BEHIND THE SHOOTING
By Gisela
The growth of the West German radical youth movement led by the SDS [Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund -- German Socialist Student League], which has mounted continuously for almost two years now, reached its highest point on the weekend of February 17-18 when, in response to the call of the Brussels Conference* and the leadership of the SDS, vanguard youth organizations from almost all the countries in Western Europe met in West Berlin to consider the problems of the Third World and to demonstrate for the victory of the NLF.
Both the conference and the demonstration were initially banned by the West Berlin city government. However, the rector of the Technical University refused to let the city authorities intrude in his sphere and ended by offering the — Technical University hall to the delegates. Also, at the-last minute a court decision forced the Berlin senate to permit the demonstration. It is quite likely that the pressure of the thousands of students who had already arrived brought about this ruling. They would not have let a ban prevent them from demonstrating in West Berlin, one of the Americans’ chief strongholds in Europe.
This demonstration of some 20,000 youth and workers came off peacefully despite provocations by agents of the . ultraright. However, it threw the West Berlin city government and the reaction-
* The Brussels Conference of West European revolutionary youth organizations held at the time of a demonstration in solidarity with the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam in Liége, Belgium, on October 15, 1966. [See World Outlook Novenber 4, 1966.] headquarters of the Bolivian army. He followed in the footsteps of the guerrillas, visiting the places they had been to and reporting back on the military situation."
With Bolivia "quiet again," as Gott puts. it, "the Americans are withdrawing as surreptitiously as they came in. Col. Rice is off to Vietnam. Shelton is on his way home, to retirement and ‘a career in politics.'"
As for Ramos and Gonzales, they went to La Paz immediately after Guevara was murdered. "They left their hotel a few days later, doubtless for other areas where they can operate ‘without existing.'" .
OF RUDI DUTSCHKE
Mandel
ary, petty-—bourgeois-local population -—goaded by the gutter press of Axel Springer -- into an extraordinary hysteria. The leaderships of the political parties in the city were also caught up in this, above all the leaders of the ruling SPD ([Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands -- Social Democratic party of Germany]. SPD members who participated in the demonstration were expelled and members of the SDS were declared fair game.
: Pa
The Berlin senate called a counterdemonstration a week later under the’ slo~ gan "For Freedom and. Democracy!"
American flags dominated in this demonstration, and young people bearing even the slightest resemblance to students, although many were not students, especially not members of the SDS, were beaten up. In two instances virtual lynchings occurred. A photographer with a beard, mistaken for Dutschke ~~ who has no beard -- was gravely wounded. He just managed to escape into a police car in the nick of time and had to’ be immediately taken to the hospital. os
What could have precipitated such a mood? One of the chief factors, which ultimately led to the attempted assassination of Rudi Dutschke, was the weekslong, deliberate red-baiting campaign waged by the Springer press monopoly against the SDS. This campaign was’ likewise supported by the. political parties, especially in West Berlin. a
Since the SDS statements and speeches of its leaders made it impossible to cast the blame -- as they would so gladly have done -- simply on East Germany and "the Communists," they referred. vaguely to an “international group of ringleaders." However, the blame was shifted more and-
more onto the most popular student in the SDS, Rudi Dutschke.
Neither the parties, nor the press in particular, paid any attention to what was on the minds of the students and a growing number of workers. They concerned themselves only with the disturbances as such arising from the discontent of the students studying in the big German universities.
Here are some sample headlines from the Springer press in recent weeks: "Put an End to Terror and Rioting!" "Stop the Young Reds' Terror Now!" “How Long Will You [the people] Let Our Young People Be Incited by Red Agitators, Our Laws Be Challenged?" "We Shouldn't Leave All the Dirty Work to the Police and Their Water Cannons."
Mayor Amrehn, the CDU [Christliche Demokratische Union -- Christian Democratic Union] caucus leader, added in the senate: "Put an end to this agitation once and for all!"
These appeals were aimed exclusively at the people. Bildzeitung [Picture Paper], Springer's mass organ with a circulation of 4,500,000 gave a reason for these appeals to the populace: "Are Our Judges Asleep? Are Our Political Leaders Asleep?"
They were by no means asleep. The judges had just released the policeman who on June 2, 1966, deliberately shot and killed a student in a demonstration involving some hundreds of persons against the Iranian Shah's visit to West Berlin.
And the politicians did not neglect to add their voices to the Springer press' hysteria campaign, stressing continually that it was high time to put an end to "radicalism," by which they meant primarily "left radicalism." They, like the press, went so far as to compare the SDS students with Hitler's SS troopers, against whom the people had no choice but to defend themselves.
Finally, the SPD had expressed its opinion already in 1961 when it adopted its so-called "Incompatibility Resolution," declaring that henceforth no SDS member could be a member of the SPD. And the SPD mayor of Berlin, Klaus Schutz, went a step further during the Vietnam conference in February when he called on the people of the city to "Get a good look at these characters, right in the eye."
Among others, “these characters" were Peter Weiss, the famous writer; Sebastian Haffner, well-known journalist; Ernest Mandel, the chief editor of the Belgian weekly La Gauche and widely known in Europe as a Marxist scholar; a doctor who works for the West German government in South Vietnam; a representative of the American black people; and several professors and assistant professors from various German universities.
Bildzeitung's comment on the Viet-— nam conference was "Dutschke -- No. 1 Enemy of the People -- Throw the Gang Out!" However, they took the precaution of putting these words in the mouth of a "construction worker," because in the days of the Third Reich the Jews and other "sources of contamination" were called "the No. 1 enemy of the people." The same people use the same expressions.
To make this quite clear, here are some of the remarks made by older bystanders at the February 18 demonstration. "There's that dirty pack of students again; they should study the right way." "All students should be locked up." "They should all be liquidated." "You need a good dictatorship, then you would have to work instead of demonstrating." "Communists and students, it's the same thing!" "They should all be shot!" "The swine should be gassed, that's all!" "They missed you in the gassing!" "Drive the whole pack into the ovens!"
Thus indoctrinated about Rudi Dutschke and the growing left in West Germany and West Berlin, Herr Bachmann, a twice arrested ultrarightist, in whose home a portrait of Hitler was found which he himself had painted and who is an admirer of Napoleon besides, set out for the West Berlin headquarters of the SDS to lie in wait there for Comrade Dutschke. He carried a loaded revolver and an extra magazine of cartridges.
When Dutschke left the SDS headquarters in the afternoon, Bachmann fired at him five times. Afterwards, Bachmann barricaded himself in a cellar and shot it out with the police as they broke in. Both Dutschke and Bachmann were taken to the hospital gravely wounded.
Bachmann, who declared that he had been inspired by Martin Luther King's murder, seemed astonished at the vigor of the police pursuit. He had after all only carried out the wish so close to the hearts of "the people." He had after all only tried to "get rid" of "the No. 1 enemy of the people," since the "judges and political leaders were asleep."
The students struck back. That Same evening there were mass demonstrations in front of the press buildings of Axel Springer in Frankfurt and Berlin. Ten thousand students gathered in Berlin and did not let attempts at mediation divert them from breaking the windows of the Springer central building overlook-—
ing the Berlin wall and from setting fire to the Springer press trucks. That evening, 1,000 students occupied a theater in Frankfurt during a performance, turning it into chaos.
The next day, demonstrations spread throughout all the large cities of West Germany. The youth marched into churches crowded for Good Friday, sat down at hundreds of busy corners, and blocked traffic for hours in the big West German cities.
The main action, however, was aimed at preventing the delivery of the Springer papers in the various West German cities. The students erected barricades and the police brought in water cannon, horses, and dogs. The upshot of this was innumerable injuries and a total of almost 2,000 arrests. Only in Munich was Axel Springer able to get out a few sacks of his gutter press over the rooftops to be dumped on the market. Springer himself had little to say -- he was naturally in a frenzy -- except that once again, according to him, "the free-
dom of. the press is being threatened."
In Essen, one of the big cities
of the Ruhr, where there is no universi-
ty, it was the workers who built barri-
cades in front of the Springer buildings
and blocked the delivery of the Springer
press. The leadership of IG-Metall [In-
dustrie-Gewerkschaft-—Metall --the Metal
Workers Union] had to issue an immediate
denial that there was any collaboration
of the union in the actions of the youth
-- who are now no longer called "a little
radical left group" but put under the
general rubric of "extraparliamentary
forces."
The demonstrations did not die
down even on Saturday and Easter Sunday.
The Springer press was again besieged.
The traditional Easter peace march, in
which 400,000 took part, declared itself
in solidarity with the demands and aims
of the SDS; and in this march, for the
first time, workers carried signs with
the slogan, "Today the Students -- To-
morrow the Workers."