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Ulrike Marie Meinhof (7 October 1934 – 9 May 1976) was a German left-wing militant, journalist and founding member of the Red Army Faction (RAF) in West Germany, commonly referred to in the press as the "Baader-Meinhof gang". She is the reputed author of The Urban Guerilla Concept (1971). The manifesto acknowledges the RAF's "roots in the history of the student movement"; condemns "reformism" as "a brake on the anti-Capitalism struggle"; and invokes Mao Zedong to define "armed struggle" as "the highest form of Marxism-Leninism".
Meinhof, who took part in the RAF's "May Offensive" in 1972, was arrested that June and spent the rest of her life in custody, largely isolated from outside contact. In November 1974, she was sentenced to 8 years in prison for complicity in a near-fatal shooting in what had been her first RAF operation, the successful jailbreak of Andreas Baader in 1970.
From 1975, with Baader and two other RAF leaders, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe, she stood trial on further charges of murder and attempted murder. Before the end of the trial, she was found hanged in her cell in the Stammheim Prison. The official finding of suicide sparked controversy, with her sister, Wienke Zitzlaff, stating that Meinhof had told her only days before her death: "You can stand up and fight only while you are alive. If they say I committed suicide, be sure that it was murder."
One year later, on , two members of the RAF assassinated the Federal Attorney-General Siegfried Buback as revenge.
On 2 June 1967, Meinhof's exposure in konkret of German complicity in supporting the Pahlavi dynasty helped rally students to a demonstration in West Berlin against the visit of the Shah of Iran. When Iranian counter-demonstrators, including agents of the SAVAK, attacked the students, the police joined the affray beating the demonstrators into a side street where an officer shot and killed the student protester Benno Ohnesorg" Stasi Archive Surprise: East German Spy Shot West Berlin Martyr". Spiegel Online. spiegel.de. 22 May 2009. Retrieved 9 February 2021. The leading Stern columnist, Sebastian Haffner whom Meinhof had befriended, took to konkret to suggest "with the anti- Student pogrom of 2 June 1967 fascism in West Berlin had thrown off its mask"."Mit den Studentenpogrom von 2. Juni 1967 hat der Faschismus in Westberlin seine maske bereits abgeworfen". Sebastian Haffner, Konkret, July 1967
In February 1968, Meinhof was a participant in the International Vietnam Conference in West Berlin, which the authorities had permitted only in the face of large-scale protests. She was co-signatory, along with intellectuals including Ernst Bloch, Noam Chomsky, Eric Hobsbawm, Ernest Mandel, and Jean-Paul Sartre, of the final declaration. This defined the U.S. intervention in Vietnam as "the Spain of our generation" and called for mobilisation against the "extermination" ( Vernichtung) of the Vietnamese people.
Later that year, her writings on arson attacks in Frankfurt as protests against the Vietnam War resulted in her developing an acquaintance with the perpetrators, most significantly Andreas Baader and Gudrun Ensslin. She stopped writing for konkret which had in her opinion evolved into a completely commercial magazine in the early part of 1969, and many other authors followed her. She stated that neither she nor her collaborators wanted to give a left-wing alibi to the magazine that sooner or later "would become part of the counter-revolution, a thing that I cannot gloss over with my co-operation, especially now that it is impossible to change its course".Ulrike Meinhof: "Ich will durch meine Mitarbeit nicht verschleiern", 26 April 1969 ( Frankfurter Rundschau) Later, they organised an occupation at konkrets office (along with several members of the Außerparlamentarische Opposition), to distribute proclamations to the employees, something that failed since Röhl learned about it, and moved the employees to their homes to continue their work from there. Finally, Röhl's house was vandalized by some of the protesters. Meinhof arrived in Röhl's villa at 11:30, after police and journalists had already arrived. She was accused by Röhl (and subsequently described by the media) as the organizer of the vandalism. It was difficult to prove, as she was not there when it happened. Page numbering follows the Greek translation
Perhaps her last work as an individual was the writing and production of the film in 1970, which focused on a group of West Berlin girls in juvenile detention; by the time it was scheduled to be aired, she was wanted for her part in the violent escape from police custody of Baader, and its broadcast was delayed until 1994. (2025). 9781571135957, Camden House. ISBN 9781571135957
Baader arrived with two guards and set to work with Meinhof in the institute's library. Two women in Ensslin's group, along with a man with a criminal record (hired because of his supposed experience with armed encounters) broke into the institute. The man shot the elderly librarian Georg Linke, severely wounding him in his liver. It was later claimed that the man was holding two weapons, a pistol and a gas canister gun, and accidentally fired the wrong weapon in the confusion. Following the unanticipated shooting, Meinhof joined the others in jumping out of the institute's window. She then called a friend to pick up her children from school. Within days wanted posters appeared throughout Berlin offered a 10,000 Deutsche Mark reward for her capture for attempted murder.
During this period, Meinhof wrote or recorded many of the and tracts for the RAF. The most significant of these is probably The Concept of the Urban Guerrilla, a response to an essay by Horst Mahler, that attempts to set out more correctly their prevailing ideology. It also included the first use of the name Rote Armee Fraktion and, in the publications of it, the first use of the RAF insignia. Full text in German of Das Konzept Stadtguerilla from Baader-Meinhof.com. Retrieved 2 January 2007.
Her practical importance in the group, however, was often overstated by the media, the most obvious example being the common name Baader-Meinhof gang for the RAF. (Gudrun Ensslin is often considered to have been the effective female co-leader of the group rather than Meinhof.)
Information on copy held by the Bonn Museum of History (site refers to an exhibit by the DHM) (2025). 9783980806305, Sammlung Goetz. ISBN 9783980806305
Meinhof wrote an essay defending the Munich massacre as part of a Palestinian strategy of resistance against Israeli land theft and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
On 14 June 1972, in Langenhagen, Fritz Rodewald, a teacher who had been providing accommodation to deserters from the U.S. Armed Forces, was approached by a stranger asking for an overnighting house the next day for herself and a friend. He agreed but later became suspicious that the woman might be involved with the RAF and called the police. The next day the pair arrived at Rodewald's dwelling while the police watched. The man was followed to a nearby telephone box and was found to be Gerhard Müller, who was armed. After arresting Müller, the police then arrested the woman – Meinhof.
"Unless we absolve the German people of fascism—that the people really didn't know what was going on in the concentration camps—they can't be mobilized for our struggle," she said. After the war, the left, in dealing with fascism, were "negligent, stupid, and insolent." They dealt with the people in the foreground, but didn't look any deeper. "How was Auschwitz possible; what was antisemitism?" That is something that someone should have clarified at the time. Instead of collectively understanding Auschwitz as an expression of evil, Meinhof stated."The worst thing is that all of us, communists as well as others, were united in this." However, she now recognizes that antisemitism can in its own way be anticapitalist. It separates the hatred of people about their dependency on money as a means of exchange from their desire for communism.
"Auschwitz meant that six million Jews were murdered and carted off to Europe's garbage heap, dispensed with for what they were presented as: money Jews." Finance capital and banks, "the hard core of the system" of imperialism and capitalism deflected the hate of the people for money and oppression from itself and transferred it to the Jews. Not having made this connection clear was the failure of the left and the communists.
Germans were antisemitic, therefore they are today RAF supporters. Only they don't know it, because they've forgotten that they must be absolved of fascism and murdering Jews, and that antisemitism is in reality hatred of capitalism. In this regard Ulrike Meinhof ably constructed a remarkable statement about the failure of the Baader-Meinhof Group. With it, it is also possible to praise the Black September attack in Munich. She claimed to feel an "historical identity" with the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto, who attempted an unarmed uprising leading to their defeat. "We have broken through the entire blah blah. We have provided the left with obvious encouragement, which they have voluntarily allowed to dissipate, because we've all been arrested."
In late 2002, following investigations by her daughter Bettina, it was discovered that Meinhof's human brain had been retained (apparently without permission) following the autopsy performed as part of the investigation into her death. The original autopsy had found brain injury near the amygdala, resulting from successful surgery in 1962 to remove a benign cyst. The unpublished autopsy results at the time stated that the brain injuries "justified questions as to the culpability" of Meinhof. Bernhard Bogerts, a psychiatrist at Magdeburg University, later re-examined the brain and also doubted that Meinhof was fully criminally responsible. On Bettina's request, the brain was interred in Meinhof's burial place on 19 December 2002.
A second investigation was carried out by an international group. The findings of the inquiry were published under the title Der Tod Ulrike Meinhofs. Bericht der Internationalen Untersuchungskommission ( The Death of Ulrike Meinhof. Report of the International Investigation Committee) in 1979.
In early May, attorney Axel Azzola contacted his client (Meinhof). They were hopeful about the possibilities that the new strategy seemed to offer. They also discussed whether Meinhof could testify as a witness at the International Law Conference in Geneva where a delegation of lawyers planned to denounce the measure of detention in solitary confinement. Finally, Meinhof was planning to reveal main witness Gerhard Müller's role in the trial. Federal prosecutors had indicted the four defendants for the murder of a policeman Norbert Schmid, who was shot by Müller himself.
During the press conference called by defense attorneys, one of Meinhof's lawyers, Michael Oberwinder, stated that it was less than a week before Meinhof's death that they had a very involved conversation. He claimed that there was not the least sign of depression or lack of interest on her part and that it was an animated discussion in the context of which Meinhof explained the group's point of view. The Stammheim model
Meinhof's last visitor was Giovanni Capelli, lawyer of the Red Brigades. He conveyed the desire of the Red Brigades to contact her and described the conditions of detention in Italy where prisoners were not held in isolation (except Renato Curcio) and were politically active. They also discussed the establishment of an international committee of lawyers to defend the RAF. Capelli later said that Meinhof gave him the impression of "a vivid, lifelike woman", "open to all questions". They arranged to meet again soon. "She behaved like a woman who wanted to live". Bericht der Internationalen Untersuchungskommission zum Tod von Ulrike Meinhof: Bericht ulrike meinhofs vom 7. mai 1976 ueber ein gespraech
There was a concern among Meinhof supporters about the forensic surgeons chosen by the state to perform the autopsy. Mallach (NSDAP Member No. 9154986) had been a member of the SS. He served in World War II as corporal in a Panzer division. In 1977, he made (without approval) and kept for a long time the death masks of Baader, Ensslin, and Raspe.Jürgen Dahlkamp: "Trophäen für den Panzerschrank" , Der Spiegel Nr. 42, 2002, 14 October 2002 Rauschke also performed the autopsy of Siegfried Hausner one year earlier and was accused by fellows and supporters of the RAF of ignoring the injuries to Hausner's head, so as to cover up the true cause of his death.
On 11 May a second autopsy was performed on demand of Wienke Zitzlaff by Werner Janssen and Jürgen Schröder, even though the brain, a lot of critical organs, and tissue parts had been removed from the body. Also, her nails had been cut, so the doctors could not determine clearly if there were traces of struggle. Some examinations could not take place since a critical time had passed. Janssen concluded that the most probable cause of death was "suicide by hanging", however in order to come to a definite conclusion he insisted on being given access to the report of the first autopsy, something that never happened.
Finally, on demand of Meinhof's attorney Klaus Croissant and the International Committee for Political Prisoners, an international investigation commission was created in order to examine the conditions surrounding Meinhof's death. Once more the German authorities refused to give the complete (first) autopsy report to the commission, hindering their investigation. In 1978 the committee published its report, concluding that: "The formal claim that Ulrike Meinhof committed suicide by hanging is unfounded, given the fact that the investigation results reasonably converge to the conclusion that she could not hang herself. Most probably Ulrike Meinhof was already dead before she was hanged and there are warning signs indicating the involvement of a third party regarding her death." Der Tod Ulrike Meinhofs. Bericht der Internationalen Untersuchungskommission, iva-Verlag bernd polke, Tübingen 1979 (2nd ed) pp. 5–6
There are inquiries regarding the procedure followed by the authorities, including the autopsy reports and the findings of the international commission. Some of them are:
Some other questions still remain, including:
Finally, there is a dispute over the arguments regarding Meinhof's motive. Some of the points usually mentioned are:
Meinhof's life has been the subject, to varying degrees of fictionalisation, of several films and stage productions. Treatment in films include Reinhard Hauff's 1986 Stammheim, an account of the Stammheim trial, Margarethe von Trotta's 1981 Marianne and Juliane and Uli Edel's 2008 film The Baader Meinhof Complex. Stage treatments include the 1990 opera Ulrike Meinhof by Johann Kresnik, the 1993 play Leviathan by Dea Loher, the 2005 play La extraordinaria muerte de Ulrike M. by Spanish playwright Carlos Be and the 2006 play by Austrian playwright Elfriede Jelinek. The 1981 French movie Birgitt Haas Must Be Killed is inspired by Meinhof's death.
In 1978, Dario Fo and Franca Rame wrote the monologue Moi, Ulrike, je crie...
The 2010 feature documentary Children of the Revolution tells Meinhof's story from the perspective of her daughter, journalist and historian Bettina Röhl.
Subtopia, a novel published in 2005 by Australian author and academic A.L. McCann, is partially set in Berlin and contains a character who is obsessed with Meinhof and another who claims to have attended her funeral.
The 2013 book "Revolutionary Brain" by Harold Jaffe features a titular section devoted to the brain of Meinhof.
The 2018 film 7 Days in Entebbe about Operation Entebbe mentions Meinhof as motivation for the participation of the Germans in the hijacking, particularly Brigitte Kuhlmann. The film suggests Meinhof was a friend of Kuhlmann and Böse and that a mistake Kuhlmann made resulted in her imprisonment and subsequent death.
Marianne Faithfull's 1979 album Broken English had the title track dedicated to Meinhof.
The anarcho punk band Chumbawamba's 1990 album, Slap! featured an opening and closing track, both named after Meinhof. The first track was entitled Ulrike and featured lyrics that directly involve Meinhof as the protagonist and the final track was an instrumental reprise of the first track. and was entitled "Meinhof". The album's liner notes included information and an article relating to the song Ulrike.
Electronica act Doris Days created a track entitled To Ulrike M., in which there is a passage spoken in German throughout the song, presumably an archived audio file from Meinhof herself. This track has since been remixed by other electronica acts like Zero 7, Kruder & Dorfmeister, and The Amalgamation of Soundz.
The German duo Andreas Ammer and F.M. Einheit released an album in 1996 entitled Deutsche Krieger, a substantial portion of which consists of audio recordings of and about Meinhof.
Der Plan, the electronic music group from Düsseldorf published 2004 the song Ulrike, as part of the Die Verschwörung album.
London-based experimental group Cindytalk has an electronic side-project called Bambule, named after the Meinhof film of the same name.
German Neue Deutsche Härte band Rammstein feature Meinhof, played by lead singer Till Lindemann, in the music video to their 2019 song Deutschland.
The English alternative rock band Ulrika Spacek took their name from Meinhof and American performer Sissy Spacek.
Works of the Red Army Faction
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