// BBC UK NEWS — CRONACA
Masked men, lorries and road blocks: How anti-migrant activists are changing tactics
Men coming out of the back of a lorry in Dover ahead of Saturday's protest
At around seven o'clock last Saturday morning, dozens of men dressed in black climbed into the backs of lorries in a quiet Kent village called Preston-next-Wingham.
The men had arrived under cover of darkness the night before, leaving their cars everywhere: in the village hall car park and on the recreation ground.
In an operation with a degree of military precision, the small fleet of lorries departed for Dover just after sunrise, where the men staged an intimidating show of strength near the port.
In disciplined, serried ranks, they wore paramilitary-style balaclavas as they blocked roads around the port. There were at least three waves of arrivals, including the men who had spent the night in Preston-next-Wingham. Glaring ominously at motorists and police officers, they stood their ground.
Hardened anti-immigration campaigners were using their newly developed tactics for the first time.
It bore little resemblance to the running battles seen in cities in the Midlands in the days of Tommy Robinson's original vehicle, the anti-Muslim English Defence League (EDL).
"I seriously thought we'd been invaded by Russians," a Dover resident, Robin Burkhardt, told the BBC.
The main organiser Danny Thomas, known to his supporters as Danny Tommo, said on Instagram afterwards: "This is our warning."
The style of protest is a new development in the crowded world of British hard-right and far-right politics. It was visually striking, and the men - who were part of a new group called Patriot Platform - chanted "Christ is King" as well as "Stop the Boats".