Backgrounder

Accelerationism

An image from The Hard Reset, a Terrorgram publication

An image from The Hard Reset, a Terrorgram publication. (Screenshot/Terrorgram Collective) 

Key Points

  • Accelerationism is an ideology within some segments of the white supremacist movement that promotes violent actions and sabotage as a means to accelerate the perceived inevitable collapse of society, allowing followers to establish a white ethno-state in the aftermath.
  • The modern iteration of white supremacist accelerationism gained traction in extremist spaces in the 2010s following the revival of neo-Nazi James Mason’s Siege essays from the 1990s.
  • White supremacist accelerationism has inspired multiple terrorist plots and attacks in countries around the world, with most of them targeting Jews, Muslims, immigrants, people of color and the LGBTQ+ community.
  • Accelerationist adherents generate online propaganda that venerates past far-right killers and encourages people to emulate them, as well as manuals and other materials designed to provide guidance on targets and tactics.

Background

Accelerationism is an extremist belief rooted in some segments of the white supremacist movement that society is irredeemable, and that acts of violence and destabilization can “accelerate” a perceived inevitable societal collapse and usher in a white ethnonationalist state in the chaotic aftermath.

The ideology originated with the 1990s writings of an American neo-Nazi and saw a resurgence in the mid-2010s with the rise of the alt-right extremist movement. Accelerationist adherents subscribe to a mix of racist, antisemitic, Islamophobic, anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTQ+ beliefs and conspiracy theories.

Accelerationist white supremacists may be hostile to other white supremacist groups and adherents who may not openly embrace violence as a tactic.

Since the late 2010s, white supremacist accelerationism has inspired dozens of terrorist plots and attacks across the world, with most targeting Jews, Muslims, immigrants, people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. Some have also targeted critical infrastructure to sow chaos.

Origins

The beliefs and attitudes behind modern white supremacist accelerationism largely originated with American neo-Nazi James Mason, a relatively minor figure in the white supremacist community in the 1970s, who was a member of George Lincoln Rockwell’s American Nazi Party and a later splinter group, the National Socialist Liberation Front (NSLF). During his time as a member of the NSLF in the 1980s, Mason wrote and edited the group’s monthly newsletter, Siege. The publication’s contents included a wholesale embrace of violence against perceived enemies anchored in fascist ideology, the promotion of guerrilla warfare against “the system,” praise for the murders committed by Charles Manson’s followers as “direct action,” and the glorification of Adolf Hitler.

In 1992, Mason compiled his writings from Siege into a single volume under the same name. For many years, these had little influence. However, the rise of the alt-right in the mid-2010s brought a wave of new, mostly younger recruits into the white supremacist movement, some of whom discovered Mason’s writings, and began spreading them, especially on the now-defunct fascist social networking forum Iron March.

These new Mason fans, many of them neo-Nazis, laid the foundation for what they dubbed “Siegeculture (Siegekultur),” a philosophy and subculture centered around Mason’s writings.

A meme featuring two anime girls reading “Siege” by James Mason.

A meme featuring two anime girls reading “Siege” by James Mason. (Screenshot/Telegram)

 

Iron March, which operated from 2011 to 2017, was instrumental in the formation of early white supremacist accelerationist networks. Members from this forum would go on to create the first neo-Nazi accelerationist group, Atomwaffen Division.

Subsequent groups followed and a series of deadly attacks by perpetrators who embraced accelerationist ideology shined a spotlight on this growing movement.

Ideology

White supremacist accelerationism is built on a series of tenets that set it apart from other white supremacist belief systems. Modern white supremacy takes various forms, though all variations hold one or more of the following beliefs:

1) White people should have dominance over people of other backgrounds, especially where they may co-exist

2) White people should live by themselves in a whites-only society

3) White people have their own "culture" that is superior to other cultures

4) White people are genetically superior to other people

Many white supremacists further believe that the white race is in danger of extinction at the hands of “non-whites” (who, according to white supremacist beliefs, are being controlled and manipulated by Jews).

Accelerationist white supremacists hold these views, but also claim that modern society is inherently fragile, unstable, and heading towards an inevitable collapse. They advocate to “speed up” this collapse through violence, acts of sabotage and sowing general chaos, and believe that they will then have a real opportunity to reshape society to their own liking and beliefs. Accelerationist white supremacists may thus be more likely than other types of white supremacists to make explicit calls for direct, violent actions.

The targets of the attacks advocated for by white supremacist accelerationists vary, but can ultimately be split into two categories. The first consists of attacks against perceived enemies, including Jews (evidenced by the 2019 Poway Synagogue shooting), people of color (seen in the 2022 Tops Friendly Market shooting in Buffalo), immigrants (demonstrated in the 2019 El Paso shooting) LGBTQ+ people (targeted in the 2022 Bratislava shooting and 2023 Colorado Springs shooting) and Muslims (shown by the 2019 Christchurch mosque shootings).

The second consists of targets that could theoretically destabilize society when attacked, such as critical infrastructure connected to the power grid.

White supremacist accelerationist propaganda frequently encourages both types of attacks and provides detailed guides on the vulnerabilities of different types of infrastructure and how to exploit them. These materials also often insist that potential perpetrators are more likely to get away with such crimes than they think.

Although there have been some arrests for plots to attack the power grid—including the co-founder of Atomwaffen Division, who allegedly planned to attack an energy facility in Baltimore, MD in February 2023 — actual attacks by accelerationist white supremacists have overwhelmingly targeted humans.

White supremacist accelerationist propaganda also includes messaging that is openly hostile towards other white supremacist groups, labeling them as “movementarians,” and criticizing them for their perceived lack of action and inability to effect change. There is also criticism from white supremacist accelerationists that other white supremacists are too concerned about the “optics” of their movement, with accelerationists insisting that matters of public image and opinion are not as important as taking direct action.

White supremacist accelerationists also sometimes view joining large, organized groups as risky, insisting that followers opt for autonomous direct action instead.

The final page of an accelerationist publication. (Screenshot/Terrorgram Collective)

The final page of an accelerationist publication. (Screenshot/Terrorgram Collective)

 

Accelerationist groups

The first neo-Nazi accelerationist group Atomwaffen Division, founded in 2015 by Brandon Russell and Devon Arthurs, sought to spread Mason’s ideas and promote the acceleration of societal collapse through violence, while simultaneously preparing its members for an impending race war.

Atomwaffen’s main actions included organizing “hate camp” hiking excursions and paramilitary-style activities to prepare members for societal destabilization and eventual collapse and indoctrinate new members. The group also organized propaganda distributions and attended rallies and events organized by other white supremacist groups.

Outside of these regular group activities, Atomwaffen quickly gained notoriety following the high-profile arrests of multiple group members. In May 2017 in Tampa, Florida, Arthurs murdered two of his and Russell’s roommates, Atomwaffen Division members Jeremy Himmelman and Andrew Oneschuk, while Russell was away for National Guard duty. Arthurs claimed to have committed the murders because his roommates ridiculed his recent conversion to Islam. He also alleged after his arrest that his roommates were planning terror attacks, possibly against nuclear plants. However, Arthurs suffered from significant mental health issues and was deemed incompetent to stand trial. After more than a year in a mental health facility, Arthurs was determined to be competent to stand trial, leading him to eventually plead guilty in 2023 to reduced charges of second-degree murder; he received a 45-year prison sentence.

During the initial murder investigation, authorities discovered multiple explosive components in Russell’s possession, which led to the Atomwaffen leader pleading guilty to possessing explosives and receiving a five-year sentence in 2018.

In January 2018, California-based Atomwaffen Division member Samuel Woodward connected with a former high school classmate, Blaze Bernstein, on an online dating app. Woodward arranged a meeting with Bernstein, stabbed him to death and buried his body in a local park. Woodward was convicted of murder motivated by hate toward Bernstein’s gay and Jewish identity and sentenced to life in prison in November 2024.

These arrests, as well as the 2017 arrest of a Virginia teen and Mason admirer who purportedly committed a double murder (but killed himself in 2024 before trial), drew considerable attention to Atomwaffen Division from law enforcement.

The Florida incident also created a leadership vacuum in the absence of Atomwaffen Division’s two founders, Russell and Arthurs. John Cameron Denton assumed leadership of the group, but after police arrested him and four other members on harassment charges in February 2020, Atomwaffen officially disbanded. In July 2020, a small group of former members of Atomwaffen reorganized as the National Socialist Order (NSO), and another splinter group would later form, called the National Socialist Resistance Front, following ideological disputes between members.

In November 2024, the staff at The American Futurist, an accelerationist publication affiliated with former Atomwaffen members, announced that the National Socialist Resistance Front had officially disbanded.

Before it fell apart, Atomwaffen had already served as the blueprint for many other neo-Nazi accelerationist groups inspired by its ideology and propaganda. Most of these groups were small, and many were short-lived, but they have spread white supremacist accelerationism into new corners.

In 2018, Sonnenkrieg Division emerged as a European counterpart to Atomwaffen, with its founder describing Sonnenkrieg Division as “Atomwaffen with less guns.” Like Atomwaffen, Sonnenkrieg advocated for the use of violence to destabilize “the system” and bring about an eventual societal collapse. Sonnenkrieg’s propaganda used many of the same Iron March-inspired aesthetic elements as propaganda produced by Atomwaffen. Despite Sonnenkrieg’s relatively small membership, it was eventually listed as a terrorist organization by the United Kingdom in February 2020 and subsequently, activity from the group largely ceased.

A collection of accelerationist memes compiled for The Hard Reset, a Terrorgram publication

A collection of accelerationist memes compiled for The Hard Reset, a Terrorgram publication. (Screenshot/Terrorgram Collective)

 

Another Atomwaffen imitator was Feuerkrieg Division, an international white supremacist accelerationist group seemingly founded in 2018 by a 13-year-old boy from Estonia that ostensibly disbanded in 2020 but saw a resurgence on the encrypted social media app Telegram the following year. Like Atomwaffen Division, Feuerkrieg Division’s beliefs were largely guided by Mason’s writings, and the group was allegedly linked to multiple terror plots and arrests, including the February 2020 arrest of Feuerkrieg member Conor Climo, who pleaded guilty to firearms charges following an investigation into an alleged plan to attack a synagogue and an LGBTQ+ bar in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Another ideological heir of Atomwaffen is The Base, formed in 2018 by Rinaldo Nazzaro, an American national from New Jersey currently living in Russia. Though small in numbers, The Base branded itself as a paramilitary or survivalist organization and Nazzaro claimed that its purpose was to unite white nationalists to prepare for violent insurgency.

Like Atomwaffen Division, The Base attracted notoriety and public scrutiny following separate infiltrations by a journalist, an activist and a law enforcement officer, and after the arrests of multiple members. In October 2021, three members of The Base in Maryland and Delaware were convicted on various firearm charges that the court determined were intended to promote federal terrorism crimes. A month later, three other members in Georgia were sentenced for their roles in an assassination plot against a couple they believed to be antifascists.

In the early 2020s, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and the European Union all designated The Base as a terrorist group. In February 2022, Nazzaro announced that he relinquished his leadership role in The Base, and the group saw little activity in the years that followed. However, in early 2024, individuals associated with The Base began distributing propaganda again in the United States, and by the end of the year, the group appeared to have a resurgence in activity, with social media profiles associated with the group sharing pictures of propaganda distributions and videos depicting training sessions with members.

Also noteworthy in the white supremacist accelerationist landscape is Injekt Division, a small accelerationist group active in spreading propaganda online and through the distribution of stickers and fliers. Injekt Division gained media attention after alleged founder Coleman Blevins was arrested in May 2021 for reportedly making threats to conduct a mass shooting at a Walmart in Kerrville, Texas. In May 2024, a jury convicted him on related firearms charges, leading to a five-year sentence.

Activity from the group dwindled following Blevins’ arrest, but the group reemerged online in April 2023. In 2024, offline activity from the group was largely confined to Pennsylvania.

The Tarrant Effect and a Rise in Notoriety

A seminal event for the accelerationist movement was the 2019 deadly mass shooting in New Zealand by a lone-wolf killer. The live-streamed attack provided a boost in visibility and popularity for accelerationism and came to serve as a blueprint for similarly motivated killings.

In March 2019, Australian white supremacist Brenton Tarrant launched shooting attacks inside two separate mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, where congregants were gathered, killing 51 people and injuring 89.

Tarrant likely deliberately structured his attacks to inspire other violent accelerationists to follow in his footsteps. Before the mass killings, Tarrant released an online manifesto titled “The Great Replacement,” a direct reference to the white supremacist “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory. Though not the first person to release a manifesto before a largescale act of violence, Tarrant’s document stood out because it not only contained hateful justifications for the attack, but also a series of memes, in-jokes and “shitposts” born out of far-right online spaces like 4chan and 8chan.

Many other white supremacist shooters later emulated this style of manifesto, including Ryan Palmeter, who killed three people at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida, on August 26, 2023, before taking his own life. Palmeter stated in his own manifesto that Tarrant served as the primary inspiration for his attack.

Seemingly trying to simulate first-person shooter video games, Tarrant also attached a camera to his helmet and live-streamed his attack on Facebook, giving viewers a first-person perspective of the massacre. Payton Gendron, who carried out a deadly shooting at the Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, NY in May 2022, later emulated this tactic, as did Arda Küçükyetim, who, according to authorities, carried out a mass stabbing attack at a mosque in Eskişehir, Turkey in August 2024.

Anderson Lee Aldrich, who opened fire at an LGBTQ+ nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in November 2022, killing five, tried but failed to livestream his attack; Stephan Balliet, who tried to attack a synagogue in Halle, Germany, in October 2019, livestreamed his attempts to get into the establishment to launch his attack. He failed to get inside but later shot and killed two people nearby.

Terrorgram

Since its emergence, many online communities have promoted white supremacist accelerationism, but few were more influential than the Terrorgram Collective, a decentralized collection of white supremacist accelerationist groups and individuals active on Telegram.

Terrorgram first took shape in 2019-2020, in the wake of the attacks by Tarrant and others. These attacks inspired accelerationists to create propaganda specifically to encourage more white supremacist accelerationist terror attacks. These propagandists became known as the Terrorgram Collective, an inner circle within the Terrorgram network that focuses on the creation and circulation of Terrorgram-branded materials. These materials, typically circulated in the form of digital publications and short-form propaganda videos, seek to inspire violence against Jews, people of color, Muslims, immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community and other groups or individuals perceived as enemies.

The materials created and promoted by Terrorgram differ from typical white supremacist propaganda in two main ways. While most white supremacist propaganda seeks to generally demonize perceived enemies, with few explicit calls to violence (often out of fear of law enforcement action or lawsuits), the Terrorgram Collective directly calls for its audience to take violent action, even providing implicit or explicit instruction on how to commit various acts of violence.

A portion of the cover of The Hard Reset, the most recent publication released by the Terrorgram Collective.

A portion of the cover of The Hard Reset, the most recent publication released by the Terrorgram Collective.

 

Additionally, Terrorgram propaganda calls for not just violence against people, but destruction and sabotage of other physical targets, including transportation infrastructure such as railroads and bridges, communication infrastructure such as 5G towers, and electrical infrastructure such as transformers and distribution substations.

In September 2024, federal authorities arrested two leaders of the Terrorgram Collective, Matthew Allison of Boise, Idaho and Dallas Humber of Elk Grove, California, as part of a 15-count indictment for soliciting hate crimes, soliciting the murder of federal officials, and conspiring to provide material support to terrorists. In the charging documents, federal authorities alleged that the two directly inspired at least three terror attacks both in the U.S. and abroad.

In January 2025, the United States government designated the Terrorgram Collective and three of its foreign-based leaders as Specially Designated Global Terrorists.

Key Incidents and Arrests

Since 2019, white supremacist accelerationists have been implicated in several attacks, attempted attacks, plots and other incidents leading to arrests. Nearly every instance below has resulted in the arrest of the perpetrator, and in some cases, arrests were made before the plot could be fully carried out.

The targets of these attacks have been both in and outside of the United States.

  • Nashville, Tennessee, November 4, 2024: Federal authorities arrested Skyler Philippi after he unknowingly collaborated with two undercover agents while allegedly plotting to carry out an attack on an electrical substation near Nashville. According to the criminal complaint, Philippi planned on carrying out the attack in furtherance of his white supremacist accelerationist ideology. At the time of publication, Philippi is awaiting trial.
  • Eskişehir, Turkiye, August 12, 2024: Turkish authorities arrested Arda Küçükyetim after he allegedly carried out a stabbing attack at a mosque, injuring five people. Shortly before the attack, the perpetrator released a manifesto that appeared to be influenced by white supremacist accelerationism, and a folder containing PDFs of white supremacist accelerationist texts, including the Terrorgram Publications. At the time of publication, no further information is available regarding the status of his case.
  • East Brunswick, New Jersey, July 11, 2024: Federal authorities arrested Andrew Takhistov after he allegedly solicited an undercover agent to commit an attack against an electrical substation in New Jersey. The teen allegedly instructed the undercover agent on how to carry out the attack and sent them Terrorgram materials intended to help them in carrying out the operation. At the time of publication, Takhistov is awaiting trial.
  • Jacksonville, Florida, August 26, 2023: According to the authorities, Ryan Christopher Palmeter carried out a mass shooting in a Dollar General store, killing three individuals, all of whom were Black. Before carrying out the attack, Palmeter wrote a manifesto that appeared to be inspired by accelerationist themes and contained many similarities to the manifesto released by Brenton Tarrant before his attack. Palmeter took his own life shortly after the attack.
  • Baltimore, Maryland, February 3, 2023: Federal authorities arrested former Atomwaffen Division leader Brandon Russell and Sarah Beth Clendaniel for allegedly plotting to destroy an energy facility outside of Baltimore, Maryland. Clendaniel pleaded guilty in May 2024 and was sentenced to 18 years in prison in September 2024, while Russell’s trial began in early 2025.
  • Manchester, United Kingdom, January 27, 2023: British authorities sentenced Daniel Harris to 11.5 years in prison for the creation and dissemination of videos that purportedly inspired Payton Gendron and Anderson Lee Aldrich, who carried out deadly 2022 attacks in Buffalo, New York and Colorado Springs, Colorado, respectively.
  • Colorado Springs, Colorado, November 19, 2022: Anderson Lee Aldrich opened fire inside of LGBTQ+ bar Club Q, killing five and injuring 19. According to testimony by local law enforcement, Aldrich administered a website that hosted footage live-streamed by Brenton Tarrant during the Christchurch, New Zealand massacre. Aldrich was found guilty and sentenced to 190 years in prison.
  • Bratislava, Slovakia, October 12, 2022: Juraj Krajcik opened fire outside of a gay bar and killed two people, one man and one non-binary person. In a manifesto released before the attack, he thanked the Terrorgram Collective and recommended two of their publications to readers of his manifesto. Krajcik took his own life within hours of the attack.
  • Buffalo, New York, May 14, 2022: Payton Gendron entered a Tops supermarket and opened fire, shooting 13 people, ten fatally. In his manifesto, he claimed to be inspired by Brenton Tarrant, with entire sections of his manifesto directly plagiarized from Tarrant’s. Gendron pleaded guilty to state terrorism and murder charges in November 2022 and was sentenced to life in prison without parole in February 2023.
  • Raleigh, NC, August 21, 2021: Federal authorities charged Paul James Kryscuk, Liam Collins, Jordan Duncan and Joseph Maurion, and later Justin Wade Hemanson, with conspiracy to damage an energy facility. Indictments alleged that the individuals were members of the Iron March forum, and all five received a combined 324 months in prison in 2024.
  • Bad Axe, Michigan, October 29, 2020: Authorities arrested Justen Watkins and Alfred Gorman, both members of The Base, on multiple charges, and accused them of harassment after they took pictures outside a family’s home thinking that an antifascist podcaster lived there. In August 2021, more charges were filed against Watkins and two other members, Thomas Denton and Tristan Webb, for entering abandoned Michigan Department of Corrections sites to assess their usefulness for training. Watkins was sentenced to up to six years in 2022, Gorman was sentenced to four years of parole in 2022, Denton was sentenced to 48 months in 2022, and Webb was sentenced to five years of probation in 2022.
  • Louisville, Kentucky, June 10, 2020: Federal authorities arrested U.S. Army member Ethan Melzer for plotting an attack on the soldiers in his unit. Charging documents alleged that Melzer provided sensitive information regarding his unit’s anticipated deployment to “RapeWaffen Division,” which claims to be a splinter group of Atomwaffen Division. Melzer pled guilty in June 2022 and was later sentenced to 45 years in prison.
  • Greenbelt, Maryland, January 16, 2020: Federal authorities arrested three members of The Base, Brian Mark Lemley Jr., William Garfield Bilbrough IV and Canadian national Patrik Jordan Mathews with charges relating to transporting firearms and harboring aliens. According to law enforcement, the three men were planning on attending an upcoming pro-gun rally in Virginia the following week. All three men pleaded guilty to related charges and received prison sentences, Lemley and Mathews received nine-year sentences while Bilbrough received five.
  • Halle, Germany, October 9, 2019: Stephan Balliet livestreamed himself attempting to enter a synagogue armed with improvised firearms and explosives. After his attempts were unsuccessful, he shot and killed two people near a kebab shop before being arrested. According to Balliet, the attack was inspired by Brenton Tarrant and his attacks in Christchurch, New Zealand. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in 2020.
  • Bærum, Norway, August 10, 2019: Philip Manshaus opened fire outside of a mosque. Fortunately, no one was injured. According to law enforcement, evidence suggested that Manshaus was inspired by Tarrant and his massacre in Christchurch, New Zealand earlier in the year. Manshaus was sentenced to 21 years in prison in 2020.
  • Las Vegas, Nevada, August 9, 2019: Federal authorities arrested Conor Climo, who discussed plans to set fire to a Las Vegas synagogue, and he later pleaded guilty to one count of possession of an unregistered firearm and was sentenced to two years in prison. According to court documents, Climo had ties to Feuerkrieg Division.
  • El Paso, Texas, August 3, 2019: Patrick Crusius killed 23 people at a Walmart in a predominantly Hispanic area. In his manifesto, he cited Brenton Tarrant’s attack in Christchurch as a source of inspiration. In 2023, Crusius was sentenced to 90 consecutive life sentences in prison.
  • London, United Kingdom, June 18, 2019: Authorities sentenced Michael Szewczuk and Oskar Dunn-Koczorowski, both members of Sonnenkrieg Division, for encouraging terrorist attacks. Dunn-Koczorowski was sentenced to 18 months, while Szewczuk was sentenced to just over four years.
  • Poway, California, April 27, 2019: John Earnest opened fire at the Chabad of Poway, killing one and injuring three others, shortly after a separate arson incident against a local mosque in late March 2019. In his own manifesto, Earnest referenced Tarrant and his attack multiple times and referred to Tarrant as the “catalyst” for his actions. In 2021, Earnest pleaded guilty to a 113-count federal hate crime indictment and was sentenced to life plus 30 years.
  • Christchurch, New Zealand, March 15, 2019: Brenton Tarrant drove to two separate mosques, and livestreamed himself carrying out a mass shooting that resulted in 51 deaths. In a manifesto released shortly before the attack, Brenton Tarrant had a section titled “Destabilization and Accelerationism: Tactics for Victory” in which he writes that white supremacists “must destabilize and discomfort society where ever [sic] possible.” Tarrant pleaded guilty to the attack and is serving life in prison without parole.