The Red Army Faction, a Documentary History, Volume 1

by J. Smith

  Stefan Aust and Jillian Becker have both claimed that members of the guerilla made what can only be described as half-hearted attempts to exact vengeance, but their stories are difficult to gauge. Both authors claim that Baader and Mahler were trying to find Homann and Aust to kill them, but if so, they evidently gave up the search quickly.3 This is just one aspect of the story that casts doubt on its veracity. Becker furthermore claims that Astrid Proll shot at Bäcker but missed; the way in which she phrases the allegation, however, indicates the source may be Karl-Heinz Ruhland, himself far from reliable.4 No charges were ever laid against Proll for this.

  There is one, and only one, documented case of the RAF doing violence to an informant. In 1971, a friend of Katharina Hammerschmidt’s, Edelgard Graefer, was arrested on bogus charges and threatened with having her five-year-old son permanently taken away from her. Under pressure, Graefer gave information to the police. In early 1972, she was abducted by the RAF and had a bucket of tar poured over her. Following this attack on her person, she stopped working with the police.5

  While unpleasant, such a violent warning is not on the order of a death sentence. Indeed, as Brigitte Mohnhaupt later argued in Stammheim, the fact that a known informant was assaulted and not killed should suffice to discredit claims that other members were executed merely for dropping out.1

  Certainly, given the guerilla’s ability to carry out attacks against even heavily guarded targets, the fact that all of those who testified against them remained unscathed should tell us something.

  As for the many others who left over the years, if they did not cooperate with the police or run with tall tales to the media, there is no indication that the guerilla bore them any ill will.

  THIS IS EDELGARD GRAEFER

  THIS COLLABORATOR IS IN BED WITH THE KILLER-PIGS

  LONG LIVE THE RAF!

  March 27, 1972

  5

  The May Offensive: Bringing the War Home

  This decision, this project, was arrived at through collective discussions involving everyone in the RAF; in other words, there was a consensus of all the groups, of the units in each of the cities, and everyone clearly understood what this meant, what the purpose of these attacks was.

  Brigitte Mohnhaupt

  Stammheim Trial

  July 22, 1976

  IN MAY 1972, SHORTLY AFTER the release of Serve the People, the RAF left the stage of logistics and preparation, launching a series of attacks that were to go down in history as the “May Offensive.”

  On the evening of May 11, the day the United States mined the harbors of North Vietnam, the RAF’s “Petra Schelm Commando” bombed the U.S. Army V Corps headquarters and the site of the National Security Agency in Frankfurt. At least three blasts went off, killing Lieutenant Colonel Paul A. Bloomquist and injuring thirteen others. As one military police officer noted, the toll would have been much worse had the bombs gone off during duty hours. Damage to property was estimated at $300,000.2

  “We expected things like this in Saigon,” a captain just back from Vietnam was quoted as saying. “Not here in Germany.”1

  One can imagine that words like that put smiles on many a face, and within twenty-four hours, U.S. military officials reported receiving a number of threats promising all kinds of follow-up attacks. These quickly snowballed, and by early June, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung was reporting that thousands of such calls had been made by “high school students, drunks, psychopaths, and criminals.”2

  “These calls,” complained the American Lieutenant General Williard Pearson in a similar vein, “were made by mentally unbalanced or irresponsible individuals seeking to create tension or panic within our community.”3

  Given that the RAF always issued proper communiqués, these threats were most likely the work of people who were simply glad to see the Americans finally being hit. The state was far from amused, and it was noted that the financial consequences of false bomb threats were substantial for warehouses, newspapers, factories, and banks. More importantly, the wave of political prank calls helped create a signal-to-noise situation that can only have helped the guerilla. Nor was the activity without some risk: prison sentences for these false bomb threats ran from a couple of months to as high as three years.4

  The day after the first bombing, on May 12, attacks were carried out in two Bavarian cities in response to the March 2 shooting of Weissbecker. In Augsburg, bombs were planted inside the police headquarters, and one cop suffered mild injuries. In the state capital Munich, a car bomb was parked just outside the six-storey police building; when it went off, it blew out the windows up to the top floor. A nearby pay station had received a telephone warning, but by the time the police got wind of it, there was not enough time to evacuate—twelve people were injured, and damages were estimated at $150,000.5 These bombings were claimed by the RAF’s “Thomas Weissbecker Commando.”

  On May 16, in Karlsruhe, the RAF’s “Manfred Grashof Commando” placed a bomb in the car of Federal Supreme Court Judge Buddenberg, who had been put in charge of all RAF cases. However, it was not the judge who was behind the wheel, but his wife on her way to pick him up from work. Gerta Buddenberg sustained serious injuries, but survived.

  On May 19, the Springer Press building in Hamburg was bombed in retaliation for the constant red baiting and counterinsurgency propaganda published in its newspapers. One bomb went off in the proofreaders’ room, and two in the toilets. Three telephone warnings were ignored and, as a result, seventeen employees were injured, two of them seriously. The attack was claimed by the RAF’s “2nd of June Commando.”

  A Springer editor was later quoted saying, “I was only surprised that if they wanted to hit a Springer Building they’d go for the proofreaders, whose views are rather left of centre. I’d have thought there were more rewarding targets if they wanted to strike a real blow. If they’d picked the computer centre, that would have done the building much more damage.”6

  As many workers had been injured, this attack caused some consternation on the left, and it was subsequently alleged that it caused dissension within the RAF itself.7 An anonymous tip the next day led to the discovery of three more bombs in the building, which were all safely defused.8

  On May 24, the RAF bombed the Heidelberg headquarters of the U.S. Army in Europe. Two cars loaded with explosives had been parked 140 meters apart near a data processing center and the officers’ club at Campbell Barracks. They were timed to go off after most people had finished work for the day,9 but nevertheless three soldiers were killed10 and six others were injured. This was the work of the “July 15th Commando,” commemorating the date Petra Schelm had died in a firefight with police.

  This was a more daring attack than any of the others so far: unlike the V Corps headquarters in Frankfurt, the Campbell Barracks were fenced off and military police were always stationed at the gates. Any person in civilian clothes or in a vehicle without U.S. military plates was supposed to show identification before entering.1

  The computer destroyed in this attack had been used to make calculations for carpet-bombing sorties in South and North Vietnam with the aim of achieving the highest possible number of deaths. This at a time when, though it was clear the war had been lost, the United States had stepped up bombings of Hanoi, Haiphong, and Thanh Hoa province.2 The RAF would later claim that their pictures had gone up on walls in Hanoi as a result of this action,3 and this clearly remained a point of pride among guerilla veterans even decades later.

  Regarding the May Offensive, it has been noted:

  Although people were injured or killed in most of these bombings, with the exception of the Buddenberg bombing, they differ from later RAF attacks in not being directed against specific individuals, a point that should be kept in mind when examining the RAF’s history.4

  Despite the many anonymous bomb threats called in during this period, and the fact that the RAF’s actions coincided with a global wave of protest against ongoing American military aggression in Southe
ast Asia, some observers have claimed that the May Offensive alienated many of the RAF’s liberal sympathizers. Those who had seen them as modern day Robin Hoods, or as romantic idealists, took a step back once they realized that this was for real.

  It would be more true to say that the 1972 bombing campaign polarized the left, and, in a healthy way, provided direction and inspiration to numerous activists who had been considering armed politics, while clarifying the disagreements which existed with opponents of the guerilla struggle. Indeed, the period in question showed a marked rise in newspaper articles describing molotov cocktail attacks and other low-

  Alienating Which Masses?

  “When we heard about the RAF bombing the American Headquarters in Frankfurt and Heidelberg, we jumped with joy. At last someone had done something against the imperialist bases in the Federal Republic of Germany.”

  These were not the words of a petit bourgeois sect, but rather come from the report of a freedom fighter fighting for national liberation in a land occupied by Portugal. He and his comrades had heard the news while he was in a guerilla base. For years the people there had heard of the FRG being one of the worst enemies of the African people—as a source of arms for Portuguese colonialism—and now for the first time the guerillas could see something happening in the Federal Republic which they considered to be an effective form of resistance to imperialism.

  I remarked that their reaction was quite different from that of Marxist groups in the Federal Republic, to which the African comrade responded, “When you are struggling, you see things differently.”

  Christian Sigrist

  Christian Sigrist, “De Heidelberg au Cap Vert” in à propos du procès Baader-Meinhof, Fraction Armée Rouge: de la torture dans les prisons de la RFA, Klaus Croissant (ed.) (Paris : Christian Bourgeois Èditeur, 1975), 53-54.

  level actions against symbols of state power, encouraged by the context the guerilla’s bombs had helped create. Years later, the Revolutionary Cells (another West German guerilla group) would explain the longterm effect of the May Offensive in this way:

  At the time, these actions drew the widespread anti-imperialist movement together, causing the further development of an idea that had been rattling around in the heads of thousands of people. We saw that what had long been thought about was in fact possible. Without the RAF, there wouldn’t be an RZ today, there wouldn’t be groups that understand that resistance doesn’t stop where the criminal code starts.1

  One thing is certain: the RAF’s bombing campaign was strongly criticized by the Maoist K-groups who were enjoying their heyday and rejected such attacks as infantile adventurism. The KB (Communist League), whose newspaper Arbeiterkampf would later distinguish itself by offering some of the most intelligent commentary on the guerilla in Germany, even went so far as to suggest that the Springer attack might have been the work of right-wing extremists.

  For its part the KSV (Communist Student Association), the youth section of the Maoist KPD,2 complained about the RAF’s violence:

  [It is] neither practiced by the masses… nor is it understood by the masses as an expression of their interests. The masses, on the contrary, perceive the actions as a threat, and therefore identify with the reactions of the state apparatus… The violence is not revolutionary. It sabotages the struggle against state repression in that it helps to conceal the class character of this repression and encourages the isolation of communists.3

  These comments were delivered at a Teach-In Against State Repression, which was held at Frankfurt University on May 31, just a couple of weeks after the Springer Building in that city was bombed. Organized by Rote Hilfe (Red Aid), a network of autonomous prisoner support collectives which had their roots in the antiauthoritarian wing of the APO, the event attracted hundreds of people, not all of whom were as negative as the Maoists.4 Indeed, one leaflet produced for the event argued that, “If imperialism is a worldwide system, and that it is, then the struggle against it must be waged worldwide. It will and must be a violent and armed struggle, or it will not be waged at all.”5

  The RAF itself sent a statement to the Red Aid Teach-In in the form of a tape recording by Ulrike Meinhof in which she once again encouraged the radical left to organize armed struggle, arguing that increasing repression and popular resentments were providing the potential which, properly exploited, could lead to a revolutionary situation. As was typical of the RAF at this time, Meinhof was attempting to engage directly with the guerilla’s left-wing critics.6

  Remarkably, the Teach-In brought together Maoists and spontis, and as such was representative of the revolutionary left. As for the tamed left, in its eyes the RAF remained well beyond the pale. The pro-Soviet DKP made a point of condemning “anarchist demonstrations” in Frankfurt, pontificating that, “The anarchist groups have clearly made hysteria the order of the day. We are making the struggle to win the solidarity of the people of Frankfurt for the Vietnamese liberation struggle the order of the day.”7 Various labor leaders also took turns condemning the “political adventurists,” “terror,” and “murder.” The chairman of the Public Service, Transport, and Communication Union explained that his union supported the government, for, while it was independent, it shared many common concerns with employers.8

  Clearly not reassured by claims that the RAF was driving people away from left, the state recognized that if it did not move quickly, the May bombings could easily inspire renewed resistance. “The longer the Baader-Meinhof gang remains at large,” Attorney General Ludwig Martin worried, “the easier it will be for the public to gain the impression that the powers of the state have broken down.”9

  An essential feature of the campaign against the RAF consisted of psychological operations, meant to discourage any solidarity or identification with the guerilla, while legitimizing the state’s own repressive response. As an example of this, in the midst of the May Offensive, communiqués attributed to the RAF, but most likely penned by the secret services or police, were received claiming that on June 2 (the anniversary of Benno Ohnesorg’s murder) three car bombs would be set off in random locations in Stuttgart “as a reminder of the bombing war of the U.S. imperialists in Vietnam.”1

  The RAF promptly issued its own communiqué repudiating this as a false flag provocation.2 Nevertheless, this denial was largely ignored, and on the day in question, “Stuttgart presented the appearance of a beleaguered city. Thousands of police checked all access roads, vehicles and ‘suspicious persons.’”3

  One hundred and thirty thousand cops were mobilized, supported by both West German and U.S. intelligence units, in a determined effort to hunt down the guerilla. A $59,000 reward was offered for their capture, and Chancellor Willy Brandt warned the public that any solidarity shown would be treated as criminal complicity.4 At the same time, Genscher announced that supporters could hope for light sentences if they turned themselves in and helped in the hunt;5 there do not seem to have been any takers.

  Nevertheless, the wave of arrests was not long in coming.

  On June 1, RAF members Holger Meins, Jan-Carl Raspe, and Andreas Baader were cornered as they arrived at a safehouse in Munich that had been identified by police. Raspe tried to make a run for it, but was quickly apprehended. Meins gave himself up, following police orders to strip down to his underwear before he did so.

  Three hundred cops surrounded the warehouse where Baader was holed up, and eventually an armored vehicle tried to enter the building; Baader shot out its wheels. At that point, a sniper took aim and shot the eponymous guerilla fighter in the leg and the police moved in quickly to take him into custody.

  Holger Meins was the only one of the three who had surrendered without resistance, a fact that did not stop the police from beating him so severely that he required hospitalization. “I didn’t squeal or scream,” he would later tell his father. “They kicked me black and blue with their big boots. It’s a thing you just can’t describe.”6

  It later came out that the RAF had intended to kidnap the th
ree U.S. Army City Commanders in Berlin, but called off this action due to security concerns following the June 1 arrests.7

  On June 7, Gudrun Ensslin was arrested in Hamburg when a store clerk noticed a gun in her handbag. (The government’s somewhat farcical Mainz report would later explain this bust in memorably sexist terms: “The arrest of her boyfriend Baader affected this deviant woman to such a degree that she simply had to buy something new, like any normal woman does when something is wrong.”)8

  On June 9, Brigitte Mohnhaupt and Bernhard Braun were arrested in West Berlin; they were both former SPK members. Mohnhaupt had gravitated to the RAF via the Munich Tupamaros. Braun, who was also close to 2JM, had come to the RAF via the West Berlin Tupamaros.

  On June 15, Ulrike Meinhof and Gerhard Müller were arrested in Hannover, turned in by a left-wing trade unionist who had agreed to put them up for the night.9 Police found forged passports, gun oil, a four-and-a-half-kilo homemade bomb, two homemade hand grenades, a semi-automatic pistol, two 9mm handguns, numerous fully loaded magazines, and more than three hundred rounds of ammunition in Meinhof’s luggage, which weighed over twenty-five kilos.10 With her capture, some observers felt that the guerilla’s entire leadership was now in custody, and yet there were more arrests to come.

  On June 30, Katharina Hammerschmidt, who had fled to France, was convinced to turn herself in by her lawyer Otto Schily. The police suspected Hammerschmidt of setting up safehouses and perhaps having a role in the recent bombings.1