Far-right extremists are becoming a clear and present danger to Scotland, according to two of the world’s leading terrorism experts.
Professor Martha Crenshaw and Dr Tim Wilson said that right-wing fanatics are gathering momentum across Europe and the UK.
These groups live by a creed of bile and hate and spout views that would have been unacceptable just five years ago.
In a rapidly changing political landscape, they are developing a “greater feeling of legitimacy” and are being emboldened by more conservative leaders and doctrines.
The news comes in the wake of a series of Daily Record articles exposing the rise of right-wing hate groups across Scotland.
We revealed how Hitler-worshipping goons took to the streets of Glasgow in a bid to lure youngsters into their sick cult.
The bigots were pictured giving Nazi salutes outside the City Chambers.
Professor Crenshaw, a senior fellow at Stanford University in the US, is one of the world’s most respected international security experts. The award-winning author and academic told the Record: “There’s much more concern with the far-right in the US and the UK and other countries as well.
“There’s now a greater feeling of legitimacy on the part of people who might feel this way, there has been a normalisation of right-wing sorts of attitudes.
“It’s a general wave of right-wing populism where political parties, even if they might not be in power, openly state views that, a few years ago, we would have found objectionable.
“Now, for instance, it’s acceptable to express anti-Muslim sentiment or antisemitic sentiment or majority versus minority sentiments.
“It is regarded by some people as more acceptable than they have been in the past.”
And speaking about the possible threat to Scotland, Professor Crenshaw added: “Terrorism is extremely unpredictable because it is not centralised or directed or organised – instead, it is homegrown and semi-spontaneous.
“It’s very difficult to predict where it’s going to come from and the authorities don’t have very much lead time.
“If anything is to happen in Scotland, it would be small group violence that would be short in the planning and could be very disruptive and aimed at soft civilian targets and very difficult to protect against.”
Professor Crenshaw spoke from St Andrews University this week, where counter-terrorism specialists joined forces to discuss future threats.
The conference, which also included former bosses of MI5, marked the 25th anniversary of the university’s Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence (CSTPV).
The centre, which is based at the school of international relations and investigates the causes and consequences of terrorism, was founded in 1994 by Paul Wilkinson and Bruce Hoffman.
Dr Tim Wilson, the CSTPV director who organised the conference, told us: “The far-right is going to be of concern for a good while. It doesn’t take that many people acting on that sort of rhetoric to change the picture.
“Think of the impact of the Jo Cox murder south of the Border.”
He also explained the advancement of social media has given fresh incentives to terrorists, adding: “The mosque attack in Christchurch was a game-changer.
“When Kennedy was shot in 1963, within about six hours, 99.7 per cent of people surveyed had heard about it. In 2019, there was a live-stream massacre.
“There is a relentless acceleration of the way in which you can communicate the use of violence that changes its impact and increases the incentives for people.”
