NFB 1 /KU KLUX KLAN ARTICLE

NOTES FROM THE BORDERLAND issue 1 blue colour cover 36 pages

The very first issue of this hard-hitting parapolitical publication never afraid to ask the questions others don't dare to, and report on stories too tame for our largely supine media to cover. This landmark issue (complete with detorned front cover as above) includes:

--a scoop, with major ramifications: using unrivalled inside information and documents, blowing the lid off the fascist ITP (International Third Position) Spanish village charity scam. Essentially, the group were running ostensibly religious charity shops as a front for channelling funds into ann (all white) Spanish village renovation project. Even the Charity Commission subsequently pretended to investigate (before they did a deal with the ITP). For those unaware of who the ITP are, there is also a concise background briefing on this sophisticated outfit (now called England First) who combine Lefebvrist Catholicism, Evolian-influenced political soldier ideology, and a flair for making money, not least through Roberto Fiore's housing rackets.

--a truly bizarre and well documented tale concerning the activities of hermaphroditic Stalino-Fascist 'Lady Athena McHugh'. who set up a honey-trap fascist group (the British National Socialist Party) that corresponded with potential recruits named on a stolen British National Party membership list that some believed (wrongly) the neo-Nazi Combat 18 might have taken. Simultaneously, McHugh infiltrated the Left-leaning Campaign Against the Job-Seekers Allowance, in addition to spying on immigrant/Islamic groups. McHugh's operation was facilitated both by the New Communist Party and the shadowy Searchlight magazine/organisation--key personnel being Daphne LIddle & her supposedly estranged husband Terry LIddle. A saga so strange you couldn't make it up: and we certainly didn't! This episode produced a letter from one BNP functionary (Alf Waite) answering member's complaints regarding McHugh's attendance (in feminine garb) at a BNP Regional meeting that will bring tears of laughter to your eyes (p.14). It certainly did ours, and still does, even today.

--NFB has always stood shoulder to shoulder with grass roots activists under the state cosh, as here, with an enthralling contemporary perspective on the crucial GANDALF (Green Anarchist & Animal Liberation Front) conspiracy trial.

--agents provocateur come in many shapes and sizes, and we here profiled one individual, Jamie de Mayo/Damji for the first time. Subsequently, his career path took a downward spiral.

--occasionally, US fascists try to set up UK franchises: read a detailed low-down on one such attempt, the Ku Klux Klan UK branch, bearing all the hallmarks of a state pseudo-group, given lots of media publicity by sleazoids like Roger Cook/Searchlight. Article reproduced below (minus graphics)

While the production values are understandably not those of later issues, this edition pioneered what has proven to be NFB's strong points--in depth research, rigorously done, backed up with a wealth of internal documents and facts, all fully footnoted (unlike disinformation conduits such as Private Eye which some erroneously compare us to). A publication those hungry for solid information will love--and those engaged in political dirty tricks have long learned to hate. In short, all the investigative journalism you could wish for--but would never find in the Guardian. A collector's item some will treasure...

Being wise after the event is a cheap commodity, the best kind of wisdom is during or before the fact. I have elsewhere written of the state's attempts to take over Combat 18 and turn it into a 'pseudo-gang', along the lines recommended by Brigadier Frank Kitson.

In this scenario, forces that appear opposed to the state are in fact controlled at arms-length by elements of the apparatus. Now Combat 18 has passed into history, the question arises, what will the state and their flunkeys try next in order to succeeed where they (largely) failed with C18? This is a legitimate question because for us parapolitics is not merely speculation about events long past, but an analytical tool that can on occasion aid political struggles. As the BNSP episode detailed elsewhere in this magazine indicates, the state always has more than one iron in the fire. The 'next big thing' in the UK in terms of media demonisation is going to be the Ku Klux Klan. I stress media demonisation--there are other far right outfits who have far more realistic (from their point of view) and sophisticated strategies who have not received such a sustained public profile, nor are they likely to. As will be outlined below, there has already been a concerted effort by the state and their media outlets to 'hype' the Klan, exaggerating its significance and degree of support in what can only be described as a free advertising campaign, launched before the 'product' was even properly on the domestic market.

For most people, the Klan have an instantly recognisable image:red-necked bigots who go around at night wearing pointed pillows on their heads seeking to frighten the life out of racial minorities. In that sense the name already has strong brand recognition, and it is this established clandestine conspiratorial profile that precludes the Klan, in my view, from a serious future in the UK as a viable political grouping. What isn't well known, but should be by all concerned, is that in the USA the KKK is currently a shadowy organisation with barely any members--a recent report puts it at little more than 2,500, down from as many as 12,000 in the 1960s [1]. The reasons for this decline are complex, but among other factors an important one has to be the intervention of US state agencies, in particular the FBI [2]. The 1970s Klan was ravaged by disputes between David Duke's KKK and Bill Wilkinson's 'Invisible Empire' of the KKK. According to George & Wilcox (two knowledgeable commentators) in "1978 Wilkinson began engaging in a strategy that would make his Invisible Empire the main Klan group in the United States. His method was to openly and unabashedly engage in violent rhetoric. He said that the Klan had tried a moderate approach for years, but it had failed to stop black advances and it was time to try other methods, presumably including violence. One disquieting tactic was to pose for the media with weapons including machine guns. He went out of his way to engage in confrontations where violence might occur" [3]. What a surprise (or not) when it transpired that Wilkinson was an FBI informant--and in that role had deliberately set the KKK on an even more violent path than before.

This is not the place to go into the various links between the KKK and UK fascists, which have been highly sporadic and short-lasting [4]. Recent leaders since a 1990 reorganisation have included Alan Beshella, who lives in South Wales, and has been accused of being a child abuser who is a fugitive from US justice [5]. Things only became really interesting in 1996, when two separate Klan organisations were set up. One of them, the 'Knights of the KKK' opened for business in both England & Scotland [6],

and was soon after that featured in a News of the World article under the by-line of Special Branch mouthpiece Gary Jones who described them as having "small IRA-style cells growing nationwide"--a sure sign the secret state wants to prioritise targetting a particular group [7].

This Klan branch seems to have folded quite quickly, much of the membership joining the current Klan brand set for take off, the reconstituted and revitalised 'Invisible Empire' label, head office located in the run-down industrial town of Bethlehem Pennsylvania. The UK relaunch document speaks of "moving towards a more cell-based structure" [8]. Before returning to what this new franchise might be up to, it

is just as well to remind ourselves just how much pre-publicity they have had, which makes me highly suspicious.

The first public sign of the Klan being hyped came in the 'Cook Report' TV programme transmitted 17/6/97. Cook ludicrously claimed that they had "effectively replaced Combat 18" [9]. No evidence was given for this extravagant claim.

Next was a Searchlight 'security alert' sent to Anti-Fascist Action (AFA) branches dated 3/6/97. This was an example of rare (unique) humility from the 'team' who affected to be concerned that issue 1 of the UK Klan magazine January 30th had published an AFA national contact list. To see how suspicious this mailing was, one need only recall that such 'alerts' were never issued to AFA when far more accurate information was published in Redwatch or Combat 18 magazines 1 and 3. Why alert anti-fascists to largely inaccurate information when previously correct information was hoarded? No anti-fascist logic to that, but certainly a state logic. And, sure enough, towards the end of June an intrinsically ridiculous story started doing the media rounds, about the fact that KKK leaflets had been left on car windscreens in the towns of Arbroath and Cupar in Scotland! This was covered in the Mirror, Guardian and Sunday Telegraph [10].

If you consider that BNP leaflets (or indeed NSM/ENM leaflets) are placed on similar locations virtually every weekend, then there has to be some reason why these incidents were being highlighted, over and above the content of the described actions. July's Searchlight mentioned having obtained an issue of January 30th magazine--but didn't (significantly) mention the refounding statement of the UK Klan.

Two recent documents have been circulated aimed at winning recruits to the Klan, and both are illuminating. The first, headlined 'Please Read' was written by long-time Nazi occultist Alan Winder, who hails from Kent. He has had a varied career, active in the NF, British Movement, BNP and most recently on the fringes of C18 [11]. Startlingly, as though meant to impress, he admits to having "formerly served as an Intelligence Operative in the British army" (p.2). This admission (even if fantasy) by anybody in any sphere of politics should be cause for concern, once an intelligence asset always an asset in my book. Bizarrely, he goes on to claim that he has been chosen as 'Imperial Wizard' because "it is hard for ZOG to pressure me into dropping my Klan activities, as they have with others". The reason he gives is curious--"I have recently been sacked from my job of the last ten years, without any form of the compensation, for my Klan work, and I am waiting now also to lose my home by repossession, as I cannot afford to keep up my mortgage payments. Therefore I cannot pay any fines imposed by ZOG" [12]. While this might mean Winder could face prison with impunity, it might also mean he is very susceptible to financial inducements. In other words, it is highly ambiguous. An article he wrote for issue 2 of January 30th (July 1977) isn't so capable of nuanced interpretation. Firstly, he urged Ulster Loyalists to "fight on the mainland, and openly, against ZOG" (p.8). His talk of "being prepared to fight a terrorist battle" and promises he will go to prison rather than pay fines, and urging of others to do likwise, may well be sincere. The balance of probability has to be however that those who advocate (even in slight jest) stunts like "stealing an atomic bomb" (p.9) have to be watched very carefully indeed. That Winder's deputy is the ludicrous figure of Bill Binding, ex-NF/National Democrats & later BNP, hardly inspires confidence. Both these two characters have made too many quick zig-zags across the political spectrum to be seen as entirely credible.

CONTINUED OVERLEAF