RAF – Terrorist Violence 21 November 2014 to 8 March 2015

PRESS KIT
RAF – Terrorist Violence
21 November 2014 to 8 March 2015
Contents
Press talk
1
Facts and dates
3
Exhibition texts
4
Accompanying programme
10
Press photos
13
Press talk on the exhibition on
20 November 2014 at 11 am
An exhibition of the Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg in cooperation
with the Deutsches Historisches Museum
The Deutsches Historisches Museum is showing the exhibition “RAF – Terrorist
Violence” from 21 November 2014 to 8th March 2015. How did the German state
and society deal with the terrorist violence? How did the Red Army Faction justify
their attacks and assassinations? What consequences did the acts of violence have
for the families of the 34 victims and the people who survived the attempted
murders? These questions are central to the exhibition, which was originally shown
under the title “RAF – Terror in the Southwest” in the Haus der Geschichte BadenWürttemberg. The presentation in the Deutsches Historisches Museum has been
expanded to include other important aspects of the topic, in particular a
perspective on the occurrences in Berlin.
The radicalisation of the student protest movement in West Berlin and the forcible
freeing of Andreas Baader from prison in May 1970, seen as the birth of the Red
Army Faction, provide a prologue to the exhibition. New objects and documents
supplementing the original exhibition give evidence of the RAF’s acts of violence
and calls for attacks on state and police, not only in Berlin. The abduction and
murder of Hanns Martin Schleyer in 1977 as well as the hijacking of the Lufthansa
machine “Landshut”, where the newly formed anti-terror task force GSG 9 was
deployed to free the passengers, mark the culmination of this phase of the
escalation of violence.
In the 1970s the attacks of the RAF were concentrated in the German Southwest.
The state reacted to the murders with the largest dragnet operations since the end
of World War II. The escalation during the “German Autumn” of 1977 spread fear
and a feeling of helplessness throughout the country. Letters, sound documents
and film clips show how the public and politicians participated in bringing the
violence to an end while at the same time advocating an atmosphere of
constructive debate.
The RAF “drop-outs” who lived in the GDR under a new identity as a result of a
cooperation between the RAF and the Ministry of State Security have their say in
the exhibition, as well. Moreover, headlines from French, English and Italian
newspapers reflect the international interest in the acts of violence of the RAF.
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Speakers:
Prof. Dr. Alexander Koch, President of the Stiftung Deutsches Historisches
Museum
Prof. Dr. Paula Lutum-Lenger, Head of the department exhibition and collection,
Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg
Dr. Sabrina Müller, Curator „RAF – Terrorist Violence“, Haus der Geschichte
Baden-Württemberg
2
Facts and dates
Venue
Deutsches Historisches Museum
Exhibition hall, first floor
Duration
21 November 2014 to 8 March 2015
Opening time
Daily 10 am – 6 pm
Entrance fee
Admission free under 18 years
Day ticket 8 €, reduced 4
Information
Deutsches Historisches Museum
Unter den Linden 2 | 10117 Berlin
Fon: +49 30 20304-444 | E-Mail: [email protected]
Internet
www.dhm.de/ausstellungen
Exhibition space
550 m²
Exhibited objects
About 220 Objects
Lenders
27
Project coordination, HdGBW
Prof. Dr. Paula Lutum-Lenger
Project coordination, DHM
Ulrike Kretzschmar
Curators, HdGBW
Dr. Sabrina Müller and Dr. Rainer Schimpf
Exhibition design
Büroberlin, Ruth Schroers
Publication
„RAF – Terror im Südwesten“
Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg
Stuttgart, 2013
160 pages, 19,90 €, ISBN 978-3-933726-45-2
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Exhibition texts
Introduction
From 1970 to the beginning of the 1990s the Red Army Faction terrorised people in
the Federal Republic of Germany with their attacks. Dead and wounded, fear and
distress were the result. How did the violence come about? How did the state and
society react to it? What did the violence mean for those who were affected? How
did it come to an end? These are questions posed by the exhibition on the RAF,
which was first presented in the Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg in
Stuttgart.
The Haus der Geschichte Baden-Württemberg has added a number of objects and
films to the original Stuttgart exhibition for presentation in the German Historical
Museum. Moreover, the exhibition has been broadened to include an international
perspective on the happenings. A further addition is the opening section, which
tells of the origins of the RAF in West-Berlin.
The RAF dissolved itself in 1998. Isn’t the violence of the RAF meanwhile a closed
chapter of history? In view of current terrorist attacks and threats, isn’t it
superfluous to look back at this history? The many still unanswered questions
regarding the Red Army Faction suggest that this is not the case.
Scenes of Violence 1967–1970
The situation in West Berlin in the second half of the 1960s played a decisive role in
the genesis of the Red Army Faction. Several members of the group, founded in
1970, directly experienced the growing tensions in the city. After the Berlin Wall
was erected in 1961, the divided city continued to be seen as the front line of the
Cold War. West Berlin lost contact with the economic modernisation in the Federal
Republic. On the other hand, an increasing number of students came to West
Berlin. They launched protests against the politics of the grand coalition then in
power and especially against the USA’s escalating Vietnam War. The shooting of
the student Benno Ohnesorg and the attempted murder of Rudi Dutschke, a
leader of the student movement, added fuel to the growing radicalisation. Many
people began to see violence as a legitimate means to achieve their political aims.
For some radical factions words were not enough and from 1969 on they began
carrying out acts of violence in the city on a regular basis.
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Acts of Violence
From the founding of the Red Army Faction (RAF) on 14 May 1970 until its official
dissolution on 20 April 1998 their members killed 34 people. Of these, 26 died in
attacks and bank robberies, while eight policemen and customs officers were
murdered during search and surveillance operations. From 1972 to 1981 the Red
Army Faction concentrated their assassination attempts in southwest Germany.
Their political motivation led them to set their sights above all on the highest
federal judicial authorities in Karlsruhe and the headquarters of the US Army in
Europe in Heidelberg. The RAF’s bomb attacks of 1972 have disappeared from
collective memory to a far greater degree than the “German Autumn” of 1977,
which dominated the media. The violent crimes targeted not only representatives
of the state, the judiciary and the economy. The explosion of a car bomb in a
residential street could have struck children at play. One passerby, Edith
Kletzhändler, was killed just because she stood in the way of fleeing RAF
members.
Call for Violence
The Red Army Faction wanted “to draw a clear line of distinction” between
themselves and the “ruling system”. They saw themselves as urban guerrillas, as a
warring faction in combat with the Federal Republic of Germany. Their aim was
the destruction of the democratic constitu-tional state and the establishment of a
communist system. Assassinations, murders and attacks were supposed to create
insecurity among the segments of the population they considered as enemies. At
the same time the RAF wanted to generate sympathy among potential supporters
through their actions and claims of responsibility. To achieve a widespread effect it
was imperative to communicate their acts of violence and so-called “commando
declarations” through the media. While they still used the Vietnam War to justify
the bomb attacks of May 1972, they concentrated their assassinations after 1975
on freeing arrested RAF members and carrying out punitive actions against judicial
representatives.
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Mourning
“There is the very personal overcoming of loss, an emotional attempt to deal with
what has happened; this takes place, hidden from the public, in oneself and with
the family,” said Hanns-Eberhard Schleyer in an interview 30 years after the
murder of his father. The interest of journalists and photo-graphers after the
murders was a burden to the families of victims of the RAF. Even today these
experiences motivate many family members to exercise great restraint toward the
media. At the time there was no psychological support for the bereaved. Learning
to deal sympathetically with the victims of violent crime remains a difficult process
for the state and the public, though greater support is available to the families
nowadays.
Monopoly on the Use of Force
Terrorist attacks and assassinations were a provocation of the powers that be. The
state responded to the acts of violence of the Red Army Faction with extensive
search and surveillance activities. The presence of the police in the public sphere
was intended to underline the state’s monopoly on the legitimate use of force and
reinforce the trust of the citizens in the security services. This was linked with an
appeal to the general public to support the police in their fight against the
common enemy. In their everyday work, however, the officers on the beat and the
detectives ran into many difficulties during security checks and searches. There
was no adequate training available for dealing with heavily armed terrorists. Cases
in point were the shooting of an innocent citizen in Stuttgart in 1972 as well as the
fate of policemen who were killed or seriously injured during ID checks.
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Imprisonment
The RAF continued their fight against the state from within the prisons. Hunger
strikes served to mobilise supporters and win over potential terrorists. The
prisoners accused the judicial authorities of “isolation torture”, “special treatment”
and “extermination detention”. In 1974 Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, Jan-Carl
Raspe and Ulrike Meinhof were transferred to Stammheim Prison in Stuttgart. A
multi-purpose building with a courtroom was built next to the prison. At the
beginning of the trial against the RAF’s founders in May 1975 the press called it
“Fortress Stammheim”. “Stammheim” developed into a symbol of the
confrontation of the state with the Red Army Faction. The hunger strike
declarations were directed against all prisons where RAF members were detained.
In Stuttgart-Stammheim the prisoners awaiting trial enjoyed many privileges. In
April 1977 Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe were sentenced to
life imprisonment. RAF actions to obtain the release of the prisoners were
unsuccessful.
Radicalisation
In 1973 the hunger strikes by the RAF prisoners met with a sympathetic response
from the students in schools and universities. They were moved to action by the
accusations of “isolation torture” and “extermination detention”. The prisoners’
lawyers organised protests against the prison conditions and called for the
founding of “committees against the torture of political prisoners in the Federal
Republic”. The path taken by many RAF members from 1977 can be traced through
the social network of these committees. Radicalised by the death of Holger Meins
on hunger strike on 9 November 1974, several activists went underground.
However, taking a stand for better prison conditions did not necessarily lead to
such radicalisation. The appeals against “isolation detention” were supported by
many students, writers and filmmakers although they rejected the armed struggle
of the RAF.
7
Escalation
The time between the attack in Cologne on 5 September 1977 and the memorial
services at the end of October 1977 has gone down in the collective memory as the
“German Autumn”. Many contemporary witnesses speak in retrospect of an
escalation of violence, a volatile atmosphere and hysteria. These memories should
not hide the fact that members of the public who belonged neither to the families
of the perpetrators nor to those of the victims reacted after 1970 in very different
ways to the violence of the RAF. Fear and hysteria were only a few of the emotions
aroused in individuals. Their reactions ranged from mere voyeuristic curiosity
about the attacks to bogus bomb threats, denunciations and even anonymous
letters demanding the death of the RAF prisoners. Despite such overreactions
against alleged sympathisers, many members of the public remained level-headed
during the German Autumn of 1977. They were more afraid for the limitation of
their basic rights than of new attacks by the RAF.
Rejection of Violence
Demonstrations against the violent actions of the RAF were first organised by leftwing and alternative groups. They wanted to prevent their ideas of an alternative
society from being confused with the destructive ideology of the RAF. In 1977
thousands of citizens participated in nonpartisan funeral marches and silent
protests. With these dem- onstrations German society gave “expression to the
bond with the democratic constitutional state” – as was stated in the call to take
part in the funeral march in Stuttgart on 10 September 1977. In numerous church
services pastors tried to counteract the feelings of hatred and revenge that had
developed. Politicians who advocated a democratic culture of debate and respect
for political opponents focused on a future beyond the escalation of the autumn of
1977.
8
Renouncing Violence
In the eyes of the peace movement, nonviolence was the only solution for
preventing an imminent nuclear inferno. The largest protest movement in the
Federal Republic of Germany grew up in response to the planned deployment of
Pershing II missiles. The nonviolent actions of the peace activists left their mark on
the political culture of the Fed-eral Republic to a far greater degree than the
confrontation with the terrorism of the RAF. Pictures of sit-ins and human chains
went round the world. Appeals to morality, not violence, would move politicians to
rethink their policies, it was believed. Despite mass demonstrations for
nonviolence, terrorist attacks continued to be carried out in the 1980s. The RAF
claimed responsibility for these murders, even though the technical perfection of
the attacks raised speculation about other possible perpetrators. Initiatives
undertaken by politicians and citizens attempted to counteract renewed escalation
by means of talks with RAF prisoners and by releasing some of them from prison.
This contributed to the process of dissolution within the RAF as well as to a
recognition that violence did not bring about the desired political and social
changes.
Is the violence of the RAF past history?
In April 1998 the Red Army Faction officially dissolved itself: “The urban guerrilla in
the form of the RAF is now history.” The families of the victims still suffer from the
crimes, however. The RAF is not yet history, because their attacks have not been
adequately solved. Many members of these families still do not know who
murdered their father, brother, or husband. The RAF’s collective
acknowledgement of their assassinations is not enough for the surviving
dependants. They want to know exactly who committed the crime and how it was
carried out. As long as the participants keep silent, it is very difficult to solve the
murders by judicial means, even with the most meticulous gathering of evidence.
The trial of Verena Becker before the High Regional Court in Stuttgart (OLG) from
30 September 2010 to 6 July 2012 could not prove who carried out the
assassination of Federal Prosecutor General Siegfried Buback in Karlsruhe on 7
April 1977. The people on the killers’ motorcycle wore full-face helmets, which
prevented them from being identified by eyewitnesses. The Suzuki GS 750 was
shown to witnesses again at the trial, although it had already been in private
ownership for 30 years.
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Accompanying programme
Panel discussions
28 January, 6 pm
Auditorium
Asyl bei der Stasi. Die RAF – Aussteiger im Arbeiter- und Bauernstaat
Dr. Tobias Wunschik, Behörde des Bundesbeauftragten für die Unterlagen des
Staatssicherheitsdienstes der ehemaligen Deutschen Demokratischen Republik
(BStU)
11 February, 6 pm
Auditorium
Der Linksterrorismus von RAF und Bewegung 2. Juni als Herausforderung
für die deutsche Justiz
Prof. Dr. Gisela Diewald-Kerkmann, Universität Bielefeld
25 February, 6 pm
Auditorium
Die transnationale Dimension des Linksterrorismus in den 1970er und
1980er Jahren
Prof. Dr. Petra Terhoeven, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Guided Tours
Every Friday 3 pm, English tour
Exhibition hall
Information:
Unter den Linden 2 | 10117 Berlin
E-Mail: [email protected], Fon: +49 30 20304-750, Fax: +49 30 20304-759
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Movie programme, Zeughauskino
6 January, 8 pm / 9 January, 9 pm
Deutschland im Herbst
BRD 1978, Regie: Alexander Kluge, Volker Schlöndorff, Rainer Werner Fassbinder
et al.
7 January, 8 pm
Kurzfilmprogramm
RAF und dffb
8 January, 8 pm
Es stirbt allerdings ein jeder
BRD 1975, Regie: Renate Sami
Johnson & Co. und der Feldzug gegen die Armut, BRD 1968,
Regie: Hartmut Bitomsky
Oskar Langenfeld
BRD 1966, Regie: Holger Meins
10 January, 7 pm / 11 January, 8.30 pm
Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum
BRD 1975, Regie: Volker Schlöndorf
10 January, 9 pm
Die dritte Generation
BRD 1979, Regie: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
11 January, 7 pm
Brandstifter
BRD 1969, Regie: Klaus Lemke
14 January, 8 pm
Vor vier Jahren – vor zwei Jahren
BRD 1979, Regie: Wolfgang Höpfner, Norbert Weyer
16 January, 9 pm / 17 January, 7 pm
Die bleierne Zeit
BRD 1981, Regie: Margarethe von Trotta
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17 January, 9 pm
Stammheim – Die Baader-Meinhof-Gruppe vor Gericht
BRD 1986, Regie: Reinhard Hauff
20 January, 8 pm
Bambule
BRD 1970, Regie: Eberhard Itzenplitz
21 January, 7 pm
Lesung | Gespräch | Film
Philip Werner Sauber: Der einsame Wanderer
In Kooperation mit der Stiftung Stadtmuseum Berlin
23 January, 9 pm / 25 January, 8.30 pm
Die Stille nach dem Schuss
D 2000, Regie: Volker Schlöndorff
24 January, 7 pm
Black Box BRD
D 2001, Regie: Andres Veiel
24 January, 9 pm
Die innere Sicherheit
D 2000, Regie: Christian Petzold
Information: www.dhm.de/zeughauskino
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