Agents of Necessity Weatherman, the Red Army Faction, and the Turn to Violence

• Published in: Bringing the War Home p. 20
• Main Author: Varon, Jeremy Peter
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: United States University of California Press 31-03-2004
• Edition: 1
• Subjects: African Americans; American minorities; Anthropology; Armed conflict; Authoritarianism; Behavioral sciences; Ethnic groups; Ethnology; European history; European history: postwar, from c 1945; Fascism; History of the Americas; Human behavior; Human societies; Imperialism; Left wing politics; Military science; Nazism; New Left; Political activism; Political change; Political ideologies; Political movements; Political philosophy; Political processes; Political protests; Political revolutions; Political science; Political sociology; Political spectrum; Politics; Social movements; Sociology; Student movements; Violence; War
• ISBN: 9780520230323; 0520230329; 9780520241190; 0520241193

To describe how one became a Weatherman, Bernardine Dohrn is reported to have said: “One day you’ll wake up and look out your window. And there, on your front lawn will be a great flaming W and you will know the time has come for you to be a WEATHERMAN!”¹ The initiation, in this account, was a moment of near-holy illumination. One did not so much choose to be a Weatherman as one was chosen by Weatherman.
In May 1970, Ulrike Meinhof helped free Andreas Baader, imprisoned for an act of political arson, from a research institute in West Berlin.