoid being implicated in terrorism law and made “deliberate” calls to action in those who ask to avoid violence.
“However, its intention is openly contradicted by symbols and images that imply violent acts and connections with Nazism.”“he added.
Preparing for a mythical race war
Nigel Bromage, who runs the anti-radicalisation charity Exit Hate After being part of neo-Nazi groups for more than two decades, he points out that the rise of the Active Club in the United Kingdom is “worrying.”
He explained that the member who spoke to the BBC spoke of “building a mass movement, so it’s not about small numbers.”
“They want to recruit a large number of people who are physically fit, who obey many rules and regulations and who are disciplined,” he continued.
“When they say they are not violent, that is just an excuse to cover your back.”
But what do they train for? Why do they insist on staying in shape? Why do they take everything so seriously?
“I think it’s a clue to what they’re doing, which is prepare for a mythical race war that they believe is going to happen“.
A representative of the United Kingdom’s anti-terrorist police assured that the scale of the far-right terrorist threat in the country had “evolved constantly over the past two decades.”
He explained that the growing number of cases his agents are working on is due to the “growing number of young people who are attracted to ideology through social media and online platforms.”
“Our dependence on digital spaces and networks is having a profound effect on how extreme opinions can form, how individuals become radicalized, and how they can be recruited by extremist groups or organizations,” he added.
A government spokesman said religious and racial hatred “has absolutely no place in our society.”
He added that the British government was “working to address the threat posed by extremist ideologies and respond to the growing and changing patterns of extremism across the United Kingdom.”
The Active Club group did not respond to the BBC’s request for comment..
The BBC also contacted Telegram for its version, but had not received a response as of the date of publication.
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