Anti-Imperialism and Urban Guerrilla Warfare

Enlarge image

Professor Alan Rosenfeld (History, UH West Oahu) will present “Strategies of Resistance: Anti-Imperialism and Urban Guerrilla Warfare in 1970s West Germany” as the next session of the History Workshop series on War and Society. The proliferation of terrorist attacks in the 1970s – including a spate of plane hijackings – caused numerous contemporary European observers to describe the decade as the “era of terror.” Following the example of urban guerrillas from Latin America, more than two hundred embittered young Germans descended into the political underground to launch a violent struggle against the West German state and the forces of global imperialism. This presentation explores the varied strategies of resistance employed by the German guerrilla in the 1970s, including bomb attacks, targeted assassinations, kidnappings, and hunger strikes. Although the mainstream media provided detailed coverage of guerrilla attacks, allowing the assailants’ ideological message to reach a multitude of audiences, the rebels fell far short of their professed goal of sparking a political revolution on German soil.

Event Sponsor
History, Manoa Campus

More Information
Suzanna Reiss and Matt Romaniello, 956-7407, histwork@hawaii.edu

Ongoing Events