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Title: How It All Began : The Personal Account of a West German Urban Guerrilla by Bommi Baumann ISBN: 0-88978-045-5 Publisher: Arsenal Pulp Press Pub. Date: 01 June, 2002 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (2 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Destroying What Destroys You
Comment: Perhaps one of the most important nonfiction books of the Cold War, "How It All Began" is the rare story from the terrorist's unapologetic point of view.
The June 2nd Movement that Michael Baumann took part in and writes about was a product of its times; its members were bored students and hippies, tired of the paranoia of a culture focused solely on not being communist. In 1969, news of American college rebellions and "love-ins" flowed into Germany and ignited a youth culture. At the same time, news of wars and global chaos ignited youth activism. The young Germans who objected to the Vietnam war did so as strongly as their counterparts in the States--though, of course, to even lesser effect.
Baumann writes that the resulting frustration made it easy to protest a little more strongly against the status quo, to take more aggressive actions. Vandalism here, arson there--and frighteningly soon, loose groups became tight-knit commando cells; students like Baumann became specialists in bomb-building, napalm, and burglary. The West German government was only too happy to match the terrorist actions with raids, secret police tactics, beatings, and torture.
Who was right? No one, of course; in a society where people have learned to respond to violence with more violence, then questions of motive and justification soon fall by the wayside. The motto of Baumann's movement, "destroy what destroys you," perfectly characterizes the irony of the situation, describing a viscous circle that entraps all of the combatants.
The idea that Baumann would eventually walk away from all this, that he could found more promise in love than in hate, is the most remarkable part of the book. It's not a novel idea, of course, except that it's real remorse, real willingness towards good coming from a mire of confused evil. All of this actually happened. So cliche or not, I was glad to rediscover that good can win, that people can change--and I was glad to find this book.
I won't debate whether this book is relevant to today. Personally, I think it is.
Note: Baumann was arrested in London in 1981. There is no record of him anywhere after that date. He effectively disappeared.
Rating: 5
Summary: going to the left
Comment: Great book describing how a disgrutled german youth goes from being a grumbler to a bomb thrower. he goes from vandalizing expensive cars yelling "walk to work" to bombing police stations. well written, first person account interview style. it drives me nuts it's so hard to find. last time i interlibrary loaned it it came from ten states away. anyone who knows which way the wind blows needs to read this book.
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Title: Bringing the War Home : The Weather Underground, the Red Army Faction, and Revolutionary Violence in the Sixties and Seventies by Jeremy Varon ISBN: 0520241193 Publisher: University of California Press Pub. Date: 15 April, 2004 List Price(USD): $21.95 |
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Title: Televisionaries: The Red Army by Tom Vague ISBN: 1873176473 Publisher: AK Pr Distribution Pub. Date: August, 1994 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
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Title: Baader Meinhof: Pictures on the Run 67-77 by Astrid Proll ISBN: 3931141845 Publisher: Scalo Verlag Ac Pub. Date: June, 1998 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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