All language subtitles for [English] The Red Army Faction. Part 1_ The Arsonists - The Foundation of the RAF. English subtitles. [DownSub.com]

Terror in Germany for three

decades, the red army faction has kept the

federal republic breathless with

attacks, kidnappings, murders, while I am

talking about higher nowhere safe on the

guilty perpetrators, a small group of

left-wing rebels have been used in the fight against the

state and are being put to the test by intelligence services

from all over the

world not only for the

federal republic

[music]

a whole generation is seething in the newly founded federal republic in

1968 the student movement is at its

height the youth revolt

lives on with the state authorities

[music]

from this group of young rebels

it emerges the later red army faction

with its founding members

andreas baader gudrun ensslin and ulrike meinhof their concern to

challenge

the state

and to radically change it

[applause]

they were really afraid that this

germany i this federal

republic fell back in bad times the

more we analyzed it Got it, it

was also proven in legal

proceedings,

all the more so we were actually finished with

this start

Germany after the second world war

the cities are being rebuilt from

the rubble the so-called economic miracle grows out of the ruins

with the help of the marshall plan of the

americans the country on which people

have to eat again and build

their small, modest prosperity on

the children of this generation, who

even then in the 1950s and

60s gradually learned the

atrocities that took place in the third

empire and they were shocked and say

it can't all be

to pay attention to money for prosperity We just want to

reflect on the time

that lies ahead of us, in which we live and

in particular we just want to

think about what is the point and

now this life

is beginning everywhere in the young federal republic

, former officials from

Hitler’s empire are again sitting in official

positions like federal president t

lübke who once worked as an architect at

concentration camp prisoners

is hard to bear for the younger generation

many

nazis had common cause with the

crimes in the elites

of the republic of that time were

virulent but any criticism of

it was already considered

anti-subversive and un-Germans

polemical say

1966 cdu and spd form the

grand coalition kurt kiesinger a

former nsdap member becomes chancellor

there is a risk of a tasting of

the political situation

the grand coalition has been linked to a substantial

loss of opposition, which

means that the fear was expressed at that time

only that fdp was, so to speak, the remaining

opposition in the bundestag and

numerically was not at all able to

counter the two large

popular parties, the union cdu csu and the

spd, that

there would be no

possibility of

being able to deal with the really important issues in parliament

the opposition must so outside

The

universities in the major German

cities will be the

nucleus of the

resistance within parliament

the rest of the

republic will have

charismatic founding member is

rudi dutschke is max is

parliamentary democracy he wants to

replace the existing parliamentary system with a rescuing rule i

consider the existing parliamentary

system to be unusable,

which means that in para in

our parliament we have no representative

who represents the interests of our

population of our

population he was able to pull thousands of

tens of thousands of answers under the spell of

the event with weird how

to make a television discussion so he

was the by no one elected but

generally recognized spokesman for the

student body ewegung he was a gifted

rhetorician

the german students are not

alone also in france, the usa and

even in japan the young people rebel

, especially in protest against the

vietnam

war more and more senseless the war seems to be more and

more casualties from the civilian population

to lament fear of escape and

Expulsion are the order of the day

since 65 the usa have been actively participating in

the bombings the people that brought

german peace and democracy are

now waging a bloody

war in vietnam

the allegations are related to the fact that

germany is said to support

americans in vietnam war we were

n't war participants that we know

everything the man who provided the

bases we were anyway there

were a lot of american troops here

that was

the vietnam congress in berlin in

february 68 is the climax of the anti

vietnam movement 5000 participants from 14

nations have

registered students sympathize with the

opponents of the usa in vietnam will

come

the opinion making the newspapers of the

axel springer group create a

good mood against the demonstrators

like bild.de correctly named students as terrorists

and she has them

in one way and him in one

way motives Assuming that

these young people at that time certainly did not

have, some of them, perhaps, but not in

principle, and so

she declared these children of the real class

terrorists stuck over the

food

for the first time the question is discussed whether

one can also use violence in protest

the question is what is legitimate to

draw attention to

grievances not at all that is why

provocations are indispensable

prerequisites for

public

relations provocation and protest are the

buzzwords of the time the youth wants to

break with the conventions the prudish

sexual morality of the 50s

leave behind long hair and beat music instead of

uptight moral ideas

[applause]

[music]

a conflict arises between the

generations

parents no longer understand their children

and the children can

hardly understand their parents' worldview Endure as with Fritz

teufel one of the most prominent

members of the protest movement through

the sayings that my father could not overhear,

for

example when he heard news on the

radio about fidel castro, the speech

was announced

when she finally

spoke to fidel castro fidel castro it has a

pun but I didn't think it was so

funny

there are ideas for new

ways of life first attempt at a consistent implementation is the commune 1 at stuttgarter platz in west berlin [music] the aim of the commune of the communards

was something like a ja wie

to make a radical change in

everyday life di e separation

between privacy and work between

intimacy and the public to be

abolished that means also

to practice another form of sexuality which was

then

translated in the tabloid press

so that everyone sleeps with everyone and

so we didn't wait to have too

many

problems

[music]

except

The members of the commune are once

known for their revealing sexual morality for their courageous forms of protest

with which they

draw attention to political

grievances and we just

wanted to make a fool of him we wanted to

make a fool of all the authorities

and then we thought

about tinkering with smoking candles and wanted to throw garbage bags great

if we wanted to mess up the convoy

shortly before humphries will arrive

fritz teufel and his commu

narden buddy rainer langhans and dieter

kunzelmann arrested the police had got

wind of an action that is known to

this day as the pudding assassination

[music]

command arrested because there was obviously information from the secret service about their planning and it was not

possible to assess whether that actually planned an

assassination attempt and then they demonstrated in front of

a television team that the mandate

for pudding would have wanted to live and so

on and so forth that of course created

an effect and so it was

often the case with municipalities, so as long as

the institutions were packed and they

actually stood always pretty

stupid and stupid

a young man from munich appears again and again at commune 1

a certain andreas

baader bader was born in munich in 1943 the

20-year-old school dropout comes 63 from

munich to berlin

[music

] i'll be andreas, for example

to have met baader and I knew him

anyway o privately years before

whoever I think I was as

apolitical as I was again and again

bader participates in the fun political protest of

commune 1 only a few years later

he will radicalize and the republic is preparing to become a

co-founder of the raf

in the spring of 1967

visit before the shah

of persia and his wife farah diba pay

a visit to germany for four

days or more you should travel through the republic

the figure of the shah was

basically a figure of the

rainbow press because the schalke was married by the egg, i.e.

initially

a woman of german origin as his wife

and

this picture has been corrected more and more

by the iranian students who have studied in

other universities in berlin

and one then learned to understand the

shah above all as a

despot and a lackey of the usa

while elisa der colorful leaves eagerly awaiting the

visit one

deals with u universities of berlin with

the political circumstances in the country of

origin of the pompous visit

here is not talk of glory and glory

but of the undemocratic

conditions in iran from torture of

students by the regime,

one student was killed 45 members of the

faculty and the hired

200 students injured had to go to the

hospital

also the student benno ohnesorg is

among the audience he decides to take part in the

protests against the

shah the following day

[music]

with all of us the couple from the

east is welcomed by the mayor of

berlin in the beautiful town hall it should

be in the golden book of the city

sign in in front of the town hall demonstrators have

gathered they loudly emphasize their

disapproval of this start of reception, supporters of

the Shah have also come

to cheer their head of state

among them members of the

persian secret service but it does

not stop at cheering with batons and

beating wooden slats at the

demonstrating students the

german police look idly at

there comes a potentate from iran

someone who had nothing to do with a democrat

the visit to the

federal republic as a state guest so far so

bad but not only that he

brings his own Thug squad with whom

it is permitted and in the eyes of the

Berlin police, i.e. a police

directly acting in accordance with the rule of law

, would have been

obliged to attack people who do more than

express slogans against the potentate,

unimpressed by the public

unrest, the daily protocol is

pulled through for the evening a

visit to the german opera is

planned here, too, demonstrating

students have come

while the visiting couple accompanied by

federal president lübke in the opera der

zauberflöte listening begins in front of the door

the evacuation

[music]

also communard fritz teufel is

on the street that day the

brutality of the poli zei up close

when the police tried to evacuate

but settled down for a sit-in

and that is a bit more difficult

and at the beginning I sat a little in

the middle and then moved a

little forward because I was

also in the favorable throwing position for the

driver wanted to come and ghosts began

to evacuate one of the first who

dragged them directly

[music]

the berlin police drive the

demonstrators into the side streets of the

kurfürstendamm shortly after 8 the

slogan is given stick free

so the police were of course completely

differently structured and it There were not

a few

in particular there would be Berlin among the

police members who had also worked

as police

officers during the Nazi

era, so of course we had

a very authoritarian image in mind and actually did not think very much

of the fact that

demonstrations could now be democratically

legitimized only unifo A well-established police force is on

duty, but they also attack in civilian clothes.

Among them, the officer karl heinz

kurras meets

the theology student benno

ohnesorg in a dark backyard, a shot is fired what exactly

happened here for a long time not quite clear

without worrying about the floor a student

takes care of he makes sure that an

ambulance arrives

the seriously injured person is taken to the

hospital an hour later he is

dead the news of the student's death

quickly makes the rounds a representative

of the state apparatus has shot at a

defenseless man,

which creates a feeling of powerlessness

and courage

This shock effect is

related to the feeling of mourning

that the spark of this student movement

that basically had

previously been a phenomenon at the

long-distance university in west berlin

, perhaps at the technical

university hardly went

beyond that that it then

jumped over is actually on all

bu nde german universities lads

everywhere in the country there are

wild clashes with the police for

many the death of the student is their

political awakening experience

for a young german studies

student from swabia it is

good from ensslin who later

co-founded the red army faction

and

the other can remind me how

good and ensslin both came and panicked

we have to arm ourselves

they bring us a woman like that they

say the state is shooting at us now

we are shooting back as that was a

very motivating element very strongly

motivating element for violence

so far if ensslin was marginally

involved in political actions in

west berlin he appeared again and

again at events of the

socialist german

student

union [music] on the night of the fatal shots

at ohnesorg, the

berlin lawyer horst mahler was given the mandate in the

death investigation

without concern

ragen founded the

socialist attorney collective in

berlin with like-minded people.The office specializes in

the defense of students arrested during demonstrations

He has represented

the so-called

demonstration criminals in court at the most prominent lawyer

in the hospital, alleged

attempts to cover up in the autopsy report say it was carelessly

injured by a

blunt object and died from

a firearm

Were stations there

at that time it was so that I heard the

bullet out of the head of

ohnesorg into this sheet metal shell

and could immediately say the bullet sat

there and there and there that was the

firing channel so that a cover up If

this moment was no longer possible

, the alleged shooting of an

innocent person should be covered up who is

the officer who surrenders the fatal shots in the

dark

against kurras, a procedure for

negligent homicide is initiated

as a representative of the co-plaintiff, horst mahler also takes

part in the process

one day sits the

Police officers in custody on remand he claims he felt threatened by the demonstrators and acted in self-defense.In

the later trial, kurras was

acquitted.It

was thought that those who made use of their

democratic rights such as

freedom of assembly could, in case of

doubt

, expect police attacks up to and including shooting

had and that those who

were responsible for it could

then count on acquittals

again, so that

was something like

the question of the correctness of the

system being

punished more severely protester fritz

teufel he also comes for it

ne involvement in the events of

June 2nd in

pre-trial custody the accusation of

trespassing and he is said to

have thrown a stone

148 days he sits in

front of the courtroom

a crowd of angry demonstrators

gathers the justice fair with two dimensions is

your accusation he sat there as someone

demonstrating did he demonstrate

a dictatorship against

the persian secret service against the shah regime he

was in prison and

who shot a student

did not sit a day

[music]

on the first advent devil is released from pretrial

detention a short time

later the court pronounces him

free Such injustices in the

judiciary do not remain unaffected by left-wing

intellectuals in the country,

and journalist

ulrike

meinhof meinhof is no

longer a blank slate as editor-in-chief of the

left-wing scene in 1967, specifically

on topics such as the war in vietnam,

the new eastern policy or the

emergency laws

in ei ner talk show of the north german

radio, she criticizes the

events of berlin in the strongest possible way

we all know that kurras

the ohnesorg shot and

that kurras is acquitted it is

an idiot yes a man who does not know what

he is doing

police employ idiots is subject to

the acquittal for fritz teufel himself

the condenser class justice

insofar as he was only acquitted for lack of evidence

on June 8, 67, 15,000 people give benno

ohnesorg the last escort

his coffin is transferred from berlin to

hanover problem-free the funeral procession passes the transit route through the gdr

only years later it becomes clear that the gdr

itself [music] is entangled in the matter

2009 the kurras case suggests to

vote again in the stasi subordinate authority in

berlin files emerge on which the

shooter kurras undoubtedly proves

unofficial cooperation with the

state security the find

shows the incident of june 2nd in a

new light en

was murdered without care on behalf of the

stasi in order to stir up unrest in the west

every form of destabilization of the

political class enemy was the gdr

welcome had it been known at the time that

this civil officer had worked for

the gdr state security

that would of course have been that it would have been a

bomb

the political the consequences would have been incalculable

and in this respect one can of course also

everything that I played in this man and the people in the know

was of course

have to do everything to prevent that from

getting out the files can indeed

prove a connection between kurras and the stasi

that he was on a political mandate

Ohnesorg shot protesters

but there is no evidence for this.

Only a few months later

another wave of horror rolls through the country

on April 11, 68 student leader

rudi Dutschke is seriously injured with three revolver shots on the open road

josef bachmann you have a worker from

munich in front of his house Go ahead

and shoot him down

the rumor makes the rounds when he was

arrested, editions of the Bild

newspaper were found on him with

inflammatory headlines against the

students

how come that ever

goes so far and then, as planned,

rudi tusch would shoot again many

who had answer is the fault of the

springer press, the Bild newspaper, the bz

and others would simply ensure through their

reporting that

such people would be so blinded that

was the view in several cities

people gather and demonstrate against the

publisher for them is

springer for them shots at your idol

dutschke responsible

[applause]

beforehand

the sds against the student movement against

the extra-parliamentary opposition and

against their representatives like rudi

dutschke who had something very

dirty and in this respect, of course, you saw the people

together. The

evening after the shots the situation escalated

thousands pull from r the springer

skyscraper in berlin with burning

torches and armed with stones

, the demonstrators try

to prevent the delivery of the bild newspaper

among them is a certain peter

urbach he provides the protesting

with molotov cocktails and instructs them

how to tip over the

gasoline in a publisher's car and the cars in lichterloh

burn

what nobody knows about the demonstrators

urbach is a man of the berlin

constitutional protection

he reports to the secret service regularly

about activities of the left-wing scene

at the same time mixed vigorously in

fueling the conflict with

the state power

it is now undisputed

that urbach was actually the first case

where it became clear

that he got out of hand,

he really

acted on his own accord,

which

was not at all responsible in the criminal field from today's point of view

,

and so you have to see that the

fund concept is

fundamental to the discussion and the

d The disposition is that what already revealed its structural weaknesses at that time

which begins this night will go down in history as the

first riots of 68

these are the biggest riots after the end

of the second world war a new

escalation level of violence

[applause]

in the political Bonn is beyond the

planned one emergency

laws debated the kiesinger government

sees its project confirmed by the nationwide unrest

that for me

[applause]

the basic law is to be supplemented

by an emergency constitution that

should ensure the state's ability to act in crisis situations

the project is another reason for

the extra-parliamentary opposition

to walk the streets 60,000 demonstrators take part in a star march

on bonn

they fear a kind of new

empowering law like the one when Hitler

came to power in 1933 it was believed that under

this condition

a legal regulation would be created for a kind of exceptional state

would go hand in hand with

the abolition of parliamentary

democracy insofar as

there was massive criticism of the

passing of the emergency laws but the laws could not be prevented on may 30, 68 pass the

german

federal parliament at the end of the protest 68 hangover mood is widespread not only in

germany the international

protest movements are also experiencing a bitter

disappointment in prague the tender

hopes for more democracy are

being crushed by tanks

in the usa the young

generation mourns the murder of the

civil

rights activist and hopefuls martin luther king

[music]

the great negative experience the

frustration experience was the failure of

the anti emergency

and of course they also say that other

things could not be implemented as

one had thought and that is why

small groups separated who were

actually convinced that

now only violence could help

to change society

A new form of protest has to be created when

a department store is on fire in brussels

the members of commune 1 in it a

picture with symbolic power in leaflets

formulate their joy in the

destruction of the capitalist

symbol department store a burning department store with

burning people mediated for the

first time in one european

metropolis that sizzling vietnam

feeling

when the berlin

department stores byrne warehouse bern are

on fire, the action was followed by 4 protesters on april second 68 the

place of the action is frankfurt am main

shortly before closing time in the lively

shopping street

zeil a young couple enters the schneider department store

on the escalator The two of them drive to

the third floor and deposit two small parcels on

a cupboard in the women's

outerwear department, a

parcel is also stored on the fourth floor in the nearby

department

store The fire brigade comes out and

tries to put out the fire.

As if by a miracle, none of the

guards on duty is injured.

The damage caused amounts to 1.6

million marks. Shortly before the detonation

, a woman called the Frankfurt office of the

German press agency and

immediately told brands at Schneider

and in Kaufhof it is a political

act

two days later the perpetrators are

arrested it is andreas baader gudrun

ensslin goalkeeper pröll and horst zu

into the idea was

to set a fanal against the vietnam war and you

have two things

This is because consumer behavior is linked to one another, the

political blindness of consumers and

the acceptance of the warlike

behavior of the

great power usa

in autumn 68 the trial against

the four arsonists begins before the higher regional court in

frankfurt

the accused use the podium to

draw attention to their political demands

, the court as authoritarian

instance of do

not take jurisdiction seriously you will be defended by

the lawyers horst mahler and otto

schieb we smoked cigarettes or

cigars wearing sunglasses

on you should have

displayed the behavior of show stars

and

not tried to say an

educational role somehow

To play along, which one absolutely

must not expect from the accused,

indeed very clear signs that one did

not want to submit to these rules

and the

systems

as well they came in

their animals their clothes of the detention

in their prisoner

clothes and and yes and one played that

a little too sometimes it was basically the matter was

very serious

as a process

observer ulrike meinhof also travels to frankfurt and

writes a column on the subject of

department store arson

first time the later founding

quartet of the raf

basically the central formations

the raf management team came together in the course of the

process firstly because

horst mahler acted as a defender there

secondly as meaner

as a journalist for

the magazine

and then baader and ensslin And

so basically this

quartet, this leading quartet, was

already recognizable from the contacts, as

the accused are being sentenced to three years

in prison for dangerous

arson, nobody had expected

that that was a shock and people

had to go to prison in general, the

prison that was for many So from us

so I would say for everyone it was

absolutely new territory that was not what

you knew where you belong, we

all somehow came from the middle class and

and the prison that was was was

something that was then

that which was outside of

any experience should

these people dr a year in custody

the department store brand verdict is under

revision

the four convicts are

temporarily released baader and

ensslin and the siblings astrid and

thorwald proll are involved in the

so-called home children campaign

the conditions in the

children's and youth homes are criticized military

drill barracks mentality and hard

physical work

then we went to the homes

and said here people

a new time is beginning

you have to defend yourself

and and we did that too, when

they all ran

away, ulrike meinhof is also committed to

disadvantaged young people,

but above all it is andreas bader, who

impressed the adolescents with his appearance questioning the authorities, he becomes a role model some of

the later raf members are

former children at home the children at home

were always fascinated by the colossal

because there was always something going on with money

there were suddenly stormed

libraries then left ma n to

parties that you weren't invited to,

your stomach was full and then

, in the broadest sense, you did off-road exercises to be

fit so the differentiated

variety, completely different from the

home eleven

in november 69, the revision is

rejected and for baader ensslin and

hubert pröll is clear about their jail sentence

they will

not start the three of them leave for

paris

and

i think

good because some people at the end of this year

jail time easily put away how to

avatar little sex holes in paris they

dive for a few weeks in

the apartment of a friend and

think about how it could go on then you didn't know where to go

and

you went out of it, maybe wanted to

write a book so it was

a time to reflect on

reorientation or now how to

deal with the situation now

in february 69 you will return to

berlin

decisive for this decision

is attorney horst mahler

who is after it alien traveled around andreas

baader and gudrun ensslin who

had landed in parts after they had previously been in france to

invite them to return to berlin

and participate in a future greger city

guerrilla organization

and he succeeded so without horst

mahler baader and ensslin did

not return to berlin

at all they had completely different plans and

so you have to see that the

spider in Kunduz nets he as a painter was

baader and ensslin find

shelter in ulrike meinhof's apartment in

kufsteiner straße

from here painter ensslin baader plan

and meinhof building a militant

underground group but for militant actions

you need weapons through horst

mahler a promising

contact is made a certain s-bahn

peter has a hot tip in a

cemetery in old buckow weapons from the second world war are said to be

buried

[music]

and so form and at night in

several members Either of the troops digged

in the moonlight in the sweat of their

face found nothing suburban train

peter said we dug so wrong

we have to

leave again one night later

urbach gives the police

the decisive tip on every fourth april 70 of

a fictitious traffic control on

the way to Bader cemetery can be

arrested

it is the same peter urbach who also

acted as an explosives supplier during the protests against Springer, a

man from the constitution protection who

regularly supplies the militant left with armed

weapons and contributes to the militancy of the

movement

that was already team scandalous case yes

us then it turned out

through the research that there was already

a committee of inquiry in the Berlin

House of Representatives

, some of which were peter urbach

about the neighbor the arrest is made immediately the

decision to release him from custody

ulrike meinhof uses her contacts as a

journalist she speaks to the left-wing

publisher klaus wagenbach about a

book project for the wagenbach publishing house

to be created about children at home co-

author andreas baader wagenbach wants

that

Financing the project so that the baths would be freed so

I knew

rüttgers a few hours later

the police were

because we had a contract

horst mahler applied for release for the

prisoner bader at the german

central institute for social

issues berlin dahlem should be researched for the project bader

is planned with help

To be freed from two armed accomplices but

the action is getting out of hand, there was

probably someone injured

and Ulrike was there and it was

not planned that

she would have to flee with her because she should have stayed

behind herself surprising, so to speak t

be

aware of the flight from meinhof and bader through the

window meinhoff can no

longer pretend she knew nothing about the liberation plan

this escape from the german

central institute for social issues is

practically the founding hour of the raf

from this moment on We drove to the

group as a whole that we had

several it was closed we

knew it was dangerous and at that time

we were looking for a large wanted letter on the Berlin advertising pillars where the

well-known policewoman ulrike meinhof

was searched for the group as a whole that

meant no one could open up to me

for ulrike meinhof it is

the radical exit from her

bourgeois life a large-scale manhunt

is initiated, a

promise of 10,000

marks a reward for

this driver posters where the only thing that was

visited was how common it was, it was clear that

they could no longer hold back and that was

perhaps a mistake because we were

always thought like that only g Well,

how far does it go in the radical

in the radicalization

the liberation action in west berlin is

the hour of birth of the red army

faction a terror organization like

the republic

will keep breathless for almost three decades

[music]