Rote Armee Fraktion - Documents
Chronology of events
History of the RAF, and the context of anti-imperialist movements, liberation movements in the 'Third World', student revolts
Compiled by Ron Augustin1954
May 7 - Viet-Minh forces win the battle of Dien Bien Phu, leading to the withdrawal of France from Indochina. First larger victory by an anticolonial guerilla movement.
Nov 1 - Start of the armed struggle in Algeria with the establishment of the National Liberation Front FLN.
1955
Apr 18-24 - Afro-Asian Conference in Bandung, leading up to the foundation of the Non-Aligned Movement. The term 'Third World', linked to it since 1952 by French sociologist Alfred Sauvy, is taken up as a rallying cry.
1956
Jul 26 - Start of the armed struggle in Cuba with Fidel Castro's attack on the Moncada Barracks.
Aug 17 - The Communist Party of Germany (KPD) is prohibited. Subsequently, some 125,000 judicial inquiries will be launched against KPD members and sympathisers.
1957
Mar 6 - After the 'Battle of Algiers', the 'suicide' of FLN leader Larbi Ben M'hidi in French captivity is pronounced. In 2000, General Paul Aussaresses will admit that Larbi Ben M'hidi and his lawyer Ali Boumendjel were tortured to death.
Jul 28 - Foundation of the Situationist International, a group of artists and intellectuals who particularly criticise French colonial policy and who, with their theoretical writings, will strongly influence the student movement of 1968 in France. Their German Section around the group Spur (lit. 'trace') will influence the extraparliamentary opposition in Germany.
1958
Apr 7 - Under the slogan 'Ban the Bomb', the first Easter March against nuclear armament takes place in London. In the next ten years, Easter Marches will gain ground across Western Europe.
1959
Jan 1 - Fidel Castro's guerilla defeats Batista's dictatorship and takes over power in Cuba.
Jun 20-22 - Two attempted assassination attacks on Frantz Fanon in Rome.
1960
Mar 14 - First agreement in the framework of the 'reparation agreements' between the Governments of the USA, Germany and Israel over billions worth of German arms supplies to Israel.
Mar 21 - At a demonstration against apartheid in Sharpeville, Southafrica, 69 people are killed. The Sharpeville massacre leads to the PAC (Pan Africanist Congress) and ANC (African National Congress) taking up arms.
Oct 15 - In Geneva, the leader of the Cameroonese independence movement, Félix Moumié, is murdered by the French secret service SDECE by means of thallium poisoning. He dies on November 3rd. His predecessor as the Secretary-General of the UPC (Union des Populations Camerounaises), Ruben Um Nyombé, had already been murdered on September 13, 1958.
1961
Jan 17 - Assassination of Congo's Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba after a CIA-fostered coup.
Jan 20 - John F Kennedy becomes President of the USA. In May, he orders a substantial increase of military aid to South Vietnam and the deployment of 2,000 counterinsurgency advisers. In an attempt to isolate the newly founded National Liberation Front FLN ('Vietcong'), within two years 13 million people are resettled in concentration camps ('strategic hamlets'), and their villages and fields destroyed.
Feb 4 - Start of the armed struggle in Angola with the liberation of prisoners at San João by the MPLA.
Jul 19 - Assassination attempt against Jean-Paul Sartre in Paris. A second attempt is launched on January 7, 1962.
Sep 18 - At the Ministry of Defense in London thousands of people participate in a sit-in organised by Bertrand Russell, to protest against nuclear armament.
Dec 8 - Frantz Fanon dies a few days after the publication of his book 'The Wretched of the Earth', which will become one of the most important texts for the revolutionary struggles in the 20th century.
1962
Jun 25 - Start of the armed struggle in Mozambique with the foundation of Frelimo.
Jul 5 - Independence of Algeria.
Aug 5 - Nelson Mandela, leader of ANC's armed wing Umkhonto we Sizwe, is arrested. In 1969 the authorities try to make him escape in order to shoot him 'on the run'. Several times he is offered to buy his liberty by renouncing armed struggle. On February 11, 1990 he will be freed, when South Africa's apartheid regime is close to collapsing.
Sep 1 - Start of the armed struggle in Eritrea with the foundation of the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF).
1963
Jan 23 - Start of the armed struggle in Guinea-Bissau with an attack by the PAIGC on the Portuguese Tite military barracks.
Jul 31 - In Uruguay's capital Montevideo, the National Liberation Movement MLN-Tupamaros is founded. It is one of the first to develop urban guerilla.
Nov 22 - John F Kennedy is killed, Lyndon B Johnson becomes President of the USA. Robert McNamara remains Secretary of Defense and in 1964 appoints General William Westmoreland as the Commander-in-Chief for the US forces in Vietnam. On the occasion of the presidential change-over, in Munich and West Berlin the first pamflet of the Situationist-inspired group 'Subversive Action' appears.
1964
May 28 - Foundation of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation PLO.
Aug 5 - First major attack against North Vietnam by the US Navy. The North Vietnamese navy is destroyed and the US government's presumption confirmed that the Soviet Union and China will not interfere with the Vietnamese Conflict.
Dec 12-18 - Congo's Prime Minister Moise Tschombé is pelted with eggs and tomatoes by students at his visits to Munich, Dusseldorf and West Berlin.
1965
Jan 3 - Palestinian organisation Al Fatah carries out its first guerilla attacks on Israel.
Feb 7 - Start of 'Operation Rolling Thunder', the almost daily bombing of North Vietnam by US aircraft. In South Vietnam, increasingly phosphor bombs and napalm are being used. According to the Pentagon, 25,000 bomber sorties are flown against Vietnam and Laos in 1965.
Feb 21 - In New York, one of the country's most important black leaders, Malcolm X, is assassinated.
Apr 1 - Ernesto Che Guevara says goodbye to Fidel Castro and goes underground in order to commit himself to the antiimperialist struggle. For six months, he leads a guerilla group in Congo, later he will fight a year in Bolivia.
Apr 17 - 25,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam war in a 'March on Washington' organised by the US American SDS (Students for a Democratic Society).
Apr 28 - Landing of 22,500 US Marines in the Dominican Republic. In order to prevent a 'communist take-over', within a year between 6,000 and 10,000 civilians are killed.
Aug 11-16 - At uproars in Los Angeles' Watts ghetto, 34 people die.
Oct 1 - Start of a CIA-sponsored coup and anticommunist massacre in Indonesia. Within six months, one million people are killed.
Oct 29 - Assassination of Mehdi Ben Barka in Paris in a joint action by the Moroccan secret service, the CIA and Mossad. Ben Barka was responsible for the preparation of the Tricontinental Conference in January 1966.
Nov 27 - 40,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam war in the second 'March on Washington'.
1966
Jan 3-15 - Tricontinental Conference in Havana, enlargement of the Organisation for the Solidarity of the African and Asian Peoples to Latin America (OSPAAAL). Amilcar Cabral delivers a speech on 'The Weapon of Theory'.
Mar 26 - In New York, 100,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam war. In 1966, demonstrations against the Vietnam war are on the increase all over the world.
May 16 - Start of the Cultural Revolution in China.
Jun 16 - In Greenwood, Mississippi, Stokely Carmichael delivers his first speech with the famous demand for Black Power.
Jun 30 - In North Vietnam, US aircraft focus on the destruction of the Red River delta dikesystem as well as Hanoi's and Haiphong's supply bases. For the first time, the strategic B-52 bombers are used, which from the end of August will fly daily sorties. According to the Pentagon, 79,000 bomber sorties are flown over Vietnam in 1966.
Oct 15 - Foundation of the Black Panther Party in the USA with a 10-Points Programme.
Dec 1 - In Germany, the Grand Coalition of CDU and SPD is formed.
Dec 10 - At the end of the 'Vietnam Weeks' organised by the German SDS (Socialist German Student Association), Rudi Dutschke proposes the foundation of an extraparliamentary opposition, later to be known as the APO.
1967
Jan 1 - Foundation of the Kommune I in West Berlin.
Apr 5 - Arrests and media hunt because of the 'pudding attack' which the Kommune I had planned against US Vice President Hubert Humphrey's visit to West Berlin.
Apr 15 - Under Martin Luther King's leadership, more than 350,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam war in the 'March on New York'. In 1967, there are demonstrations against US imperialism across the world.
Apr 16 - Publication of Ernesto Che Guevara's message to the Tricontinentale on the 'creation of two, three, many Vietnams'.
Apr 18 - World boxing champion Cassius Clay, alias Muhammad Ali, refuses military draft because of the Vietnam war. His license will be withdrawn until 1970.
Apr 21 - Coup by the military Junta in Greece, establishment of a NATO-sponsored military dictatorship. In the seven years of its existence, at least 8,000 people will be tortured and killed.
May 2-10 - First session of the Russell-Tribunal in Stockholm, investigating US war crimes in Vietnam. Members include Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Vladimir Dedijer, Lelio Basso, Stokely Carmichael, Isaac Deutscher, Laurent Schwartz, Peter Weiss, James Baldwin, Wolfgang Abendroth and others.
May 30 - Start of the Biafra war.
Jun 2 - At a demonstration against the visit of the Shah of Iran, demonstrators are beaten up brutally by police and Iranian undercover agents. Benno Ohnesorg is killed by a police officer. The police officer, Karl-Heinz Kurras, will initially be acquitted, then sentenced. He will spend four months in prison but remains on the police force, and, at his request, receives his pistol back out of fear for revenge when in 1971 Petra Schelm is killed.
Jun 5-10 - During the 'Six Day War', Israel occupies Gaza, East-Jerusalem and parts of Syria and Jordan.
Jul 15-30 - At the 'Dialectics of Liberation' Congress in London, possibilities of antiimperialist struggle are discussed for two weeks. Speakers: David Cooper, Ronald Laing, Herbert Marcuse, Paul Sweezy, Stokely Carmichael, Julian Beck, Allen Ginsberg and others.
Jul 23 - Antiwar demonstrations lead to an uprise in Newark. In confrontations with the National Guard, 27 people are killed and 1,100 injured. Riots follow in more than 50 cities. During the '12th Street Riots' in Detroit, 43 people are killed and 2,000 injured.
Jul 31-Aug 10 - First Conference of the Latin American Solidarity Organisation (OLAS) in Havana. Breaking away from the pro-Soviet communist parties, the conference declares its support to armed struggle. Stokely Carmichael is received as a guest of honour.
Oct 9 - Assassination of Ernesto Che Guevara in Bolivia.
Oct 21 - In front of the Pentagon near Washington, 250,000 people demonstrate against the Vietnam war.
In West Berlin, pamflet rockets are being shot at the US Army barracks, with which soldiers are called to desert because of the Vietnam war. According to the Pentagon, 108,000 bomber sorties are flown over Vietnam in 1967.
Nov 30 - The British colonial troops withdraw from South Yemen earlier than planned, after the National Liberation Front extended its guerillawarfare to the urban areas of Aden.
1968
Jan 30 - The North Vietnamese army and the South Vietnamese liberation front FLN start their Tet offensive. It will last two months and will lead to the US government understanding that it cannot win this war. President Johnson decides to stop bombing Hanoi and to withdraw his candidacy to the presidency. Several times during 1968, the Pentagon demands the use of nuclear bombs in Vietnam. Demonstrations against the Vietnam war are taking place across the globe.
Feb 1 - In Brasil, Carlos Marighella and Joaquim Ferreira start the guerilla movement ALN (Ação Libertadora Nacional).
Feb 17-18 - In West Berlin's Technical University, the International Vietnam Congress takes place. Speakers include Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, Rudi Dutschke, Bahman Nirumand, Gaston Salvatore, Peter Weiss, Tariq Ali, Robin Blackburn, Erich Fried, Ernest Mandel and Ekkehart Krippendorff among others. The organisers are being informed by police informers that Berlin's US Commander issued a firing order against the demonstration after the congress.
Feb 21 - At a counterdemonstration organised by the Senate of West Berlin, the Federation of Trade Unions and publisher Springer, 80,000 people demonstrate against the student movement and for the US government's Vietnam policy. Several student 'suspects' are beaten up by demonstrators carrying transparents with slogans like 'Dutschke People's Enemy Number One' and 'Berlin must not become Saigon'.
Apr 3 - During the night, fire bombs explode in two department stores in Frankfurt. The attack is meant as a protest against the general public's indifference with regard to the Vietnam war. Six months later Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, Thorwald Proll and Horst Söhnlein will be convicted to three years in jail. February 1970, Andreas Baader and Gudrun Ensslin go underground. Andreas Baader will be arrested on April 4, 1970 and liberated on May 14, 1970. Apr 4 - The assassination of Martin Luther King triggers revolts in 125 US American cities. 21,000 soldiers and 34,000 National Guards are deployed in days of confrontation. Result: 46 dead, 2,600 injured, 21,000 arrested.
Apr 6 - Black Panther Bobby Hutton is killed by police in Oakland.
Apr 11 - Assassination attempt against Rudi Dutschke. In West Berlin, the 'Springer-Blockade' is organised. In several West German and European cities attacks on Springer are organised, leading to heavy confrontations with the police. In Munich two demonstrators are killed. It takes years for Dutschke to recover from the head injuries caused by the attack, but on December 24, 1979 he still dies as a result of these.
May 5 - In Saigon, the FLN kills the First Secretary of the German Embassy, Hasso Freiherr Rüdt von Collenberg.
May 6 - After several weeks of conflict at Nanterre University, a first larger student demonstration takes place in Paris. After several strikes and the famous 'Night of the Barricades' of May 10, a 24-hour general strike is held on May 13. A demonstration of one million workers and students in Paris leads to the occupation of Sorbonne University. For two weeks, some 10 million workers are on strike. Factory occupations and demonstrations last until mid-June. Mass demonstrations, street fights, university and factory occupations occur all over the world in the months between May and August 1968.
May 30 - In Germany, the 'Emergency Laws' ('Notstandsgesetze') are issued.
Jul 23 - On the way from Rome to Tel Aviv, the PFLP (People's Front for the Liberation of Palestine) for the first time hijacks an El Al plane and takes it to Algeria. Several Palestinians are freed from Israeli prisons in exchange for the Israeli passengers.
Aug 5 - In Los Angeles, Black Panthers Steve Bartholemew, Robert Lawrence and Tommy Lewis are killed by police.
Aug 21 - In Prag, Warsaw Pact troops suppress the 'Czech Spring'.
Aug 26-29 - During the Democratic Party's Chicago Convention, demonstrators are beaten up brutally by police.
Sep 26 - In Essen, the German Communist Party (DKP) is founded.
Oct 2 - At demonstrations in Mexico City, 300 students and bystanders are shot by the military. At the following Olympic Games, two of the medal winners, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, raise their fists in a Black Power salute. Immediately, IOC President Avery Brundage expels them from the Olympic Village.
Nov 4 - In West Berlin, student anger erupts in the 'Tegeler Weg Battle', when lawyer Horst Mahler is threatened with exclusion from the bar because of his participation in the 'Springer-Blockade'.
Nov 8 - Beate Klarsfeld slaps Chanceler Georg Kiesinger in order to draw attention to his nazi past. She is sentenced to one year in prison.
1969
Jan 20 - Richard M Nixon becomes President of the USA. His Security Advisor will be Henry Kissinger, his Defense Advisor Donald Rumsfeld.
Jan 30 - Mozambican Frelimo leader Eduardo Mondlane is murdered by the Portuguese wing of NATO's secret organisation Gladio. His successor, Samora Machel, will die on October 19, 1986 in a suspicious plane crash at the South African border.
April - At 543,400, the number of US troops in Vietnam has reached its highest level in the history of the Vietnam war.
Jun 20 - After several splits in the US American SDS, the Weathermen organisation, later Weather Underground, is established. They will go underground and start armed struggle in December.
Jul 15-21 - 'Red Prison Week' and 'Prison Camp' in Ebrach near Nuremberg.
Jul 27 - Seven German army draft resisters, who fled to West Berlin because of its special status, are deported to West Germany after their arrest.
Aug 29 - On the way from Rome to Athens, a TWA plane is hijacked by a PFLP unit led by Leila Khaled and re-routed via Haifa to Damascus. The plane is blown up and the passengers are exchanged against prisoners of war in Israel.
Sep 2 - Vietnamese President Ho Chi Minh dies.
In Germany, spontaneous strikes burst out in the mining, metal, energy and car industries.
Sep 6 - Four airplanes are hijacked by the PFLP. Three planes are blown up at an airstrip near Amman. The hijack of one El Al plane on the way from Amsterdam to New York ends with the killing of Nicaraguan Patrick Arguello and the arrest of Leila Khaled in London. Little later, Khaled will be freed by another PFLP plane hijack. In total, Palestinian organisations are carrying out some 3,000 guerilla operations against Israel in 1969.
Oct 8-11 - With the dictum 'Bring the War Home', the Weathermen organise a street battle in Chicago. During the four 'Days of Rage' one student dies in the confrontations with police.
Oct 21 - In Germany, a Coalition Government is formed by the SPD and FDP parties, with Willy Brandt as Chancelor.
Nov 3 - US President Nixon confirms to have started a policy of 'Vietnamisation' as early as March 1969, embracing the gradual retreat of US troops and transfer of responsibilities to the South Vietnamese military. Nixon doesn't mention the Phoenix Programme, with which 30,000 presumed FLN cadres are identified and assassinated.
Nov 4 - Carlos Marighella is shot by police in São Paulo. The following year, his 'Manual of the Urban Guerilla' will be published in several languages.
Nov 12 - Journalist Seymour Hersh makes the My Lai massacre of March 1968 public.
Nov 15 - 'National Mobilisation To End The War': more than 1 million people demonstrate in Washington, 100,000 in San Francisco.
Dec 4 - In Chicago, Black Panther members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark are killed in their sleep during a raid by FBI and local police.
Dec 12 - At the culmination of labour struggles during Italy's 'Hot Autumn', four banks in Rome and Milan are attacked with bombs. At the explosions in Milan's Rural Bank, 16 people are killed and 84 injured. A huge media campaign renders the Left responsible for the attacks. On December 15, the accused anarchist Pinelli 'falls' out of the
window of Superintendent Calabresi's office. In the meantime it is known that the attacks were perpetrated in the framework of the 'strategy of tension' by intelligence agencies reporting to NATO's secret organisation Gladio.
1970
Feb 12 - In Heidelberg, the Socialist Patients Collective (SPK) is founded with the dictum 'turn illness into a weapon'.
Mar 21 - In Germany, the SDS is declared dissolved. The last SDS chapter in Heidelberg will be forbidden on June 24 by the Secretary of the Interior.
Mar 31 - In Guatemala, German Ambassador Karl Graf von Spreti is abducted by the FAR guerilla movement. They demand the liberation of prisoners from FAR. After the government's refusal (probably because the prisoners had already been killed), von Spreti is killed on May 5.
Apr 30 - President Nixon announces the US invasion of Cambodia, leading to protests and demonstrations worldwide.
May 4 - At a demonstration at Kent University in Ohio, the US National Guard kills 4 students.
May 14 - In Jackson, Mississippi, police kills 2 students at a demonstration at Jackson State University.
At the Central Institute for Social Affairs in West Berlin, Andreas Baader is liberated from captivity. Institute employee Georg Linke is injured by a bullet. Weeks later, a declaration is published in the Agit 883 journal: 'Build the Red Army!'.
May 20 - In Germany, a legal pardon is issued for thousands who had been sentenced to up to 9 months for 'demonstration offences'. This so-called 'amnesty' was an SPD election promise to defuse the Student Movement.
Aug 7 - In California, Jonathan Jackson, brother of imprisoned 'Soledad Brother' and Black Panther George Jackson, takes hostages to free his brother and is killed, with the hostages, by police. Angela Davis, who is accused of having provided one of the weapons, is later acquitted.
Sep 15 - Formation of the Red Brigades (Brigate Rosse, BR) in Italy. First armed attacks on foremen and police informers at Fiat, Siemens and Pirelli.
Sep 17 - Beginning of the 'Black September' massacres in Jordan. In case the Jordan military would fail, Israel masses its troops at the border, while the US Navy keeps 12,000 paratroopers and the Sixth Fleet ready. Between 4,000 and 10,000 Palestinians are killed by Jordan military.
Sep 29 - In West Berlin three banks are robbed to finance the underground movements.
Oct 8 - In West Berlin, Ingrid Schubert, Brigitte Asdonk, Monika Berberich, Irene Goergens and Horst Mahler are arrested as the first ones from the Red Army Faction. Months later they will be convicted to sentences of 6 1/2 to 14 years in prison.
Dec 22 - Ali Jansen and Ulrich Scholze are arrested in Nuremberg.
1971
Jan 15 - In Kassel, two banks are robbed by the Red Army Faction.
Apr 24-May 6 - After anti-war demonstrations, martial law is proclaimed over Washington DC. More than 12,000 people are arrested.
May 1 - At May 1 demonstrations, the first journal of the Red Army Faction is distributed, 'The Concept of Urban Guerilla'.
May 6 -Astrid Proll is arrested in Hamburg. Little later she will be imprisoned in Cologne prison's dead wing.
Jun 13 - The New York Times starts to publish the secret Pentagon Papers, which further questions the US government's credibility with regard to its official Vietnam policy.
Jun 21 - Helmut Pohl is arrested for the first time.
Jun 24 - Police measures against the SPK. Several searches and arrests which are continued July 19 to 20.
Jul 13 - The SPK is dissolved.
Jul 15 - At the first larger sweep search against the Red Army Faction, 'Operation Cora', Petra Schelm is killed and Werner Hoppe is arrested in Hamburg.
Aug 21 - In San Quentin prison, George Jackson is killed under circumstances that have never been clarified.
Sep 1 - Horst Herold becomes the President of the BKA (Bundeskriminalamt, the German FBI).
Sep 9-13 - Prison revolt in New York's Attica prison. 43 prisoners are killed by police.
Oct 22 - In Hamburg, police officer Norbert Schmid is killed during an attempt to control three people. Margrit Schiller is arrested. Gerhard Müller, who shot the police officer, gets away. Later he becomes the prosecution's 'Crown Witness', in exchange for which the charges against him are dropped.
Nov 28 - The Palestinian organisation Black September kills Jordan Prime Minister Wasfi Tall in Cairo. Three weeks later they wound Jordan's Ambassador Zaid Rifai in London.
Dec 4 - At a raid in West Berlin, Georg von Rauch is killed by police.
Dec 22 - After a bank robbery in Kaiserslautern, police officer Herbert Schoner is killed in a shootout with members of the Red Army Faction.
1972
Jan 30 - Bloody Sunday in Derry, Northern Ireland: 14 people are killed by British military.
Feb 6 - The Palestinian organisation Black September destroys three Gulf Oil installation in the Netherlands. The same day, they kill five Jordanians in Germany who were accused of collaboration with Israel. Two days later, they
carry out a bomb attack on a Hamburg factory manufacturing motor parts for Israel. On February 22, they destroy an Exxon pipeline near Hamburg.
Feb 21 - In Ludwigshafen, a bank is robbed by the Red Army Faction.
Mar 1 - In Herrenberg near Tübingen, 17 year old apprentice Richard Epple is killed by police during a raid against the Red Army Faction.
Mar 2 - In Augsburg, police arrest Carmen Roll and kill Thomas Weissbecker.
Mar 3 - In Hamburg, police arrest Manfred Grashof and Wolfgang Grundmann. At the ensuing shootout, Manfred Grashof is injured and police superinspector Hans Eckhardt is killed.
Mar 14 - Near Milan, publisher and founder of the GAP (Partisan Action Group) Giangiacomo Feltrinelli is killed by a prematurely detonated bomb.
May 1 - At May 1 demonstrations, the Red Army Faction's second journal is distributed, 'Urban Guerilla and Class Struggle'.
May 11 - Bomb attack on the US Army's 5th Corps Headquarters in Frankfurt by the Red Army Faction's 'Petra Schelm Unit'. US officer Paul Bloomquist is killed, 13 soldiers are injured.
May 12 - Bomb attacks on police headquarters in Augsburg and Munich by the Red Army Faction's 'Thomas Weissbecker Unit'. Five policemen are injured.
May 15 - Bomb attack on Federal Judge Wolfgang Buddenberg's car in Karlsruhe by the Red Army Faction's 'Manfred Grashof Unit'. Buddenberg's wife is injured.
May 19 - The Weather Underground carry out a bomb attack at the Pentagon, after the USA mined North Vietnam's harbours and intensified air attacks on rural areas.
At a bomb attack on the Springer premises in Hamburg by the Red Army Faction's 'June 2nd Unit', 15 employees are injured.
May 24 - Bomb attack on the 7th US Army's Heidelberg Headquarters by the Red Army Faction's 'July 15th Unit'. Three US soldiers are killed, five injured.
May 31 - The German Federal Police (BKA) initiates the largest sweep search against the Red Army Faction, 'Operation Washout'.
At a teach-in organised by the Red Help organisation in Frankfurt, a recorded message by Ulrike Meinhof is played off.
Jun 1 - Jan Raspe, Holger Meins and Andreas Baader are arrested in Frankfurt. Andreas Baader is injured at the ensuing shootout.
Jun 7-15 - Gudrun Ensslin is arrested in Hamburg, Brigitte Mohnhaupt and Bernhard Braun are arrested in West Berlin, Ulrike Meinhof and Gerhard Müller in Hannover.
Jun 25 - The British tradesman Ian McLeod is killed by police in Stuttgart at a raid against the Red Army Faction.
Jun 29 - Katharina Hammerschmidt, who was wanted for support to the Red Army Faction, surrenders to police upon the advice of her lawyer Otto Schily. She dies of a tumor on June 29, 1975, in a West Berlin hospital, as a result of failing treatment in prison until January 1974.
Jul 9 - Irmgard Möller and Klaus Jünschke are arrested in Offenbach.
Jul 26 - Werner Hoppe is sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Aug 5 - The Palestinian organisation Black September destroys a petrol depot in Triest.
Sep 5 - Eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team in Munich are taken hostage by a Black September unit. Instead of following the demand for liberation of prisoners from Israeli jails, a diversion takes place at Furstenfeldbruck airport, in which the hostages and one police officer die. Three of the eight Black September members survive and will be freed from prison by a plane hijack on October 29. On September 8, in 'retaliation' to the Munich attack, the Israeli airforce bombs ten Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan. On September 16, three Israeli tank convoys destroy more than ten villages in South Lebanon. On October 24, the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad starts a series of letter bomb attacks, killing or wounding several Palestinians across the world. In the following twenty years, a special branch of Mossad kills more than 25 Palestinian leaders.
Oct 3 - The German government outlaws the Palestinian workers union GUPA and the Palestinian students union GUPS. Hundreds of Palestinians are prosecuted or expelled.
November - Distribution of the Red Army Faction's third journal, 'Black September's attack in Munich - On the strategy of antiimperialist struggle'.
Dec 8 - In Israel, authorities confirm the arrest of about 100 members of an illegal group which calls itself 'Common Organisation of Jews and Arabs'. They are tortured and sentenced to up to 17 years for contacts with Palestinian organisations.
1973
Jan 17-Feb 16 - First hungerstrike of the prisoners from the Red Army Faction. Forty political prisoners demand the abolition of isolation detention and the abolition of the dead wing in Cologne-Ossendorf. For five days, February 9 through 14, Andreas Baader is kept without drinking water. On February 9, Ulrike Meinhof is moved from the dead wing to another cell.
Jan 20 - In Guinea-Bissau, PAIGC leader Amilcar Cabral is killed with the support of the Portuguese secret service.
Feb 9-12 - Solidarity hungerstrike by lawyers of the political prisoners in front of the Federal Court in Karlsruhe.
May 8-Jun 29 - Second hungerstrike. Eighty political prisoners demand the abolition of isolation detention. For ten days, from May 24 to June 4, Andreas Baader is kept without drinking water.
Jul 13 - At the request of the Federal Prosecutor, Ulrike Meinhof is ordered to have her brain examined by means of a scintigraphy, in case of resistance also under forced anaesthesia. After numerous public protests, the request is withdrawn on August 28.
Jul 16 - First BKA raids in the cells of the prisoners from the Red Army Faction.
Jul 24 - Ron Augustin is arrested in Lingen.
Sep 11 - In Chili, President Salvador Allende is killed at a military coup led by General Pinochet. In the next seven years, at least 3,000 people are tortured and killed.
Oct 6-22 - Arab-Israeli war, start of a five months oil embargo that will lead to the restructuring of the oil market.
Nov 17 - In Athens, 24 students are killed after an uprising at the Polytechneion.
Nov 22 - In West Berlin, Ali Jansen is sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Dec 20 - 'Operation Ogro': in Madrid, Spanish Prime Minister Luis Carrero Blanco, General Franco's right hand, is killed with a remotely controlled bomb by Basque organisation ETA's Txikia unit.
Dec 21 - Ulrike Meinhof is again transferred to the dead wing of Cologne-Ossendorf prison. On February 5, 1974, Gudrun Ensslin is taken to the dead wing. They will stay there until their transfer to Stammheim on April 28, 1974.
1974
Feb 4 - Arrest of Helmut Pohl, Ilse Stachowiak, Christa Eckes and Eberhard Becker in Hamburg, Margrit Schiller, Kai Allnach and Wolfgang Beer in Frankfurt, Axel Achterrath and Ekkehard Blenk in Amsterdam.
Astrid Proll is released because of her physical and mental condition, and flees to friends in the UK until she'll be arrested again on September 15, 1978. On February 22, 1980, she is sentenced to 5 1/2 years and released.
Mar 15-May 28 - The media are spreading rumours that the Red Army Faction would have planned to commit rocket attacks on soccer stadiums during the World Cup and to poison a city's water supplies with cyanide.
Apr 25 - In Portugal, Caetano's dictatorship is ended by a military coup that will be known as the 'Carnation Revolution'. Between June 25 and November 1, the Portuguese colonies will obtain independence.
May 16 - Chancelor Willy Brandt steps down. His successor is Helmut Schmidt.
May 21 - Taxidriver Gunter Jendrian is killed by police in Munich at a raid against the Red Army Faction.
May 31 - Siegfried Buback succeeds Ludwig Martin as Chief Federal Prosecutor.
Jul 23 - After a failed coup in Cyprus, the Greek military Junta falls. Greece's parliamentary republic is re-instated on December 13.
Aug 9 - US President Nixon steps down after the Watergate scandal. His successor is Gerald Ford. Ford proclaims legal immunity for Nixon and a limited amnesty for those who escaped military draft during the Vietnam war by hiding or emigrating. This amnesty will only be extended on January 21, 1977, when Jimmy Carter has taken office as US President.
Sep 13 - Third hungerstrike, until February 5, 1975. Ulrike Meinhof reads the hungerstrike demands at the trial against her for the liberation of Andreas Baader. They are published, together with her declaration in trial and a provisory fighting programme for prisoners, as the Red Army Faction's fourth journal.
Sep 27 - In a public declaration by Monika Berberich in the name of the prisoners, Horst Mahler is expelled from the Red Army Faction.
Nov 9 - Holger Meins dies during the hungerstrike in Wittlich prison.
Nov 10 - During an attempt to kidnap West Berlin's Chief Judge Gunter von Drenkmann, the latter is killed by a unit of the June 2nd Movement.
Nov 13 - The PLO obtains Observer Status and Yasser Arafat holds his first speech at the UN General Assembly.
Nov 26 - Nationwide man hunt in Germany with numerous road blocks and searches.
Nov 29 - In West Berlin, Ulrike Meinhof is sentenced to eight years in prison.
Dec 7 - Bomb attack at the Central Station of Bremen. The Red Army Faction is insinuated to be responsible but dissociates itself from it.
1975
Jan 27 - Establishment of the US Senate's Church Committee to examine illegal activities by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies. In the course of 1975, several assassinations and assassination attempts by the CIA are published. The US government establishes several other committees that will lead to the restructuring of US intelligence agencies under Presidents Ford and Bush Sr until 1980.
Feb 17-Apr 24 - At a trial in Buckeburg's prison yard, legal procedures against Ron Augustin are sped up. Verdict: 6 years in prison.
Feb 27 - West Berlin's CDU Chairman Peter Lorenz is kidnapped by the June 2nd Movement. In exchange for Lorenz, five prisoners are liberated.
Apr 13 - Start of the civil war in Lebanon which will last until 1991 at least, and which to a large extent will determine PLO policy.
Apr 22 - A court in Stuttgart excludes lawyer Klaus Croissant from defending Andreas Baader. On May 2 and 13, also Kurt Groenewold and Hans-Christian Stroebele are excluded from Andreas Baader's defense. In November, other lawyers are excluded from defending their clients.
Apr 24 - The German Embassy in Stockholm is occupied by the 'Holger Meins Unit', who demand the liberation of 26 prisoners from the Red Army Faction. They kill Embassy officers Heinz Hillegaart and Baron Andreas von Mirbach, but the German Government ignores the demands. An attempted police raid is followed by an explosion, and one of the unit's members, Ulrich Wessel, is killed. Hanna Krabbe, Karl-Heinz Dellwo, Bernd Roessner and Lutz Taufer are arrested. Siegfried Hausner is heavily wounded by rifle butts and dies on May 4 in Stammheim prison. Immediately after the start of the occupation, all prisoners from the Red Army Faction are searched and deprived from their radios, newspapers and any contacts.
Apr 30 - Final victory of the FLN in Vietnam after the occupation of the President's Palace in Saigon.
May 9 - At a shootout in Cologne, Werner Sauber and police officer Walter Pauli die. Karl-Heinz Roth and Roland Otto are heavily wounded and arrested.
May 10 - Sollicitor Siegfried Haag is arrested briefly, his files for the Stammheim trial are confiscated. The next day, he decides to go underground.
May 16 - In the run-up to the Stammheim trial, the media spread rumours that the Red Army Faction would plan a poison attack against the federal parliament.
May 21 - Start of the trial against Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, Ulrike Meinhof and Jan Raspe in Stuttgart-Stammheim.
Jun 23 - Sollicitors Klaus Croissant and Hans-Christian Stroebele are arrested, their offices and appartments as well as those of sollicitor Marieluise Becker are searched, and loads of defense files for the Stammheim trial are confiscated. Legal procedures against the lawyers are justified with their public appearances in the media. Few days prior to the arrests, sollicitor Croissant had organised a press conference with regard to the death of Siegfried Hausner.
Sep 13-Nov 12 - Bomb attacks at the Central Stations of Hamburg, Nuremberg and Cologne. The Red Army Faction is insinuated to be responsible but dissociates itself from these.
Nov 20 - Spanish dictator Franco dies. A three-year 'transition period from fascism to democracy' starts.
Nov 25 - Surinam becomes independent. Colonialism, however, has not come to an end in the world as yet.
1976
Jan 8 - In China, Prime Minister Zhou Enlai dies.
Jan 13-14 - Declaration of the defendants in the Stammheim trial.
Mar 16 - In Hamburg, Irmgard Moeller and Gerhard Mueller are sentences to 4 1/2 and 10 years in prison. Gerhard Mueller will be released before his term, Irmgard Moeller will be charged another time and sentenced to life.
May 9 - In a cell of Stuttgart-Stammheim prison, Ulrike Meinhof is found dead.
Jun 27 - A mixed unit of the group Revolutionary Cells (RZ) and Palestinian organisation PFLP-GC hijacks a plane coming from Tel Aviv via Athens. They demand the liberation of 53 prisoners from Israel, Kenya, France, Switzerland and Germany. On July 4, an Israeli military squad raids the plane at Entebbe airport. The unit's four members, three hostages, the squad's commander and 45 Ugandan soldiers are killed. Immediately after the start of the hijack, all prisoners from the Red Army Faction are searched and deprived from their radios, newspapers and any contacts.
Jul 7 - Four prisoners from the Red Army Faction and the June 2n Movement escape from Lehrter Strasse prison in West Berlin. Monika Berberich is arrested again on July 21.
Jul 16 - Sollicitor Croissant is again arrested, after he announced the foundation of an International Commission for the Examination of Ulrike Meinhof's Death.
Aug 18 - After a similar police operation in December 1975, bookshops and publishing houses across Germany are raided for 'suspicion of support to a criminal organisation'. Numerous books and magazines are confiscated.
Sep 9 - The Chairman of China's Communist Party, Mao Zedong, dies. On October 10, his successor Hua Guofeng has the 'Gang of Four' around Mao's widow Jiang Qing arrested, thus ending the Chinese Cultural Revolution.
Nov 30 - Siegfried Haag and Roland Mayer are arrested near Butzbach.
1977
Jan 23 - At the Stammheim trial, Chief Judge Theodor Prinzing is expelled due to partiality after the 85th legal request to do so.
Feb 8 - Brigitte Mohnhaupt is released from prison for the first time.
Mar 17 - Local Secretaries of the Interior and Justice Departments, Karl Schieß and Traugott Bender, admit that bugs installed by intelligence agencies BND and Verfassungsschutz have been used to eavesdrop the prisoners in Stammheim prison. They have the media spread rumours that the prisoners in Stammheim would have planned kidnaps at children's playing grounds.
Mar 29-May 1 - Fourth hungerstrike. The prisoners from the Red Army Faction demand to be regrouped into groups large enough to allow for social interaction.
Apr 7 - Chief Federal Prosecutor Siegfried Buback and two attendants are killed in Karlsruhe by the Red Army Faction's 'Ulrike Meinhof Unit'. Immediately, all prisoners from the Red Army Faction are searched and deprived from their radios, newspapers and any contacts.
Apr 28 - In the Stammheim trial, the defendants are sentenced to life.
May 3 - At a shootout in Singen, Guenter Sonnenberg is seriously injured by a shot in the head. Verena Becker is arrested.
May 13 - Irene Goergens is released from prison.
Jun 2 - At a trial in Kaiserslautern, Manfred Grashof and Klaus Juenschke are sentenced to life, Wolfgang Grundmann to four years in prison.
Jul 1 - The Red Army Faction captures several hand guns with a hold-up at an arms shop in Frankfurt.
Jul 11 - Sollicitor Klaus Croissant quits Germany and requests political asylum in France. He will be arrested on September 30 and expelled to Germany where he will be sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison.
Jul 20 - In Dusseldorf, Hanna Krabbe, Karl-Heinz Dellwo, Lutz Taufer and Bernd Roessner are each sentenced to twice life.
Jul 30 - The Red Army Faction kills Dresdner Bank Chairman of the Board Juergen Ponto in his house in Oberursel, during an attempt to kidnap him. Immediately, all prisoners from the Red Army Faction are searched and deprived from their radios, newspapers and any contacts.
Aug 9-Sep 2 - After a number of provocations and an assault on the group of prisoners in Stammheim, the prisoners from the Red Army Faction hold their fifth hungerstrike.
Aug 15 - Bomb attack on the office of the lawyers in Stuttgart. The office had been searched several times and was under permanent police observation.
Aug 25 - In Karlsruhe, a rocket launching pad is found. It was directed at the Federal Prosecutor's building as a 'warning' by the Red Army Faction.
Aug 29 - Germany's Federal Prosecutor orders the seizure of legal documents addressed at the European Commission for Human Rights in Strassburg, that were to be delivered before the expiration of the time limit.
Aug 30 - In Stuttgart, lawyer Armin Newerla is arrested. Further defense documents are confiscated.
Sep 5 - In Cologne, the President of the German Employers Federation, Hanns-Martin Schleyer, is abducted by the Red Army Faction's 'Siegfried Hausner Unit'. His driver and three bodyguards are killed. Immediately, all prisoners from the Red Army Faction are searched and excluded from any contact in a 'contact cut' ('Kontaktsperre') that will be legalised by law from September 28 and that will last for more than six weeks. The Government refuses to meet the demands for liberation of 10 prisoners from the Red Army Faction. In the framework of search sweeps, shepherd Helmut Schlaudraff is killed by police.
Sep 12 - Steve Biko is killed in a South African prison.
Sep 22 - After a shootout in Utrecht, police officer Arie Kranenburg is killed and Knut Folkerts is arrested.
Sep 30 - In Stuttgart, lawyer Arndt Müller is arrested. The Stuttgart lawyers office's remaining documents are confiscated.
Oct 13 - The 'Martyr Halimeh Unit' of a Palestinian group hijacks a Lufthansa plane with the demand for liberation of prisoners from the Red Army Faction. On October 17, flight captain Juergen Schumann is killed. The plane is raided by a German GSG9 squad and three of the four Palestinians are killed.
Oct 18 - In their cells in the prison of Stuttgart-Stammheim, Andreas Baader and Gudrun Ensslin are found dead, Jan Raspe is found dieing, and Irmgard Moeller is found wounded.
Oct 19 - The Red Army Faction's 'Siegfried Hausner Unit' kills Hanns-Martin Schleyer.
Nov 9 - In Austria, entrepreneur Walter Palmers is kidnapped by the June 2nd Movement. He will be released for a ransom of 30 million Schillings (2.3 million Euros).
Nov 11 -Christoph Wackernagel and Gerd Schneider are arrested in Amsterdam.
Nov 12 - In an isolated cell of Munich-Stadelheim prison, Ingrid Schubert is found dead.
Dec 28 - In Stuttgart-Stammheim, Verena Becker is sentenced to life.
1978
Jan 21 - Christine Kuby is arrested in Hamburg.
Feb 6 - 'Celle's hole': with explosives, a hole is blown in the wall around Celle prison. Later it is revealed to be the attempt by an intelligence agency to fake a prison break and use prisoners and their contact persons to get at wanted persons.
Feb 26 - An eavesdrop operation, organised by the German Federal Intelligence Agency (BfV) against nuclear physicist Klaus Traube because of presumed sympathies with the Red Army Faction, lead to a Government crisis.
Mar 10-Apr 20 - Sixth hungerstrike of the prisoners from the Red Army Faction.
Mar 16 - In Rome, DC politician and former Prime Minister Aldo Moro is kidnapped by the Red Brigades. He will be killed on May 9 when his exchange against prisoners from the BR fail.
Apr 14 - In Germany, separating windows for visits to prisoners are decreed by law.
Apr 26 - In Stuttgart-Stammheim, Guenter Sonnenberg is sentenced to twice life.
May 4 - Henri Curiel, supporter of several liberation movements, is killed in Paris.
May 11-12 - Sieglinde Hofmann, Brigitte Mohnhaupt, Rolf Clemens Wagner and Peter-Jürgen Boock are arrested in Yugoslavia. Wenn the German Government refuses to exchange them against eight exiled Croats, they are freed on November 17. Stefan Wisniewski is arrested at Paris Orly airport.
Jun 6 - German Minister of Interior Affairs Werner Maihofer steps down after the Traube scandal. His successor is Gerhart Baum.
Sep 6 - Willy-Peter Stoll is killed by two police officers in Dusseldorf.
Sep 24 - After a shootout in Dortmund, Angelika Speitel and Michael Knoll are arrested. Werner Lotze escapes.
Police officer Hans-Wilhelm Hansen is killed, Michael Knoll dies of his injuries on October 8.
Nov 1 - At a shootout near Kerkrade at the Dutch border, customs officers Dirk de Jong and Johannes Goemans are killed.
1979
Jan 16 - After months of demonstrations in Iran, Shah Reza Pahlavi flees with his family to the USA. On February 1, Ayatollah Khomeini returns from exile. After a referendum, the Islamic Republic is proclaimed on April 1.
Feb 16 - In Stuttgart-Stammheim, lawyer Klaus Croissant is sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison and 4 years exclusion from practicing as a lawyer.
Mar 19, Apr 17 - The Red Army Faction robs banks in Darmstadt and Nuremberg.
Apr 20-Jun 26 - Seventh hungerstrike of the prisoners from the Red Army Faction.
May 2 - In Hamburg, Christine Kuby is sentenced to life.
May 4 - Elisabeth von Dyck is killed by three police officers in Nuremberg.
Jun 9 - At his arrest in Frankfurt, Rolf Heissler is seriously injured by a shot in the head.
Jun 25 - Bomb attack in Belgium on NATO Supreme Commander Alexander Haig by the Red Army Faction's 'Andreas Baader Unit'. General Haig remains unscathed.
Jul 17 - Victory of the Sandinist Liberation Movement in Nicaragua.
Nov 4 - In Teheran, students occupy the US Embassy and take 66 hostages, who are only released by January 20, 1981.
Nov 19 - After a bank robbery in Zurich and an ensuing shootout, Rolf Clemens Wagner is arrested. A bystanding housewife is killed by a ricochet bullet.
Dec 19 - In Stuttgart, Siegfried Haag is sentenced to 15 years in prison.
1980
Jan 31 - In Stuttgart-Stammheim, lawyers Arndt Mueller and Armin Newerla are sentenced to four years and eight months and three years and six months, respectively.
Feb 22 - Peter-Juergen Boock is arrested in Hamburg. He renounces the Red Army Faction and will be released on March 13, 1998.
Mar 7 - Ron Augustin is released from prison and expelled to Holland. He is not allowed back into Germany until 1994.
May 5 - Sieglinde Hofmann and four women of the June 2nd Movement are arrested in Paris.
Jun 2 - The June 2nd Movement declares its merger with the Red Army Faction.
Jul 25 - Wolfgang Beer and Juliane Plambeck die in a car crash near Bietigheim-Bissingen. Sound technician Manfred Perler is killed by accident by a BKA sharpshooter during a raid against the Red Army Faction near Neuss.
Jul 31 - In Stuttgart, Knut Folkerts is sentenced to twice life.
Sep 5 - In Dusseldorf, Christof Wackernagel and Gerd Schneider are sentenced to 15 years in prison each.
Sep 22 - Beginning of the war between Iraq and Iran, which will last until August 20, 1988, and will take more than one million lives.
1981
Jan 20 - Ronald Reagan becomes President of the USA. He appoints William Casey as Director of the CIA.
Feb 6 - Eight hungerstrike by more than one hundred political prisoners in Germany. The hungerstrike is stopped on April 16, when the Government promises that no prisoner will remain in isolation. The same day the announcement is made that prisoner Sigurd Debus died.
Mar 1-Oct 3 - Hungerstrike of the prisoners from the IRA in Northern Ireland. In this hungerstrike, 10 prisoners die: Bobby Sands, Francis Hughes, Patsy O'Hara, Raymond McCreesh, Joe McDonnell, Martin Hurson, Kevin Lynch, Kieran Doherty, Thomas McElwee and Mickey Devine.
Aug 31 - Bomb attack at the US Airforce's European Headquarters in Ramstein by the Red Army Faction's 'Sigurd Debus Unit'. 17 persons are injured.
Sep 15 - Grenade attack in Heidelberg on US Commander Frederick Kroesen by the Red Army Faction's 'Gudrun Ensslin Unit'. General Kroesen's armoured car is hit, but he survives.
Dec 4 - In Dusseldorf, Stefan Wisniewski is sentenced to life.
1982
May 1 - Distribution of the Red Army Faction's (fifth) journal 'Guerilla, Resistance and Antiimperialist Front'.
Jun 13-Sep 13 - Occupation of Beirut by the Israeli army.
Jun 16 - In Frankfurt, Sieglinde Hofmann is sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Aug 21 - In Lebanon, the Multinational Force is formed by NATO troops from the USA, France, Italy and the UK, to control the PLO's retreat from Lebanon.
Sep 15-16 - Massacre in the Palestinian refugee camps of Sabra and Chatila.
Sep 15 - The Red Army Faction robs a bank in Bochum.
Oct 1 - In Germany, a Coalition Government of CDU and FDP is formed, with Helmut Kohl as Chancelor.
Nov 10 - In Dusseldorf, Rolf Heissler is sentenced to twice life plus 15 years in prison.
Nov 11-16 - Brigitte Mohnhaupt, Heidi Schulz and Christian Klar are arrested at forestry depots near Frankfurt and Hamburg. In all, police find eight depots with weaponry and papers.
1983
Mar 1 - Gisela Dutzi is arrested in Darmstadt.
Apr 18 - In Beirut, 63 people die at a bomb attack on the US Embassy. In 1983, US Marines are engaged several times in fights with lebanese militia forces. In August, the Sixth Fleet bombs Druse and Shiite positions.
Oct 23 - In Lebanon, two bases of the Multinational Force are destroyed by bomb attacks. 241 US Marines and other US Soldiers and 58 French paratroopers are killed.
1984
Mar 26 - The Red Army Faction robs a bank in Wurzburg.
May 7 - In Stuttgart, Peter-Juergen Boock is sentenced to three times life plus 15 years in prison. On November 28, 1986, the verdict will be reduced to one time life.
Jun 22 - Manuela Happe is arrested in Deizisau near Stuttgart.
Jul 2 - In Frankfurt, Helmut Pohl, Ingrid Jakobsmeier, Christa Eckes, Stefan Frey, Ernst Volker Staub and Barbara Ernst are arrested.
Nov 5 - The Red Army Faction captures several hand guns, rifles and ammunition with a hold-up at an arms shop in Maxdorf near Ludwigshafen.
December - The first issue of the journal 'Fighting Together' is published. The journal contains statements by the Red Army Faction and antiimperialist resistance groups, and will be continued till August 1990 as a clandestine project. After many demonstrations and occupations, like for the support of the prisoners' demands, legal militants increasingly organise themselves in clandestine structures and, particularly between 1983 and 1990, commit bomb attacks of their own as well.
Dec 4 - Ninth hungerstrike of political prisoners in Germany, until February 3, 1985.
Dec 18 - The Red Army's 'Jan Raspe Unit' parks a car loaded with explosives near the NATO Officers School in Oberammergau. It is disarmed before it can explode.
1985
Jan 15 - Joint statement of the Red Army Faction and the French Action Directe: 'For the Unitity of the Revolutionaries in Western Europe'.
Jan 20 - At an attempted bomb attack on the German Air and Space Research Institute in Stuttgart, a bomb explodes prematurely and kills Johannes Thimme. Claudia Wannersdorfer is injured and arrested.
Jan 25 - Action Directe's 'Elisabeth von Dyck Unit' kills the Chief of Arms Trade in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, General René Audran, in La Celle-Saint-Cloud near Paris.
Feb 1 - The Red Army Faction's 'Patsy O'Hara Unit' kills MTU's Chairman of the Board Ernst Zimmermann in Gauting near Munich.
Mar 13 - In Dusseldorf, Heidi Schulz and Rolf Clemens Wagner are sentenced to twice life each.
Apr 2 - In Stuttgart-Stammheim, Brigitte Mohnhaupt and Christian Klar are sentenced to five times life each.
Jun 2 - At an attempted bomb attack on the Hannover Messe, a bomb explodes prematurely and kills Juergen Peemoeller.
Jul 3 - In Offenbach, Ingrid Barabass and Mareille Schmegner are arrested.
Aug 8 - Bomb attack at the Rhein-Main Airbase near Frankfurt by the joint Red Army Faction and Action Directe's 'George Jackson Unit'. One soldier and one employee are killed and 23 persons are injured. In order to obtain access to the Airbase, Soldier Edward Pimental is killed for his ID card.
1986
Jan 31-Feb 3 - The Congress 'Antiimperialist and Anticapitalist Resistance in Western Europe' takes place in Frankfurt with some one thousand participants.
Apr 15 - The US Airforce and the US Navy carry out airstrikes against Libya. The operation is presented as retaliation for Libya's support to certain Palestinian groups. The bomb attack at discotheque La Belle in Berlin on April 5 is particularly mentioned, although the attack is later exposed as a provocation set up by the CIA and Mossad.
Jul 9 - The Red Army Faction's 'Mara Cagol Unit' kills Siemens Chairman of the Board Karl-Heinz Beckurts and his driver with a remotely controlled bomb on a road near Munich.
Aug 2 - Eva Haule and her counterparts from antiimperialist resistance groups, Luitgard Hornstein and Christian Kluth, are arrested in Russelsheim.
Oct 10 - The Red Army Faction's 'Ingrid Schubert Unit' kills Foreign Department Director Gerold von Braunmuehl in Bonn.
Nov 17 - Action Directe kills Renault Chairman of the Board Georges Besse in Paris.
Dec 23 - In Dusseldorf, Helmut Pohl is sentenced to life.
1987
Feb 21 - Near Orleans, South of Paris, AD members Jann-Marc Rouillan, Nathalie Ménigon, Joëlle Aubron and Georges Cipriani are arrested.
Mar 16 - In Dusseldorf, Rolf Clemens Wagner is sentenced to life.
Dec 18 - Andrea Sievering and Rico Prauss, members of antiimperialist resistance groups, are arrested in Dusseldorf.
1988
Mar 29 - ANC Representative Dulcie September is killed in Paris on the order of South African intelligence agency Boss.
Jun 28 - In Stuttgart, Luitgart Hornstein, Christian Kluth and Eva Haule are sentenced to 4 to 15 years in prison.
Sep 20 - Attempted attack on Federal Finance Secretary Hans Tietmeyer in Bonn by the Red Army Faction's 'Khaled Aker Unit'.
September - Joint statement of the Red Army Faction and the Red Brigade's BR-PCC on their 'front' policy.
1989
Jan 18 - In Stuttgart, Andrea Sievering and Rico Prauss are sentenced to 9 years in prison each.
Jan 20 - George H W Bush becomes President of the USA.
In Dusseldorf, Thomas Richter, Thomas Thoene, Barbara Perau and Norbert Hofmeier, members of antiimperialist resistance groups, are sentenced to 4 to years in prison.
Feb 1-May 14 - Tenth hungerstrike of political prisoners in Germany.
Nov 9 - The fall of the Berlin wall. The reunification of Germany follows October 3, 1990.
Nov 30 - The Red Army Faction's 'Wolfgang Beer Unit' kills Deutsche Bank Chairman of the Board Alfred Herrhausen with a bomb attack in Bad Homburg. His driver is injured.
Verena Becker is released from prison.
Dec 7 - Ute Hladki und Holger Deilke, supposedly members of an antiimperialist resistance group, are arrested near Suedermarsch in Northern Germany.
1990
Mar 2 - Attempted attack on the Minister of Agriculture, Ignaz Kiechle, in Bonn. The Red Army Faction is made responsible but dissociates itself from it.
Jun 5 - The Red Army Faction captures 325,000 Marks (166,000 Euros) by robbing a supermarket in Duisburg.
Jun 6-18 - Susanne Albrecht, Inge Viett, Werner Lotze, Christine Dümlein, Ekkehard von Seckendorff, Monika Helbing, Sigrid Sternebeck, Ralf Friedrich, Silke Maier-Witt and Henning Beer are arrested in Eastern Germany. Most of them agree to be 'Crown Witnesses' for the Prosecution in further trials against prisoners from the Red Army Faction. In 1994 and 1995, Christian Klar, Heidi Schulz, Sieglinde Hofmann, Rolf Clemens Wagner and Ingrid Jakobsmeier are again convicted because of their testimonies.
Jul 27 - Attempted attack in Bonn on the Secretary of Interior Affairs Hans Neusel by the Red Army Faction's
'José Manuel Sévillano Unit'.
1991
Jan 16 - After the occupation of Kuwait by Iraq in August 1990 and the massing of 500,000 US troops in the Middle East, the US Airforce attacks Iraq for two weeks with heavy air strikes, before an invasion with US troops is started that will last until April 12. In September 1996 and December 1998, the US Airforce will again strike at Iraq, before the USA start another war in Iraq in March 2003.
Feb 13 - The Red Army Faction fires 250 rounds at the US Embassy in Bonn with a unit which is first called after Vincenzo Spano and subsequently after Ciro Rizatto.
Apr 1 - The Red Army Faction's 'Ulrich Wessel Unit' kills the Chairman of the Privatisation Office for Eastern Germany (Treuhandanstalt) Detlev Karsten Rohwedder in Dusseldorf.
Dec 26 - Official dissolution of the Soviet Union.
1992
Apr 10 - The Red Army Faction makes a statement of 'incision', in which it declares to stop its escalation of attacks 'on leading figures from state and industry'.
May 15 - Guenter Sonnenberg is released from prison.
Nov 17 - Bernd Roessner is released from prison.
1993
Jan 20 - William (Bill) Clinton becomes President of the USA.
Mar 27 - Prior to the opening of a new high security prison in Weiterstadt near Darmstadt, it is blown up by the Red Army Faction's 'Katharina Hammerschmidt Unit'.
Apr 10 - Communist ANC leader Chris Hani is killed by supporters of the apartheid regime in South Africa.
Jun 27 - At a shootout after an arrest operation initiated with the help of secret agent Klaus Steinmetz in Bad Kleinen, Wolfgang Grams and GSG9 police officer Michael Newrzella are killed. Birgit Hogefeld is arrested. Because of a series of contradictions during the operation, Minister for Interior Affairs Rudolf Seiters steps down and Chief Federal Prosecutor Alexander von Stahl is fired.
Oct 28 - In a statement for the prisoners from the Red Army Faction, Brigitte Mohnhaupt declares their rupture with the remaining group outside and some of the prisoners.
1994
Jul 27-Aug 3 - Limited hungerstrike by prisoners from the Red Army Faction for the liberation of Irmgard Moeller.
Dec 1 - Irmgard Moeller is released from prison.
1995
Feb 21 - Christine Kuby is released from prison.
Apr 25-26 - Manuela Happe and Lutz Taufer are released from prison.
May 10 - Karl-Heinz Dellwo is released from prison.
August - Limited hungerstrike by prisoners from the Red Army Faction in solidarity of Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Oct 16 - Knut Folkerts is released from prison.
1996
May 10 - Hanna Krabbe is released from prison.
Nov 5 - In Frankfurt, Birgit Hogefeld is sentenced to life. Her release is fixed as not earlier than 2011.
1997
Jan 24 - Inge Viett is released from prison.
1998
Apr 20 - Red Army Faction statement in which the organisation declares it dissolution.
May 19 - Helmut Pohl is released from prison.
Oct 19 - Heidi Schulz is released from prison.
Oct 27 - In Germany, a Coalition Government is formed by the Green Party and the SPD, with Gerhard Schroeder as Chancelor, Joschka Fischer as Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Otto Schily as Minister of Interior Affairs.
1999
Mar 1 - Stefan Wisniewski is released from prison.
May 5 - Sieglinde Hofmann is released from prison.
Jul 20 - For the attack on an armored security car in Duisburg and the escape with half a million Euros, fugitives from the Red Army Faction are held responsible. Still three former members of the Red Army Faction are wanted by police.
Sep 15 - Police kill Horst-Ludwig Meyer in Vienna and arrest Andrea Klump. Both belonged to an antiimperialist resistance group.
2001
Oct 26 - Rolf Heissler is released from prison.
2003
Dec 10 - Rolf Clemens Wagner is released from prison.
2007
Mar 25 - Brigitte Mohnhaupt is released from prison.
May 7 - German President Horst Koehler refuses to grant pardon to Christian Klar. He shall stay in prison till the end of 2008.
Aug 17 - Eva Haule is released from prison.