As highlighted in Chapter 1, a number of events in the late 1960s played an important part in the radicalisation and politicisation of the founding members of the MJ2 and others in the radical Left in West Germany. Wolfgang Kraushaar points out that in the heated atmosphere of West Berlin in the mid-1960s, a single event sufficed to spark off a revolt: the killing of the student Benno Ohnesorg during the anti-Shah demonstration on 2 June 1967 (Kraushaar 2006b: 526-527). The fact that a police officer could get away with shooting a peaceful demonstrator shocked and mobilised young people across political lines and subcultural divisions.143 As highlighted in the first chapter, the name ‘Movement of June 2’ indicates the centrality of this event for the founding members of the MJ2. Reinders notes: ‘After all the blows and beatings, we felt that the cops had shot at us all’144 (Fritzsch and Reinders 1995: 18). The attempted assassination of the student leader Rudi Dutschke in spring 1968 had an equally agitating effect on the founding members of the MJ2. Baumann describes his feelings after the attack on Dutschke as follows: ‘The bullet
142 ‘in der Vorphase der Bewegung 2. Juni stand nicht die Politisierung, sondern die protesthafte Lebensform als Ausgangspunkt ihrer Aktivitäten’
143 Karl-Heinz Kurras, the police officer who shot Ohnesorg, stood trial for manslaughter but was acquitted of the charge. In 2009, the case was reviewed when investigations exposed Kurras as a secret agent for the Ministry of State Security of the GDR. For a detailed discussion of the case, see: Kellerhoff 2010.
144 ‘Nach all den Prügeln und Schlägen hatten wir das Gefühl, daß die Bullen auf uns alle geschossen haben’
was as much directed against you [as against Rudi Dutschke]. It was the first time that they shot directly at you. I don’t give a shit who is shooting. No more excuses. It was time to hit back’145 (Baumann 1980: 38).
The formation of the ‘Central Council of the Roaming Hash Rebels’ [Zentralrat der umherschweifenden Haschrebellen]146 was a key step towards the development of the MJ2. In 1969, a number of occupants and visitors of the previously mentioned ‘Wieland-Kommune’ began to call themselves ‘Hash Rebels’. Unlike most in the Berlin Underground, the ‘Hash Rebels’ no longer wanted to limit themselves to defensive violence, but called for an ‘active struggle’ [aktiver Kampf] against the police and drug squads in Berlin (Baumann 1980: 51). Amongst the ‘Hash Rebels’ were several future members of the MJ2: Thomas Weisbecker, Ralf Reinders, Michael Baumann, Gabriele Kröcher-Tiedemann, Norbert Kröcher and Ina Siepmann. Some group members had a university background (e.g. Thomas Weisbecker and Georg von Rauch), others originated in the working class; and most had gathered experiences in the Berlin Underground. Inspired by the hedonist spirit of the subcultural scene and a selective recourse to anarchist ideas, the group preached a ‘crude vitalism’ [kruder Vitalismus] (Kraushaar 2005: 158): ‘Don’t give a shit about this society of semi-seniles and taboos. Run wild and do beautiful things. Have a joint!’147 (Baumann 1980: 51). The political demands of the ‘Hash Rebels’ were simple and mostly pleasure-oriented.
145 ‘Die Kugel war genauso gegen dich, da haben die das erste mal nun voll auf dich geschossen. Wer da schießt ist scheißegal. Da war natürlich klar, jetzt zuhauen, kein Pardon mehr geben’
146 Allegedly, it was Dieter Kunzelmann, a former member of the K1, who came up with the name, which mockingly refers to Mao Zedong’s remarks about roaming rebels and the hierarchical structures of leftist organisations at the time (Kraushaar 2006: 515). 147 ‘Scheißt auf diese Gesellschaft der Halbgreise und Tabus. Werdet wild und tut schöne Sachen. Have a joint’
Ralf Reinders explains: ‘We simply wanted to assert that we can smoke. After all, the others can booze, too’148 (Fritzsch and Reinders 1995: 23).
Whilst maintaining the style of the subcultural scene, the ‘Hash Rebels’ called for a new level of militancy and aggression. Put simply, the ‘Hash Rebels’ looked like ‘Gammler’, lived like communards and consumed significant amounts of drugs. Most members of the group had opted out of the world of work and had neither private property nor a permanent residence (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 107). Till Meyer, like Fritzsch, Reinders, Baumann and Viett a former member of the MJ2, describes their self-understanding at the time: ‘We not only looked wild, we were wild, and we were dangerous’149 (Meyer 2008: 162). Indeed, as mentioned above, the ‘Hash Rebels’ deemed the time was ripe to proceed from defensive violence against the police (e.g. with paving stones) to proactive attacks with Molotov cocktails and explosives (Siegfried 2006b: 88). The name ‘Central Council of the Roaming Hash Rebels’ was ironic. ‘Of course’, notes Baumann, ‘there was no central council, no chief and no leader’ (Baumann and Meueler 2008: 51).150 The loose structure of the group reflects the anti-authoritarian, spontaneous and pleasure-oriented spirit of the subcultural environment in which it emerged. As we shall see, the same characteristics applied to the MJ2.
The ‘Hash Rebels’ became the driving force in the formation of the ‘Blues’, a loose network of militant leftist groups in West Berlin. Initially, the inner circle of the ‘Blues’ consisted of approximately 30 members with
148 ‘Wir wollten einfach durchsetzen, daß wir rauchen können. Die anderen können schließlich auch saufen’
149 ‘Wir sahen nicht nur wild aus, wir waren es auch, und wir waren gefährlich’
a ‘hard core’ of 5 members (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 123). According to Wolfgang Kraushaar, the name ‘Blues’ was a reference to the melancholic ‘sound’ of the subculture. He explains: ‘those who identified with this label felt that they were excluded, marginalised, criminalised and condemned to a life on the fringe of society’151 (Kraushaar 2006b: 516). The ‘Blues’ was a network of small and mostly short-lived groups, whose political objectives ranged from the legalisation of hashish to the organisation of youth centres.
While the ‘Blues’ was clearly dominated by men, there were exceptions. The ‘Women’s Liberation Front’ [Frauenbefreiungsfront], for instance, was a short-lived alliance of women who promoted a violent struggle against the oppression of women in society at large and in leftist groups (Der Blues gesammelte Texte der Bewegung 2. Juni: 85). Taking inspiration from figures as diverse as Valerie Solanas, Emma Goldman and Leila Khaled, the Women’s Liberation Front claimed in 1969 ‘[w]e fight against hierarchy, [i.e.] the domination of humans by other humans. This struggle can only be fought by women, because even the most oppressed proletarian is still also the oppressor of his wife and children and of any girl on the street’152 (Perincioli 1999: 101). According to a former acquaintance, the future MJ2 members Angela Luther and Verena Becker were among the first women in Berlin to carry out violent attacks against perceived oppressors. Apparently, they attacked the property of misogynist gynaecologists with butyric acid and paint (ibid.: 103). As we
151 ‘Diejenigen, die sich unter diesem Emblem versammelten, begreifen sich als Ausgegrenzte, Marginalisierte, Kriminalisierte, als an den Rand der Gesellschaft Verbannte’
152 ‘Wir bekämpfen die Hierarchie, die Herrschaft von Menschen über Menschen. Dieser Kampf ist nur uns Frauen möglich, weil auch der unterdrückteste Prolet immer noch Unterdrücker seiner Frau und Kinder und jedes Mädchens auf der Straße bleibt’
shall see, neither continued to focus on women’s issues after joining the MJ2.
The members of the Blues distinguished themselves from most in the student and protest movement in Berlin because they were not reluctant to use violence. On the contrary: ‘We were militant’, explains Baumann, ‘kind of the “black bloc” of the ‘68 movement’153 (Baumann and Meueler 2008: 63). A rapidly growing number of attacks against courts, police departments and US institutions between 1969 and 1970 reflects the remarkable activity of the ‘Blues’. For the most part, the actors involved limited themselves to vandalism, arson and bombings directed against objects (Neidhardt 1982: 438). Some of the groups and individuals, however, quickly radicalised further.
In July 1969, militant leftist activists from Berlin and West Germany – among them a number of future members of the MJ2 and the RAF – gathered in the small Frankish town of Ebrach to campaign for the release of a detained comrade (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 119). After the gathering, the communards Dieter Kunzelmann, Lena Conradt, Ina Siepmann, Adalbert Fichter and Georg von Rauch travelled further to Jordan and received military training in a PFLP camp (note that this was almost a year before the RAF’s first visit to a Palestinian training camp). After their return, the ‘Palästina Fraktion’ [Palestine Faction] urged the formation of an urban guerrilla group in West Berlin (Kraushaar 2006b: 518). Jointly with a few members of the ‘Blues’, they created the ‘Tupamaros West Berlin’ (TW). As the name indicates, the group sought to follow the armed struggle of the Tupamaros in Uruguay and other
revolutionary movements in the Third World. With good reason, the TW is depicted as the predecessor of the MJ2. Both organisations shared a number of structural characteristics and ideological principles: they were spontaneous, anti-intellectual and anti-elitist, pleasure-oriented and willing to resort to violence (see: Kraushaar 2006b: 528).
Like most groups associated with the ‘Blues’, the TW mainly used fire and explosives for their attacks. But their activities represented a new level of militancy in the Berlin activist scene. Jamie Trnka notes that the failed bombing of a Jewish community centre in 1969 was ‘the first and best known act by the Tupamaros West Berlin’ (Trnka 2003a: 323). Other attacks by the TW were directed against legal authorities, politicians and other public figures as well as Israeli and American institutions (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 123). The TW and other groups associated with the Blues promoted a strongly anti-Zionist position before this had gained wide currency in the radical Left (Weiss 2005: 228). As discussed in Chapter 1, the TW presented Israel as the ‘new’ fascist state and identified with the Palestinian struggle that they saw as a ‘clear and simple’ anti-fascist resistance movement (ibid.: 229). Since summer 1971, the self-identified Fedayeen were equipped with firearms (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 146).
Unlike the ‘Hash Rebels’ and other militant groups in the Berlin Underground, the TW gave up the subcultural look. Claessens and de Ahna rightly argue that ‘the loss of the look of the subcultural scene replaced by a totally “straight” appearance and carrying forged
passports’154 aroused suspicion in the Berlin Underground (Claessens and Ahna 1982: 121). Indeed, while their trimmed hair and neat clothes made it easier to pass unnoticed on the streets of Berlin, the TW provoked hostile reactions in the subcultural scene from which they had emerged (Baumann 1980: 66).