David Wulstan Myatt (born 1950), also known by various pseudonyms, including Wulstan Tedder, Godric Redbeard, Abdul al-Qari, and Abdul-Aziz ibn Myatt, is a British writer, religious leader, far-right and former Islamist militant, most notable for being considered the likely identity of Anton Long, the political and religious leader of the theistic Satanist and neo-Nazi organization the Order of Nine Angles (ONA) from 1974 onwards.
Raised in Tanganyika, Myatt became a neo-Nazi while in secondary school. He was a member of Colin Jordan's British Movement from the late 1960s to 1974, when he founded a schism with Eddy Morrison, the National Democratic Freedom Movement. He founded or led various neo-Nazi groups from the 1970s to 1990s, including Combat 18, Reichsfolk, and the National Socialist Movement, until 1998, when he converted to radical Islam. He later declared he had rejected both Islam and all extremism.
Early life
David Wulstan Myatt was born in 1950. He grew up in Tanganyika, now part of Tanzania, where his father worked as a civil servant for the British government. He later lived in the Far East, where he studied martial arts. He attended a British preparatory school. He learned Ancient Greek and Sanskrit, as well as logic, astronomy and philosophy topics, which would shape his adult interests. Myatt returned to England with his father in 1967.
Career
Neo-Nazism
In 1968 or 1969, while in secondary school, Myatt met members of Colin Jordan's British Movement, a neo-Nazi group. He joined the group and became a fanatical supporter of Jordan, sometimes acting as Jordan's bodyguard at meetings and rallies. Myatt later became the Leeds Branch Secretary and a member of British Movement's National Council.
In 1970, he enrolled in Hull University, where he studied physics, interested in other dimensions and space travel. He did not graduate as he spent most of his time on political activism and found his studies boring, dropping out of the course. At the same time, he began to be interested in occultism. Jordan introduced him to the book The Lightning and the Sun by Savitri Devi, which lays out an occultist Nazi view of history; Myatt was heavily influenced by the book. In 1974, he formed a schism from the British Movement, the National Democratic Freedom Movement (NDFM), with Eddy Morrison; it was a neo-Nazi organization active in Leeds, England. Myatt created propaganda and spoke publicly about his views. The NDFM was involved in several attacks on left-wing activists and non-white peoples. He was imprisoned twice for violent offences in connection with his political activism.
He created several journals throughout the years, including Das Reich, Future Reich, and The National Socialist. Due to his neo-Nazi activism, he was engaged in frequent disputes with the antifascist Searchlight magazine. Myatt used various pseudonyms throughout his career in neo-Nazism. He at times went by the name Wulstan Tedder, another pseudonym, which was attached to an elaborate aristocratic persona. Myatt maintained that Tedder was a different person for some time before admitting it was him in the 2000s. He also used the pseudonym Godric Redbeard.
In this interview, he noted that an animal would have to be sacrificed for a ritual. after its original leader left, whereupon he reshaped the group in line with his own beliefs, writing the publicly available teachings of the ONA under the pseudonym Anton Long. Senholt called Myatt's role "paramount to the whole creation and existence of the ONA".
The ONA has an elaborate mythology and its actual origins are confused. It may have been a preexisting pagan group before Myatt's involvement; in 1974, it became a theistic Satanist organization once the leadership was allegedly taken over by Myatt. The Order of Nine Angles identify as theistic Satanists and affirm to practice "traditional Satanism". In a 1984 article in the American neo-Nazi magazine Liberty Bell, "Vindex: The Destiny of the West", Myatt presents an esoteric neo-Nazi view of history, arguing that through "Aeonics", neo-Nazi Satanists can channel "sinister" energies to overcome the "Nazarene" era.
Paramilitary neo-Nazi activity
Myatt reappeared on the neo-Nazi scene in the early 1990s, becoming involved with paramilitary and neo-Nazi organisations such as Column 88 and Combat 18. Myatt was the founder and first leader of the National Socialist Movement in the late 1990s. According to the BBC's Panorama, in 1998 when Myatt was leader of the NSM, he called for "the creation of racial terror with bombs".
In February 1998, detectives from S012 Scotland Yard raided Myatt's home in Worcestershire and removed his computers and files. He was arrested on suspicion of incitement to murder and incitement to racial hatred. A copy of the Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution pamphlet was discovered by police in the flat of David Copeland; Copeland was also a member of Myatt's NSM. Three people died and 129 were injured in the explosions, several of them losing limbs. It has also been suggested that Myatt's A Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution might have influenced the German National Socialist Underground.
As a Muslim, he travelled and spoke in several Arab countries, and wrote one of the most detailed defences in the English language of Islamic suicide attacks. He expressed support for the Taliban, Osama bin Laden, and referred to the Holocaust as a "hoax". While operating as a radical Islamist, he used the names Abdul-Aziz ibn Myatt and Abdul al-Qari. While advocating radical Islam, he was still in contact with many of his neo-Nazi associates, and maintained many of the same basic beliefs. He advocated for alliances between neo-Nazis and Islamists throughout the 2000s, seeing them as part of the same struggle and inspired by historical examples of collaboration between Nazis and Muslims. Jacob C. Senholt argued that his turn to Islam was yet another manifestation of his Satanic neo-Nazi ideology and the beliefs of his Order of Nine Angles, particularly "insight roles".
He eventually came to be accepted by radical Muslims. One of Myatt's writings justifying suicide attacks, "Are Martyrdom Operations Lawful (According to Quran and Sunnah)?" was, for several years, on the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades (the military wing) section of the Hamas website. He has since developed a mystical philosophy which he calls The Numinous Way. He wrote an autobiography in 2013.
Despite this renunciation of extremism, it was alleged that Myatt attended the far-right "Pact of Steel III" conference in December 2018; this allegation is unconfirmed. Scholar Andre G. Palella argued that it was "plausible that his 2013 renunciation of extremism is likely another disingenuous 'sinister trick,' part of ONA’s 'Sinister Game' that advises 'not trust what people say about their experiences, their 'achievements,' and themselves.'" As of 2024, Myatt continues to run a blog.
Beliefs and influence
Myatt's writings have been widely spread by neo-Nazis. According to scholar Jacob C. Senholt, "ONA-inspired activities, led by protagonist David Myatt, managed to enter the scene of grand politics and the global 'War On Terror', because of several foiled terror plots in Europe that can be linked to Myatt's writings". Political scientist George Michael writes that Myatt has "arguably done more than any other theorist to develop a synthesis of the extreme right and Islam," and is "arguably England's principal proponent of contemporary neo-Nazi ideology and theoretician of revolution." In 2021 the Counter Extremism Project listed Myatt as one of the world's 20 most dangerous extremists.
Michael described Myatt as an "intriguing theorist" whose "Faustian quests" involved a variety of political groups, ideologies, and traditions. Myatt is regarded as an "example of the axis between right-wing extremists and Islamists". He has been described as an "extremely violent, intelligent, dark, and complex individual", and as a key Al-Qaeda propagandist. His satanic writings under the Long name have hailed Adolf Hitler as the manifestation of the "Satanic spirit".