The English Defence League: What We Know About Them

The Basics

*Founded in around about April 2009. The group came into existence in Luton. Luton is economically depressed following the closure of much of its auto-engineering and electronics production industries. The city is largely white, however, the towns central residential districts are home to a large population of Muslim immigrants. The younger ones are mostly the third generation out of Pakistan-their grandparent's having come to work in the car plants etc.

*The catalyst for the group was the protest by a small group of Islamic extremists against the returning troops of the Anglian Regiment. However, racial tensions have been running high for years, with the BNP and NF entrenched in the town. All accounts suggest that the protesters were members of a small break away mosque, all young blokes with few prospects. About twenty of them gathered behind a police line whilst the Anglian troops marched past holding placards reading 'Anglian Murderers'.
-What ever your views about the propriety of their actions they were breaking no law and merely exercising their right to peaceful protest.


*Nevertheless the group, who are well known around Luton, came under attack from the crowd that gathered had gathered to watch the parade. They began chanting 'we pay your benefits' (rather ironic as they had nothing better to do themselves on an afternoon mid-week). They clustered around the Islamic protesters-who were now chanting provocatively Allah, Akbar. The police couldn't contain the crowd and scuffles broke out, the crowd forcing the police protecting the demonstrators back under a hail of bottles.

*The police had not turned out in force and they were soon overwhelmed. The Islamic protesters were chased across Luton eventually been corralled by a reinforced police presence in front of Luton's main shopping mall. The crowd then threw bacon at the protesters.

*The English Defence League first appeared approximately one month after the incident at the parade. It is fair to say with hindsight that the parade was the culmination of tensions dating back many years. A few years ago there was a large riot in Luton outside a Muslim owned bakery-for example. However, the parade disturbance appeared to blow the safety off. In the weeks that followed there, were a series of racial assaults perpetrated by both communities. As in the Netherlands following the murder of Theo Van Gough windows were broken at both mosques and churches on consecutive nights.

*However, the ethnic minority community-thanks no doubt to their status as the minority-suffered the worst. Luton's Sikh Lord Mayor was assaulted during a parade, swastikas and racist slogans appeared on walls across the town, a mosque as fire bombed and Asian owned stores subjected to attack.

*This period of civic unrest culminated on the 24th May in a seemingly spontaneous (although almost certainly pre-arranged) demonstration which same crowds of young, tanked up men marching through the deserted streets of Luton, past shuttered shops, carrying England flags and home made placards, proclaiming themselves 'against Islam'. Later some of their more "eloquent", or at least aware, apologists, like Lionheart's Blog and BBC Radio Five Live claimed the march was against 'terrorism', however, we can only go by the words and actions of the marchers themselves.


*The origins of the EDL are murky. Lionheart (Paul Ray) claims to have been involved with setting up the group. His main concern is Islamification of what he considers a righteous, Christian nation.

*Other founding members have more earthly, although equally extreme, motivations. Wigan Mike a known Nazi has been spotted on EDL demonstrations. Mike appears to be a character rather like the ageing neo-Nazi pseudo-intellectual in 'American History X'. The group had an internal feud over the summer which saw it being taken over by the Renton Brothers. The brothers are on the extremist-wing of the BNP with connections to C18. The brothers take over led to a split in the organisation and the departure of many of the very few non-white members. One person who left was Lionheart. However, he has now been reconciled to the group. Possibly because his American sponsors dumped him following an outburst on talk-radio about 'dam pakis taking over the country'.

*We must however, remember that the EDL's core membership is largely apolitical. It consists of working class men (and a few women) who are fundamentally disadvantaged and feel shut out of politics. Cynics would argue that whilst many of them go along out of a crude dislike of foreigners and the progressive 'elite' as represented by the likes of the TUC and Ken Livingstone in UAF, their main motivation is actually the beer, camaraderie and chance of a fight.

*This core membership is habitually Labour voting. However, as with the BNP there is no doubt a strain of working class Toryism in there as well. They have very little in common with the Liberal Democratic or Green Parties, the rural, upper-class focus of UKIP, or the petty intellectual focus of most socialist parties; with their constant squabbling. Unlike the fascist phenomenon in the 1920s and '30s there is no disaffected middle-class element. In that sense they are a totally 'proletarian' grouping. Their thinkers are of the Rosenberg and Hess school as opposed to that of Goebbels or Mosley.


In Action!

*The EDL is entirely organised online. Without the advent of Facebook their existence would be unthinkable. Most members have never met face to face-or indeed spoken to each other. Since the end of May many individual 'Divisions' have sprung up around the country, as far a field as Bristol and Carlisle.

*The groups leadership is shadowy. It appears to be led by one 'Commander Tommy' a man in his early thirties who is supported by an older man called 'Alan' who is is his second in command. The group has no formal membership structure, and little by way of a visible organisational or administrative structure. Groups appear to just emerge locally and then form their own online groups and no-doubt informal local meetings are held.

*This contrasts with most pressure groups which are either top down affairs with a membership providing funds and letter writing muscle (the preserve of fundamentally middle-class groups like Liberty and the Campaign for Rural England). Or a pseudo-Labour Party style 'democratic-centralist' type, typical of louder, but still totally legal, groups like Amnesty International and the trade union movement. The EDL is this respect resembles an all together dodgier type of group exemplified by semi-legal groups such as Greenpeace and Father's 4 Justice. These groups tend to have a cell like structure and little by way of a public image. No spokespeople, no annual conferences-just direct action and the occasional angry statement e-mailed to a sympathetic publication or blogger.



*This structure could mean two things, or possibly both. It either represents an essentially "bottom-up" approach with these groups springing into action due to the righteous anger of citizens. That is the optimists view, cynics might be more inclined to say that the anonymity of the internet and electronic communication, allows the group to organise in such a way as to confound the security services and the police. The police have frequently commented on the fact that unlike the UAF the EDL never liaise with them about planned actions. This blogger is sympathetic towards those that share his dislike of the heavy hand of the state, however, one does wonder why in the case of democratic protest it is necessary to take such a stand?


*The EDL's modus operandi appears to be, to gather where there is a football match. Ostentatiously this is because they want to see the game. However, it is worth noting that the EDL appears to have links with the; Casual United group of racist football firms. It is clear that their most violent supporters are to be found where there are matches. The EDL invariably spends the early part of the afternoon before a protest drinking, getting up some Dutch courage.

*It is clear that the protesters are worked up by racist chants for example 'who the fuck is Allah', 'shove Allah up your cunt', 'dirty Pakis out', the good old football hooligan classic 'Engerland, Engerland' and their key slogans 'we want our country back' and 'Muslim bombers, off our streets!'.

*The protest usually gets going after five O'clock once the match is finished. Although as the group has grown they have come to rely less on football matches, so now hold protests a little earlier in the afternoon. Although never before three O'clock, allowing time for the consumption of alcohol in large enough quantities. EDL protests tend to take the form of marches. The police are usually take by surprise as the EDL seldom meet with them. It is probably reasonable to assume that because of the groups general lack of organisation the EDL leaders themselves seldom know exactly how many people are going to turn up at a given protest.

*The EDL is a violent but essentially cowardly group. Their protests are loud, with lots of chanting and banner waving. However, they are easily scared, running from counter protesters and hiding behind their police guardians. It is unfair to completely blame the EDL for the violence that accompanies their protests, much of it is instigated by UAF agitators and SWP activists. This blogger overheard the UAF leader Weyman Bennett say to a prominent member of the Birmingham SWP 'it looks like you might get your revolution after all' in regards to the large number of angry young Muslim men who gathered to protest against the EDL demonstration on the eighth of August in Birmingham city centre. His tone of voice and facial expression suggested that he wasn't joking.

*We must however, accept that the EDL is in essence a provocative group. The sight of skinheads chanting 'we want out country back', the making of Nazi salutes, the usage of words like division, the racially motivated violence that follows them, even the very name 'English Defence League' suggests paramilitary, white supremacist violence. As such they are the instigator and the UAF and comrades are merely the idiotic followers with ulterior motives.

So Are the EDL Racist, Nazis?

*Racist yes-and mostly out of happy ignorance. National socialist, yes. They are instinctively socialist and anti-internationalism as well as being deeply authoritarian. Still it would be stupid to compare them to historic groups like the SA. They are their for much the same reasons as many of the SA were-but are poorly led and lack the commitment characteristic of such historical groups. If you want to see a modern Falange, Iron Guard or Italian Blackshirts look to Jobbik in Hungary. Their who we should really worry about.


*In general the EDL are an association of people who like to go out at the weekend and fight people, after drinking copious amounts of booze. They do this because it distracts from their frustratingly boring and unfulfilled lives which they have little control over. The EDL gives them a purpose and comradeship. As well as a scapegoat in radical Islam. It mirrors the rise of the various national-conservative, populist parties which have risen in UKIPs wake over the last few years. Parties which try to capitalise on the sense of dislocation people feel with the current political climate.

*A more radical party and wildly more successful party than the likes of Veratas, the English Democrats, Free England Party etc. is the BNP. I and other have devoted enough column inches to them, however, their links to the EDL are clear.

*The EDL as has been outlined are total amateurs. The BNP are masters of organisational development and campaign running. Crap politicians, but increasingly good at getting both heard and elected. The promotional skills they show are increasingly sophisticated and their use of the internet is at least as advanced as any other British political party. My guess is that they are providing the EDL with both technical and financial support. Chris Renton, half of the Renton brothers duo, is the EDL's webmaster-despite his party officially declaring that 'the party has no interst in the type of confrontation the EDL wish to seek'. This is blatantly untrue, as shown by the BNPs arms training for members and Nick Griffin's talk of 'race war' and very recently 'a second English civil war'. The stuff of Charles Manson not normal politicians.

*In a similar vein, after the 8/8 (ironically neo-Nazi code for 'Heil Hitler', coincidence?) protest in Birmingham Griffin and Derby both expressed the view that the EDL was a positive for the party as it proved 'them right' about the effects of mass immigration.

*The EDL are very clearly part of a larger trend. The white working class feel betrayed. Traditional British institutions are failing to deal with the pressure that has built up. Labour no longer backs them. The EDL suits the BNPs Naziesque motives very well. Ever since his "political soldier days", Nick Griffin has wanted a semi-legal army of street thugs, to promote the white nationalist message by force. It would appear that he now has such a group.