The presence of Turkey’s national football team at this year’s EURO offers a good opportunity for ultra-nationalist forces to show their strength and recruit new members. On Tuesday night German cities were resounding with the honking of horns from excited drivers of Turkish origin who took to the streets to celebrate the victory. of their national team in their first game at EURO 2024 against Georgia. This is not unusual, since the Turks in Germany see their football team as an “ambassador” of the country and do not miss an opportunity to celebrate its successes. One more reason now, that the games are held at their… home.

Of course, football is not to blame for the fact that it is often used to stimulate nationalistic sentiments, giving opportunities for show of force to groups and political forces that seek them, to make their presence felt. A photographer in Frankfurt recorded several of the Turks, who had taken to the streets excitedly, greeting with the well-known gesture of the nationalist Gray Wolves, adding another episode to the debate about the activity of this particular organization in the country and giving the German press an opportunity to focus on a very serious matter.

Strong in Dortmund

The activity of this particular group is known and is anyway the subject of monitoring by the competent services. Especially in the Ruhr region, once the heart of German industry, where there is a large Turkish community, the Gray Wolves are highly networked. Coincidentally the first match against Georgia was played in this very area at Dortmund’s stadium, as was another of the three in total in the group stage. According to information, this was a good opportunity to combine football patriotism with the recruitment of new members or even with the demonstration of the strength of the organization. Those who use this greeting may not be members of the organization, but to some extent they are making this move as a challenge to German society and the German state.

“Football has been a recruiting platform for the Gray Wolves for decades,” said the educator Burak Yilmaz, who researches this ideology, a few days ago speaking to the Swiss Neue Zürcher Zeitung. “I’m guessing it will be heavily utilized this summer.” Already at the reception of the Turkish team in the center, where it will remain during the tournament, many young fans were holding flags with the symbols of the Gray Wolves.

The nationalist organization began spreading its tentacles in Germany as early as the 1960s. Today it is estimated that it has 18,000 active members in the country. Especially when it comes to football, he took advantage of the fact that even in the 70s it was difficult for young Turks to get into German teams. The argument was that as guest workers (Gastarbeiter) they would at some point return to their home country anyway. Nationalists took advantage of the lack of real political integration by the German state by forming their own associations. The names and semiology were characteristic: “Turanspor” is an indicative club name, and “1453”, the year of the “victory over the Christians” with the Fall of Constantinople, a number that appears frequently. Gradually the slogan became “Be German. Stay Turkish”.

The case of Mesut Ozil

The example of Mesut Özil, the former international with the German national team and highly paid footballer, is one of the most characteristic. Not only for the open support for Erdogan, with whom he did not hesitate to appear together in 2018, but because at one point photos of him with tattoos of three crescent moons and the roaring wolf, one of the organization’s most classic motifs, were published.

Especially in times of political tension in the motherland Turkey, the Gray Wolves appear extremely strong and dynamic. Something pointed out by Social Pedagogy professor Mehmet Tanli, who has lived in Germany since 1980 and studies the organization’s structure and action.

“If there are polarizing discussions in Turkey, then the threat situation is also increasing here in the Ruhr region,” he says characteristically. For example in 2016, after the failed coup attempt in Turkey, Kurdish institutions and shops were attacked in Berlin, Hamburg and Stuttgart. There were also threats and attacks against organizations and associations, which are said to be related to Erdoğan’s former ally and later sworn enemy Fethullah Gülen, whom the Turkish president “saw” behind the attempt. Tanli, like many political scientists, believes that the police and the Constitution Protection Agency underestimated the action of the Turkish ultra-nationalists and at some point they will find themselves in front of surprises. Regardless of the Turkish National Football Team’s final run in the competition, the fear is that the Gray Wolves will be victorious in any case.