RAF Boss to be Released

[Louis VI the Fat]

Most of the former RAF members have been released already. None have relapsed, and this doesn't seem very likely. Society has changed enourmously, radical left-wing terrorism is gone. All the sixties/seventies red terrorism groups have disbanded themselves, except where it is tied to territorial claims (ETA, somewhat the IRA).
Plus the Soviet Union and East Germany have no use for Western ideologues and useful idiots anymore.

Either you believe him to be a murdering thug, in which case you err on the side of caution and keep him jailed OR you believe him to be a revolutionary

Or, the third option, you believe society to be wrong. Which a lot of people believed. The RAF shook West Germany to the core, tested it to the limit. I think that about a third of Germans at the time did not see this episode in terms of terrorist thugs versus a legitimate state. This anti-capitalist democracy line of thinking has virtually disappeared. Together, it should be noted, with a lot of anti-democratic sentiment from the right.

(On the downside, at least in the seventies anti-democracy usually implied one had read Marx and Adorno. Backwards. In a foreign language. Nowadays, anti-democratic usually means 'semi-literate internet populist'. O tempora, o mores...)

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Most of the former RAF members have been released already. None have relapsed, and this doesn't seem very likely. Society has changed enourmously, radical left-wing terrorism is gone. All the sixties/seventies red terrorism groups have disbanded themselves, except where it is tied to territorial claims (ETA, somewhat the IRA).
Plus the Soviet Union and East Germany have no use for Western ideologues and useful idiots anymore.

The likelihood of reoffending should not even enter into the equation. The man tore families a part, murdered people in cold blood and his organization did so in excessively brutal ways. If there is one single person in the world who actually deserves Guantanumo, he is that person.

How about we build a time machine, go back 150 years, and send all extremist Germans to Antarctica to wage their battles there?

Send every extremist there. The KKK, Black Panthers, communists, Nazis, terrorist organizations everywhere, fence the whole continent off and let them sort themselves out.

[Louis VI the Fat]

The likelihood of reoffending should not even enter into the equation. The man tore families a part, murdered people in cold blood and his organization did so in excessively brutal ways. If there is one single person in the world who actually deserves Guantanumo, he is that person.

I wouldn't mind seeing him in Gitmo...

...together with all NPD members.


Imprisonment is for prevention and revenge. Prevention seems unnecessary. I just pointed it out for arguments sake.
More importantly for me is indeed revenge. Personally I have my usual dual thoughts. Half of me wants blood and revenge, half of me thinks releasing people in their fifties for what they did in their twenties is what a civilised society does.

Apart from this personal struglle, more in general, I think it is a commendable sign of German maturity that the RAF members have been mostly released by now. There is no more fear of them, no more breeding ground for them, no more East Germany to support them, and no more nazis to imprison them.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

I wouldn't mind seeing him in Gitmo...

...together with all NPD members.

...who committed terrorist acts, yes.

[LittleGrizzly]

Im glad im not the only one who wondered what the royal air force boss had done!

If he isn't a threat anymore then i do see a good reason to release him, 26 years for 9 murders does seem a bit low, but if he's an old man that isn't a threat anymore is there really any need for more punishment...

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

If he isn't a threat anymore then i do see a good reason to release him, 26 years for 9 murders does seem a bit low, but if he's an old man that isn't a threat anymore is there really any need for more punishment...

He is fifty-six and guilty of some of the most henious crimes in post-Second World War German history.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Im glad im not the only one who wondered what the royal air force boss had done!

If he isn't a threat anymore then i do see a good reason to release him, 26 years for 9 murders does seem a bit low, but if he's an old man that isn't a threat anymore is there really any need for more punishment...

Punishment has nothing to do with threats.

CR

[Tribesman]

Same response to the same topic posted here last time one of them was released .
Yes its terrible isn't it , but if you a do a deal with terrorists that offers early release in exchange for disbanding their group then they get early release .

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Same response to the same topic posted here last time one of them was released .
Yes its terrible isn't it , but if you a do a deal with terrorists that offers early release in exchange for disbanding their group then they get early release .

Which deal? I was under the impression that the group was officially disbanded in 1998 with this:

"Vor fast 28 Jahren, am 14. Mai 1970, entstand in einer Befreiungsaktion die RAF. Heute beenden wir dieses Projekt. Die Stadtguerilla in Form der RAF ist nun Geschichte."