Baader Meinhof

               Die Rote Armee Fraktion or RAF was a West German far-left militant group founded in 1970, by Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, and Ulrike Meinhof. They identified themselves as a communist group engaged in armed resistance against what they considered to be a fascist state. However, it was considered by many people as a terrorist group.

Origin

               “They'll kill us all. You know what kind of pigs we're up against. This is the Auschwitz generation. You can't argue with people who made Auschwitz. They have weapons and we haven't. We must arm ourselves!” – Gudrun Ensslin (speaking after the death of Benno Ohnesorg).

After being convicted for burning stores; Baader, Ensslin, Thorwald Proll and Horst Söhnlein were arrested. Few month later of being released, their liberty were contested and their prison were requested. However, Horst Söhnlein was the only one to respond the request. The 3 other ran away to Paris, and Italy after that. Regis Debray helped them to escape, hiding them in his own property. Debray’s friendship with Che Guevara, and his works about urban guerrilla probably influenced Baader and his group.

They returned to Germany, to execute the plan of creating a guerrilla, but Baader was arrested. Meinhof and Ensslin planned to release him. Meinhof had access to Baader, because she was a journalist. By the excuse of writing a book with Baader, she got a meeting with him in an Institute on May 14^th of 1970, Meinhof, Gurund, Astri, Ingrid Schubert, Irene Goergens and Peter Homann executed their plan and Baader escaped with them, and the attack was attributed to Gang Baader-Meinhof. However, in July 2^nd of 1970 the group published an article where it was signed for the first time their official name Rote Armee Fraktion.  

               The RAF lasted for 28 years, and committed numerous operations that resulted in a national crisis. They fight for freedom, but for that they lost their way and killed 34 people including secondary target.. But as any guerrilla in the world, divided public opinion between lovers and haters.