Steinmeier calls on RAF terrorists to break silence 40 years after German Autumn
A cellist plays Beethoven for the guests invited to the German president’s residence, Bellevue Palace. Among them are the co-pilot and passengers who were held hostage in the Lufthansa plane, Landshut, as well as the son of Hanns Martin Schleyer, the murdered president of the German Employers’ Association.
It was 40 years ago that the German Autumn, the bloody standoff between the Red Army Faction (RAF) and the German state, reached its peak. President Frank-Walter Steinmeier invited the guests to honor the victims and reflect on the events that unfolded four decades ago.
Steinmeier said it was time to hear from RAF members who have been silent for four decades
RAF terrorists killed 11 people in 1977, but by the time their last victim was shot in 1991, some 35 people had died. For Steinmeier, however, the time has not come to close this chapter of German history. There are too many questions unanswered questions, he said, calling on RAF members to break their silence.
“If you have the backbone that you so often accused others of lacking, then speak,” he said. “Then disclose your crimes in full!”
In his remarks, Steinmeier also spoke of the dilemma faced by the German government at the time.
“The refusal to be blackmailed can have the consequence that you sacrifice a human life,” he said.
Read more: Terror casualty Hanns Martin Schleyer – sacrificed by the state?
Schleyer’s kidnapping was meant to give the RAF leverage in demanding the release of leading terror cell members who were in jail in Stuttgart. That was the same goal in the hijacking of the Landshut plane, an operation carried out by Palestinian sympathizers.
RAF leaders Gudrun Ensslin, Jan-Carl Raspe and Andreas Baader were buried under tight security
The chancellor at the time, Helmut Schmidt, refused to negotiate. A day after the hijacking, Schleyer’s body was found in the trunk of an Audi 100. Three RAF members were found dead in their cells, having committed suicide. Reflecting on the Schmidt government’s stance, Steinmeier commented that “the history books say the state was tough, the state would not be blackmailed.”
Myths and conspiracy theories
No one in Germany would doubt Steinmeier when he says that the events of the German Autumn continue to influence the collective conscience today. Books, artworks and especially film productions keep revisiting the era of the RAF.
“Telling the story of the conflict as a duel — the terrorists versus the state — makes this subject very attractive,” said historian Andreas Rödder.
Read more: The legacy of the 1977 German Autumn of left-wing terror
Much of the discussion now delves into the myths and conspiracy theories surrounding the terrorists. Did the imprisoned RAF leaders really commit suicide? And the later phases of RAF terror in the 1980s and 1990s are also open to speculation, in part because the perpetrators of the third generation were never caught.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
The harsh reality on the big screen
Whether it was the murder of business executive and industry representative Hanns-Martin Schleyer, the early RAF court trials or the hijacking of a Lufthansa airplane, the far-left militant group Red Army Faction (RAF) brought a wave of terror onto West Germany in the 1970s. Their actions have since inspired a number of filmmakers.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
Collateral damage
In “The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum,” a young woman played by Angela Winkler has an affair with an alleged terrorist, drawing the attention of the police, the judiciary system and the press. The 1975 film by Volker Schlöndorrf, based on a book by Heinrich Böll, is a fictional story based on the left-wing terrorism that took place in Germany in the 1960s and 1970s.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
11-part reflection of the times
“‘Germany in Autumn’ is not a ‘good’ film, but an important one,” wrote Die Zeit. The 1978 film, comprised of 11 episodes, brought together top German directors including Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Volker Schlöndorff. Reflecting the socio-political climate of West Germany in the 1970s, this film was also based on a work by Nobel Prize-winning author Heinrich Böll.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
A question of violence
“Knife in the Head,” starring Bruno Ganz as Dr. Hoffmann, was a 1978 blockbuster in West Germany. During a police raid, he is shot in the head but survives. But is he a victim of police brutality or terrorism? No one seems to know – not even Hoffmann, who loses his memory in the shooting.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
Sisters on the front lines
Margarethe von Trotta’s 1981 film “Marianne and Juliane” is a fictionalized account based on the biographies of two real-life sisters and pastor’s daughters, Christiane and Gudrun Ensslin. Both are active in politics. While one is a quiet pragmatist, the other joins the RAF and is later found dead in her prison cell. The film helped von Trotta make her international breakthrough.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
A 192-day trial
About 10 years after the Stammheim trial of RAF co-founders Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof, filmmaker Reinhard Hauff devoted a new film to the subject of RAF terrorism. Based on authentic protocols, “Stammheim” (1986) reconstructs the 192-day trial in 1975. The narrative is limited to the protocol reproduction and does not include any commentary.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
Life after RAF?
“The State I Am In” is a 2000 film by Christian Petzold about life after being part of the RAF. A couple who defied the German state in the 1970s lives underground with their daughter for years out of fear of being caught. While the parents are plagued by paranoia, the daughter decides to break out of hiding.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
Crossing borders
Another story of life in hiding, this time in the former East Germany, is Volker Schlöndorff’s “The Legend of Rita.” In the film from 2000, left-wing terrorists go underground in East Germany in the 1970s with the help of the Stasi. After German reunification, their cover is blown and they are shot and killed while trying to escape. Several RAF members really did attempt to hide in East Germany.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
A true story of two deaths
The documentary film released in 2001 by director Andres Veiel, “Black Box BRD” offers a counter-narrative in which surprising parallels open up. On the one side there is Alfred Herrhausen, spokesperson for Deutsche Bank’s board of directors, who was murdered by the RAF. On the other side is RAF member Wolfgang Grams, whose violent death also raises questions.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
The Baader-Meinhof Complex
Perhaps the best-known film about the RAF, “The Baader-Meinhof Complex” (2008) provides the terrorist group’s back story and their actions based on a book of the same name written by Stefan Aust. The film received mixed reviews, with some critics claiming it mystified the RAF – in part due to a star cast including Moritz Bleibtreu as Andreas Baader and Martina Gedeck as Ulrike Meinhof.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
The lawyers behind the far-left
In “Die Anwälte – Eine deutsche Geschichte” (The Lawyers – A German Story) from 2009, the careers of Otto Schily, Hans-Christian Ströbele and Horst Mahler are traced from their days as attorneys for the left-wing political opposition in the 1970s to the present. Schily (right) became interior minister; Ströbele (left) joined the Greens party; Mahler is a right-wing extremist and Holocaust denier.
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Films about far-left German terrorist group RAF
A complex love triangle
Andres Veiel made his feature film debut in 2011, in “If Not Us, Who?” The story of an emotional and sexual love triangle follows RAF co-founder Gudrun Ensslin and Bernward Vesper, son of a Nazi poet, as they fall in love, get married and have a child. But then Ensslin leaves the family and follows Andreas Baader into the RAF underground.
Rödder was one of the panelists who continued the discussion about the German Autumn after Steinmeier’s speech. He was joined by Federal Prosecutor Peter Frank, public opinion researcher Renate Köcher and journalist and publisher Stefan Aust.
Aust is one of the most high-profile authors to have chronicled the terrorist organization and said it’s time that the authorities open their archives to the public.
“After 40 years, it’s time to stop the secrecy,” he said, adding that he would not be surprised to find information on mistakes made by investigators, or dubious surveillance activity.
Terrorist campaign with lasting impact
“Next to the building of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the Wall, Germans list the RAF era as one of the most important events in the post-war period,” said Köcher, adding that this applies to the population of the former West Germany.
The peak of the group’s activities in the fall of 1977 marked a turning point and was accompanied by a heavy police presence in Germany, she added.
“Sympathy for the RAF’s goals decreased by half,” Köcher said, adding that trust in the state began to grow, and people allowed the state much more room to increase security measures. “That trend continues today.”
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
A long-awaited return to Germany
The years haven’t been kind to the Landshut, perhaps the most famous Boeing 737-200 in Germany’s history. It is currently rusting away at a “cemetery” for airplanes at the Fortaleza International Airport in Brazil. But now officials want to take the plane apart, transport the pieces to Germany and restore it at the Dornier Museum, close to Lake Constance.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
The RAF and the German Autumn
The Landshut became famous in 1977’s German Autumn: the weeks during which the country was shaken by several terrorist acts committed by the Red Army Faction and allied groups. Four militants from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacked the Lufthansa plane to blackmail the German government into releasing prominent RAF members from prison.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
The odyssey begins
On October 13, 1977, two men and two women revealed the guns and explosives that they had brought onto a tourist flight from Palma de Mallorca, Spain, to Frankfurt. They demanded that the jet fly to Somalia instead, and they called for the release of 11 RAF prisoners – or else they’d blow up all 86 passengers and five crew. The plane’s first stop was Rome, where it had to refuel.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
Making it to Dubai
The plane continued on its way and landed to refuel again in Cyprus and – after airports in Damascus, Baghdad and Kuwait denied permission to land – Bahrain. From there, pilot Jürgen Schumann and co-pilot Jürgen Vietor flew the Landshut to Dubai, where it arrived at about 6 a.m. on October 14. In this shot, a negotiator on the ground shows one of the hostage takers that he’s unarmed.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
Life-threatening information
The hijackers asked the tower in Dubai to supply water, food and medicine. Captain Schumann was able to communicate the exact number of the hijackers on board to the authorities. But, when Dubai’s defense minister revealed the information in an interview, the hostage takers learned about it, too, and threatened to kill Schumann.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
A life lost
Germany’s GSG 9 anti-terror specialists went to Dubai, but practiced on a different airplane for so long that the Landshut took off before they could intervene. The next stop was Aden, in what was then South Yemen. Because the plane had to land on sandy ground, Schumann (pictured in Dubai) went out to inspect the landing gear – but took too long. Upon his return, a hijacker shot and killed him.
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Landshut returns to Germany 40 years after hijacking
Dramatic end to the nightmare
The last stop was Mogadishu, Somalia. The hijackers issued an ultimatum for the RAF prisoners to be released and poured the duty-free spirits over the hostages, preparing to blow up the plane, so West German officials pretended to give in. But, instead, the GSG 9 stormed the plane, shot three of the four hijackers and saved all remaining hostages, who returned to Germany on October 18.