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Remember that when you're posting things! -G
The article should say something about the group's motives and aims; or, if the group had no clear aims, this should be clearly stated. At the moment the article gives some basic facts and timeline about what happened, but it's impossible to infer why the people may have behaved as they did -- surely the more important thing for the article to tackle.
Assuming there are competing theories about why the RAF emerged in Germany while similar movements did not emerge in other European countries, these should be summarised.
I know nothing about the group's motivation myself, merely came to the article as a reader. I could attempt to research this but if anyone else already knows some of this it might be quicker! Alex
The so-called third generation was PARTLY a phantom created by secret players With Braunmühl, Herrhausen and Rohwedder there are no shred of evidence for red army fraction involvement but considerable motives of pro-business clandestine operatives. Keywords: Braunmuehl's Reagan-disarmament taken briefcase, Herrhausen finance-reform, Rohwedder ownership of GDR. Please read the excellent wikipedia article on GLADIO and Celle Hole in german 203.184.35.187 20:40, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
I came to this RAF page from the page for Operation Entebbe. There they mention two RAF members being a part of the hijjacking, but that isn't mentioned at all in this article. Is it a false statement in the Enetebbe article or an omission here (perhaps a partial truth involving fragile associations between the participating hijjackers and the actual RAF?) If anyone knows it would be great to have that cleared up. Jeremyclarke 03:47, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Note: several originally separate entries were compounded in this section by Maikel 21:46, 30 January 2006 (UTC).
Is it Faction or Fraction? I'm still confused. The text seems to say "Faction" is an incorrect translation of the name, but yet the article is still named "Faction". Either the article should be moved to Red Army Fra(c/k)tion, and the page spelled "Faction" should redirect to it, or the text should be made more clear. Mrzaius 05:39, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Shouldn't it be "Red Army Fraction", the correct translation from the German? --Charles Stewart 16:11, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Copied from Talk:History of Germany: In the Germany since 1945 section, there is a link to the article Red Army Faction, but that is just a redirect to Red Army Fraction. Should this be changed to make people less confused? Or am I barking up the wrong tree here? -iten
It was always the "Red Army Faction" in the English-language press way back when. "Google proves nothing," of course, but here's a Googlefight. –Hajor 00:46, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I've moved the page back to Faction as the result of the discussion suggested. Here's a summary:
I hope that's cleared up the confusion. Saintswithin 21:54, 2 May 2005 (UTC)
hello all. the differences between faction and fraction have little to do with the terms being lost in translation, and more to do with their actual meaning. fraction is a soviet inspired term that implies a highly organized unit, which is the exact reason why the red army uses it. faction implies a droid like unit that isnt capable of being organized or making decisions, rather implimenting them, also a marxist denounciation of the term - again, the reason why the red army does not use it. it is an insult to label them as faction. in light of this, which seems to not have been noticed by people on the discussion board, i will change the title in the intro.
i wasnt able to change the title, tried changing the redirect but couldnt. im wikichallenged so i ask that registered users or anyone who knows their way around this thing kindly change the title.
1) The name of the terrorist organization is the Red Army Faction. That is what it is called in English, that is what the article should be titled, that is what instances of the name in the English-language article should read. However, in Germany, it is called the Rote Armee Fraktion, and NOT the Rote Armee Faktion, despite that the most common translation English->German is faction->Faktion. The reasoning for this is perfectly and correctly illustrated in "Origins of the name".
2) Baader-Meinhof Gang ≠ Rote Armee Fraktion. "Baader-Meinhof Gang" refers exclusively to the gang consisting of Andreas Baader, Ulrike Meinhof, Jan-Karl Raspe, and Irmgard Moeller, and their compatriots, or the first generation of the RAF. (In German, by the way, they are the Baader-Meinhof Gruppe, or group.) The second and third generations of the RAF are separate entities from the BMG.
- Che Nuevara, the Democratic Revolutionary 21:11, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Encyclopedia Britannica notes that the group is "also called Red Army Fraction", so I have added this to the article. Maikel 15:18, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Rewrote the page. I have used the detailed data at http://www.rafinfo.de as a source, but the site looks somewhat dubious – at least leftist-leaning – to me. Some fact-checking might still be in order.
Also, I removed this paragraph:
Meinhof didn't have to be Baader's lover to be the intellectual leader. The name is not misleading and was in common use in Germany. djmutex 20:16 15 Jul 2003 (UTC)
"and killing dozens of high-profile Germans in its more than 20 years of existence. "
This seems to be an exaggeration. Should be more like "a dozen of high-profile people and another dozen of bystanders"
81.164.253.130 17:46, 27 March 2007 (UTC) Meinhof isn't Baader's lover, AND isn't the intellectual leader! She was just a journalist who helped escape him the 14/05/1970 in Berlin. She isn't even a "high officer" in the RAF/Baader-Meinhof Grüppe. It was the media that give the first RAF generation the name of BMG, because Ulrike Meinhof was a well known journaliste!
If there are no any other arguments for removing the paragraph:
i will add this paragraph, a little adjusted to the text! because it is a common mistake that Ulrike Meinhof was one of the leaders! (and she isn't)
I changed some details in the last part. Weiterstadt was not a secret service action but really done by the RAF - the secret service bombing of a prison was in Celle (it's called the "Celler Loch"). Also Klaus Steinmetz wasn't a terrorist but a secret service agent.
Anybody know if the parallels to the game Red Faction are coincidence or not?
It's clearly not coincidence, yet the editors of this article don't seem to be able to see it Killridemedly 06:07, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
While I do not know much about this group, and I don't mind calling it a terrorist group in the introduction or whatever, I think the word "terrorist" is a little overused in the rest of the text. Phrases like "More people died when the explosives deployed by the terrorists were triggered later that night." are a little strange.
Referring to individuals as "the terrorists", "the other terrorists" kinda seems sloppy and a little POV to me. Maybe we could throw a little diversity into the adjectives to avoid seeming like bush-bots? :P --Che y Marijuana 10:18, Nov 17, 2004 (UTC)
That's right. Lumping every Gen 2 RAF soldier, USA mercenary, Palestinian ambulance driver, Guantanomo bay inmate, freedom fighter and political dissident under one label is old hat. And besides, even under the correct definition of "terrorist", there were three seperate generations of RAF, each one with their own questionable actions. Department stores, Axel Springer press offices, banks and privatization officials are targets only under some abstract notion of the lethal nature of poverty, but the first generation's targets also concentrated on "arson attacks against U.S. military facilities,” generally considered imperialist and overly aggressive terrorists themselves, “ [and] German police stations," whose “tactics of the period are nowadays mostly viewed as generally overly aggressive”. So they sometimes attacked just anybody, but to say that they attacked just anybody [all the time] would be incorrect. FET 22:19, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
There is no "correct" international definition of terrorism, it's used differently and variously by people and governments, normally to describe people they don't like. Armed group is the neutral term. --Donnacha 11:45, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Two people, named Andreas Ammer and F.M. Einheit (from Einstürzenede Neubauten), released a conceptual album under the name "Ammer Einheit" with samples from three infamous periods of German history: Kaiser Wilhelm, Hitler, and Ulrike Meinhof (from the trial). Note that "Einheit" means "Unity" ("единство") by itself--but the artist FM Einheit has been releasing music under that name since at least 1980. I think it is interesting that a German group (oder gruppe!) put her in with the others, that it says something about the attitudes toward each historical figure/period, because that's what their album "Deutsche Krieger" was more about - not which Person/Krieg was necessarily worse than the other (it's a kinda of a moot point). And about the Cyrillic origin of the word Fraktion, that would be фракция? First by Khirad 19:25, 19 September 2005 (UTC) corrected by Dando C, 03 November 2005.
The English language article suggests it's a conspiracy theory to think it's suicide:
However, the German language article writes:
This sounds very different, and is much closer to what I learned at school. I think the English language article needs to be rewritten - it's much more than a conspiracy theory to doubt the official version. The same is true on today's frontpage. I might fix this job myself (the former, I can't do the latter) but if not at least I have stated the problem here. Gerrit CUTEDH 13:04, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
For those of you who are German-impaired, the quote from the German article translates to
May 24, 1967: "leaflets at Berlin's Free University which jokingly imply that one way to bring a Marxist Revolution to fruition in West Germany is by deliberately burning down department stores and other business buildings in West Germany." The leaflets actually were part of the protests against the Vietnam War and said, that burning down department stores would bring "that crackling vietnam-feeling (being there and burning along)" to european consumers.
I really enjoyed reading this article (just watched a movie last night about Operation Thunderbolt) and made some changes. When I got down to where someone had asked "Who is Heins??" - I'll do some sourcing and then see if I can patch it, because there's a jump between the RAF beginnings and when Mein and others join the group in the early 1970s.
I removed this ...(West German police tactics of the period are viewed in contemporary times as generally overly aggressive) because it's on the edge of POV ... viewed in contemporary times by who? It also breaks flow in writing. Of course, this comment might be very evident or accepted as fact in modern German society, but most of the readers will be outside Germany. The comment need sourcing about the claim - such as a mainstream leader of the 1960s saying today, "Well, we were overtly aggressive and learned from it."
... Rudi Dutschke, the intellectual leader of the student protests ... I'm thinking of how to best clarify this, because "intellectual" can and is primarily used as an descriptive adjective, such as "smart", funny or bold: George W. Bush is an anti-intellectual leader. The Wikipedia definition uses it mostly as a noun, completely ignoring the adjective usage, but many readers may be left with the impression that Dutschke was a leader who was also smart, rather than the Noam Chomsky of his time.
"The students" is also used a lot here; but this borders POV; did every single student in all of Germany support the New Left? Noirdame 18:58, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
I have replaced insurgent with terrorism in the description of RAF as I consider the former to be NPOV and euphemistic of their actions. Maikel 20:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but targetting the repressive police authorities and illegal US occupation thugs who strive to preserve the tortorous status quo does not qualify as terrorism. The use of the term terrorist is a fundamental violation of NPOV. They shall be called a militant group. The opening paragraphs contains specifies that the RAF was tied to legitimate liberation organizations such as the IRA and PLO. It is inconsitent to call a group terrorist but then not to call groups with which it has contact with like IRA terrorist. Jacob Peters
You should write more about the group's activities in the early '70s and early 80s. The way the article is now it seems that these were years without events. This is of course not true. The 1970-1972 period was filled with ultra-violent bankrobberies across West Germany, with several deaths. This was done to get money to buy guns and explosives on the black market via Italy and Lebanon. The early 80s was also full of dramatic events. In 1981? they shot down a high ranking Bundeswehr (that's the West German army) officer pretending to be package-delivering postal workers. The event is immortalised by the english goth group Bauhaus. They released a song called "Terror Couple Kill Colonel" in 1982. Several bomb attacks was also done in the early 80s. -Bjarnulf
Jimbo Wales highly recommended to delete the article about the SPK and all links to the Wikipedia-project terrorism. See our recent Boston meeting, see the juridical proceedings of SPK against Wikipedia.
I made no recommendation about this article. The anon ip number should be ignored.--Jimbo Wales 23:33, 20 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but attacking the armed and repressive police officers and USA occpuying forces does not amount to terrorism. Police officers and soldiers are killed all the time because they are expected to. The actions of the Red Army Faction were in no circumstance directed towards the working masses of Germany. The targetting of oppressive state and capitalist tyrants does not constitute terrorism because these people are part of the ruling class and therefore opposition to them will be natural. For a manifestation of terrorism, refer to the massacre of school children committed by Chechen terrorists. The absence of any major civilian casualities brought by Red Army Faction disqualifies it as a terrorist group. Jacob Peters
of course they were a terrorist group. there is no doubt that in germany the mainstream considers the raf a terrorist group. only a tiny radical left fringe would argue that.trueblood 18:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
“ | One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. | ” |
Their were TERRORIST and nothing else, these cynicle euphemisms make me puke (sorry my bad english) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.164.192.137 (talk) 15:32, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
i deleted the passage about the list of members: because, it is superfluous since there already is a sub article apart from that it only contains muddled language (nearly 100 Germans joined terrorist organisations in the fight against capitalism) and facts.trueblood 19:07, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
As a reader of the article, I still don't understand what values and ideologies they were fighting for. They obviously had some sort of cause and something they strongly believed in... Can we explain their ideology, values, causes, etc. so I can understand what they're all about?--Sonjaaa 18:11, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
very interesting stuff Caranorn! I found the link to German Guerrilla dot com English Translations of the RAF's public statements to be quite enough. However, much of it is tiresome to read, so someone would be doing a great service in writing a summary. I might attempt it when I'm feeling utterly bored of life. (The actions of these kind of people are generally far more interesting than what they claimed to be fighting for... Hasslehoof 15:32, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
calling the state or the police criminal that really is pov, although i agree that the german state move in direction of becoming a police state in reaction to the raf, which is what alienated the raf from the political left in germany. i would not know which party you are refering to, the communist party was already outlawed in the fifties. a lot went wrong in those days but it was as much the fault of the raf as of the state. a history of the raf already exists, der baader meinhof complex by stefan aust. trueblood 13:41, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
What does the hijacking have to do with the RAF? In the article on it, it says the RAF encouraged the Palestinians? --AW 20:21, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
can we come to an agreement about what to call the raf, now the article calls it on of the most active left wing groups, which it clearly was not. i don't see the merits of an edit war, it is clear to everybody that the german public, the gouvernment, the media, then and now saw and sees the raf as a terrorist group. this should be reflected in the article even if the article does not call it directly a terrorist group. is there any controversity about this?trueblood 20:41, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
I've put in that he was a 'vehemently right-wing capitalist'. You can take it as an outlining the left position. He was implacably opposed to the demonstrators et al so even on its own its probably not POV. -- maxrspct ping me 15:44, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
Not really. I think you just have a hatred for left-wing groups. maxrspct ping me 18:43, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
On your opinion I rest my case. Please don't revert and edit POV. See also sections are the mainstay of wikipedia. Fiction and art are what they are. --maxrspct ping me 19:38, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
I changed it to ardent. He might be considered a 'defender of democracy' by some.. but that is a POV label ..not a description of his political persuasions. maxrspct ping me 19:53, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
from the article: Industrialised nations in late 1960s experienced massive social upheavals stemming from dissatisfaction among both workers and students. Newly-found youth identity and issues such as racism, women's liberation and anti-imperialism were at the forefront of radical politics. The Communist Party of Germany had been outlawed since 1956. Elected and unelected government positions down to the local level were often occupied by ex-Nazis. There was anger at post-war denazification, seen by some as ineffective. The conservative media was considered biased by the radicals as they were owned and controlled by ardent right-wing capitalists such Axel Springer, who was implacably opposed to student radicalism
i am unhappy with this part, because it is and sounds leftleaning, not objective as a encyclopedia should. and there are a couple of things that don't have much to do with the raf,
trueblood 20:39, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
I have changed a lot of what i wrote. My answers to your points-
maxrspct ping me 21:07, 18 February 2007 (UTC)
Ardent only means strong belief
also what disturbed me that you rewrite things to put in a more leftwing drive and at the same time do little changes which seems like white wash to me, changing violent protest into lively protest, replaces murder with dead... trueblood 08:35, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
the list now contains an entry that i think is bogus, the new ref as far as i could see does not mention this particular attack although it has a chapter that discusses the terrorist threat in the 70s. the german article does not mention it, nothing can be found at google, the think the raf did not attack anything nuclear ever. if there casualties on the raf side it should be easy to find the names. please supply some other ref or i delete it again.trueblood 06:38, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
In the section about Bad Kleinen it's said that Grams was shot. In fact there is no conformimation of this and the officials including a trial on european court of justice for human rights. regards, georg --84.145.91.176 08:39, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
I have deleted the entry referring to a bomb blast in the Frankfurt Airport departure area in June 1985. This was and is not attributed to the RAF. Besides, the bomb blast did not happen on June 9, 1985, but June 19, 1985. RAF has only taken the responsibility for the attack on the Rhein Main Airbase, a US military installation on the south of the Frankfurt airport, in August 1985.--L.Willms 20:48, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
That section is vastly oversized and largely NPOV. Maikel 13:07, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
The abbreviation RAF was also a gibe at the Royal Air Force, a major contributor to the huge NATO presence in West Germany. ... doesn't make any sense and I very much doubt it. Maikel 14:25, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
Some has changed the date the group 'operated' until .. as 1993 rather than 1998 - when the end communique was issued. Should there be a reword or a revert on this? --maxrspct ping me 16:39, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
÷14:23, 9 December 2007 (UTC)80.137.5.94 (talk)As a German native speaker I d like to point out that the German term "Fraktion" means a seperated group within a greater group. The English word "fracture" has the same roots, so a fraktion means generally a group which has broken away from a bigger group. The translation as "splinter group" comes in fact closest to the original meaning. In German "Fraktion" is also a common political term, which describes members of the Bundestag belonging to the same political party and voting accordingly. Therefore in German understanding a "fraktion" is a political group of the same allegiance. By choosing their Name RAF wanted to express that they were a political group within the APO which pursued their interests and goals by means of the Red Army, i.e. by violence. So a "fraktion" is not necessariy a faction and should not be translated as such.
The RAF called itself RAF, because of WW2, Churchill's air force (to speak slightly enigmatically), the poor souls wanted to portrait themselves as an European VCong, up to the job of eye to eye combat with the evil superpower, so the semantics of fraction (useful if one thinks of "hirn-rissig") are less important than "give me a f". This urdeutsche Größenwahn really smakes of Mahler--Radh (talk) 03:08, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
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BetacommandBot (talk) 23:43, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I have corrected numerous cases of bad (often Germanized) English in the article, without altering the sense. By the way, is this (as it looks) an English-language playground for left-wing Germans? APW (talk) 12:02, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
The part of the article on this is confused and confusing. The point is simple: the word 'fraction' is virtually unknown in English in the meaning 'a political grouping' (or any other grouping for that matter). See for example the Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary. APW (talk) 17:11, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
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The reference to money received by Rainer Röhl and Ulrike Meinhof when they were married is irrelevant to an article about the RAF as their marriage had ended before the RAF was founded. Unless somebody can justify including this information here and not, for example, in the article about Röhl, I will delete it. There are, however, other allegations of support from the GDR (over and above providing asylum for former RAF activists), but these would need to be documented. --Mia-etol (talk) 20:24, 16 November 2008 (UTC)
I've removed the reference again because it refers to events several years before the formation of the RAF. Please explain why the payment of money to Rainer Röhl, the divorced husband of Ulrike Meinhof, during their marriage is relevant in an article about the RAF while it isn't even mentioned in the article about Röhl himself. The money was supposed to finance the publication of the magazine konkret, edited by Röhl. --Mia-etol (talk) 02:29, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
I've moved the section on anti-semitism without changing the content, as it appears to me that whatever about Mahler, who is now a militant NATIONAL socialist, the majority of the RAF founders were internationalist in their orientation and there is no evidence I'm aware of that they were anti-semitic. Indeed they emerged out of the APO, one of whose main themes was the necessity of acknowledging and critiquing the Nazi past and its continuing influence in the Federal Republic (Kiesinger the Federal Chancellor until he was replaced by Willy Brandt had been a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party).
There is a large element of self-justification in Mahler's assertions about the RAF and other former members distance themselves from his interpretations. --Mia-etol (talk) 12:56, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
There is evidence of a general anti-semitic tendency on the German far-left in this period which resulted in the entebbe hijacking, the firebombing of a synagogue on the anniversary of krystallnacht and plans to murder the head of the Jewish community.
For more information see http://www.workersliberty.org/node/6705
http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10511
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ulrike_Meinhof :
Auschwitz meant that six million Jews were killed, and thrown on the waste-heap of Europe, for what they were represented as: money-Jews. Finance capital and the banks, the hard core of the system of imperialism and capitalism, steered the hatred of men against money and exploitation into hatred against the Jews. . . . Antisemitism is really a hatred of capitalism.
Mahler says his antisemitism has not changed, so we can conclude that there was antisemitism in the Baader Meinhoff, at least from him.
Just because they were anti-fascist doesnt mean they couldn't be antisemitic. The new location seems fine to me, I agree that more evidence would help. Telaviv1 (talk) 14:31, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
Interesting reading at [1]. The Meinhof quote is from a trial, and as the article explains there are different ways of interpreting the message that Meinhof was trying to convey (and that Meinhof's stance in court was hardly a coherent political manifesto). I think it's important that we stand by WP:OR policy here, and not make our judgements and interpretations from quotes removed from their context. I cannot see, as per the discussion so far, any solid backing that RAF as an organization would be antisemitic, that antisemitism would have moulded its political activity. I think its a side-track on writing the history of the RAF, and I see no reason why give undue weight to the issue. --Soman (talk) 16:55, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
which part of the Meinhoff quote to you think was "a stand against Israel"?
Telaviv1 (talk) 16:09, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
The present wording "can be read as" is essentially a weasel wording. Notably, albeit the libertarian website is linked for the quote, the way the quote is ripped out of its context is by no means representative of the article as such. We cannot base entire sections of articles on subjective interpretations of our own, case remains that anti-semitism (be it that you can find quotes that are unsympathetic) wasn't a feature of the RAF. I stand unconvinced so far as to the need of an 'Antisemitism' section in this article. --Soman (talk) 17:28, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
I felt my previous comment was made in anger and wrong so I deleted it. I realize that the use of the word "antisemitic" was causing a problem and I have taken that into account. Like racism and even sexism, antisemitism can be reflected in attitudes and statements as well as action and is not always overt or conscious.
Telaviv1 (talk) 15:40, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Telaviv1 (talk) 15:40, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Anyone know the details of the (relatively) recent documentary film (i.e. *not* the Aust feature film) which included interviews with some who have never spoken before? Would be good to include. Testbed (talk) 17:05, 19 April 2009 (UTC)
Won the Pulitzer in 1981. Based on Hitler's Children, also on Heidegger.--Radh (talk) 04:52, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
If L Cohen's song really was about the raf, it should be put back in.--Radh (talk) 06:50, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
Baader and esp. Meinhof were (are?) very big in italian left wing culture (film and music).--Radh (talk) 06:50, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
Christian Riechers' 1 Vol. Gramsci edition was in the extensive raf-prisoner's library at Stammheim prison.--Radh (talk) 04:48, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
There is good reason to suppose he was always an antisemite: he has said that his enemy hasn't changed, his work with the PFLP (funded by Francois Genoud) and the statement of support for the Munich Massacre. The text implies his antisemitism is a new development and it perhaps needs to be carefully rephrased so as to say he is an atnisemite without stating when this began.
Telaviv1 (talk) 10:48, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
Mahler has a very complicated personal/political history (as can be still seen from the stuff on his homepage- at least the last time I dared to), as far as I know he was a right wing student (Korpsstudent), then SDS and SPD (which soon expelled all SDS members), it is said he finished his law studies with the very best note (1), absolutely rare this. He earned a lot of money from wealthy clients in the 60s (still seems to have rich friends) but got more and more drawn into the student revolt, working without pay for army deserters and students accused of having disturbed the peace and quiet of the land (Landesfriedensbruch). He held very militant speeches against Springer (here are probably the deepest roots of the raf) and must have begun to see himself as a revolutionary. If he was an antisemite in the 60s it will show in his speeches and talks of this time. Then everything moves fast. Serious, still also well established Mahler (and friends, people who work for him at his law firm,...) meets the "pimpish" Baader and his (now also bohemian) girlfriend Ensslin and both groups seem to have arranged to join forces, voila the RAF is born. And all early raf and many more other people went to Palestine to get started in the guerilla businee. Mahler and late-comer Meinhof were the raf' s most prominent members (in the eyes of the public, but also far into the radical milieu) and probably wrote a lot of the early papers (,but certainly not without debates). I think it is simply impossible to say this is antisemitic, it must be Mahler. At that time it probably was Meinhof (who come from the old KPD (not the DKP!) milieu, which had a long history of antisemitism going well back into its Weimar phase. I am sorry if this is too long.--Radh (talk) 12:43, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
You seem to know a lot about this. Telaviv1 (talk) 14:50, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
Thank you, I am prety sure that this sketch of Mahler is correct as it stands, but I really do not know as much about him, as I sometimes want to (but not most of the time. He is a pretty scare guy).
2.) W. Böse(RZ) helped the Palestine freedom fighters to get into Munich from the airport. (Only?) source H-J Klein (whom Böse told this). 3.) Meinhof (?)'s jubilation about this. Mahler's (?). 4.) W. Böse more antisemitic as even Carlos (Klein). 5.) The german left wing's disgust at Israel after Entebbe.--Radh (talk) 16:34, 27 May 2009 (UTC)
Unfortunately I cannot speak German. Truth is, you seem a reliable editor of this stuff and I am happy for you to get on with it.
Telaviv1 (talk) 19:46, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, will try. I have to admit that I don't know or have forgotten an awful lot of the dates and details. But, as said, there are very good people on this at german Wikipedia. And please feel free to ask for anything. As long as I have the time and can work at it I'll be very glad to help. (I have this funny idea to get a useful overview/catalog of 60s german left-wing radicalism (the intellectual aspects) off the ground, so working on Mahler or the Roter Stern Verlag is all part of this).--Radh (talk) 14:21, 30 May 2009 (UTC)
Does this article express the idea, that that Westgermany was on the sure way to become a totalitarian state or even was one already?--Radh (talk) 14:03, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
Somebody, I don't know who, inserted the same comment in German into the body of the text, several times. The comments were signed as if by Radh but the name was in red. I cut the comments and blamed their insertion on Radh in my own annotation to the edit, but I am persuaded from looking at Radh's own comments that it wasn't him who was defacing the article in this way. Apologies to Radh for the wrong attribution; whoever is inserting bits of German into the text, please stop it. Lexo (talk) 23:44, 2 June 2009 (UTC)