Show Notes
What starts with a mysterious gun in an airport bathroom and a fake refugee identity opens the door to a nationwide network of far-right extremists inside Germany’s military and police. It’s a story about a changing national identity — and the backlash against it — raising a question that democracies across the world are waking up to: What happens when the threat is coming from within?
More from Day X
In this episode, we get answers on just how bad the problem of far-right infiltration in the German military and police really is — and how Germany is trying to address it.
We meet Franco A., an officer in the German military who lived a double life as a Syrian refugee and stands accused of plotting an act of terrorism to bring down the German government.
Franco A. is not the only far-right extremist in Germany discovered by chance. For over a decade, 10 murders in the country, including nine victims who were immigrants, went unsolved. The neo-Nazi group responsible was discovered only when a bank robbery went wrong.
Franco A. visited the workplaces of two of his alleged targets. We meet both targets to hear the stories of two Germanies: One a beacon of liberal democracy that has worked to overcome its Nazi past, the other a place where that past is attracting new recruits.
The mysterious story of a German soldier, a faked Syrian identity and a loaded gun in an airport bathroom cracks the door open to a network of far-right extremists inside the German military and the police. They are preparing for the day democracy collapses — a day they call Day X. But just how dangerous are they?