BERLIN — Anyone who wants to become a member of the Jungadler (Young Eagle) youth group is expected to be tough. The invitation to their “leadership school” states that participants must bring specific gear: a compass, an axe, a waterproof poncho. They are to prepare seriously, including drawing up a list of the ten “most important people” in German history and being prepared to defend your choices at any time of day or night.
The document ends with a warning written in old-style Fraktur font: “Some things can be experienced harshly or softly; we experience them harshly.”
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“Leadership schools” (in German, Führerschulen) is what the Nazi regime called its cadre training centers, such as those for the Hitler Youth. Now, 80 years later, the Jungadler is using the same term for its own group leader training.
It has been just over three months since the Jungadler, a youth organization previously unknown to the public, was brought to light by a report in Die Zeit and the ARD broadcast program Kontraste. Investigators from the Berlin public prosecutor’s office are now looking into whether the group may be a front for the banned Neo-Nazi organization “Heimattreue Deutsche Jugend” (HDJ) from the 1990s, which would be a criminal offense. A spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office confirmed the “ongoing investigation.” However, to protect the proceedings, he declined to comment “on the status of the case, the specific allegations, or the general classification of the organization.”
A suspected leader of the Jungadler denied in an interview with Die Zeit that the group was continuing the work of the HDJ. He claimed the accusation was “fabricated,” and that the Jungadler is apolitical and sees itself in the tradition of the German youth movement — not Nazi National Socialism.
The HDJ was one of the most radical Neo-Nazi organizations in Germany. Before it was banned in 2009, it indoctrinated children and teenagers during their free time, modeling itself on the Hitler Youth. Adolf Hitler was portrayed to them as a “hero of our history,” swastikas were painted on their faces, they wore uniforms during flag ceremonies, and they were taught “racial studies.”
The HDJ trained children and youth to see themselves as a future ethnic elite. “The best method is always the one that shapes our young fighters into fanatical National Socialist freedom warriors,” read an internal document at the time.
There are several crucial questions now, the first of which is whether this form of National Socialist education is continuing in secret, just under a new name? Or is the Jungadler simply a nationalist-style scouting group?
There are also suspicions that a prominent AfD family, former HDJ activists, and possibly even a senior public prosecutor from Brandenburg sent or planned to send their children to this new organization. And, crucially: have security services for years overlooked the formation of a group that seems to be reviving the model of the Hitler Youth?
“Big trip” to Rügen
Die Zeit asked domestic intelligence services across the country what they knew about the Jungadler and its similarities to the HDJ. Most declined to comment. Only the agencies in the German states of Saxony and Baden-Württemberg, and the Federal Office, confirmed they were aware of the group. Others, like the one in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, claimed to have no information. But there are signs that the organization operates nationwide, including a Jungadler “major expedition” to the German island of Rügen in the Baltic Sea.
The materials provide insight into the group’s personnel, ideology, and structure.
Evidence can be found in documents reviewed by Die Zeit: calendars, photo albums, internal notes, and training materials. There are strong indications that these come from inside the Jungadler itself.
The materials provide insight into the group’s personnel, ideology, and structure. For publication, the faces of minors were covered over to protect their privacy.
HDJ leaders’ kids, and AfD link
A closer look at the documents reveals striking connections to families already active in the HDJ, including that of lawyer Laurens Nothdurft from Saxony-Anhalt.
Nothdurft was once the “second federal leader” of the HDJ, and his wife served for a time as the “federal girls’ leader.” Now, the Jungadler’s files include an invitation to “leadership school” addressed to one of Nothdurft’s seven children.
Today, Laurens Nothdurft is a member of the far-right AfD party and mayor of the Roßlau district in eastern Germany. He is also frequently seen at the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament, where he works for the AfD’s parliamentary group. These days, he also puts his knowledge of association bans to professional use: he is representing the far-right Compact publishing house in its legal challenge against its ban, a case currently before the Federal Administrative Court.
According to the materials, one of his children reportedly took part in Jungadler activities years ago and later completed the leadership training program. This is supported by photos and documents. In an undated letter, the young person appears to invite others on a trip to the Harz Mountains, using their full name and listing Nothdurft’s address. When contacted, the individual declined to comment. Laurens Nothdurft also did not respond to questions about whether he sent his child to the Jungadler or whether he was aware of their involvement.
The HDJ wasn’t a typical club you joined and left at will; it openly claimed to seek out “the tough ones” and “not the weak.”
A lawyer representing him wrote to Die Zeit that there is no proof of a successor organization to the HDJ. A second inquiry received a similar response: no available information regarding successor or replacement organizations to the HDJ. According to Nothdurft’s lawyer, this proves there is no “interest in information” on the matter.
Small and agile
Exactly how many members the Jungadler has remains unclear. Before it was banned, the HDJ had an estimated 400 members and viewed itself as a training ground for future political leaders. In one document, the Jungadler describes itself as a “smaller but more agile youth organization.” The internal material contains several clues pointing to families already active in the HDJ. For example, the child of neo-Nazi Holger S. from North Rhine-Westphalia, who once appeared on the cover of the HDJ magazine Funkenflug. Two children of a former HDJ leader named U., also from North Rhine-Westphalia. And the child of another former HDJ member from Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, a man who now offers survival training online and promotes his background in “outdoor education.”
Die Zeit contacted the parents involved, asking whether they were aware of their children’s participation in the Jungadler or had even sent them there themselves. None responded. Nor did any of those children who are now adults reply to questions about their involvement in the group.
One possible reason for the presence of so many HDJ families in the Jungadler might lie in the old organization’s own self-image. The HDJ wasn’t a typical club you joined and left at will; it openly claimed to seek out “the tough ones” and “not the weak.” It operated according to a so-called “lifelong alliance principle,” made elementary school children swear loyalty by torchlight, and demanded unwavering obedience and courage tests. Kids who aged out of summer camp remained part of the network, with the hope of one day sending their own children to the HDJ.
100 Years of Hate
HDJ stood for hardcore neo-Nazi ideology. The group saw itself in the tradition of the Hitler Youth, whose spirit Nazi loyalists tried to carry forward into the postwar era. Just seven years after the Hitler Youth was banned, the Wiking Youth was founded in 1952 in Wilhelmshaven, named after a Waffen-SS division. According to its own records, roughly 15,000 young people were trained over 42 years by right-wing extremists.
The group was only banned in 1994 for its aggressive, militant posture and its parallels to the Hitler Youth. Violence had already erupted before the ban. Even so, the HDJ carried on until it too was outlawed.
The more one sifts through the documents, the longer the list of long-forgotten Nazi authors becomes.
Now, the Jungadler appears to be echoing strong references to the Third Reich. A 2020 calendar, for instance, quotes a Nazi official likely known today only to historians or hardcore neo-Nazis: Dieter Vollmer. In the mid-1930s, Vollmer contributed to a Hitler Youth propaganda journal. After 1945, he relocated to Argentina, where he worked for a magazine that gave a platform to Nazi fugitives, including concentration camp doctor Josef Mengele. The more one sifts through the documents, the longer the list of long-forgotten Nazi authors becomes, among them Georg Stammler, a poet celebrated under the Third Reich, and Herbert Böhme, a cultural officer for the Nazi Party.
A “guideline” for preparing a “morning celebration” cites a book by right-wing terrorist and Holocaust denier Manfred Roeder. One knowledge test asks participants to name “Germans” who “dedicated themselves to their homeland.” A teenager answers: Hans-Ulrich Rudel. The former Wehrmacht pilot later founded a support organization for Nazi war criminals.
According to the material, Jungadler members are expected to line up in the mornings for flag ceremonies at camp, just as they did in the HDJ. Photos show flags bearing the group’s supposed emblem: a kind of sun wheel with five spiral arms.
Ready for violence
This same symbol traces back to Nazi official Dieter Vollmer. It appears on the cover of his esoteric book Sun Mirror. People allegedly associated with the organization did not respond to questions about whether the Jungadler borrowed the symbol from Vollmer.
For political scientist Gideon Botsch of the University of Potsdam, the reference to Vollmer is just one of several indicators that the Jungadler stands in the tradition of the Hitler Youth, just as the HDJ did before them. Botsch has been researching far-right youth movements for many years — what he calls “100 years of education in hatred and violence.”
The material, which he considers authentic, contains what he describes as a clear “accumulation” of far-right and National Socialist content and references. Botsch believes it is highly likely that the Jungadler serve the same function as the Wiking Youth or the HDJ. In other words, children and teenagers appear to be drawn into a kind of adventure-based program, indoctrinated with ideology, and mentally conditioned for the idea of using violence. This idea is subtly reinforced, for instance, in a quote from Vollmer that appears in the group’s 2020 calendar: “Our task is to fulfill ourselves as life has designed us,” it reads. “Our enemy is whoever wants to prevent us from doing so.”
Botsch sees it as self-evident that the work of the HDJ will continue. Even after the ban, he says, it was only a matter of time before the scene would try to fill the gap. “The HDJ was the crown jewel of far-right youth work.” So for Botsch, the question isn’t if this work will go on. It’s where and how.
A self-proclaimed ethnic elite
One thing does, however, set the Jungadler apart from the HDJ: the way they present themselves to the public. While the HDJ produced promotional videos, according to internal documents, the Jungadler instruct their members to be far more secretive.
The guidelines for the “Leadership School” state, for instance, that there should be “no direct recruitment of new members,” neither online nor through family gatherings. Before a child can join, their “character” must be evaluated. Parents are expected to “support the organization’s philosophy”: “Not everyone who thinks ‘nationalistically’ or comes from ‘ethnic’ backgrounds is the right fit for our youth organization!” It appears they are trying to groom a far-right elite for the future.
The organization has no website, not even a presence on Instagram. Even invitations to members rarely mention names or reveal the locations of events. This kind of secrecy usually suggests someone has something to hide. And when a youth organization goes to such lengths to cover its tracks, one has to ask: why?
Jungadler leaders on handling interactions with law enforcement:
“be polite and answer all questions.”
It looks as if nationalist families have learned from their past mistakes. After the HDJ was banned, police investigated former members. They were suspected of regrouping under the umbrella of an NPD-affiliated organization. After that, the group stopped operating publicly under the HDJ name.
Today, it seems that Jungadler leaders are being taught how to handle interactions with law enforcement: “be polite and answer all questions,” a teenager wrote in an internal document on the subject.
This may be how the Jungadler managed to quietly build up their structures over the years— possibly starting as far back as 2012, if one member’s notes are to be believed.
A classic liberal?
According to the material, the organization appears to have several hierarchical levels. Individual groups are reportedly part of regional units known as Horten. Among those named are “Wolfswald,” “Rote Milane,” “Dragooner,” “Löwenfels,” and “Berlichingen.” References are made to a summer camp in 2018, a “Silesia Grand Trip,” a winter trip of the “Wolfswald” Horte in 2020, and an “Elders’ Meeting” in May 2023. Other documents mention solstice celebrations, Horten competitions, a “Tobsucht Summer Camp North,” a “Discoverer Summer Camp South,” and a “Grand Trip to the Eifel.” There even appears to be a national assembly, called the “Thing,” headed by a “first companionship leader.”
Exactly who that is is not clear from the documents. However, Die Zeit was able to speak with a student from Dresden who claims he has held a senior leadership position within the Jungadler for several years. In the past, he was seen at demonstrations with the far-right Identitarian Movement, but he now insists that was never really his thing. He denies spreading Nazi ideology and describes himself as a “classic liberal in the sense of Wilhelm von Humboldt.” His role models, he says, are Thomas Mann, Friedrich Schiller, and Goethe.
They can’t be blamed for their parents’ HDJ past.
Over the course of a long conversation, he indirectly confirmed that the Jungadler exists and that it has been operating in secret for several years. Still, he insists that it is nothing more than an innocent youth group. He declined to speak about his fellow members or the organization’s structure. He did, however, acknowledge one thing: some of the children come from HDJ families. His goal, he says, was to teach them to become “free and self-determined individuals”: “They can’t be blamed for their parents’ HDJ past.”
Later, he sent over documents he claimed were meant to demonstrate that the Jungadler harbored no ideological agenda. These were essays on topics like space exploration and natural philosophy, which he said he and his brother had written. The metadata does not indicate whether these are original works.
But older materials obtained by Die Zeit show that the student helped coordinate Jungadler events. On one occasion, under his leadership, the Jungadler nearly emerged from the shadows. It was in the small town of Geislingen near Schwäbisch Hall, at the end of 2023. According to local residents who spoke to Die Zeit, an unusual group of visitors had rented a holiday home on the edge of town. On New Year’s Eve, about 30 young people gathered around a large fire, moving in unison and changing direction on cue. The landlord noted that they sang the national anthem.
Die Zeit has obtained a video recorded on New Year’s Day. It shows women in long skirts singing what sounds like an innocent tune on the harmonica. But the song’s composer also wrote music for the Hitler Youth. Above the women, a flag with what appears to be the Jungadler emblem flutters in the wind, along with another flag featuring a bird of prey. Residents called the police, but the group could not be identified at the time. Still, officers learned that the Dresden student had booked the accommodation. They also recorded several license plate numbers of attendees, including some who had previously been active in the HDJ.
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One of the property’s owners is believed to be Laurens Nothdurft. He did not respond to questions.
