Putin’s brown pawns

Back to nature, let the simple country life come, away with the high-tech society and all its electronics: these ideas sound appealing to many people. And more and more of them are putting them into practice, moving to the countryside, finding fulfillment in their own gardens – or leaving society altogether and establishing eco-communities.

A relatively new movement that has its roots in Russia also has such an approach to life. Her name: Anastasia Community.

Their followers live without technical aids on so-called family estates, where they are self-sufficient. But what at first sounds like a dream come true turns out to be a treasure trove of anti-Semitic, ethnic and homophobic thoughts.

What do the supporters of the Anastasia movement want? Is the scene dangerous? And what does all this have to do with Russian President Vladimir Putin? t-online answers the most important questions about the Anastasia movement.

The idea of ​​the Anastasia movement is based on the ten-volume book series “Anastasia – The Ringing Cedars of Russia” by the Russian writer Waldimir Megre (born 1950). In it, the narrator tells in the first person how, while walking through the Siberian taiga, he meets the fantasy figure Anastasia – whom Megre describes as if she were real.

According to Megre, Anastasia is a young blonde woman. She has supernatural abilities, including a healing ray that can heal serious injuries. According to the story, she lives in the forests of Siberia and feeds on fruits and vegetables. According to Megre’s books, Anastasia is the divine ambassador of the fictional primeval culture of the “Vedrusses”, whose descendants are said to still live in Russia today.

It sounds innocent at first, but according to expert Matthias Pöhlmann it is not. “The Anastasia books are clearly anti-Semitic,” explains Pöhlmann, who has been involved in the Anastasia movement for some time as a representative for sectarian and ideological issues at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria. Among other things, Anastasia tells the first person narrator in the books about a group of Levite priests who control the fate of the world. “The classic story of the supposed Jewish world conspiracy,” Pöhlmann said in an interview with t-online.

Elsewhere this becomes even clearer, where the author Wladimir Megre explains the Holocaust. The Jews themselves are responsible for their persecution because they “initiate conspiracies against power”. In the book series, Jews repeatedly represent “evil”, “modernity”, “democracy” and ominous “dark forces”, author Kira Ayyadi also analyzes the book series in an article for “Belltower News”.

In addition, in the Anastasia books, Megre describes a guideline for escaping modern society: founding so-called family estates, where families live autonomously under a male head, eat vegetarian food and adopt a critical attitude towards modern technology and openness. society. The emerging Anastasia movement took these ideas as a model.

In 2010, Vladimir Megre completed his ten-volume book series, which initially met with great success in Russia. Since then, more and more people have founded the family estates described in the books. In 2011, there were reportedly 700 of these goods in Russia, explains Matthias Pöhlmann in his “Handbook World Views, Religious Communities, Free Churches”.

The movement came to Germany in the early 2010s with the first translations of the Anastasia books. “Family estates” were also founded here – mainly in Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Bavaria. The followers live there among themselves and isolate themselves from the rest of society.

“There is no such thing as an Anastasia movement,” explains Laura Schenderlein of the Brandenburg Institute for Community Advice demos in an interview with t-online. The Anastasia scene is organized in a decentralized manner, but the goal of most small regional groups is complete withdrawal from society and explicit demarcation from the democratic environment.

There are now more than 20 family businesses all over Germany. However, the movement mainly comes into the public eye through contacts and surrounding organizations, explains Matthias Pöhlmann. While these family domains have fewer than 100 members, Anastasia Festivals – around 2020 – will bring together more than 800 people. As the “Merkur” reported in March 2023, the German-language Anastasia channels on Telegram have now grown to over 250,000 members.

“At first glance, the separate groups do not seem dangerous,” says Laura Schenderlein. “However, the individual small groups often represent right-wing to right-wing extremist views.” In addition, the Anastasia ideology is not an idea that intends to overthrow the existing system in the short term. “It was designed for several centuries, even millennia,” says Schenderlein.

In addition to the family property, making contacts in the right-wing esoteric scene is an important building block for the growth of the Anastasia ideology, explains Matthias Pöhlmann. For example, there have been close contacts with Martin Laker, the founder of the Engelsburg Academy, for a number of years now. Laker is an influential figure in the German right-wing esoteric scene. On his Telegram channel, which has more than 45,000 subscribers, he establishes contacts between those interested and established Anastasia estates.

“The movement is often underestimated,” says expert Pöhlmann. “From the outside, Anastasia is often interpreted as an alternative ecologist just doing her thing.” However, the world view of the individual small groups is permeated with ethnic and anti-Semitic thoughts.

Vladimir Putin gave the Anastasia movement a major boost in 2016. At that time, the Russian president passed a law allowing Russians in the Far East, a remote region of Russia, to buy up to one hectare of land for free.

Local governments willingly gave Anastasia’s supporters land for their project, and former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev also supported the movement. In return, Anastasia author Vladimir Megre repeatedly called on his supporters to vote for Putin.

Pöhlmann explains that Putin is also ideologically important to the Anastasia movement. “He serves the Russian soul,” says the expert. By this he means a return to life in the middle of nature, away from modern technological and social achievements. “This so-called Wedrussenism is the DNA of the Anastasia movement,” continues Pöhlmann. “Your supporters see Putin as a guarantee for ‘Western decadence'”.

At least the state knows about the existence of the Anastasia movement. However, it is not an object of observation by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Only in Bavaria is the internal secret service under scrutiny – because that is where one of the movement’s centers of gravity lies.

For example, the Anastasia settlers in Prien am Chiemsee attempted to establish a school based on the Schetinin pedagogy propagated by the Anastasia novels. The blog “Allgäu Rechtsaussen” reports, among other things, that children are indoctrinated with ethnic ideas in schools, the research portal “Psiram” reports on the so-called “learning for Russia”, in which affiliation with the Anastasia ideology plays a major role.

Whether the circle of Anastasia supporters is currently expanding is difficult to say, according to Laura Schenderlein. “The media attention of recent years has pushed parts of Anastasia’s activities underground,” she explains. That is why you can no longer conduct research so openly within the movement. “But their activities have not diminished.”