In today’s Vatnik Soup, we introduce Hans-Thomas Tillschneider, a German AfD politician, Islamic-studies scholar and Putinversteher. He’s best known for playing dumb over his Russian Army mug and for shaping the AfD program ahead of Sunday’s Sachsen-Anhalt elections. 1/21
Russian Army and Putin mugs, Putin portrait, Spasskaya Tower souvenir, vodka Kalashnikovs… If you asked your AI, “Draw me a caricatural vatnik’s office, as ridiculous as possible”, you’d probably get this. Except this is Tillschneider’s real political office. 2/21
When journalist Paul Ronzheimer @ronzheimer.bsky.social asked him where the Russian Army mug came from, Tillschneider claimed it was given to him in Berlin. Then he tried to stop the video from being published. Later, he changed his story: a souvenir from Russia. Very normal mug behavior. 3/21
But Tillschneider is no random Internet troll. Born in Timișoara, Romania, in 1978, he studied Islamic studies, German literature and philosophy, including in Syria. He earned a PhD, habilitated, worked at France’s CNRS and taught at the University of Bayreuth. 4/21
Politically, Tillschneider joined the FDP in 1996, then the AfD in 2013. His academic specialty soon became politically useful: he helped shape the AfD’s hardline position that “Islam does not belong in Germany” and fought a proposal to support liberal reform within Islam. 5/21
Founded in 2013 as a eurosceptic party, the AfD gradually became more and more nationalist, anti-immigration, and pro-Russia. In the February 2025 federal election, the AfD became Germany’s second-largest party nationwide. 6/21 vatniksoup.com
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And for some reason, a certain illegal immigrant from Africa goes out of his way to help them. Elon Musk declared that “only the AfD can save Germany,” published an op-ed backing it and hosted Alice Weidel for a 75-minute conversation urging support for the far right party. 7/21
Musk even appeared on video at the AfD’s 2025 campaign launch in Halle, in the same Sachsen-Anhalt state that votes this Sunday. Addressing thousands of supporters, he called the party “Germany’s best hope” and told Germans that they “focus too much on past guilt.” 8/21
Tillschneider loved it. The next day he thanked Musk “endlessly” for the speech and said it would help Germany end its “cult of guilt” over the Nazi era. He fits on the far right of the party: Patriotische Plattform, Björn Höcke’s Flügel and ties with the Identitarians. 9/21
Some in Tillschneider’s party certainly seem to have overcome the guilt already. In 2024, AfD lead EU candidate Maximilian Krah said that not everyone who wore an SS uniform was automatically a criminal. Even Marine Le Pen’s RN cut ties with the AfD over this. 10/21 vatniksoup.com
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And Tillschneider, who could become Sachsen-Anhalt’s education minister, wants to reshape how German history is taught. National Socialism would “of course” remain in the curriculum — but “somewhat less”. His own summary: “More Bismarck, less Hitler.” 11/21
Shortly before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Tillschneider called Putin a “real man” with a “healthy value system.” His response to February 24, 2022? “Russia is defending itself!” and “the attacker is not the actual aggressor.” 12/21
When confronted in parliament about waving a Russian flag, Tillschneider protested: “I’m not a Kremlin agent; I’m a German patriot.” The “German patriot” also told a rally: “Our enemies are not in Moscow. Our enemies are in Magdeburg and Berlin — and Washington”. 13/21
In September 2022, Tillschneider travelled to Russia with AfD politicians Daniel Wald and Christian Blex. Their plan was to (illegally) continue into Russian-occupied Donetsk and Luhansk to get their “own” view of the war. 14/21
Since 2023, the “German patriot” also writes a column in Vedomosti. In August 2023, he attended a vatnik conference in Moscow, praising its goal of a “multipolar world order” and Russia’s “clean streets”. In June 2024, he joined an AfD propaganda trip to Kaliningrad. 15/21
In March 2024, Putin staged another fake election; Tillschneider congratulated him. In October 2025, he celebrated Putin’s birthday in the Russian embassy in Berlin. The Putinversteher also helped Jürgen Elsässer launch Ostwind, literally a group for “understanding” Putin. 16/21
Tillschneider admires another Moscow resident: Bashar al-Assad. Even after Assad’s fall, he refused to retract “one iota” of his support — as fellow MPs asked: “Despite the torture? Despite the poison gas?” 17/21
Ironically, Assad’s atrocities and war crimes helped drive the Syrian exodus, while Putin intervened in 2015 to keep his regime in power. Syrians went on to become Germany’s largest refugee group, and migration a key topic for AfD. 18/21
By 2026, Tillschneider was proclaiming the end of “the era of international law”. The emerging world order, he said, would consist of great-power spaces and their spheres of influence. And it’s pretty obvious which one of them the “German patriot” is siding with. 19/21
And Tillschneider isn’t merely posting from the sidelines. He wrote large parts of the AfD’s 2026 Sachsen-Anhalt program, which includes ending sanctions, restoring Nord Stream, expanding Russian-language teaching, and reviving student exchanges with Russia. 20/21
And he could end up as minister of education. The Sachsen-Anhalt election is this Sunday. The AfD is polling at around 42%, and Tillschneider is #3 on its list. He can play dumb about the mug all he wants, but the man behind the mug is a real vatnik, not a German patriot. 21/21
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In der heutigen Vatnik Suppe stellen wir Hans-Thomas Tillschneider vor, AfD-Politiker, Islamwissenschaftler und Putinversteher. Bekannt ist er dafür, sich wegen seiner Tasse der russischen Armee dumm zu stellen und das AfD-Programm für die Wahl am Sonntag mitgeprägt zu haben.