Union of Bulgarian National Legions

The Union of Bulgarian National Legions (UBNL) (Bulgarian: Съюз на Българските Национални Легиони (СБНЛ); Sayuz na Balgarskite Natsionalni Legioni (SBNL)), until 1935 the Union of the National Youth Legions (UNYL); Съюз на Младежките Национални Легиони (СМНЛ); Sayuz na Mladezhkite Natsionalni Legioni (SMNL), was an ultranationalist, pro-fascist, pro-Nazi, and right extremist organization in Bulgaria, which was active between 1932 and 1944.

Union of Bulgarian National Legions Съюз на Българските Национални Легиони
Leader	Hristo Lukov
Founded	26 August 1932
Banned	9 September 1944
Headquarters	Sofia, Bulgaria
Newspaper	Prelom
Membership (1939)	75,000
Ideology	Bulgarian nationalism Anti-communism Nazism Fascism Antisemitism
Political position	Far-right
Religion	Bulgarian Orthodox Church
Colours	Red,   green,   black, and   white
Party flag
Politics of Bulgaria Political parties Elections

The organization had ideology, near to fascism, including creation of a totalitarian one-party regime, ban of market economy and total control by the state over the economy and the society, anti-Semitism and hostility towards foreigners, anti-communism, etc. It demonstrated similarity to the Italian fascism and German Nazism, from which it "borrows" ideas, symbols, slogans.[1]

Amblem of the Union of National Youth Legions (SMNL)

It was initially founded as Union of the National Youth Legions, which gained popularity among youth by using propaganda methods, popular in Nazi Germany at that time, including a march from Sofia to Veliko Tarnovo. It rivaled for poltical support with other popular nationalist organizations such as the Ratniks and the National Social movement. By 1939 the already renamed UBNL had 75,000 members, and while in that year it was formally banned by the pro-Nazi government of Tsar Boris III, it continued to function and was supporting the close alliance of Bulgaria to Nazi Germany.

In 1942 Hristo Lukov, a retired Bulgarian army lieutenant general and former minister of war, became head of the organization. Identifying itself as an extreme monarchist group, it sought unsuccessfully to work with the National Social Movement, before finally emerging as an opposition group that was largely supportive of Nazism, but nevertheless critical of Bogdan Filov's pro-Nazi government, which they defined as consisting of "capitalists, Judeo-Masons and Bolsheviks".[2][3] SBNL was banned after the 1944 coup d'etat along with all other nationalist organizations and parties.

Bulgarian historians define the organization as containing the features of the far right. Besides Nikolay Poppetrov, quoted above, Rumen Daskalov[4] describes it as "having a complete fascist character during the years of WWII", which includes "far nationalistic and chauvinistic, authoritarian and totalitarian ideas, but even more tenacious and irreconcilable to any party-parliamentary forms and liberal-individualistic ideas, but also –more characteristically– leadership and elitism, racism, anti-Semitism, etc."

A yearly march with torches, reminiscent of the Nazi marches from the 1930s,[5] in commemoration of UBNL leader Hristo Lukov, is being organized by a far-right informal organization in Bulgaria, calling themselves Bulgarian National Union (Български национален съюз). The organization describes itself as "ideologically closest to the Union of Bulgarian National Legions".[6][7][8]