Terms such as “mishaps” and “mistakes” still characterize the creation and investigation of the NSU. This classification does not do justice to the documented processes. The security authorities financed and built up the Nazi terror and later prevented any investigation. – A comment from Reiner Matzinke.

It is one of the most remarkable formulations in the German post-war history of the secret services: In 2013, the Bundestag investigative committee into the NSU series of murders found that there were "no clues“ for the fact that an authority supported, promoted or approved the actions of the “National Socialist Underground”. Since then, this formula has been repeated by interior ministers, heads of authorities and government spokespersons as if it were an acquittal. The truth is the opposite.

The files that would have been suitable for answering this question were destroyed by the very authorities that claimed the acquittal. The finding is not “no evidence of involvement,” but “no evidence left.” But between the shredded files there is still clear evidence of how the state financed, built and protected the fascist scene around the NSU over the years.

“Operation Confetti”: document destruction after self-exposure

On November 11, 2011, a week after the deaths of Uwe Mundlos and Uwe Böhnhardt and one day after Beate Zschäpe's self-denunciation, a head of department in the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) ordered theDestruction of files. The man who testified before the investigative committee under the code name “Lothar Lingen” admitted that he knew the explosive nature of the material.

The NSU was not an isolated case

The destroyed files related to “Operation Rennsteig”, the campaign that began in 1996 and with which the BfV recruited neo-Nazis from Thuringia as informants. Mundlos, Böhnhardt and Zschäpe were organized in the same “Thuringian Homeland Security”. The process became known as “Operation Confetti” and cost BfV President Heinz Fromm his job.

An audit report from the Federal Ministry of the Interior later revealed that a total of 310 files had been destroyed in the BfV alone by July 2012, “thus thousands of documents”. The last files were officially shredded on July 4, 2012 - at a time when the public was already discussing the NSU murders and the parliamentary investigation had begun. The question of what was in these 310 files remains unanswered to this day.

Financing of the neo-Nazi scene by informants

“Operation Rennsteig” was not an isolated program to observe a fringe group. She was oneSource of fundingfor the organized neo-Nazi scene in Thuringia.

The most prominent case is Tino Brandt: head of the “Thuringian Homeland Security”, NPD official, leading neo-Nazi – and from 1994 to 2001 undercover agent for the Thuringian Office for the Protection of the Constitution under the code name “Otto”. Brandt received more than 200,000 DM for his work. According to his own statements, this money also flowed into the development and stabilization of extreme right-wing structures. In the reports, Brandt is considered an “organizer, networker and cadre” in the scene. According to estimates, around 40 informants were deployed by the authorities in the NSU trio's environment.

NSU weapons supplier Ralf Wohlleben released from prison – neo-Nazi scene celebrates return

“Primus”: undercover agent employed terrorists

The Bavarian investigative committee looked into Ralf Marschner, who ran a demolition and construction company in Zwickau. Between 2000 and 2002 he is said to have employed Uwe Mundlos there, and possibly also Beate Zschäpe. Mundlos worked under a cover identity as “Max-Florian” in the company of a man who at the same time was an undercover agent for the BfV under the code name “Primus”.

The BfV department head at the time, Gerd Egevist, told the Bundestag committee that he did not believe that Marschner had known the three. Marschner is onebeen a “very rich source”.and would have done good work for the Office for the Protection of the Constitution. The federal prosecutor's office later stated that they had no evidence that Marschner had supported the trio. He now lives in Switzerland and was not extradited to Germany in 2016.

Constitutional protection officers at the crime scene

On April 6, 2006, Halit Yozgat was shot in an internet café in Kassel. Andreas Temme, an employee of the Hessian State Office for the Protection of the Constitution, was in the same room at the time of the crime. He said he heard nothing and saw nothing.

The London research team “Forensic Architecture” reconstructed the crime scene in 2017 and came to the conclusion that Temme must have noticed the shots and Yozgat lying on the ground. The Hessian investigators themselves had already stated in 2006 that Temme could have seen Yozgat and the traces of blood on the table. The Munich Higher Regional Court nevertheless believed Temme's account. The case against him was dropped.

The then Hesse Interior Minister and later Prime Minister Volker Bouffierrefused permission to testifyfor all informants led by Temme. The Hessian investigative committee later admitted that this had been a “mistake”: If a distinction had been made between the informants, “at least the right-wing extremist informant would probably have been granted permission to testify.” The committee added that the informant “may not have provided any further information.”

Verdict equals acquittal: only two years in prison on probation for NSU supporter

Investigations against the victims

After the first murder of Enver Şimşek in 2000 and the subsequent eight murders of migrant small business owners, the investigative committees found that the police concentrated on theories such as “foreign extremism”, “protection racket” and “organized crime”.

The series of murders was referred to in the media as the “Kebab Murders,” a term that was later voted the worst word of the year. The victims' relatives were made suspects and their surroundings were investigated, while the right-wing lead was systematically ignored, according to the committee's findings. The BfV not only prevented the murders from being solved, but also actively approved the racist persecution of the victims of the NSU terror.

To date, no real attempts at clarification

Since the NSU self-exposure, there have been numerous investigative committees at the federal and state levels. The final report of the NSU investigative committee in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, presented in 2026, comprises around 3,000 pages and, after 123 meetings and the questioning of 86 witnesses, documents a pattern of “massive failures by security authorities“.

Authorities did not adequately evaluate information, shared information too poorly and “sometimes treated people affected by right-wing violence with suspicion.” In the case of Mehmet Turgut, who was murdered in Rostock in 2004, the investigations focused for a long time on the family's environment, not on the right-wing scene. An informant tip in connection with the series of murders was not processed with the necessary analytical skills. A report about high donations received by the neo-Nazi magazine “Der Weisse Wolf” was not forwarded to the BfV, which meant that information was not brought together.

Such a result is not an isolated case. The investigative committees unanimously came to the conclusion that the authorities had clues, informants and files. However, a final assessment of the events was impossible due to the destruction of files.

“Unfortunately, clarification is impossible” – that’s how state officials repeatedly acknowledge the NSU terror today. But the fact that there is no real interest in clarifying the matter is shown by the fact that the results of the various state investigative committees were never brought together. On the contrary, politicians and security authorities are hiding behind this excuse and have been doing so for more than a decade.

On the one hand, they talk about “mistakes” that we have to learn from. On the other hand, they actively prevent the investigation by destroying files and covering up for Nazis. To date there have been no real consequences for this.

The postNSU: The entanglements of the security authorities and the prevention of clarificationappeared firstperspective.