Black wolves
The Black Wolves were a militant, German nationalist organization of Alsatian separatists . In the 1970s and early 1980s, members of the Black Wolves carried out a series of incendiary and explosive attacks against symbols of French statehood as well as numerous propaganda crimes (graffiti) in Alsace.
The attack on the Turenne monument in Turckheim (Türkheim) in 1980 and the two demolitions of the Staufen cross near Thann in 1981 caused the greatest sensation in Alsace ; these events were largely unmentioned in the German media. The legal offshoot of the Black Wolves, the Council of France-Germans, publishes the publication Elsaß den Alsässern - Kampfblatt für Nutersprach und Heimatrecht . Since the mid-1990s, the black wolves again increasingly attracted attention through graffiti.
Attack at Türkheim
The group's first bomb attack hit the monument to French Marshal Turenne in Turckheim in Upper Alsace on December 9, 1980 . The monument glorifies Turenne's victory in the battle of Türkheim over the imperial troops on January 5, 1675. The separatists claim that this victory was followed by a hideous massacre, which no serious historian has confirmed.
First attack at Thann
The most famous attack on March 16, 1981 was the demolition of a memorial for the French reconquest of Alsace in 1945 on the summit of Staufen in the Vosges near Thann . In their letter of confession, the perpetrators declared in German that the concrete monument had been "built by the colonists and their collaborators in 1949 in order to keep hatred against the German nation alive forever". The terrorists' letter of confession culminated in the demand: “We demand German lessons in all school classes without exception. Our homeland and our language belong to us Elässern and only to us. ”The letter is marked with“ Alsatian combat group - the black wolves ”.
The notice and the letter referred to the inscription on the memorial: “Face à l'envahisseur, notre fidélité a bravé la force, trois siècles en témoignent 1648–1948” (In the face of the conqueror, our loyalty has overcome violence, three centuries bear witness including 1648-1948).
Second attack at Thann
The memorial was restored quickly and true to the original, but it was blown up again on September 20, 1981, whereby the assassins left traces in addition to another letter of confession. The second letter of confession read:
“Staufen Kreuz von Thann: No monument to the alleged 'LIBERATORS' as long as the politicians don't follow our conditions.
1681–1981:
300 years of French colonialism in Alsace is 300 years too long !
At that time, the conquest of Alsace-Lorraine was not a LIBERATION but a ROBBERY, contrary to international law.
We demand German lessons in all schools in Alsace-Lorraine.
We don't let our mother tongue and culture suppress.
We want to be a free people in our own country!
EKSW "
Arrest and trial
Less than four weeks later, on October 14, 1981, the perpetrators were arrested: three socially integrated Alsatian craftsmen and small businessmen in their fifties with no criminal record. The head of the group was Pierre Rieffel from Val de Villé , a liqueur manufacturer with around 20 employees. The other two perpetrators were Ewald Jaschek and René Woerly. The preparation of the deeds turned out to be comparatively amateurish. For example, the perpetrators took off from each other on the phone even though they had previously been involved in the autonomist movement in Alsace and were therefore bugged. This then led to their capture.
They were tried in Mulhouse in 1982 . It turned out that Rieffel's father was interned in the former Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp after the end of the Second World War on charges of collaboration with the Nazis . According to Rieffel, however, his father only served as mayor of a small community, with no further involvement in Nazi injustice. In the Struthof camp, which was still in use after the end of the war, his father almost starved to death; when he was 15 at the time, he tried to throw food over the fence and was caught by French guards. They brutally beat him up and supposedly left him dead, he owes his rescue to American soldiers.
A certain sensation caused a sensation in the trial that the priest and publicist Pierri Zind (1923–1988), well-known in Alsace, testified in favor of the accused. In the end, the perpetrators were sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment without parole, but with the loss of their entire property. After his release, Rieffel managed to return to his profession, and in 2008 he was again producing liqueurs in his home town ("Les délices du Val de Villé").
Statement by the Federal Government
In January 1995, the German government responded to a small inquiry about their findings about the black wolves as follows:
“It is a French organization based in Alsace that had already carried out numerous bomb attacks there in the mid-1970s. She also had connections to right-wing extremists in the Federal Republic of Germany. In 1984 members of this Alsatian separatist movement founded a new organization called the "Council of France-Germans" or "Freundeskreis Karl Roos ". Since then, the »Freundeskreis Karl Roos« for Alsace-Lorraine has published »Alsace to the Alsatians - Combat Journal for Mother Tongues and Homeland Law«. "
The news magazine Der Spiegel suspected in its issue no. 45/1994 that the Düsseldorf multimillionaire Hermann Niermann (1905–1985) had supported the defense of the members of the Black Wolves in court. Through the Hermann Niermann Foundation named after him, he had also promoted the autonomist party Alsatian-Lorraine People's League.
Desecration of the cemetery
On the night of February 18-19, 2019, 96 graves at the Jewish cemetery in Quatzenheim were desecrated. The graves were marked with blue or yellow swastikas. A crypt bears the inscription "ELSASSICHES SCHWARZEN WOlFE" (sic) . On the same day, President Emmanuel Macron , accompanied by the Chief Rabbi of France Haïm Korsia and the Minister of the Interior Christophe Castaner, visited the site of the desecration of the cemetery .
literature
- Bernard Fischbach, Roland Oberlé: Les Loups Noirs: autonomisme & terrorisme en Alsace. éditions Alsatia-Union 1990.
Individual evidence
- ^ "Bas-Rhin: 96 sépultures d'un cimetière juif profanées" , RTL 19 February 2019.