POLITICAL TERRORISM: A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE AND TWELVE CASE STUDIES

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• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 06646360
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• Document Creation Date: December 28, 2022
• Document Release Date: November 28, 2017
• Case Number: F-2017-00351
• Publication Date: June 12, 1970

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DIRECTORATE OF
INTELLIGENCE
Intelligence Report
Political Terrorism: A Survey of the Literature
and Twelve Case Studies
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12 June 1970
No. 0513/70
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WARNING
This document e ains information affecting the national
defense of the Unite ates, within the meaning of Title
18, sections 793 and 794, the US Code, as amended.
its transmission or revelation its contents to or re-
ceipt by an unauthorized person is rohibited by law.
GROUP 1
ExcLumn 1110M AUTOMATIC
DO.NOliADING AND
DECLAt,SIPICATION
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POLITICAL TERRORISM:
A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE
AND TWELVE CASE STUDIES
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POLITICAL TERRORISM:
A SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE
AND TWELVE CASE STUDIES
Contents
FOREWORD
SOME WRITING ON POLITICAL TERRORISM 1
SOME TENTATIVE CONCLUSIONS 7
A. The Nature and Objectives of Terrorism 7
B. The Effectiveness of Terrorism 10
1. Against Colonial Regimes 10
2. Against Authoritarian Regimes 11
3. Against Constitutionally-Elected
Governments 12
C. Counter-Measures: Kinds and Effectiveness 13
1. Kinds of Forces 13
2. Conventional Measures 15
3. Extraordinary Measures 15
4. Reform 21
5. Summary 23
TWELVE CASE STUDIES
A. Historical
1. Tsarist Russia (1825-1917) 27
2. The United States (1831-1920) 58
3. Ireland--Sinn Fein (1916-1921) 91
4. Palestine--Stern Gang-Lehi (1931-1948) 98
B. Recent and Current
1. In Colonial Situations
b. Algeria
i. The FLN (1954-1962) 109
ii. The OAS (1961-1962) 113
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b. Guatemala (1960-1970) 145
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FOREWORD
There is a substantial literature of terrorism. Part
of this is fictional, and part has been written by the
terrorists themselves. Most of the rest is in the form
of studies of particular situations, mainly of terrorism
against authoritarian or colonial governments; there is
very little literature on terrorism in free societies.
There are a few articles on the theory and practice of
terrorism which formulate general propositions about
terrorism apart from the study of particular cases.
There is no general work, however, which derives a
systematic and coherent set of propositions from a close
study of particular cases. The students of particular
cases either generalize little or are confined to cases
of one type (usually colonial), while the most ambitious
theorists do not seem to have drawn their propositions
from, or to have tested them on, the range of particular
cases.
A general work of the type most desirable would, we
think, consider terrorism in operation against at least
three types of governments--colonial, authoritarian, and
constitutionally-elected--and the counter-measures taken
by these governments. It would then construct a set of
general propositions about terrorism as elaborate as the
material permits.
The following study makes a beginning along those
lines. It is by no means a definitive work on the subject.
Its case studies are representative, not comprehensive,
and its conclusions are tentative.
Part I is a review of the few books and articles found
to be of value as a source of general propositions. The
conclusions of the study--the general propositions which
stood up in, or derived from, our examination of 12 cases--
appear as Part II. The case studies, the main body of the
report, appear as Part III.
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Some of the 12 case studies are substantial; some,
where information is scanty, are brief. There is no
common format. In each of them, however, the analyst
has tried to assess the conditions producing the
terrorism, the prime objective and essential strategy of
the terrorists, the terrorist organization and its
practices, and the effectiveness of terrorism. Each case
study also includes a discussion of measures taken against
the terrorists, the effectiveness of the measures, and
the lessons derived by those concerned or by other
observers.
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I. SOME WRITING ON POLITICAL TERRORISM
In fiction, the two classics are probably Fyodor
Dostoyevsky's The Possessed (1872) and Joseph Conrad's
The Secret Agent (1907). Dostoyevsky was writing of the
'Russian Nihilist movement, and in particular of Nechayev
and his followers. He saw them as a pack of fools led by
one evil intelligence, unconsciously preparing the way
for state terrorism, i.e., for the anti-religious, pseudo-
scientific totalitarian state. Conrad was writing of the
anarchist movement in England, which he saw as a form of
lunacy, and, as such, truly terrifying. Only insanity,
he said, could not be reasoned with, bought off, or
coerced.
Both Dostoyevsky and Conrad saw society's short-
range "answer" as a reaffirmation of the traditional
values under attack. Dostoyevsky was willing to defend
an authoritarian society employing harsh repressive
methods, while Conrad was devoted to democratic principles.
Conrad was not sure, however, that adherence to conventional
procedures could effectively deal with terrorists. His
apparent spokesman, Chief Inspector Heat, argued that he
must work within the principles of his society if he was
to preserve it, but he feared that it "may yet be necessary
to make people believe that some of you [bomb-planting
anarchists] ought to be shot at sight like mad dogs..."
Outside of fiction, a part of the literature has
been written by the terrorists themselves--from Bakunin
and Nechayev in the mid-19th century to General Grivas
and the late Frantz Fanon and Carlos Marighella in recent
years. Much of this--for example, Nechayev and Fanon on
the psychology of the terrorist, Grivas and Marighella
on tactics--is well worth reading. However, the practitioners
of terrorism do not discuss it from the point of view of
the society or government against which it is practiced.
Most of the literature is in the form of studies of
particular situations--terrorism in Tsarist Russia (where
in its modern form it began), in Western Europe, and in a
number of colonial situations. (These are used and refer-
enced in Part III of this report, the 12 case studies.)
Comparatively little has been written about terrorism in
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recent years, especially in the critical category of
terrorism practiced against constitutionally-elected
governments.
The nearest thing to a general work of the type that
seems most desirable is Roland Gaucher's The Terrorists:
from Tsarist Russia to the 0.A.S., published in France in
1965 and in England by Secker and Warburg, London, in 1968.
Gaucher's book is aimed at a popular audience, in that its
stated objectives are to capture the "essential moments"
of terrorism, to "describe its more lively episodes," and
to "depict its protagonists." It includes generally good
accounts of the two waves of terrorism in Tsarist Russia,
the terrorists' unsuccessful effort to overthrow the
Bolsheviks, terrorism in Europe, and terrorism in Ireland
and Palestine and Algeria. But Gaucher does not do as
much as he might with his material. In a brief concluding
chapter on the strategy of terror, he sets forth only a
few findings. He concludes that the aim of terrorism is
to "break the spirit of the opposition" and that it is
undertaken because other methods seem doomed to defeat and
"because a certain emotional threshold has been crossed."
He holds that terrorism must first impose its law on the
population it "wishes to lead into battle"--must make
people either prefer the terrorists to the government or
fear the terrorists more than the government. He sees
terrorism as �best suited to the task of fighting foreign
rule. And he concludes that terrorist movements, always
an expression of weakness, tend eventually to be wiped
out unless circumstances "enable them to play on a world
stage and pass on to other forms of combat"--e.g. guerrilla
war. In sum, Gaucher's careful studies and modest observa-
tions are of value to anyone who might attempt to develop
an ambitious set of general propositions about terrorism,
but he himself is not primarily a theorist and does not
do so.
A much more ambitious and rigorous theoretical
effort, aimed at a more specialized audience, is Thomas
P. Thornton's chapter, "Terror as a Weapon of Political
Agitation" in INTERNAL WAR: Problems and Approaches,
edited by Harry Eckstein, Macmillan, 1964. Thornton offers
a definition of terrorism and explains it, discusses
tactical considerations (targets, responses sought,
discrimination) and proximate objectives (morale-building,
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advertising, disorientation, elimination of opposing forces,
provocation of counter-measures). He concludes with a
section on the place of terrorism in internal war, in which
he finds that terrorism cannot be the final determinant
of the outcome of an internal war. He does not, however,
discuss means of countering terrorism. And the article is
entirely at the level of assertion: no case studies or
even examples are presented, and there is no way to judge
the degree to which his general propositions have been
derived from close study of particular cases. Thornton,
who is now with the Department of State, is most useful
as a source of general propositions with which to approach
and bring into order the raw materials of case studies.
These cases do seem to support most of his propositions
--though not all--and many of the formulations on the
nature and objectives of terrorism in the first part of
the next section of this paper are similar to Thornton's.
Terrorism as a part of guerrilla war is discussed at
various points throughout Robert Taber's The War of the
Flea, Lyle Stuart, New York, 1965. Taber is concerned
almost entirely with guerrilla wars and terrorism against
colonial and other occupying powers; he is a partisan of
almost all such wars, without distinguishing between those
which are dominated by the Communists and those which are
not. Concerned with guerrilla wars, which have popular
support, he tends to think of all terrorism as having
popular support, as being a "manifestation of popular
will." At one point he argues that modern governments
could crush guerrilla movements and terrorists if they
were willing to be as ruthless as the situation demands:
he adduces Franco as his example. But through most of the
book, and in his conclusions, his view of the terrorist
cause as usually a popular one leads him to argue that
almost any action against the terrorists, instead of
against the basic social injustices that breed them, is
vain and even counter-productive. This is clearly a
restricted view, and one which seems to be refuted by
studies of several non-colonial situations.
Brian Crozier in The Rebels: A Study of Bost-War
Insurrections (Chatto and Windus, London, 1960) devotes a
substantial part of his book to terrorism, also in,
colonial or similar situations. He is not so ready as is
Taber to assume that terrorism has a great deal of inherent
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popular support, even in colonial situations. In his case
studies, only Egypt and Palestine are held up as examples
of terrorist movements that had popular support. He finds
that, lacking popular support, terrorist movements have
to dissipate their efforts in order to keep their nominal
supporters in line. Agreeing with Taber that the objective
of terrorism in a colonial situation is to make the colony
too costly to be worth keeping, he thinks (with Thornton)
that terrorism is generally a useful auxiliary weapon, but
rarely decisive and sometimes, if carried too far, counter-
productive. He like Taber argues at one point that "pure
repression" of a rebellion (including terrorism) is some-
times possible, at least for the short term. However,
also like Taber, he is concerned with causes he takes to
be just and popular, even where he concludes that the
terrorism itself is not, and in his discussion of counter-
measures he too emphasizes the need for "enlightened
policies" to correct the basic conditions which produce
the rebels.
Raymond M. Momboisse's Riots, Revolts and Insurrections,
published by Charles C. Thomas of Springfield, Illinois, in
1967, includes a section on terrorism which appears to be
derived largely from Thornton and other writers. However,
Momboisse as Deputy Attorney General of the State of
California has been professionally concerned with insur-
rectionists. His discussion of counter-insurgent methods
is professional, and he emphasizes the importance of good
intelligence, especially from insiders. He argues that
with solid intelligence, the insurgents can be contained,
or harassed, or destroyed, as the government wishes.
Ted Gurr of Princeton has published recently two
interesting articles: "Psychological Factors in Civil
Violence" (in World Politics XX, January 1968), and "A
Causal Model of Civil Strife: A Comparative Analysis Using
New Indices" (in American Political Science Review No. 62,
December 1968). Gurr contends that "relative deprivation"
(the difference between what men have or expect to have
and what they feel entitled to) is the basic precondition
for civil "violence" or "strife." He argues that a high
level of discontent, especially if an elite group is
disaffected along with the masses, normally leads to intense
and persistent violence, and he discusses the effects of
"retribution" against it. He offers a number of interesting
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propositions: 1) the belief of the aggressive group as to
the attitude of the armed forces (e.g. will they be loyal?)
is particularly important; 2) any weakening of law
enforcement agencies leads to much trouble; 3) tacit
approval of violence is sure to make trouble; 4) "moderate
coerciveness" is likely to make the situation worse, and
only the "highest levels" of coerciveness are likely to
inhibit civil violence; and 5) inhibition of civil violence
by external retribution tends in the short run to increase
anger but in the long run to reduce it. It is uncertain,
however, whether Gurr's work is very helpful with respect
specifically to terrorism. It is frequently impossible,
for example, to judge what kind of violence or strife he
is talking about; and he sometimes seems to mean by
"coercive force" the size of military and internal security
forces, sometimes the amount of force applied, and sometimes
the kind. Another problem is that he offers very few
examples.
An especially good article on the psychology of the
political extremist, and of extremist organizations, is
Egon Bittner's "Radicalism and the Organization of Radical
Movements," American Sociological Review, December 1963.
Bittner, of the Langley Porter Neuropsychiatric Institute
in San Francisco, offers a definition of the extremist
view as that which differs diametrically (not just in degree)
from common sense--meaning that it seeks a perfectly
unified, internally consistent interpretation of the world
which is not possible outside a hard science. This pure,
simplistic schema would be continually discredited by
practical experience if the believer could not find some
way of discrediting his practical experience. This is
the organizational task of the movement. In terms of the
believer's psychic economy, the solution must reward him
for his participation in the movement ("payoffs" or "kicks"),
must maintain his internal harmony by leaving as little as
possible to negotiation between claims, and must prevent
energy leaks by monopolizing his interest.
The organizational solution, Bittner argues, includes:
1) a sense of charisma attached to the movement
and creed, often symbolized in the Leader, and expressed
in arrogant self-righteousness;
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2) doctrine drawn in part from outside everyday
experience, perhaps from the unique experiences of the
Leader, permitting rigidity of 'conviction and scorn of
argument;
3) an intense concern for purity (not clarity) of
belief, so that an insistence on clarity is itself evid-
ence of bad faith and disloyalty;
4) the containment of the member's life entirely
in the movement, with no important area of personal
choice;
5) suffering as an integral part of the movement,
both to minimize the effects of anticipated suffering on
morale and to accumulate aggression toward the external
enemy, toward whom the extremist acts as an "instrument
of fate" (there is nothing personal in, say, the enemy's
assassination);
6) the suspension of all. traditional ties outside
the group, and the discouragement of strong personal ties
even among members, except for devotion to the Leader; and
7) the exploitation of external antagonism to the
movement for its organizational advantage, e.g. so
compromising the member that he cannot return to the
outside world.
The person suited to such a movement, Bittner (like
others) finds, is one high in the personality traits of
dependence, rigidity, and sadomasochism. Such movements
would never get started, he surmises, if there were not a
fair number of such persons in the larger society. Not all
members are entirely suited psychologically, but the right
attitudes are enforced on them in the name of discipline.
Bittner concludes that the features of political extremism,
considered as a group's "organized response to its peculiar
disadvantage" (i.e. its opposition to common sense), appear
as "calculated and efficient mechanisms," which are
"compatible with or even feed on the emotional life of
the persons who implement them..." Bittner's conclusions
seem to apply particularly to terrorists in free societies.
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II. SOME TENTATIVE CONCLUSIONS
A. The Nature and Objectives of Terrorism
Political terrorism is symbolic action, by those out
of power, designed to achieve political ends through the
systematic use of violence.- It is distinguished from
intimidation (which emphasizes threats), mob violence
(normally unplanned and uncontrolled), mass insurrection
(larger in scale, later in time), and governmental ter-
rorism (presented as law-enforcement). It may be practiced
by anarchists, by nihilists, by their successors the
modern totalitarians, by nationalists, and by a variety
of social groups with genuine or fancied grievances.
Terrorism is always directed ultimately against the
ruling government. Although a terrorist movement may
associate itself with opposition to a given policy (e.g.
prosecution of a foreign war, imprisonment of 'political'
offenders), its true aim is always that of expelling,
overthrowing or.replacing the government it is acting
against. Most terrorist movements today 'regard themselves
as part of a larger "anti-imperialist" movement working
for the downfall of all anti-Communist governments.
Terrorism is a weapon of the weak who are fanatically
devoted to their cause. Denied effective expression in
a colonial situation or any extremely oppressive 'society,
the terrorist--often highly-motivated--can often argue
credibly that this course is forced upon him. In a free
society in which other means of action are open to him,
the terrorist most often seems to choose this course--a
"romantic messianism"--out of psychological need. The
terrorist's cause is normally more important to him than
his life.
Terrorism is always rationalized the same way,
whether the rationale is true or false in the given society.
The argument is that the government practices terrorism
on a far greater scale and for base ends, whereas the
terrorist has noble objectives and employs terrorism more
selectively and humanely.
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Terrorism aims primarily at producing psychological
effects. To the terrorist, the human and material damage
done is less important than the psychological--and thus
political--effects. If the aim is primarily to deprive
the government of a material asset, the activity is
sabotage, not terrorism. In order to achieve optimum
effects, widespread publicity is essential to the terrorist.
Terrorism seeks to demonstrate the weakness of the
government, and, ultimately, of the individual. It seeks
to demonstrate in the first instance that the government
can be effectively opposed, that it cannot govern effectively.
It seeks to show that government leaders and the government's
security forces cannot protect themselves, their resources,
their principal supporters, and the general populace. It
aims to progress to the point of disorienting and isolating
everyone by making it appear that the structure which
previously sustained his strength and morale is now weak
and disintegrating, so that the terrorists will appear to
him to be an alternative source of order or at least too
strong for the individual to oppose.
Terrorism employs simple forms of action that are
easy bra small group to carry out. Assassination is an
important part of the program of most terrorist movements,
and has been the primary instrument for some (Tsarist
Russia, Palestine, Guatemala). Bombing has been (b)(3)
important to almost all terrorist groups for selective
attack or for terrorizing the general public, or both.
Indiscriminate sniping is popular. Arson is very common.
Rioting is organized, occasionally as a diversionary tactic.
Kidnapping to raise money or gain publicity has been .
practiced for years, and may now be spreading as a means of
securing the release of political prisoners. Airplanes
and ships are hijacked. Some terrorists torture and
murder captured officials and their own defectors. If the
group is competing with other terrorist organizations for
leadership of the movement, it may use those same means
against them.
Terrorist organizations are also simple. The ter-
rorists are usually young and often depend heavily on a
single charismatic leader. The overall organization may
include political, military and specialized departments
(e.g. bombing or kidnapping), and regional, district,
municipal and even smaller commands. Some of its units
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may be autonomous. The most sophisticated kind of or-
ganization has three layers, a top or leadership layer
(possibly a central or executive committee), an intermediate
or planning layer, and an action layer made up of those
who actually carry out the acts of terrorism. The
intermediate layer screens the leaders from the troops,
whose only contact with the leaders may be through that
middle layer. The basic action unit is the small cell,
which is difficult to penetrate. Action groups may be
composed of one cell or several cells, and are often ad
hoc groups brought together for a particular mission.
Terrorists normally discriminate, concentrating
their efforts on the symbols and resources of the govern-
ment or on a key group such as the police. But terrorism
may also be indiscriminate; bombing public places and
sniping at random targets may be calculated to disorient
and demoralize the general populace. There is commonly
some element of apparent indiscrimination, in the interest
of producing widespread anxiety and in order to prevent
the government from concentrating its resources to protect
particular targets.
Terrorism seeks to rise to 'higher' forms of action.
The terrorists see their actions as leading to other forms
of action which will eventually expel, overthrow, or replace
the government. Some envisage that their efforts will
expand to guerrilla warfare and then to full-scale anti-
colonial or internal war. Others envisage stimulating
massive popular revolt. They may hold such beliefs even
when neutral observers would regard them as fantastic.
Terrorism may be employed at all stages of a war or popular
uprising. However, when employed after more ambitious
methods have failed (e.g. when a guerrilla movement has
been broken up), it is usually _ineffectual.
Terrorist movements often seek to provoke the
government into over-reaction on the calculation that
this will assist the movement to rise to 'higher' forms
of action or will gain it international sympathy and
support. Such was the case with the terrorists in
Ugeria (both the FLN and the OAS),
The
terrorists anticipate that the government's use of
extraordinary and illegal measures will generate the popular
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support for the terrorists required for guerrilla warfare
or will produce widespread revulsion against the government
which can be turned into a popular revolt, or will lead to
pressure on the government by other governments. Governmental
over-reaction has in fact often led to an accession of
popular support and international sympathy for terrorist
causes which has been highly or even critically important
in the outcome. Governments which withhold extraordinary
measures until they no longer appear to be over-reacting
avoid this trap.
B. The Effectiveness of Terrorism
Against Colonial Regimes
Terrorism appears to be best suited to a colonial
situation. In all four of the cases examined--Ireland,
Palestine, and Algeria--terrorism played an im-
portant role in expelling the colonial regime. It may
have played the primary role in some of these.
In Ireland, terrorist acts by the Irish resist-
ance were effective against the British-administered Irish
police and against the British intelligence network,
and helped to provoke the use of extreme measures by the
British. Although that apparently was not part of the
Irish plan, the extreme British measures united the Irish
and divided the British, and, in the end, the British
were forced to conclude a truce even though the Irish
resistance was greatly weakened.
In Palestine, the assassination of the British
High Commissioner may have affected British determination.
In any case, it was a spectacular act, and it provoked
extreme measures of retaliation which attracted inter-
national attention and helped the Jewish cause.
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In Algeria, despite the suppression of their opera-
tions in the cities, the terrorists succeeded in intimidat-
ing the Moslem population and gained much popular support
by provoking severe French reprisals; again, part of the
plan. They were also successful in attracting international
attention and support. However, the later terrorism of the
rightwing OAS failed to gain any non-European or interna-
tional support, and its cause was lost.
Against Authoritarian Regimes
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Terrorism seems to be less effective against
authoritarian regimes, at least in the short run.
Authoritarian regimes normally conduct a high level of
surveillance and can resort at will to a variety of
extraordinary and even illegal measures against the
terrorists. Of the two cases examined--Tsarist Russia
--the terrorists were effectively suppressed (b)(3)
in Russia Nevertheless, (b)(3)
in Russia the terrorists were in a way successful, in
that they helped prepare the way for the government's
eventual overthrow by others, and terrorism may lead (as
in Batista's Cuba) to the nup,rthrnw nf annthrm anthor itarian
Latin American government (b)(3)
In Russia, in the 1880's, the wave of reaction and
repression which followed the assassination of Alexander
II, strengthened by popular revulsion against the
terrorists, soon destroyed them. In the early years of
the 20th century, other successful assassinations of
government leaders again failed to overthrow the Tsarist
regime and again led to the suppression of the terrorists,
but this terrorism also helped to disrupt a trend toward
reform which, if it had continued, might have saved Russia
from the Bolsheviks. Some of the original Nihilists had
envisaged a revolutionary dictatorship such as the Bolsheviks
imposed; thus, in a sense, they were victorious.
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Against Constitutionally-Elected Governments
Terrorism can pose a serious challenge to free societies
in which great social injustices or severe economic problems
exist (e.g., Guatemala), but terrorism does not do well
in free societies in which serious grievances are not
widespread The latter societies are the
first to develop popular revulsion.
Of the six case studies of constitutionally-elected
governments, the terrorists have posed no substantial
threat to three (19th and early 20th century America
In 19th and early 20th century America, the terrorists
could only shock: some of them had some popular support
when they were regarded as labor leaders instead of ter-
rorists, but they lost popular support when their roles
in terrorism became known. Some accused terrorists were
supported by labor demonstrations or threats, but not
often effectively. Most had no popular support at any
time and provoked popular revulsion with every outrage.
All brought retaliation and repression on themselves and
others, damaged their own causes, and left a lasting
negative impression on their societies.
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In Guatemala, the terrorists seem to have a fair
chance of causing the democratically-elected government
to be reolaced with a more authoritarian one
however, such a government might not oblige them
by behaving so badly that it would (as they believe) provoke
a popular revolt.
Note: In all societies, one kind of terrorist act,
the assassination of the head of the government, has
invariably been counter-productive. In every case examined,
the terrorist cause has suffered badly in consequence.
C. Counter-Measures: Kinds and Effectiveness
Kinds of Forces
Military forces, the conventional police, federal
law enforcement and investigative agencies, and vigilante
groups have all had successes and failures. The vigilante
groups, however, have achieved their successes at such
political cost that they are now rarely encouraged. Some
combination of military forces, police forces, and federal
agencies is now the preferred approach almost everywhere.
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Military forces have been used effectively as guard-
ing, patrolling and striking forces in a variety of
routine and special ways. They are perhaps best employed
for the saturation of a troublesome area in which ter-
rorists are concentrated; that is, moving in in large
numbers, overwhelming the terrorists, paralyzing their
organization,- and hunting them down house by house--in
effect, a wartime military operation. The French paratroop
operation in Algiers in 1957 is a prime example. However,
in none of our colonial situations were military forces
able to save the situation for the colonial power; they
might have done so, if the government had persisted, but
in each case the military forces in the long run contributed
to arousing such popular and international sympathy for
the terrorist cause that in the end the colonial power
chose to withdraw. In the cases of authoritarian govern-
ments and free societies too, prolonged use of military
forces and lack of discrimination in their operations has
provoked popular resentment.
Local police have also been used effectively against
terrorists. They are very vulnerable, however, in colonial
situations, and in all such cases have had to be replaced
or backed up by troops or special forces. They have usually
required backing in non-colonial situations too, and have
sometimes been put under military control. They have
tended to be the prime targets of the terrorists among
functional groups, partly because the populace usually has
mixed feelings about them. The police seem to be best
used in relatively stable situations, working in areas they
know and against groups or individuals they know. Like the
military, the police sometimes provoke popular antagonism
by the use of coarse methods and by extralegal activity,
such as cooperation with vigilantes. Where police work
is incompetent, as in Guatemala, the terrorists thrive.
Federal agencies seem to be best used for nationwide
problems which require a comprehensive attack, coordination
of the work, and careful discrimination. They too have
had failures, as in some periods in Tsarist Russia. And
federal forces too have been guilty of counterproductive
excesses, as in Guatemala where the government itself has
organized assassination teams. They have had successes,
however, both under authoritarian governments and in free
societies. The Tsarist police did roll up the terrorist
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The most effective counter-terrorist force seems
to be one specifically designed for that purpose, controlled
and directed by a federal law enforcement agency, and draw-
ing on various intelligence and security agencies including
elements of the military and police. Among the historical
case studies, such forces under federal control worked
effectively in Tsarist Russia in some periods, and in most
of Palmer's term in the United States
The
organization of such forces has varied widely, although
there seems to be a common disposition to separate the
components concerned with intelligence and interrogation,
surveillance, penetration, and raids and arrests.
Conventional Measures
Conventional security measures, such as thorough
investigations, intensive surveillance (including wiretaps),
the use of heavy guards and patrols, curfews, house searches,
stop-and-search, raids, arrests for criminal acts, appeals
or rewards to informants, offers of amnesty, have all had
some success without provoking great resentment. In general,
however, terrorist operations tend to force (as the terrorists
often aim to force) the government into adopting extra-
ordinary measures.
Extraordinary Measures
ExtraOrdinary and sometimes illegal methods employed
against terrorist movements have included: .declaring
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emergencies, imposing martial law, instituting censorship,
restricting assemblies, closing schools, dissolving labor
unions, banning political parties, suppressing public media,
withdrawing university sanctuaries, cordoning off terrorist
enclaves, imposing extreme penalties for agitation or for
violation of emergency regulations, disregarding legislative
immunity, suspending political rights, confiscating property,
initiating group accountability systems, raiding and
wrecking homes and areas in the course of search sweeps,
conducting raids and arrests without observing legal pro-
cedures, making mass arrests and holding suspects without
charges or trial, beating and torturing suspects, disposing
of terrorist cases by administrative action or by military
courts, exiling citizens and deporting aliens, retaliating
against groups or communities, and organizing vigilante
action.
Some of these extraordinary measures have been
effective at one time or another or in one situation or
another, but all have provoked popular resentment in
some degree. In some instances the amount of resentment
generated has gravely weakened the government's cause.
Several of these forms of action are widely regarded as
reprehensible whatever the result.
In all three types of society considered--in Tsarist
Russia for example--harsh action against
student demonstrations has been counter-productive. Re-
pression of this non-terrorist activity (as distinct from
legal action against terrorist activity which may accompany
demonstrations) has encouraged a small minority of the
student demonstrators to become full-time agitators and
ultimately terrorists. There is some evidence that
established terrorist organizations look on expelled
students as a particularly good source of recruits.
Mass arrests (following terrorist acts) of groups
which have produced terrorists, and their detention without
trial while an attempt is made to sort out the terrorists,
have been employed by all three types of governments
considered, with mixed results.
Among the colonial cases, mass arrests in Ireland
and Palestine unquestionably hurt the terrorists' organiza-
tions. However, the Irish terrorists continued to assas-
sinate British officials and agents; and in Palestine the
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mass arrests did not prevent the assassination of the
highest official in the area. In both countries,,mass
arrests contributed to a shift in popular support from
the government to the terrorists. Mass arrests apparently
'contributed to initial Trench successes in Algeria; the
terrorists in Algiers were wiped out.
Among the cases of authoritarian regimes, in Tsarist
Russia mass arrests at various times from the 1820s through
the 1870s may have helped to prevent the formation of an
effective terrorist movement through the 1860s. They
did not prevent, and may have hastened, the formation of
efficient terrorist organizations in the 1870s which killed
many officials and (in 1881) assassinated the Tsar. After
terrorist leaders had been captured, mass arrests were
important in breaking up the movement and keeping it sub-
merged for the rest of the century. It formed up again
in the first years of the next century to kill many more
officials--some just below the Tsar's level--despite the
mass arrests that were taking place concurrently. In 1906
and 1907, terrorist assassinations reached their highest
point during a period in which mass arrests were being made.
This particular group of mass arrests, however, apparently
helped to put the terrorists out of action for the next
decade.
At least one constitutionally-elected government has
made mass arrests. Mass arrests in the United States in
1919-1920 probably picked up a few genuine terrorists,
although illegally and inefficiently. Those mass arrests
(and subsequent deportations) did not arouse widespread
popular resentment, indeed they had general approval. But
there was some reaction against them even at the time,
and the affair has been regarded by most observers since
as a rather shameful episode in U.S. history. Other
constitutionally-elected governments among our examples
have sometimes arrested large numbers of people, but these
were arrests on evidence, not mass arrests in the sense of
the arrest of all known members of a party, group, family,
or neighborhood.
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In sum, mass arrests seem to have been counter-
productive, or on balance unproductive, more often than
they have proven useful.
The torture of suspects has been practiced both by
colonial governments (Ireland and Algeria), and by
authoritarian regimes (Tsarist Russia It
has been defended by all of its practitioners as a dis-
agreeable necessity. There is reason to believe that
in all of these cases the authorities sometimes obtained
information on terrorist organizations by this means
that they could not have obtained in any other way, and
that this information was important in their subsequent
successes against the terrorists. In no case, however,
did torture lead to the destruction of the terrorist
movement, in some cases it reinforced terrorist deter-
mination, and in almost all cases it provoked popular
revulsion (including the home populaces of colonial
governments) and brought heavy international pressure
on the governments employing it. It seems self-evident
that no free society 'can afford to use this form of
action.
Vigilante action against actual and suspected
terrorists has sometimes been taken with official en-
couragement under both authoritarian and constitutionally-
elected governments. In Tsarist Russia, the police
sometimes cooperated with right-wing terrorist organiza-
tions exploiting anti-semitic feeling. In the United
States in 1919-20, mobs attacked the meetings and parades
of political radicals, and private patriotic organizations
'assisted in the arrests of suspected Communists. More
recently, Guatemala has included private citizens in
special counter-terrorist corps organized to hunt down
and kill terrorists.
Vigilante action was not effective in apprehending
the genuine terrorists in Tsarist Russia. A reaction
against illegal and unproductive vigilante activity took
place in the U.S. While vigilante activity in Guatemala
was effective against the Communist movement for a time,
many innocent people were assaulted and the populace became
alienated; government-sponsored assassination and vigilante
activity was sharply curtailed, although one vigilante
group has reportedly reorganized. It seems apparent that
this form of action is counter-productive.
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In all three types of societies examined, the key
to effective action against terrorist groups has most
often seemed to be good intelligence, which depends on a
combination of thorough investigation, intensive surveil-
lance, effective penetration, and the cooperation of
informants. Such intelligence gives advance warning of
terrorist plans and permits small, well-trained forces to
move suddenly against correctly-identified key figures.
Even where this form of action has been less important
than extraordinary measures such as action against entire
organizations and areas (e.g. a Communist party and its
sanctuaries), it has been one important part of the
government's effort.
In Ireland, both sides made good use of informants,
the British to locate (and then kill) resistance leaders
and the Irish to learn British plans and to identify (and
then kill) British agents. (As it turned out, Irish ter-
rorism against the British intelligence network considerably
reduced its effectiveness )
In Tsarist Russia the secret police had its greatest
successes in preventing terrorist acts when it was able
to plant agents in terrorist organizations; according to
the last head of the Okhrana, the work of one young lady
resulted in the prevention of several planned assassina-
tions and the capture of the would-be assassins. Penetra-
tion can of course work both ways, as in the case of the
notorious Azev, the double agent who planned the successful
murder of high officials at the same time he was working
for the Okhrana.
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In the United States, the Molly Maguires were broken
by penetration by a private detective, and in later years
investigation and penetration prevented many planned labor
union bombings and resulted in the conviction of the
planners.
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Advantages of penetration as a counter-terrorist
tactic, for a free society, are apparent. The agent can
testify as to conspiracy and (less hard to prove) the
commission of criminal acts, and this testimony--unlike
information obtained by illegal measures--will stand up
in court. It must be recognized, however, that penetration
of very small groups is very difficult, and that, if the
terrorist movement is composed of many small groups which
are not in contact with one another and are not responsive
to a central organization, there is little possibility of
penetrating all of these groups. Moreover, the security
agencies must take care not to be penetrated themselves,
as this can undo all their work. However, it seems likely
that, in a free society, as terrorist acts increase the
numbers of defectors and informants will increase, out of
revulsion for such acts. Also, some terrorists will
inform on others in exchange for a reduction in the charges
against themselves.
The value of special courts to deal with terrorists
seems debatable. In Tsarist Russia, terrorists, when not
handled by administrative action, were often turned over
to military tribunals and other special courts for speedy
and harsh action, but this sometimes provoked an increase
in both the sea1p and intrangity of ttarrovicf no+iwifx7
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The value of capital punishment is also debatable.
It is obvious that the prospect of death does not deter
the hard-core terrorist, who has already signed his life
away. The only capital crime in Tsarist Russia for many
years was the murder or attempted murder of a member of
the Imperial Family; yet many attempts were made.
The actual execution of terrorists May serve to
deter the less fanatically committed,:but it may reinforce
the remaining hard-core terrorists or help the terrorist
cause in other ways. In Tsarist Russia, high officials
were frequently assassinated expressly in retaliation for
the execution of terrorist leaders. The British in
colonial situations (Ireland, Palestine, repeatedly
found the execution of terrorists to be, on balance, counter-
productive, in that it increased popular sympathy for the
terrorists' cause.
Severe penalties for minor offenses such as violation
of curfews or even the possession of a weapon are generally
counter-productive. They dissuade some, but again the
terrorists gain popular sympathy.
Reform
None of the governments studied�whether colonial,
authoritarian, or constitutionally-elected�cOuld have
prevented.the formation of a terrorist movement Or could'
have extinguished the movement, simply by social reform,
unless it were a reform so radical as to Tut itself out
of business. All of these terrorist movements have been
built around true revolutionaries, who are not interested
in reform. In most cases, -however, the government need
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not have been faced with as large a problem as it was, and,
among current case studies, it seems still within the power
of the governments concerned to. reduce the problem by reform.�
This has been true even in colonial situations;
where the fundamental issue is independence. .In all four
cases studied, the British and French could have reduced
popular sympathy for the terrorists by making reforms short
of independence.
In the two case �studies of authoritarian governments,
Tsarist Russia demands for reform were or are
a large factor. Zhelyabov, who organized the assassination
of the Tsar in 1881, argued at his trial that the terrorist
movement developed simply as a result of despair over the
government's lack of responsiveness. This was clearly not
a complete explanation, as some of Zhelyabov's colleagues
were totalitarian fanatics, and the two terrorist waves
--in Zhelyabov's time and.in the early 20th century--in
fact disrupted long-term trends of social reform. But
observers have been struck by the reluctance of many of the
Russian terrorists to take up this means of action. It may
be, as some Russian officials believed at the time, that
the bulk of the �terrorists could have been diverted into
constructive activity. Certainly their popular support
could have been reduced. Agrarian reform played a part in
drying up the second wave of terrorism after 1907.
Among the constitutionally-elected governments
studied, reforms clearly reduced the terrorist prohlPm
in the U.S. in the 19th and early 20th rentnripq
In the U.S., some terrorists remained despite the
steady progress of the society, but the abolitionist issue
was of course removed after 1863 and the growth of effective
unions virtually wiped out the anarchist and syndicalist
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terrorists based in the labor movement-in.the early 20th
century.
In Guatemala, however, �the government
seems to have done very little in the way of reforml
In sum, reform can divert some potential. terrorists
and many more of their potential supporters and sympathizers,
and can help to mobilize the public behind the government
in critical periods.
Summary
No single form of action--legal or illegal--against -
terrorists is sovereign. Thus a combination of means is
always used, and the combination depends both on the nature
of the attack And on the nature of the society attacked. �
Obviously a totalitarian state has inherent advantages
in combatting terrorism, because surveillance of the .entire
society is so complete that, there are few places. in which
an active enemy of the state can hide or work, and because
the state Can take any promising form of action without
regard for.public opinion. When a modest challenge arises,
the government can simply arrest all known members of
suspect groups and all their relatives and associates, hold
them indefinitely and torture those who might know something,
make further raids and arrests on the, basis of those leads,
and mop up with vigilante action.
Such tactics may work fairly well even for authoritarian
states, in which surveillance is less pervasive,, public
opinion cannot be altogether.disregarded, and there are
some limits on the means which may be adopted.. However,
the history of Tsarist Russia suggests, that while terrorists
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may be successfully contained for some-Years by authoritarian
measures, they will eventually re-emerge if the popular
grievances which produce, and support terrorists have 'not
been Allayed.
A colonial government is in a comparatively weak
position. The terrorists begin with a good cause--independ-
ence--and may have considerable popular support from the
start. The government is free to use almost any means to
combat the terrorists--including means which would never
be employed against criminals in the home countries--but
extraordinary measures tend to unify the populace against
the colonial government and to develop heavy international
pressure on the government. The colonial government frequ-
ently decides that the colony is just not worth the cost.
A constitutionally-elected government may also be
in a weak position, once the terrorist movement has got
established. A free society is to some degree--and neces-
sarily--a victim of its own institutions. In the first
place, the government may be unable to make an effective
national response because it lacks jurisdiction over many
forms of terrorist activity--that is, most crimes fall
under the jurisdiction of local authorities. Beyond this,
if a free society takes extraordinary measures against
terrorists, it risks permanently changing the character
of the society. (This is only a risk, not a necessary
consequence.) Thus any free society confronted with a
terrorist challenge does well
to begin with, and to adhere as Long as possible to, a
conservative course of action which emphasizes investiga-
tion, surveillance and penetration, concentrating on the
apprehension and conviction of terrorist leaders for actual
criminal offenses. With good luck, the terrorist movement
can be reasonably well contained and
can eventually be exposed as the weapon �I a lost cause
and thus dried up.
It sometimes happens, however, that conventional
measures do not avail, or even that there is a considerable
increase in torrnrim fter the first governmental inter-
vention . Thus the free society, in
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order to preserve itself, is forced to adopt extra-
ordinary measures which would ordinarily provoke popular
resentment and which would indeed, if persisted in, change
the character of the society.
In this connection, there seems to be a general
principle in the development of terrorism which, when
understood, is helpful to any government to which public
understanding and public support are important. This
principle is, that terrorism tends to be counter-productive
at intermediate levels. A low, level of terrorism is well
tolerated by most societies. If, however, terrorism escalates
beyond that level, it normally alienates the populace and
causes a shift in popular sympathy to the government. (This
has been true in all three types of societies considered
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If the terrorists are to gain (b)(3)
their ends, after that point is reached, they must make a
great leap forward in terrorism, effectively terrorizing
the entire populace (as in Ireland and Algeria/FLN). (b)(3)
If the terrorists are unable or unwilling to attain that
extreme degree of ruthless violence (as in Tsarist Russia
and Latin American countries), the terrorist (b)(3)
movement tends then to decline.
This principle seems to have important implications
for the government's management of a terrorist challenge.
That is, if the government can avoid over-reacting and
thereby alienating public opinion when terrorism is at
a low-level--if it can avoid the kind of mistakes made by
several colonial governments and by some of the Latin
American governments--it will be the beneficiary if
terrorism rises to the next level. The government will
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then have the popular support it needs to move 'firmly and
decisively against the terrorists
employing certain extraordinary measure
have been tolerated at an earlier stage.
cularly true if the government has
initiated desirable reforms. With the
or well contained, the government
then dispense with its extraordinary measures
which
This
would not
is path-
terrorists beaten
on as a free society.
can
and carry
The cases examined suggest a tentative general
,conclusion that there is a "best course" for a constitu-
tionally-elected government faced with a terrorist chal-
lenge. This is, first, to attempt to deal with terrorism
by conventional, conservative measures; and, second, if
terrorism rises to a higher level despite such measures,
to take advantage of the concurrent rise in.public
hostility to the terrorists and employ certain other legal,
less conservative measures (varying with the case) which
popular support will make effective
The struggle need not,'of course, go through these
three stages of low, intermediate, and high (or attempted
high) levels of violence. The terrorists may
opt for the highest possible level of violence from the
beginning. In this case, the government would seem to
have no choice but to undertake extraordinary counter-
measures at once.
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TSARIST RUSSIA (1825-1917)
The Background
The revolutionary extremists of Russia in the -
latter half of the last century, according to many observers,
are paradigms of the psychology, aims and methods which have
underlain the rise of modern revolutionary terrorism. They
have been the object not only of historical inquiry but of
imitation by latter-day revolutionaries. The most recent
example is provided by two violent factions of.a contempo-
rary "student" organization which have reportedly chosen the
Russian extremists as their exemplars even to the extent of
adopting the names by which they came to be-known--the
Narodniki (Populists) and the Nihilists (Nothing-ists).
In Russia both terms were used in general and also
specific senses. Both terms were used to characterize a
whole generation of revolutionary youth that emerged with
unexpected suddenness in Russian universities in the 1860's
and 1870's. The term "Nihilist" points specifically to
their zeal for destruction, but rather than implying an
absence of beliefs it was applied to radicals blindly and
fanatically attached to their ideas. The term "Narodnik"
is especially connected with the crusade of young radicals
into the countryside in the 1870's which was called the
"to-the-people" movement. Through propagandizing and
educating'the peasant masses, they sought to spark a rising
of the peasantry, who, the Narodniki believed, were
"communists by instinct and tradition." The upheaval,
they expected, would spontaneously replace the Tsarist
regime with a system of agrarian socialism. The peasants
proved indifferent or hostile and turned over to the police
a number of the Narodniki who had gone into the countryside.
As a result some of the Narodniki lost their "faith in the
People" and moved to terrorism as the path to a revolutionary
apocalypse.
Turgenyev popularized the term "Nihilist" in "Fathers
and Sons", his classic novel of the generational conflict
in Russia in mid-century. The work depicts the gap, or
gulf, between the radicals among Russia's youth of the time
and their "enlightened" intellectual forebears among Russia's
gentry. The latter had imbibed a mixture of Western liberal,
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progressive and romantic ideas which had spread among the
Russian aristocracy in the wake of the French Revolution
and the Napoleonic era. Under the impact of Western
ideas, they became painfully aware of Russian backward-
ness and of the gap between the Tsarist autocracy and
the masses, between the thin stratum of an educated and
privileged class and the "dark people" of the peasantry.*
Typically, the "fathers" were "cultured" noblemen who.
suffered from a sense of social "guilt" and deprecated
themselves as "superfluous men." The "sons"--the nihilists--
broke violently with the "fathers," rejecting their "cul-
ture" and genteel idealism. Instead, they became passionate
proponents of an ethic of self-denial and activism.
Despairing of gradual reform under Russia's autocracy and
enthralled by visions of an apocalyptic revolution, they
dedicated themselves to the destruction of the existing
order root and branch. The Nihilist suppressed any stray
conciliatory impulse he might feel toward the society
around him: as one of them expressed it, "I feed on my
own bile."
The novel "What is to be Done?" by Chernyshevski
became a universally accepted statement of the Nihilist
creed among the radical youth. The novel portrays a group
of students living according to the new ideas and in
conscious defiance of existing social conventions, and
also pictures a new Russian village organized on communis-
tic principles. Wallace, an English journalist and
historian, who was a perspicacious observer of the Russian
scene in the last half of the 19th and early 20th centuries,
offers a characterization of the ethos of the Russian
Nihilists which has striking parallels today. Wallace
says:
According to popular opinion the Nihilists
were a band of fanatical young men and women,
mostly medical students, who had determined to
turn the world upside down and to introduce a
new kind of social order, founded on the most
*The peasant serfs, in fact, were also called by way
of metaphor "blacks" (i.e., slaves).
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advanced principles of social equality and
Communism. As a first step towards the great
transformation they hacIreversed the traditional
order of things in the matter of Coiffure: the
males allowed their hair to. grow long, and the
female adepts cut their hair short, adding'
occasionally the additional badge of the blue
spectacles. Their unkempt appearance naturally
shocked the aesthetic feelings of ordinary
people, but to this they were indifferent. They
had raised themselves above the level of Popular
opinion, glorified in Bohemianism, despised Phili-
stine respectability, and rather liked to
scandalize old-fashioned people imbued with
antiquated prejudices.
Wallace adds that this was the absurd aspect of the
movement but that underneath the appearances these
youths were "terribly in earnest, were systematically
hostile, not only to accepted conventionalities in the
matter of dress, but to all manner of sham, hypocrisy,
andcant...." (cf. Wallace, Russia: On the Eve of War
and Revolution, New York: Random House, 1961, Vintage
Russian Library V 724.)
Despite its design as a tract for the times,
Dostoyevsky's novel, The Possessed, is the great psycholo-
gical study of Nihilism. Dostoyevsky, who almost fell on
to the path of Nihilism as a youth, insisted that a dia-
lectical relation tied the Nihilist "sons" to the enlightened
fathers despite the antagonism that separated them. The
great Russian Liberal of the. first half of the 19th century,
Alexander Herzen; and the fantastic, though real-life
Nihilist, Nechayev, became his models for the novel's main
characters. Dostoyevsky's main contention was that, although
Nechayev's ethic--that any and every means was permitted to
accomplish revolution--was appalling to a Herzen, Nethayev's
doctrine was an extreme and unsentimental extension of widely-
held ideas among Herzen's generation.
Dostoyevsky's thesis is not without basis. Herzen
had called for the reform of Russia through democratic and
constitutional means, specifically through a Constituent
Assembly. However, he saw these means as a vehicle for an
act of unfettered popular will which would produce a sweeping
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social revolution in mid-19th century Russia.- This
romantic, quasi-Rousseauean notion, of a transformational
act of the. general will, passed into the minds of the
revolutionary youth and in fact animated. the hopes of a
wide spectrum of 'revolutionary factions in Russia. Out of
growing impatience and despair of a peaceful transformation
of the old regime, some revolutionary factions resorted to
terror aimed at high officials and the Tsar himself.
The Two Waves of Terrorism
Rising out of the miliau of the mid-century generation
of radical "sons", the first wave of terrorism emerged in
the rule of Alexander II, the emancipator of the serfs
(1855-1881). Ironically, Alexander's reign was an era of
unprecedented reforms, rapid social change and liberaliza-
tion in the political and intellectual spheres in contrast
to the Draconian despotism of his precedessor Nicholas I
(1825-1855). Although Nicholas' regime produced no ter-
rorists (the Third Section, or secret police, had not found .
a single serious conspiracy as of 1855), radical and
activist appetites grew in secret student circles and
debating societies under Nicholas and became voracious in
the atmosphere of change and heightened expectations that
Alexander's reforms produced. The terrorists, seeking total
and immediate change through political assassination,
finally killed the Tsar himself. (There is a very good
account of these first two periods--of Nicholas I and
Alexander II--in Franco Venturi's Roots of Revolution,
Alfred A. Knopf, 1960.) His successor, Alexander III,
riding on a tide of public revulsion against terrorism,
succeeded in suppressing the terrorist organizations. At
the same time he put an end to the era of reform and
instituted an ultra-conservative regime under the head of
"Autocracy, Orthodoxy and Nationality" (1881-1894).
The second wave of terrorism developed after Alexander
III's death, striking during the reign of the last Tsar,
Nicholas II (1894-1917). 1:t developed in the first
decade of this century, especially in the period of the
Russo-Japanese war (1904-1905) and the abortive 1905
Revolution. The terrorist assassinations of Tsarist of-
ficials this time were engineered by members of the
Social Revolutionary party, agrarian socialists who were
political heirs of the Narodniki.
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The First Wave: 1860 to 1881
The historian kleading liberal
constitutionalist under the last Tsar--provides a useful
periodization of the evolution of the revolutionaries
toward terrorism under Alexander II.* He distinguishes
four phases: (1) 1855-1863, in which the-young'break
with the old intellectual leadership and develop an ethos
of "deeds not words", seeing themselves as "thinking realists"
and forthright materialists in,contradistinction'to.the.
philosophical idealism of their elders; (2) 1864-1873,'
in which secretive student circles and debating societies
evolve into tightly-knit revolutionary organizations;'
(3) 1874-1877, in which several thousand'revolutionary
youth--the Narodniki--undertake a crusade ."to the people"
in the countryside to win the peasantry over to the Revolu-
tion through propaganda and agitation:- and (4) 1877-1881,.
in which disillusion sets in with the collapse of the
crusade and leads one ,wing of the Narodniki to form con-
spiratorial terrorist groups and initiate a systematic
campaign of political assassinations, while a second wing
(of the Narodniki) branches off and founds the Russian
Marxist movement. Later, the most extreme elements of .
the Russian Marxists, led by Lenin, organize the Bolshevik
party.
Two Two kinds of revolutionary personality are distinguish-
able in the movement that produced the political-terrorists
of Alexander II's reign. They seem not to be simply .
character-types unique to the Russian experience but recur
in the history of modern revolutionary terrorism. . Two .
striking figures of the period, Nechayev.and Zhelyabov,-em-
bodied the two kinds of.character. Nechayev manifested a
wholly unscrupulous and steel-like fanaticism which excluded
no means, however viciOus, to accomplish revolution--including,
if necessary, the imposition of a revolutionary tyranny
over, a recalcitrant society. The revolutionary apparatus
which Nechayev claimed he headed in Russia turned out to
*Paul Miliukov et. al., History of Russia (Vol. III),
Funk and Wagnalls, 1969.
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be, in large part, fictional, but his notion of revolu-
tionary organization was elaborated by one of Nechayev's
associates, Tkachev. Tkachev laid out in detail the
theory of an elitist, conspiratorial and dictatorial re-
volutionary organization which was realized'in the
practice of Lenin's Bolshevik party. Nechayev and Zhelyabov
are ably depicted in Robert Payne's book, The Terrorists
(Funk and Wagnalls, 1957); Albert Week's The First Bolshevik
(N.Y.U. Press, 1969) is the most revealing study of Tkachev.
Nechayev was among the first of his generation to
regard the pursuit of the Revolution as a full-time, all-
absorbing profession. His practical efforts were unavail-
ing, but his example and his ideas of revolutionary method
and organization profoundly influenced the subsequent
development of revolutionary movements in Russia.
Zhelyabov stands in contrast to Nechayev in some
important respects. Zhelyabov was a skilled amateur
who was the chief of The People's Will group that finally
succeeded in killing Alexander II. Unlike Nechayev,
Tkachev or later Lenin, Zhelyabov saw his revolutionary
activity as a transient, though compelling, mission, not
as a permanent career. Zhelyabov yearned to shatter,
rather than seize, state power, thinking that this was all
that was necessary to open the way to an agrarian coopera-
tive Utopia and a constitutional republic. While resorting
to extreme methods and subordinating personal ethics to
revolution, he was driven by a fierce, puritanical passion
which contrasted with the cold, calculating practicality
of a Lenin, who single-mindedly concentrated on shaping
his actions to the end of taking and holding power.
Berdyayev in his Origins of Russian Communism (1937)
seems close to the mark in seeing in such figures,
especially Zhelyabov, a messianic and apocalyptic
mentality which finds analogues only in the history of
religion.
The first attempt on the life of Alexander II was
made in 1866, by the student Karakozov. Karakozov belonged
to a loose group of young revolutionaries, but was acting
on his own and in fact against the advice of his friends.
The efficiency of the Tsarist police in that period can
be judged from the fact that, although Karakozov's plan
to kill the Tsar was known to the police three weeks
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beforehand, they did not get around to apprehending him.
The attempt was followed by arrests, executions,: exiles,
and a general repressiveness which prevented overt terrorist
acts for the rest of the decade.
Nechayev,.inspired by Karakozov, was-the most for-
midable of the terrorists being formed beneath the surface
in the late 1860's. He was able to put together only a
small group, and was apprehended himself after murdering
a member of the group who disobeyed his orders.- However,
his "Revolutionary Catechism"--a systematic account of the
nature and duties of the true revolutionary--was the first
Terrorist Manifesto and the inspiration for hundreds of -
subsequent terrorists. Sentenced to twenty years, he
remained absolutely intransigent and died in prison the
year after the event he had steadily prophesied�the'
assassination of the Tsar.
The Narodniki in the early 1870's were active in
agitating among peasants and workers. Many were arrested
for it, and some were given long sentences. Some of these
populist revolutionaries founded the Land and Liberty
organization in 1876.
In 1877, after some of those arrested had been held
in preventive detention for years, the regime staged a
massive trial of 193 of the more than 1,500 arrested.
The outcome was the handwriting on the wall for the Tsarist
regime: despite the fact that the case was tried by a
committee of Senators rather than a jury, very few severe
sentences were handed down.
Public sentiment--i.e., of the limited educated
class which made up the public opinion--was rapidly
becoming favorable toward the revolutionaries and hostile
to the police. Tsarist officials had perpetrated enough
arbitrarily repressive acts to outrage the sensitized
conscience of the new educated class. This was particularly
marked early in 1878, at the trial of Vera Zasulich, a
young revolutionary who had once served a two-year term
in prison and in January 1878 shot and wounded a
notoriously brutal and corrupt police official, General
Trepov. Prior to the Zasulich case, political cases had
always been tried by Senatorial committees; but this one
was handed over in March to an ordinary tribunal for a jury
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trial. Zasulich converted her trial into an indictment of
the regime and--despite her admission of the shooting--won
a 'pot guilty' verdict from the jury amidst public rejoicing
and official consternation. The authorities; frustrated by
the autonomy the courts had won under Alexander, also had
to endure a bad press in the newspapers and periodicals
that flourished in Alexander's less restrictive climate.
The Zasulich affair, and the arrests of other young
revolutionaries--some of whom were sentenced to death--
in the months following, served to confirm the populist
revolutionary movement in its course of terrorism.
Political murder was justified as a combination of
vengeance, self-defense and propaganda, all of which were
expected to precipitate the disintegration of the Tsarist
"system." An excellent brief account of the Zasulich
affair and its repercussions can be found in M.T. Florinsky's
Russia: A History and an Interpretation (MacMillan, 1953).
The next blow was struck in August 1878, when a
terrorist assassinated General Mezentsev, the head of the
Tsarist police (the Third Section) in the streets of St.
Petersburg. This came only two days after the execution
of a terrorist, and was done in his name. The regime
responded by adopting within a week a decree which would
turn over to military tribunals every suspected terrorist
or revolutionary.
Violent student demonstrations resumed in the fall of
1878, when the police were making further arrests. Some
arrested were central leaders of the principal terrorist
organization, the Land and Liberty group. However, Land
and Liberty managed to penetrate the police through an
unknown student, who provided such excellent information
on the plans of the police that the terrorists were able
to rebuild their organization despite the loss of their
leaders.
The pattern of assassinations and large-scale arrests
continued into 1879. In February terrorists killed Prince
Kropotkin, the governor general of Kharkhov, in reprisal
for death sentences given other revolutionaries by military
tribunals. The Land and Liberty journal soon thereafter
boasted that terrorism was a weapon that forced the govern-
ment to recognize its "total impotence...in the face of a
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danger whose source is invisible and unknown." Terrorists
made another Attempt on the Tsar's life in April. The
regime's response to this latest attempt has been described
as the imposition of a "state of siege." Extraordinary
powers were given to the regional governors, enabling them
to hand over to the military tribunals--which could impose
sentences up to death--anyone who might displease them.
The regional governors were also 'authorized to arrest and
banish at will and to suppress publications. Many revolu-
tionaries were executed during the summer of 1879.
At the same time, in summer 1879, the terrorist group
Narodnaya Volya (The People's Will) was taking shape. This
came about through a split. in the Land and Liberty group
on the question of whether or not to kill the Tsar. Those
who favored it became The People's Will. The expelled
student Zhelyabov, who. had served two brief terms in prison
but had been acquitted in the mass trial of 1877 and had
only recently joined the Land and Liberty organization,
was foremost among those who advocated killing the Tsar.
As it turned out, Zhelyabov was to become the leader of
the group and the organizer of the assassination.
In early August 1879, the student Lisogub,-.a member
and favorite of the Land and Liberty organization, was
publicly hanged. Two weeks later, the Executive Committee
of The People's Will under Zhelyabov formally sentenced
the Tsar to death. From that day on, their pursuit of the
Tsar was bold and relentless. Although the group was very
small, its zeal and resourcesfulness in this pursuit produced
an illusion of a widespread and powerful network.
The common--but erroneous--belief of many terrorists
of the �time was that the Tsarist autocracy "hung in the
air" without supporting roots in �any social class, and
that a well-placed blow would collapse the autocratic
structure. The People's Will group believed, of course,
that the best-placed blow would be at the Tsar himself.
They made at least seven attempts on his life from November
1879 until their final success on I March 1881.
Each attempt required careful planning and painstaking
preparations. They decided that explosives would best
ensure success and manufactured their own bombs with the
aid of a skilled chemist who was a 'member of the organization.
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One abortive attempt involved the purchase of a building
beside a railway on which theImperial train passed and
the placing of a. mine in a tunnel theybuilt.under the
tracks.
After this failure, The People's Will group publicly
announced the failure and stated its determination to
kill the Tsar sooner or later. Some members of the group
were captured, and one was tricked into betraying the
others in the early summer of 1880. This led to further
arrests, but the police did not catch up with the key
figures, especially Zhelyabov and his mistress, Sofia
Perovskaya.
After a very near miss in February 1881 in which the
Tsar was accidentally delayed from entering a room they
destroyed by dynamite, the terrorists set another mine
under the main route by which the Tsar normally left the
palace. On the fatal day (I March) the Tsar took an
alternate route from the palace, but the terrorists had
prepared for this contingency by stationing bombers on
this route. The first terrorist blew up the Tsar's car-
riage but missed the Tsar himself. A second terrorist
threw another bomb which killed the Tsar as he went to
assist the victims of the first explosion. (The chief of
the Tsar's Security detail failed to prevent, as he should
have, the Tsar's exposure to the second bomb.) Sofia
Perovskaya directed the group in this action; she could
have escaped abroad, but chose to share Zhelyabov's fate
and was arrested ten days after the assassination.*
With the murder of the Tsar, the energies of The
People's Will seemed to be spent. Four men and two women
--all young, ranging from 19 to 30--were tried and hanged
publicly for the murder. The police, under the ultra-
*A few months later, spokesmen for the Narodniki con-
demned the assassination of President Garfield (in July
1881) on the ground that such an action in a free society
like the United States was an expression of the "same
spirit of despotism" that they were trying to eliminate in
Russia. The Narodniki were in fact seeking a constitutional
government.
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conservative regime of Alexander. III, the successor to the
dead Tsar, succeeded over a six-year period in rooting out
the remnants of the group. By 1883, all members of the
Central Committee remaining in Russia had been caught.
Popular revulsion against the regicide undoubtedly assisted
these efforts. Even liberals who had originally sympathized
with the aims of the terrorists (and who, the terrorists
expected, would set up a constitutional regime after the
fall of the TSardom) withdrew their support. Seven students
did engage in an abortive attempt to kill Alexander III in
1887 in an inept imitation of The People's Will's methods.
The police discovered the plot and waited until the would-
be assassins were posted in the streets, bombs in hand,
and then arrested them all. Lenin's elder brother was
among them.
Despite their resourcefulness, an astonishing political
naivete lay behind the readiness of the members of The
People's Will to commit suicide on the altar of revolution.
They rejected the most elementary lessons of political
experience--they were, in fact, without such experience
and could not have obtained it in any case, under the
autocratic regime. Instead, their principles of action,
were born out of the secretive and superheated ideological
debates of student societies. Contrary to the expectations
of The People's Will, the regicide. did not ignite a popular
revolt. Though discontented, the masses werenot:in revo-
lutionary ferment and knew little about the terrorists',
activities or aims. In fact, many peasants viewed the
regicide as an act of venegeance by the nobility against
the Tsar that had set them free.
The Second Wave
Although the terrorist organization of The People's
Will was crushed under the harsh rule of Alexander III,
there were occasional assassinations in the last two
decades of the century, and systematic terrorism arose
again in the first decade of the 20th century. It was a
time of renewed political agitation within the Russian
educated class and of opposition activity by a wide spectrum
of revolutionary elements, including a growing Marxist
movement. Russia's humiliating defeat by the Japanese
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in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) severely undermined
the prestige and authority of the Tsardom and paved the
way for the abortive but Almost successful revolutionary
upheaval in 1905. �
The revival of systematic efforts at political
assassinations of high Tsarist officials developed under
the auspices of the Socialist Revolutionaries, the political
heirs of the Narodniki in advocacy of "peasant socialism"
and of The People's Will in the employment of political
terror. �They believed again that the fall of the autocracy
by itself would lead to a decentralized agrarian socialism.
They were anti-statist and anti-bureaucratic, warning that
Marxism would lead to "state socialism," and they also,
unlike the Marxists, sought alliance with liberal elements
in overthrowing the monarchy. Though now conceding that
terrorism as a tactic was inadequate without propagandizing
the peasantry, it was the belief in the efficacy of
political terror that held loosely-knit Socialist Revolu-
tionary (SR) groups together. A separate conspiratorial
terrorist group, "The Fighting Organization"--was formed
under orders from the SR Central Committee. Counterparts
to the main organization were also set up by local SR groups.
The "Fighting Organization" was mainly responsible for the
successive waves of political murders of high Tsarist
officials from 1901 to 1907, the year when the revolutionary
ferment simmered down. Some of the SR terrorist groups also
committed armed robberies under the name of "revolutionary
expropriation"--adventures which the main SR party frowned
upon, but which Stalin in his early career with other
Bolsheviks emulated in his home ground of Georgia.
The SR Fighting Organization consisted of small numbers
of men and women ready to sacrifice their lives to the
cause. They were drawn from all walks of life from the
peasantry to the aristocratic families. For example, the
daughter of the vice governor of Yakutsk volunteered for
the task of killing the Tsar at a ball (although this
plan was not carried out because of a last-minute cancel-
lation of the ball).
The terrorism of the SRs generally followed the pattern
set by The People's Will of the 1870's and 1880's, but with
greater refinement of method. Moreover, the SRs' constant
battle with the police seems to have led to increasing skill
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on both sides in fabricating plots and counter-plots. The
antagonists became so entangled that the "double agent"
became a major menace to both sides. The staging of ruses
and the infiltrating of agents into the Tsar's police
apparatus, as well as liquidating police infiltrators in
their own ranks, grew into a major activity of the Fighting
Organization.
The SRs claimed many victims among high officialdom.
These included two Ministers of Interior and the Governor-
General of Moscow.
Following student demonstrations in the winter of
1900-1901 in which hundreds of students were beaten by
Cossacks and many were expelled, jailed, and banished, many
other students were forced into the army as a disciplinary
measure. A student angered by this regulation shot and
killed the Minister of Education early in 1901. After the
regime tried unsuccessfully to placate the students with
modest educational reforms, another student assassinated
the Minister of Interior in April 1902. The new Minister
of Interior (Von Plehve) instituted an ultra-reactionary
policy against all elements of the population. One of the
students expelled and jailed earlier, Sazonov, came to the
capital with an SR terrorist squad in 1904 to attempt to
kill this Minister, and in July he did so, throwing a
bomb into his carriage. Sazonov's deed was widely ap-
plauded, and the Minister's successor announced a program
of liberal reforms and a relaxation of the censorship.
Sazonov himself was sentenced to life imprisonment, and
committed suicide five years later as a protest against
the prison administration.
An atrocious act by the regime in January 1905--the
killing of workers attempting peacefully to present a
petition to the Tsar--apparently reactivated the SR
terrorist organization. Another student who had been
jailed for agitation, a Pole named Kalyayev, who had
played a supporting role in the assassination of Von
Plehve in 1904, was now given a starring role. He was
chosen by the SRs to attempt the assassination of Grand
Duke Sergei, the governor-general of Moscow. In February,
after withholding one bomb because the Duke's wife and
children were also in the carriage, Kalyayev--working
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alone, without aback-up--threw a bomb into the Duke's
carriage which killed him. Exulting in his act, Kalyayev
was hanged. (There is a good account of Kalyayev, a poet
and a complex person, in Payne's book, The Terrorists.
The same book has an interesting account of Boris Savinkov,
a very bold and colorful figure who organized this
assassination and many other operations, and escaped unscathed
to write his memoirs.) The hanging of Kalyayev was
followed by several more attempted assassinations of high
officials, and successful assassinations of less important
figures.
In October 1905, the Tsar, frightened by the revolu-
tionary uprisings of that year, took good counsel and
agreed to a draft manifesto promising reforms. This was
greeted with general enthusiasm, and in November the
central committee of the Socialist Revolutionaries
decreed a temporary suspension of terrorist activity. At
the same time, however, the extreme right-wing opponents
of any reform closed ranks and took action to undercut
the manifesto.
In the SR Congress of December 1905 and January 1906,
the SRs decreed an end to their suspension of terrorist
activity. Intensified terrorism began at once, and in
August 1906 the newly-formed "maximalist" faction of the
SR terrorists--a faction devoted wholeheartedly to terror--
made an attempt On Prime Minister Stolypin. They entered
Stolypin's summer home disguised as guests and threw down
dynamite sticks, killing 32 people in addition to them-
selves and wounding 22 others, including Stolypin's two
children. Although this attack was disavowed by the SR
central committee, from this time Stolypin became the
terrorists' most formidable enemy.
Within a week of the attack on Stolypin, new legis-
lation provided for the transfer of criminal cases, at
the discretion of high officials, to military courts.
At the same time, a circular directed provincial governors
to maintain public order "at any cost" and to enroll the
services of private persons sympathetic to the struggle
against revolution--in other words, to organize vigilante
activity. Moreover, the police were given complete freedom
to make searches, arrests and deportations without observ-
ing legal procedures. And government officials holding
"undesirable" views were summarily expelled.
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,This very harsh, across-the-board. program took some
time to work. By the end of 1906, some 1,600 officials
--ranging from generals to village policemen--had been
killed by SR terrorists in that year alone. Apparently
as a gesture of conciliation) the regime in spring 1907
withdrew its August 1906 decree establishing the special
military courts. This did not seem to help. During 1907,
some 2,500 officials were killed by the terrorists. (Some
of this was done by Bolshevist terrorist squads, but they
were less important than the SRs.)
During 1907, good police work--with the help of some
of the extraordinary and illegal measures noted above--led,
to the arrest of the leaders of the "maximaiist" faction .
(the one that had made the attempt on Stolypin). This
group had used the proceeds from a spectacular robbery-to.,.
set up an organization separate from the SRs. The arrest �
of its leaders forced the liquidation of its central
organization, and the local organizations had dried up
or beencrOShed by the end of 1907. Late in 1907, the
police captured .the leaders of the most important remain-
ing terrorist squad of the SR organization.
The steam seemed to go out of the terrorist movement
in 1908. . The movement suffered heavily with the exposure
in that year of Evno Azev as a double-agent who had served
and betrayed both of his masters impartially. He had
organized assassinations (including that of Von Plehve
in 1904) on behalf of the revolutionaries, and he:had
compromised his revolutionary comrades to the police.
According to Florinsky, this exposure dealt terrorism,
already declining, "a blow from which it never recovered."
It was no longer possible to assert, as had the "Granny of
the Russian Revolution" Catherine Breshko-Breshkovskaya,
that terrorism was a pure manifestation of "revolutionary
and civic valor."
The terrorists mustered just one more big punch, and
it is uncertain who called the shot. In 1911, five years
after their first attempt, they assassinated Prime Minister
Stolypin, who had been mainly responsible for rolling
them up after 1907. Again the terrorist was a double
agent, Bogrov, who by a stroke of luck managed to get
within pistol range of Stolypin at a theatre. �There is
some evidence that Bogrov was impelled to his action by
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fear that his SR associates suspected him of being a double
agent. Some observers, however, believe that Bogrov was
acting on behalf of the police on orders from the Tsar.
In any case, whoever was responsible was acting on the
dictum of the mid-19th century terrorist Nechayev--to
kill the most intelligent and able officials while allow-
ing the mediocre and inept to persist in discrediting the
regime.
The general result that political assassinations
produced from Alexander II's reign to the Russian Revolu-
tion--from 1855 to 1917--was a vicious circle of violent
action and repressive counter-action. Efforts by the
Tsars or their ministers to institute political reforms
to meet the needs of the time were repeatedly blunted or
erased by terrorist outrages. The repressive counter-
measures of the regime in turn intensified the impulse
among revolutionaries to force change by violence. The
assassination of Alexander II, most historians agree, was
a severe setback for those among the Russian educated
class who were striving for the peaceful transformation
of the monarchy into a constitutional regime. The ter-
rorists did not succeed in producing an apocalyptic
"liberation" of Russia and the establishment of peasant
socialism and constitutional rule. Rather, they opened the
door to an extended period of reaction and repression under
Alexander III. A similar destructive dialectic undercut
moves toward a constitutional structure and general reform
under the last Tsar. Despite the noble ends professed by
the Narodniki and their SR heirs, their violent means ag-
gravated the conditions that eventually produced the Russian
Revolution of 1917 and brought to power not a democratic
but a despotic revolutionary regime.
COUNTER-MEASURES UNDER VARIOUS TSARS
The "Third Section" Under Nicholas I
The Tsar's political police, engaged in a continuing
struggle with revolutionary, and terrorist groups in the
19th and early 20th century, assumed its basic form under
Nicholas I (1825-1855). Before Nicholas, "higher" or
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bodyguard-type police had reached back at least to Ivan the
Terrible's dreaded Oprichniki, a personal political security
force that left its own mark in the history of terrorism.
Nicholas I, however, created a modernized secret police in
the wake of the abortive Decembrist uprising of 1825. This
revolt, more romantic than realistic in conception, was
plotted by a conspiratorial society consisting mainly of young
Imperial Guardsmen and aristocrats imbued with the
libertarian and republican ideas which had spread through
Europe in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars. Mass arrests,
some executions and many exiles followed �the exposure of
this plot.
Nicholas endowed his new police apparatus with
wide-ranging missions and sweeping powers. He placed the
police apparatus under his quasi-personal direction as
the "Third Section" of "His Majesty's Own Chancery." The
Third Section became one of Nicholas's main instruments of
state policy. While patterned after the Napoleonic Ministry
of Police, in the exercise of a combination of intelligence,
police and security functions, the breadth of the Third
Section's functions was unique--so much so that Russians
of the time regarded the ubiquitous Third Section as a break
with national traditions. It was not onlydesigned to cope
with subversive' activities in the usual sense, but to uncover
the hidden thoughts of the population, manipulate public
opinion and, in sum, to insure that all political initiative
remained firmly in the hands of the .sovereign. The prying,
suspiciousness and omnipresence of Nicholas' police is
vividly described in the diary of de Custine, 4 French
nobleman who travelled through Nicholas' Russia.* Custine's
memoirs lend weight to the view that the Third Section
was a rough ancestor of Stalin's secret police.
The Third Section was divided into a formidable..
corps of gendarmes, consisting of military officers and
enjoying some prestige, and a network of secret operatives
drawn from all levels of society. The extraordinary powers
of the Director of the Third Section under Nicholas rested
*Astolphe de Custine, Journey for Our Time, Vintage,
1952.
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on. his close ties with the Tsar, which elevated him to the
status of 7a kind of prime minister." The Third. Section's-
widespread'extra-legal operations and employment of
administrative trials and punishments was largely respon--
sible for the reputation Nicholas I's reign acquired as a
Draconian dictatorship. (Sidney Monas's The Third- Section,
Cambridge, 1967, provides the most comprehensive inter-
pretive study of Nicholas' police-.)
Nicholas I's repressive police policy can perhaps
be credited with scotching any incipient conspiracies
against the Tsardom. However, Nicholas' policy produced
a general feeling of alienation from the Russian state
within the educated class and forced thought in Russia
inward, divorcing it from action. The intellectual elite
was reared on European idealism and romanticism, and when
it turned to politics it was first caught up with Utopian
socialism and later by an apocalyptic and revolutionary
nihilism. It was under Nicholas that radical ideas began
to incubate in secretive discussion circles. Some of
these sprouts eventually bore fruit in the form of,poli-
tical terrorism in Alexander II's reign.
Perhaps the greatest weakness of Nicholas' Third
Section was its resort to administrative devices to cope
with social discontent and its tendency to equate intel-
lectual ferment with full-blown activities aimed at destroy-
ing the regime. A celebrated example of the latter mistake
was the arrest shortly after the European revolutions of
1848 of the members of an informal circle of devotees of
the pacific Fourier, the French Utopian socialist. At a
dinner organized by a minor Foreign Affairs official,
Fourier's ideas for self-contained Utopian communities
and the anticipated doom of the modern city were enthusias-
tically discussed. The police regarded the meeting as a
plot to destroy St. Petersburg and arrested 39 members of
the group. Charged with a "conspiracy of ideas", an offense
not contained in the legal code of the time, some 16 were
sentenced to death and six to forced labor or Siberian exile.
The death sentences were commuted minutes before the
scheduled executions. Tsar Nicholas evidently saw the
proceedings as an object lesson for would-be revolution-
aries. Dostoevsky (then 28) was among those initially
condemned to death, but his sentence was reduced to four
years of hard labor and six years of army service in Siberia.
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In any: case, it was under Nicholas I that the deadly
cycle of conflict between police and revolutionaries began.
The conflict helped mightily in maintaining the extreme
polarization'ofHpolitics under the last Tsars.
Counter-Terrorist Measures Under Alexander II
As noted earlier, Alexander II's reign, the era of
"the great reforms," opened with.great expectations of
far-reaching social changes and constitutional reforms.
Major changes, including Alexander's emancipation ,of the
serfs, did occur.. Moreover, the state under Alexander II
was far less restrictive than in the repressive rule of
Nicholas I. In some respects his rule was remarkably
libertarian. The*universities, for example, won a freedom
from outside interference that had few parallels anywhere,
and the courts of justice also enjoyed a great measure of
independence.
However, as the reforms failed to produce a.total
transformation of Russian society, disillusion and unrest
grew in the liberal and radical wing of the intellectual
class. The brief period of good feeling begun with the
freeing of the serfs was succeeded by a resumption of the
political struggle between the regime and the radicalized
intelligentsia. *Phases of renewed attempts at reform and
conciliation by the regime alternated with periods of
reaction and repressive measures. In the process, as has
been noted, one wing of the Narodniki resorted to the
systematic _political assassinations that culminated in
Alexander's death and the return to a harsh ultra-conserva-
tive regime under Alexander II/.
Despite the network of police informers keeping tabs
on the activities and changing moods of the radical intel-
ligentsia, the eruption of terrorist-activities in Russia's
political life in the 1860's and 1870's came as a shock to
the regime. Alexander's reform administration underrated
the potent mixture that reform and rising expectations were
producing among the "public," principally the educated and
privileged 'class.' The government also initially found it
difficult to understand and cope with the relationship
between the peculiar intellectual climate of Russian
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society and the phenomenon of terror, on the one hand, and
the dynamic between police actions and a hypersensitized
public opinion on the other hand. Though some of the
Tsar's advisors were clear-sighted, the possibility of
carrying out a consistent and integrated counter-strategy
--whether reformist or conservative--against the revolution-
aries was reduced by the see-saw battles between court
factions for the ear and mandate of the Tsar.
There were curious combinations of harsh repression
and lenient treatment of oppositionists. The response of
the regilhe in the Karakozov case--previously noted--is a
good example of repressive over-reaction. KarakOzov, put
to torture, turned out to be alone in his plot to kill the .
Tsar, but the Tsar's advisors blamed the younger generation
as a whole. The general crackdown that followed drove many
radical � students into European exile to evade the police.
Student disorders in the universities during the 1860's also
resulted in the Tsar's decision to implement a traditionalist
educational program throughout the country's Schools to
combat the spread of revolutionary ideas. The disorders
also provoked the political authorities into efforts to
curb.university autonomy.
These counter-measures indeed seemed to reduce
revolutionary activity toward the latter half of the
sixties. However, in a curious decree in 1873 the govern7-
ment undermined its own policy by ordering home all young
Russians studying in Switzerland. The students threw
themselves into renewed activism which produced the "to the
4seop1e" movement of the Narodniki. The show trials of the
participants staged by the government to discredit the
revolutionaries were successfully turned into platforms of
propagandizing their cause.
The instances of leniency and laxity on the part of
the authorities were as striking as the instances of severity.
There were many escapes by revolutionaries from Siberian
exile and from prisons. Exile, despite its rigors, often
put revolutionaries only temporarily out of business. Many,
in fact, used exile as a kind of revolutionary's "sabbatical"
wherein they mediated on revolution and strategy. The
notorious Nechayev, although in solitary confinement, found
no difficulty in maintaining a steady stream of correspond-
ence with-his associates from his cell in the Peter and Paul
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fortress; and Zhelyabov and his mistress Perovskaya, both
of them police suspects moved freely through Russia with
trunks full of dynamite-.
A complicating factor, for the police, Was popular
support of terrorists,. Large amounts of money were often
given to revolutionary organizations by wealthy well--
wishers and converts. Further, while actual membership
in the secret groups was small, their revolutionary ideas
and even terrorist activities found support not only among
students but in the professions and even in the army and -
bureaucracy itself. This situation often led to compromises
of police operations against the terrorists.
An impressive but abortive attempt to defuse the
terrorist.movement was initiated in 1880 by Loris-Melikov,
the ex-governor of Kharkov, to whom the Tsar gave dictatorial
powers to deal with the crisis produced by the increasingly
intense attempt on the Tsar's life that The/People's Will
group, was mounting after 1879. While he actually strength-
ened repressive measures against revolutionaries, :he worked
to win overthe liberal wing of the Russian public and
isolate the terrorists (by depriving them of an issue).
In a program, popularly known as the "dictatorship of the.
heart," he began instituting major reforms directed toward
a constitutionalist-parliamentary-type regime, the broad
demand of:both_the liberal and terrorist elements
Soon after Loris-Melikov's appointment, terrorists
of The People's Will made an unsuccessful attempt: on his
life. The People's Will Central Committee- disavowed this,
and for the.rest of 1880 the terrorists were quiet. Some
observers believe that they were waiting to see what
Loris-Melikov would do, but the main reason for their
inactivity seems to have been the loss of central leaders
through a series of arrests in 1879 and 1880.'
Loris-Melikov gained the support of the liberals,
but his efforts were eventually crippled by counter-moves
from .the revolutionaries, and court conservatives. The
killing of the Tsar in 1881 put an end to this hopeful
epXsode.
Reform of the.police was a part of Loris-Melikov's
coordinated attack on the sources of political and social
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discontent., He removed the political police from their
immediate access to the Tsar in the Third Section of his
chancery and placed them in a Department of Police, where
they remained (under the Ministry of the Interior) until
1917. At about the same time the police began to be called
the "Okhrana" the Defense) in journalistic and revolu-
tionary parlance--the name that stuck until the fall of
the monarchy.
The Hard Line of Alexander III
Alexander III suffered none of the vacillation of
his murdered father over issues of reform but devoted
himself to restoring the integrity of the principles of
autocratic rule. Loris-Melikov was quickly replaced by .
a new chief minister who drafted a statute empowering the
government to proclaim states of "emergency." The statute
gave administrative officials throughout the empire broad
extra-judicial and executive powers. Originally a
"provisional" three-year measure, the law was frequently
renewed until the fall of the monarchy. The law gave
officials special powers to arrest, confiscate�property �
without trial, transfer criminal cases from regular courts
to military tribunals, close schools, suspend periodicals
and fire subordinate officials. Moreover, police penetra-
tion of The People-'s Will after 1881 was pervasive.
In a narrow sense the police apparatus, with strong
support from Alexander III, was eminently successful in
breaking the back of The People's Will in the early 1880's,
leaving its remnants scattered and crippled. And through
its network of informers and secret operatives, the police
uncovered and arrested the group of conspirators who sought
to revive The People's Will and assassinate the Tsar in -
1887, Open attacks on the regime thus were contained.
However, much as under Nicholas I, A new generation of
revolutionaries--this time a large portion of them Marxists,
including the young Lenin and Stalin--bided their time and
developed their theories and strategies beneath the crust
of the Ultra-conservative order. Moreover, Alexander III's
systematic program of conservative counter-reform pro-
foundly-undermined the political modernization which had
made halting progress 'under his predecessor. -The net
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result was to stir a new brew of political and social
discontent that broke out under his successor, Nicholas II.
The Mixed Record Under Nicholas II
Alexander III's ministers, with a considerable measure
of success, had exploited pro-monarchist and conservative
opinion and even widespread anti-semitic feeling in deal-
ing with liberal and revolutionary elements. Following
his death in 1894 and in the period leading up to the
abortive 1905 Revolution, the Okhrana carried forward this
strategy in some of its operations. The strategy involved
both an attempt to generate public support for the govern-
ment and a resort to counter-terror against the revolu-
tionaries.
In general, the regime's policy toward liberal trends
in this period of 1894 tu 1905 was unintelligent; and
toward renewed terrorist activity was ineffectual. In the
years 1895 to 1900, some 6,000 members of the Social
Democratic party were arrested for organizing strikes and
other proscribed action. The Socialist Revolutionary Party
was reorganized in 1900 and decided.to.organize terrorist
teams as one form of revolutionary action', complementing
"mass struggle."
It was a time of much ferment among university students.
The government acted savagely against student demonstra-
tions�beating, jailing, exiling and impressing into the
army large numbers of students.. It was students treated
in this way Who killed the Minister of Education in .1901
and the Minister of Interior in 1902. As previously noted,.
the new 'Minister of Interior pursued an ultra-reactionary
policy toward all elements of the population, in effect
recruiting for the revolution. He also contrived a war
with Japan (an unpopular war), persecuted national minorities,
and in particular promised to "drown the revolution in
Jewish blood." (Many of the. SRs were in fact- Jewish, in-
cluding the founder of the Fighting Organization, -Gershuni, -
and his successor, Azev.) Following the assassination of
this. Minister by an SR terrorist in'July 1904, the Tsar's
policy was less repressive than it -might understandably
have been, but there were still' no genuine reforms.
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With the incident of January 1905 in which troops
killed workers attempting to present a petition (and
also killed innocent bystanders), the regime decided,
upon a hard line across the board. The governor-gene-ral
of St. Petersburg, the son of the police official Trepov
who had been shot by the terrorist heroine Vera Zasulich
in 1878, ordered mass arrests of intellectuals and the -
dissolution of labor unions, and thus managed to unify all
opponents of the .regime, liberals and terrorists alike.
With the assassination of the governor-general of Moscow
in February, the Tsar denounced disorder and proclaimed
his intention to extirpate the "roots of sedition.." He
also proclaimed his intention to consider "legislative
proposals" if they did not break with tradition. It �
was to be a bad year for the Tsar: strikes, peasant
uprisings, student demonstrations calling for revolu-
tion, mutinies in the armed forces, and attempted as-
sassinations--opposition too widespread to be dealt with
by pure repression or empty promises.
Later in 1905, the Tsar's principal advisor told
him that he had a choice: to institute, a rigid dictator-
ship to try to stamp out sedition, which he did not think
possible in any case, or to make some genuine move toward
constitutional government. As previously noted, the
Tsar at that time agreed to a draft manifesto promising
real reforms (civil liberties, a strong Duma), an act
hailed by almost everyone, including the Social Revolu-
tionaries, but this was undercut at once by rightwing
opponents of reform. These forces, among other-things,-
exploited nationalist and antisemitic feeling to organize
pogroms in which thousands were killed.
Following the Social Revolutionaries' official call
in January 1906 for a resumption and intensification of
terrorist activity, Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin began
to carry out the first broadly conceived and integrated
counter-attack on revolutionary terrorism and its poli-
tical bases which had been seen for many years. Stolypin
is regarded by most historians as one of the ablest of
Tsarist ministers. His strategy against the Social Revo-
lutionaries was based on a clear insight into the political
crisis facing the monarchy. Like Loris-Melikov a quarter-
century earlier, he did not see terrorist activity as
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simply a police problem; he too realized that part of the
problem was to divert and enlist the potential supporters
and sympathizers of the terrorists.
Stolypin's attitude toward the terrorists themselves
was tough and aggressive, and the more so after the attack
on himself--and the maiming of his children--in August
1906. As previously noted, the police were then given
wide powers to search, arrest, and deport; provincial
governors were told to maintain order "at any cost" and
to organize vigilante activity to this end; many news-
papers (one source says/260) were closed down; and offi-
cials were permitted to dispense with investigation when
they were satisfied as to the guilt of the accused and
to transfer the cases to military courts. (This last was
similar to decrees issued before and after the assassina-
tion of Tsar Alexander II 35 years earlier.) These courts
met within 24 hours, reached a decision within 48 hours,
and usually imposed sentences of death, which were carried
out immediately. While the special courts were apparently
regarded as counter-productive by spring 1907 and were
withdrawn, the other extraordinary measures--together with
the frequent torture of suspected terrorists, who had
learned how to resist normal interrogation--continued
through 1907 and perhaps beyond.
After the loss of some 4,100 officials to terrorists
in the years 1906 and 1907, by 1908 Stolypin and the police
had dispersed and virtually eliminated the SR terrorist
organization. Unfortunately, available materials do not
permit a judgment as to how: ,much of this success was
owed to good police work and how much to extraordinary and
illegal measures. This is not clear even in the most
spectacular single success of the period, the arrest'of
the leaders of the super-terrorist "maximalist" group in
spring 1907. These arrests were due at least in part to
good police work, probably including penetration of the
group, but the police probably employed torture to locate
some of these leaders and to get further leads with which
to roll up the local organizations throughout Russia.
At the same time, Stolypin was steadily urging the
less violent oppositionists into peaceful forms of poli-
tical activity. By a mixture of persuasion and pressure,
he won the cooperation or at least acquiescence of iduch
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of of the center and even some of the left. He was an
effective leader in the quasi-parliament, the Duma,
established as a concession to the pressures of 1905.
He won respect even among his foes.
Stolypin implemented a sweeping, and in Russian
conditions radical, land reform program. This undermined
the efforts of the Social Revolutionaries to build a
revolutionary mass movement on a peasant base. The SR
program called for a system of agrarian socialism grow-
ing out of the traditional communal structure and tilling
arrangements of the Russian village. Stolypin moved in
the opposite direction, making it possible for great
numbers of peasants to become small landowners. That move,
as Stolypin correctly judged, gave the peasant a stake in
law and order. The spreading success of this reform caused
Lenin to become deeply pessimistic about the prospects for
revolution in Russia; only Russia's entry into World War
I revived his expectations and spirits.
Stolypin's death at the hands of a double-agent in
1911 seemed to be a fluke, resulting from a gross failure
of vigilance on the part of a police official guarding
him. As previously suggested, however, it is possible
that this was planned negligence, on the Tsar's order.
Stolypin had fallen from favor, and the right wing again
was in the ascendant. (Interesting accounts as well as
varied views of Stolypin appear in Miliukov's and Florinsky's
histories, as well as in works on the pre-revolutionary
era by two English historians: Sir Bernard Pares, The
Fall of the Russian Monarchy (A.A. Knopf, 1939) and Sir
Donald Wallace, Russia: On the Eve of War and Revolution
(Random House, 1961)).
Evaluations of the Okhrana
Immediately available sources on the inner workings
of the Okhrana from 1881 to 1917 are meager, although
there is a substantial amount of possibly valuable Russian-
language material at Stanford. The most thorough biblio-
grapher of the sources (E.E� Smith's The Okhrana: The
Russian Department of Police, A Bibliography, Stanford,
1967) complains that no general work exists covering the
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Okhrana's operations from the time of Alexander II. He
rates an untranslated book by a vice director of the police
(Kurlov, The Catastrophe of Imperial Russia), covering only
the years 1907-1910, as excellent, and another by the
last police head, Vassilyev, as episodic and more sensa-
tionalist then profound, but interesting.* Based on his
review of the sources, Smith does stress that Okhrana was
a far more complex institution than most observers and
even historians have realized. He points out that its
apparatus extended from its headquarters in St. Petersburg
to virtually every locality of the empire. Further, its
operations followed the activities of Russian revolution-
aries in exile in Europe; a Special Section in Headquarters
directed a foreign Okhrana with its principal base in Paris.
It maintained close surveillance of and engaged in counter-
measures against revolutionary groups in Europe and even
the United States.
On the whole, Smith assesses the professional skill
of the Okhrana favorably. Surveillance, including inter-
ception of mail and deciphering codes and invisible writing
without detection was, according to Smith, quite effective.
Smith says that the Okhrana's penetrations into revolution-
ary groups were generally effective and that each local
Okhrana "worth its salt" had an agent planted in every
local revolutionary or terrorist group. He cited the
famous case of Roman Malinovskiy, who maintained close
ties with Lenin himself and whose speeches as a Bolshevik
deputy in the Duma (parliament) were edited first by Lenin
and then by the Okhrana. Lenin refused to the end to
believe that Malinovskiy was a double agent. The Okhrana's
coverage of Lenin himself was good, but they apparently
failed to take him as seriously as he deserved.
Another observer, Roland Gaucher (The Terrorists)
concludes that the Okhrana was very effective in inter-
rogations, having worked out an elaborate system of
exploiting the suspect's psychological vulnerabilities.
*A.T. Vassilyev, The Ochrana, Harrap & Co'y, Ltd.,
London, 1930.
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He notes that the Okhrana got many of its agents by compro-
mising the suspect in interrogations and then giving him
his freedom in exchange for his work. There were many
volunteers for such work, but in general a person already
a member of a terrorist organization would be preferred.
The record obviously supports Smith's comment that
the personnel of the Okhrana ranged from intelligent and
principled men to numbskulls and scoundrels. He notes
that many failed to understand revolutionary motivations
or doctrine. Some were obtuse, misinformed and prone to
shallow views of their functions. But others showed remark-
able insight. For example, the Tsar's Minister of Interior,
Durnovo, in 1914 warned the Tsar, on the basis of his long
familiarity with Okhrana reports on the revolutionary move-
ment, that Russia's entry into world war would end in a
Russian revolution.
Smith believes that the operational failures of the
police (e.g. the Azev and Bogrov cases) did not materially
contribute to the fall of the dynasty. The reasons for
the collapse of the dynasty, he concludes, must be found
in broader political causes and mistakes in high policy.
Among these reasons, he cites: (a) successive defeats
in war--in the Crimean War under Alexander II, in the
Russo-Japanese War, and finally and disastrously in World
War I; (b) the failures of the Tsar and his principal
advisors to understand and cope with revolutionary forces;
(c) the failure of policy-makers to use police information
effectively and to give the police firm policy direction;
and (d) the abandonment of the police apparatus by the
Provisional Government that replaced the monarchy for a
brief period in 1917, which then found itself helpless
before the Bolshevik uprising under Lenin's lead. To
clinch his argument, Smith notes that Lenin's secret
police, the Cheka, emulated the methods of the Okhrana
in a number of ways, including its comprehensive system
of dossiers. According to Smith, Lenin showed that the
apparatus itself was not unserviceable but was, indeed, an
effective instrument of the Bolshevik dictatorship. More-
over, the ruthless Bolsheviks, Smith adds, did not suffer
from the vacillations, ineptitude and political short-
sightedness that often afflicted the monarchy's policy
making.
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The previously-cited book by the last police chief,
Vassilyev, which Smith devalues, arouses some doubt about
the operational efficiency of the Okhrana. The Vassilyev
book is more revealing than the author himself suspects.
Vassilyev, a loyal but unsophisticated servant of the Tsar,
gives an account of the Okhrana's operations covering
roughly the twenty years before the Bolshevik revolution
which at times would resemble a Buster Keaton sequence
if the affairs were not so deadly serious. It is a story
of imprudent police actions and plain fiascos by over-
zealous or gallible police operatives. There was also
plot-faking by the Okhrana, a tactic developed monstrously
under the Bolsheviks.
The Okhrana's organization, according to Vassilyev,
was divided into two parts--an External agency engaging
in intelligence and surveillance, and an Internal agency
which engaged in clandestine operations against the ter-
rorist organizations. The External agency often used
separate and unlinked groups of agents in the same surveil-
lance operation as a means of double-checking information.
The surveillance operation appears to have had a fair degree
of success, although the SR terrorists worked out a system
for discovering the surveillance agents assigned to them,
often luring these agents to their death. The Okhrana's
real complications and entanglements were centered in the
clandestine operations.
The use of agents--that is, the infiltration of
agents into terrorist �organizations--was a dangerous
practice, as the agent might be and sometimes was doubled.
The Okhrana tried to reduce the dangers of this by getting
two agents into every revolutionary group whenever possible,
reporting independently and being checked not only by each
other but by External surveillance. Penetration was ef-
fective in many cases, but the use of agents proved
disastrous in some--e.g. Stolypin's death came at the hands
of a double agent. The Okhrana had perhaps the best record
of success in provocation--inducing terrorist groups to
undertake operations which would result in their arrest,
and creating false anti-Tsarist groups to lure the unwary.
One of the key operational problems facing the Okhrana,
Vassilyev points out, was judging the size of terrorist
forces. More often than not the police, it appears, over-
estimated those forces.
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Vassilyev argues that terrorist organizations and
modes of operation were "so elaborate that they were not
to be countered by ill-considered measures of violence."
In one instance, Vassilyev recalls, the Okhrana itself,
unsure of the extent of one terrorist plot, warned off
rather than arrested the leader on the hope that he and
all his confederates would flee. However, Vassilyev does
admit that at times the police did not move soon enough,
"because of pressure from public opinion." And he com-
plains in general terms of bureaucratic inertia and
fussiness, and of bureaucratic rivalry.
Despite its successes, the overall record of the
operations of the Tsar's political police, according to
most accounts, was uneven. Even from a purely technical
standpoint, its successes were often counter-balanced by
failures; and from a broad political perspective, many
commentators believe that its workings in the long run
were counter-productive in terms of the Tsar's own poli-
tical interests.
Bibliographer E.E. Smith's discovery that no one
has fully exploited the original and secondary sources
for an overall study of the Okhrana suggests that sweep-
ing judgments on its success or failure must be made and
viewed with caution. However, the sources of some of the
difficulties the Tsar's secret police experienced over a
longer period--from the time of Nicholas I to the end of
the monarchy--seem clear enough. From its inception in
its modern form under Nicholas, the secret police were
given an excessively broad mission and ill-defined func-
tions. Moreover, the Tsar's ministers often failed to
maintain close enough supervision of the police to prevent
their operations from working at cross-purposes with
official policy. Also, counter-terrorist and counter-
revolutionary activities went off on their own tangents
with bizarre results. The security of the police was
infirm--it was too often penetrated. And it made some
monumental mistakes in judgment.
Verging on a truism, but one borne out by the Rus-
sian experience, those Russian officials who more or less
successfully coped with terrorists fitted police operations
into a broader political strategy. Such officials displayed
a more or less clear view of the political environment in
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which terrorism developed. Further, they kept a sharp eye
on the struggle for the loyalties, sympathies or acquiesc-
ence of important social groups most prone to support or
accept rapid or revolutionary change. However, these able
officials were not numerous. More usually, Tsarist offi-
cials as well as the Tsars themselves let the immediate
disruptions or horrors of terrorist activity obscure their
long-range vision.
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THE UNITED STATES: 1831-1920
I. Abolitionist "Uprisings"
The two pocket-size uprisings against the system of
slave-holding in the South -- e.g., Nat Turner's (1831) and
John Brown's (1859) -- were characterized by their leaders'
failure to anticipate the probable public revulsion against
crude terrorism. Neither seems to have gone further in his
thinking than to assume that the nobility of the cause (eman-
cipation) would carry all good men, black and white, along
with him. Abraham Lincoln grasped the psychology of Brown
and equated it with that of European regicides: "An enthu-
siast broods over the oppression of a people till he fancies
himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He ventures
the attempt, which ends in little else than his own execu-
tion." (Speech of 27 February 1860) Turner and Brown had a
similar rationale for their killings. They believed that
they had been chosen by God to free slaves, and that they were
accountable for their action only to God. Both men had serious
psychological defects, a fact which may account for their
failure to perceive the probable damage their action would do
to their political cause and for their inability to preserve
their quasi-military forces. Their uprisings were crushed by
the first act of armed counteraction.
Turner's group, having murdered 51 whites including women
and children, provoked a strong negative reaction among poten-
tial allies in the South. Emancipation societies which had
flourished there were immediately dealt a death blow. On the
legal level, almost every state in the South enacted new laws
which greatly increased the severity of the slave codes.
Psychologically, his actions created a deep sense of fear of
massive slave insurrections, which pervaded Southern thinking
for 30 crucial years.
Brown, a fanatic already considered an outlaw because of
his murder of a Missouri slaveholding planter, chose a poor
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target. There were very few slaves in the Harper's Ferry
area, and the first man his group killed was a free Negro,
the station baggage-master. The sympathy and admiration
generated by Brown's dignified bearing during his trial was
greatly overshadowed by the antagonism and alarm his raid
created even among moderates. Few could sanction seizure
of a Federal arsenal or a firefight with Federal marines
(ironically, led by Colonel Robert E. Lee).
II. Assassinations of Symbolic Figures
A. Presidents
Some assassins of American presidents believed in
a vague way that murder of the chief executive would
eliminate, at the root, opposition to their political
cause. However, their motivation actually was deeper,
in the unconscious. They give an overwhelming impression
of mental disturbance, suggesting that regardless of a
president's policies or personal character, killers will
always appear.
1. Lincoln
There was an element of insanity in John Wilkes
Booth, who was described by one in a position to
know as "insane on that one point"--the struggle
between what he saw as Northern tyranny and Southern
freedom. The brief diary he kept during his effort
to escape suggests that he envisaged his act as that
of Brutus or William Tell. In addition, he was in-
flamed by a craving for revenge. After he shouted
from the Ford's Theater stage "Sic semper tyrannis!"
he shouted "The South is avenged!"
His planning had been rational. He had visited
the presidential box earlier in the day and secured
its door to block quick pursuit. And, but for chance,
he probably would have escaped the theater unharmed.
Booth had planned an even more spectacular impact.
The accomplice was to murder Vice President Johnson,
but he failed to act. Another accomplice was to
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murder Secretary of State Seward; he succeeded
in seriously wounding the Secretary.
Booth was incredulous at the public reaction
to the murder. He jotted down the following in
his brief diary, a day or two after killing
Lincoln. "After being hunted like a dog through
swamps and woods, and last night being chased by
gunboats till I was forced to return, wet, cold,
and starving, with every man's hand against me,
I am here in despair. And why? For doing what
Brutus was honored for--what made William Tell a
hero; and yet I, for striking down an even greater
tyrant than they even knew, am looked upon as a
common cutthroat." He failed to perceive that by
striking down the highest political figure in the
North he would produce only revulsion and shock,
rather than elation, among the populace. The
public reaction deepened the North-South split.
Lincoln had been a moderating influence; his views
at the end of the Civil War were far more con-
ciliatory to the defeated South than was true of
the radical Republicans. The shocking manner of
his death intensified the polarization, brought
wider political support to the advocates of a
radical reconstruction policy, and perpetuated the
political cleavage centered on the relative status
of whites and blacks. The Northern populace became
more susceptible to the argument that unless the
political activities of Southern whites were
forcefully suppressed, a conspiratorial plot against
the Union would persist. Thus the radical minority
within the party was better able to undermine
Lincoln's policy of moderation. The South became
increasingly homogeneous and bitter as a result of
being treated as a conquered province; and bitter-
ness was grist for the conservative's mill. Had
Booth not murdered the President, the Southern
planter class which dominated political life in
the South might not have been able to regain the
control it exercised before the war. Men were
judged to be either loyal to the "old South" or
traitors, and any opportunity for the rise of a new
class of Southern leaders was curtailed. If Booth
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ever believed that his act would produce greater
political freedom for the South--he was wrong.
It led to greatly increased Northern suppression.
2. Garfield
Charles J. Guiteau, who shot President Garfield
at a Washington railroad station on 2 July 1881,
was a disappointed office-seeker and a mentally un-
balanced lawyer. When apprehended, he insisted that
he had acted under divine inspiration, and that
Garfield's death would unite the Republican party
and save the Republic. Because he earlier had
worked for Garfield's election, he believed he
deserved a consulship in Paris, and his failure to
be appointed was the immediate motive for the
assassination.
His act catalyzed public concern about the
spoils system and eventually led to the passage of
the Pendleton Act, in December 1882, which estab-
lished a federal Civil Service Commission. Although
civil service reform probably would have been
achieved before the end of the 19th century, the
murder of Garfield stimulated immediate legislative
action.
3. McKinley
McKinley was shot in Buffalo on September 61
1901 by Leon F. Czolgosz, an American of Polish
descent. He was nearly insane, although in his signed
confession he said that he was aware of what he
was doing when he fired the shot. He said that he
knew he would be "catched" and was willing to accept
the consequences of his act. He felt the assassination
to be a "duty", because he believed there should be
no "rulers". Czolgosz was a relatively new convert
to anarchist ideas. He had been particularly impressed
by a speech in Cleveland earlier in the year by the
Russian-born anarchist Emma Goldman. Miss Goldman
had discussed anarchist bomb-throwing and other
terrorist acts, and although she claimed not to believe
in such methods, "she did not think that they should
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be too severely condemned in view of the high
and noble motives which prompted their perpe-
tration". (Cleveland Plain Dealer, 6 May 1901)
During the intermission, Czolgosz asked her to
suggest materials to read, and she recommended
several titles. To his disturbed mind, the speech
and the literature were a call to action.
Thus, an important factor in the assassination
of McKinley was the open exhortation of hatred and
violence against public officials in the speeches
and writings of Bakunin, Miss Goldman, and Johann
Most. Later, Miss Goldman defensively rejected
the idea that circulation of anarchist ruler-
killing concepts had anything to do with Czolgosz's
act. Stressing psychology, she wrote that killers
are "high strung, like a violin string." "They
weep and moan for life, so relentless, so cruel,
so terribly inhuman. In a desperate moment, the
string breaks." (Anarchism and Other Essays, 1911)
Yet, shortly after the assassination and Czolgosz's
execution, she implied approval of the act and, in
her own words, could "bow in reverent silence before
the powers" of the killer's soul.
Many American writers of the time viewed as a
flattering comment on the unlimited liberty of the
press in the U.S. the fact that Goldman's ruler-
hatred and Most's bomb-making instructions could be
freely printed and circulated. An anarchist news-
paper in San Francisco wrote that this unusual
press freedom in effect deterred killers from attempts
on president's lives: "The Anarchists are treated
with sufficiently gross injustice, even in this
country. But they are at least allowed the right
of conducting a peaceful propaganda, and the conse-
quence is that McKinley, hated and despised though
he is, needs no body-guard to protect him from the
attacks of revolutionists." This passage was quoted
in the journal, Outlook, on 10 August 1901, just one
month before McKiiii-677�iiias shot.
The story widely circulated at the time held
that McKinley's murder was organized by anarchists
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with international connections, and that
Czolgosz was merely the pawn of a highly
sophisticated terrorist organization which
had assassinated the heads of states of several
European countries.
Following the assassination and the stories
of international conspiracy, popular anxiety
about the stability of the government and the
danger of internal subversion developed.
Organized reactions included acts of violence
by local citizens in various states against
persons with known anarchist views. In some
cases, individual anarchists were attacked by
angry mobs; in others, vigilante committees
were organized to attack entire anarchist
communities.
The most important anarchists arrested in
the aftermath of the assassination were Emma
Goldman and Johann Most, the German-born preacher
of bomb-throwing. Anarchist leaders were also
arrested in many major cities. In Rochester,
Justice Day of the New York Supreme Court ordered
a grand jury investigation of the city's 100
anarchists. He ordered that "every person found
to be a member of the local society was to be
indicted for conspiracy to overthrow the government
In Cleveland, the police suppressed meetings of
local anarchist groups and the newspaper published
an editorial demanding that Czolgosz's father be
fired from his job as a ditch digger for the city.
11
Vigilantes, like government officials, tended
to make no distinction between philosophical-
individualist anarchists (peaceful) and Communist
anarchists (some peaceful, some violent, in method).
In Spring Valley, Illinois, the site of an anarchist
community of about 500, a citizens' committee visited
the general manager of the Spring Valley Coal
Company and insisted that he discharge every known
anarchist in his employ. The committee also informed
him that there were 2,000 towns-people who were
ready to assist in exterminating the "reds." Near
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McKeesport, Pennsylvania, at the anarchist
colony of Guffey's Hollow, a community composed
primarily of Italian coal miners, 25 anarchist
families fled the community after 300 men wearing
robes resembling those of the Ku Klux Klan and
armed with rifles and shotguns marched on the
community.
Throughout the country, the outraged citi-
zenry indicated their suspicion and a desire for
vengeance and protection. Any group which felt
that it might be suspected of association with
anarchism or with the assassin felt impelled to
make a public statement denouncing the act and
dissociating itself from the killer. Thus, all
five of the Polish newspapers in Buffalo clearly
condemned Czolgosz and denounced anarchism in
strong language.
A significant and lasting effect of the
assassination was the revision of immigration
laws by Congress two and a half years later. An
early sign that strong sentiment favored a hardening
of immigration policy appeared in an editorial in
the Washington Post on 14 September (eight days
after the assassination). The editorial stated:
We parade as a matter of patriotic
pride those dangerous political dissi-
pations which should be a cause of
patriotic sorrow and alarm. We open
our arms to the human sewage of Europe;
we offer asylum to the outcasts and
male factors of every nation.
In his first message to Congress, Theodore Roosevelt
initiated a federal campaign to control anarchists
in order to prevent future assassinations. Not only
anarchists, he declared, but also "all active and
passive sympathisers with anarchists" should be sub-
jected to a national war waged with "relentless
efficiency." Legislation took the form of anarchist-
exclusion ammendments to the immigration laws,
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blocking entry into the country of anarchists
who believe in or advocate overthrow of
governments or assassination of public
officials (Section 2) or who disbelieve in all
governments (Section 38). (Passed in Congress,
3 March 1903). The new legislation was used for
the first time against English anarchist John
Turner, arrested on 23 October 1903 for a
New York speech. The Supreme Court took the
case on 6 April 1904; it rejected Clarence
Darrow's defense. In the majority opinion,
Chief Justice Fuller presumed that "Congress
was of the opinion that the tendency of the
general exploitation of such views is so dan-
gerous to the public weal that aliens who hold
and advocate them would be undesirable additions
to our population."
The activities of native born or naturalized
anarchists were also limited by government action.
Two years after the assassination, the state
legislatures of New York, New Jersey, and Wisconsin
passed laws outlawing the teaching of anarchist
doctrines and limiting the movements and activities
of anarchist organizations within their states.
These laws were more relevant to the Czolgosz case
than the federal ammendments, which could not have
been used to deter men like him because he was born
in the U.S. The Immigration Act of 16 October 1918
went a small step further, providing for the
exclusion and deportation, "any time after entry,"
of those aliens who were anarchists. In 1919
Attorney General A. M. Palmer asked for, but did
not get, tough legislation in the form of a peace-
time sedition act which would make "preaching
anarchy and sedition" a crime under general criminal
statutes for native Amer-3757F.
Nevertheless, Palmer with the assistance among
others of J. Edgar Hoover (Head of the General
Intelligence Division of the Department of Justice)
was able to use the 1918 Act to deport anarchists,
the most important of whom were Goldman and Alexander
Berkman. They and 49 others sailed to Russia on the
ship Buford ("Red Ark") in December 1919.
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The criminal syndicalist laws enacted
partly against the Industrial Workers of the
World ("wobblies") during World War I and
immediately thereafter were part of a pro-
tracted, combined attack of the federal and
state governments. The attack between 1917 and
1920 almost completely disrupted the anarchist
movement in the U.S. Although anarchism was to
be a factor in the Sacco-Vanzetti case, it no
longer attracted public attention after 1920.
The Communists became the new menace.
B. Industrialists
1. Mine Supervisors
Murders committed by Irish immigrant miners
in the coal fields of eastern Pennsylvania in
the 1860's and 1870's were directed against English
or Welsh mine supervisors for a variety of reasons,
including but not limited to economic grievances.
Motives were usually personal. The leaders of
Molly Maguire groups were neither miners nor union
employees. On the contrary, their acts of terrorism
were cited by mine owners to condemn the unions as
perpetrators of violence. For the most part the
leaders were town idlers and toughs; some were
saloon keepers; only the rank and file were actual
miners. The Molly Maguire groups could unleash
their assassins against any supervisor and could
terrorize local people into providing alibis for
the assassins. The groups operated almost without
restraint for several years. Finally, the President
of the Reading Railroad, F. B. Gowen, secretly hired
Alan Pinkerton, who sent a detective (James McParlan)
in October 1873 to penetrate the Molly Maguire
clandestine organization. McParlan was highly success-
ful. He was initiated into the secret MM order, and
over the course of 30 months in the coal fields, sent
out secret reports which identified group leaders
and the assassins. He later surfaced and was the key
witness for the prosecution. His evidence helped
Pennsylvania wipe out the Molly Maguire groups.
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The Molly Maguire terrorism badly hurt
union activity in the coal fields, permitting
the owners to tar the unions with the Molly
Maguire brush.
2. Carnegie Steel Company Manager H. C. Frick
In the 6 July 1892 battle between Carnegie
Steel Company guards (300 armed Pinkerton men)
and striking workers at the Homestead, Pa. plant
site, three Pinkerton men and 10 workers were
killed. Communist-anarchists Emma Goldman and
Alexander Berkman decided upon revenge against
company manager Frick. Berkman first planned to
assassinate Frick-with a bomb, and he tried to
make one, following directions printed in the
widely circulated pamphlet of Johann Most (titled,
Science of Revolutionary Warfare: A Manual of
Instructions in the Use and Preparation of
Nitroglycerine, Dynamite, Gun-Cotton, Fulminating
Mercury, Bombs, Fuses, Poisons, etc., etc.)
published c. 1886. Berkman, working at night in
a New York apartment, was not able to fabricate
a bomb that would detonate. His efforts greatly
worried Emma Goldman, who feared he might not
control the explosion and might kill friends
sleeping in the apartment. She later recounted:
"What if anything should go wrong - but, then, did
not the end justify the means? Our end was the
sacred cause of the oppressed and exploited
people...What if a few should perish? - the
many would be made free and could live in beauty
and comfort." Berkman's difficulty was that the
dynamite "was wet", and he decided to use a
revolver and knife. He entered Frick's Pittsburgh
office on 23 July 1892 and fired two shots and
stabbed him twice, but Frick recovered.
Berkman served 22 years (1892-1914) in jail
for his effort. He failed to eliminate Frick or
to achieve his political propaganda purposes.
Frick became stronger and even more immovable in
labor :matters. Berkman's act hurt the cause of the
strikers. And it created a sharp split among
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Communist-anarchists. Goldman and Most
engaged in public mutual recriminations,
a major scandal in anarchist history, which
contributed significantly to the disintegra-
tion of the anarchist movement in America.
In articles published after the assassination
attempt, Most modified his views on terrorist
acts, and stated that he had greatly over-esti-
mated the importance of terrorism. He concluded
that terrorism was not practicable where the
revolutionary movement was yet in its infancy and
where, as a result, governmental reprisals could
put an end to all radical activities. Berkman's
act had aroused a lynching fury among the American
public, and Most, having completed his ninth
prison year, was apparently henceforth to live
less dangerously.
Berkman and Goldman in planning the murder
made a mistake common to many anarchists. They
believed conditions in the U.S. to be as
oppressive as in Russia and failed to distinguish
between democracy and despotism. In addition,
they lacked understanding of how Americans would
react to the assassination attempt. :Finally,
they failed to recognize that modern police
forces and efficient concentration of state power
made their tactic far out of date. Goldman had
second thoughts. In 1928, after her deportation,
she wrote: "I feel violence in whatever form
never had brought and probably never will bring
constructive results."
III. Bomb-Throwing, Bomb-Planting, Bomb-Mailing
A. The Chicago Haymarket Affair
A bomb was thrown at Chicago's Haymarket Square
(during the McCormick works strike) on 4 May 1886 at
a unit of 180 police acting to disperse a peaceful
crowd listening to Communist-anarchist lecturers.
Eight policemen were killed, and 67 wounded. The
national public was outraged, and a cry for vengeance
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against anarchists quickly rose, especially in
Chicago. Eight anarchists were condemned for
"conspiracy", although there was no persuasive
evidence that any of them had thrown the bomb. But
one thing, their naive worship of the liberating
virtues of dynamite, weighed very heavily against
them, both with the jury and a large section of
national public opinion. Johann Most had already
published his pamphlet giving detailed instructions
for bomb-manufacture. Also, one year before the
Haymarket incident, on 25 February 1885, Alarm,
the English-language organ of the Chicago anarchists,
had published an article beginning with the words
"Dynamite! Of all the good stuff, that is the stuff!"
The article gave minute directions as to "stuffing
several pounds of that sublime stuff into an inch
pipe" and placing it "in the immediate vicinity of a
lot of rich loafers...."
The Chicago eight were all members of the Inter-
national Working People's Association, which had issued
a manifesto in October 1883 for "Destruction of the
existing class rule, by all means, i.e., by energetic,
relentless, revolutionary, and international action."
At least one fanatic in the group, Louis Lingg, was
similar in his zeal for the bomb to the Russian
Nechayev and to the German-American Johann Most. As he
was taken from the court Lingg said,
I declare again, frankly and openly,
that I am in favor of using force.
I have told Captain Schaack, and I
stand by it. "If you cannonade us,
we shall dynamite you."
By the afternoon of May 4, Lingg and his colleagues,
working in his Chicago apartment had completed about
50 round and pipe-shaped dynamite contrivances with
caps attached. Lingg and a friend transported the
bombs to an agreed meeting place, and distributed them.
On the way home, pausing at a police station, Lingg
told a comrade that "it might be a beautiful thing" to
throw one or two bombs into the station; but he was dis-
suaded. Soon thereafter, he had to be dissuaded from
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throwing one at a police wagon. During the trial,
however, it was never proved that he threw the bomb
at the Haymarket Square meeting.
The Haymarket incident, more than any other,
conditioned Americans to equate anarchism, and
socialism, with violence and murder. Union men
thereafter drew away from the anarchist agitators
and rejected association with all revolutionary ideas
and many liberal ideas. Despite the effort of many
American and British liberals to have the Chicago
eight set free, five were hanged; among them was the
editor of Alarm, Parsons, who was not at the Square
when the bomb was thrown. Three were sentenced to
long terms; in 1893 they were pardoned by Governor
Altgeld, who was subjected to a storm of criticism.
Another result of the incident was the hovering
threat of legislation which would have meant deporta-
tion to all alien anarchists. The threat of such a
law, not passed until 1918, deterred a large number of
those remaining in the anarchist movement. The journal
Alarm survived editor Parsons by only two years;
ITEWiter-Zeitung became moderate, eventually moving to
the socialist camp.
B. Bomb-Killing of Idaho's Ex-Governor
In Idaho during the 1890's, a small scale war was
conducted between the radical Western Federation of
Miners (later to become a subordinate unit to William
Haywood's Industrial Workers of the World--the "wobblies")
and the mine owners, who were assisted by local sheriffs
and state militia. By May 1897 the situation had become
so tense that President Boyce of the Western Federation
of Miners urged every local union in Idaho and Colorado
to organize a rifle corps, "so that in two years we can
hear the inspiring music of the martial tread of 25,000
armed men in the ranks of labor." The war reached a climax
in the spring of 1899, when the $250,000 lumber mill of
the Bunker Hill Company was destroyed by the miners with
dynamite. Frank Steunenberg, Governor of Idaho, besieged
by the mine owners seeking redress, asked President McKinley
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for Federal troops and declared Shoshone County in
a state of "insurrection and rebellion."
McKinley ordered several companies of negro
soldiers from Brownsville, Texas to the scene to put
down the "insurrection." They rounded up striking
miners by the thousands and put them into specially
built "bull-pens." White troops closer than Texas
had been available, but, in the view of Haywood, black
soldiers were used to "incite the miners" and to press
an indignity upon them.
The miners blamed Governor Steunenberg for all
their troubles in the mining country in the late 1890's.
After leaving office, he returned to sheep-ranching.
Six years later, on 30 December 1905, he opened the
gate of his home at Caldwell. To the gate was tied
a piece of fish-line, one end of which was attached to
a bomb, which instantly killed him.
Harry Orchard, a member of the Western Federation
of Miners, was hunted down and arrested by James McParlan,
the Pinkerton detective who had smashed the Molly Maguires
earlier. Orchard confessed to 26 murders, mostly of
mining bosses in Colorado and Idaho, including the
bomb-assassination of Steunenberg, at the direct instiga-
tion of Haywood. "Wobblies" leader Haywood was arrested
in Colorado, and illegally extradited to Idaho in
February 1906. (A later application on his behalf to
the Supreme Court for a writ of habeas corpus was denied
eight to one. In his dissent, JUFTTEJ McKenna declared
that the crime of kidnapping had been committed, pure
and simple.) Haywood seemed destined to be found
guilty, but huge and threatening labor demonstrations
were held in May 1907 in major American cities, intimi-
dating American political figures. The judge recommended
acquittal. Haywood was acquitted in July 1907, although
the entire jury believed, privately, that he was guilty
of ordering Orchard to commit the murder. Radical-labor
organizations, particularly the "wobblies," were
encouraged to continue with labor violence, and they
were convinced that their threats in demonstrations had
preserved their leader for further agitation. McParlan
and other men who examined Orchard were convinced that he
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was not lying about Haywood's complicity, but,
unlike the Molly Maguires trials in the 1870's,
overwhelming public and labor sympathy was on the
side of the accused.
Haywood's "wobblies" advocated violence and
"direct action", such as arming Western miners and
calling industrial strikes in order to displace
capitalism with syndicalism. They also openly
opposed American participation in World War I.
Haywood was arrested for sedition in September 1917,
convicted in August 1918, and in September given a
20-year sentence. But when released on bail, he
sailed incognito to Russia, where he died in the
Kremlin hospital in March 1928. His militant "direct
action" and syndicalist appeals, particularly during
the war, created strong public opposition. That
opposition, and the severe penalities imposed by
the federal government, were factors in the decline
of the "wobblies". Just prior to Haywood's arrest,
with other "wobblies" officers, agents of the
Department of Justice raided offices of the IWW from
coast to coast, "without a search warrant".
(William D. Haywood, Bill Haywood's Book, New York:
International Publishers, 1929, p. 326) Immediately
after he was sentenced in September 1918, a huge
bomb exploded at the entrance of the Federal Building
in Chicago. No suspect was seized, but public condem-
nation of Haywood intensified.
C. New York Union Square Explosion
The explosion of a bomb in Union Square during an
attempt to hold a socialist public meeting at the end
of March, 1908, was the work of Selig Silverman, a
member of Berkman's Anarchist Federation of America;
Silverman was a Russian-born radical who had been reading
anarchist literature. The immediate cause was petty:
having been manhandled one day by the New York police, he
went home and made a bomb from the top of his brass bed-
stead. 'He half-filled it with nails broken in two, put
nitroglycerin on the nails and gun powder on the nitro-
glycerin, then put in a short fuse, and waited. When a
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group of socialists tried to hold a mass meeting
and police intervened, he seized the ppportunity.
But in his anxiety to kill policemen, he tried to
light the fuse with his cigarette, inserting the
light in the wrong hole. The immediate explosion
killed the man by his side and "frightfully"maimed
Silverstein. All accounts say he was a mentally
disturbed individual, only a dabbler in serious
anarchism.
The bomb incident, and earlier activities of
anarchists, had by then stirred up a hysterical
and futile discussion in the press. The main point
was that a near-repetition of the Haymarket incident
had occurred and it seemed impossible to create
conditions which would prevent future recurrences.
Two key New York papers took different lines.
The Times took a hard line, linking the socialists
with Silverstein as "one; if not in heart and purpose,
at least one in the effects they produce..." and
"there is no place for these teachers and these
teachings in this republic." (Quoted in Current
Literature, May 1908) The Tribune warned against
sweeping denunciations and broad inferences, stating
that the city officials should have granted permission
for the meeting, as once promised. It claimed that
London and Paris were more tolerant, and the results
were not worse than in New York, even though anarchists
"are more numerous and powerful abroad than here." The
Tribune continued, in a coolheaded way, to insist that
history teaches nothing on preventive action:
Like all the crimes of the anarchists,
this one was without rhyme or reason.
The bomb was to be thrown, no matter
what the police did. And it is this utter
lack of reason which makes anarchy so hard
to deal with. It is never possible to
anticipate its outbreaks, because- it never
has anything to. gain by its crimes. It is
possible to guard against crime that is
logical or that is moved by. reasonable
self-interest,, but there is no. logic in
bomb-throwing. Every once in so often
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among the many men who brood too much
over social disorders or talk too much
over the coming revolution, a man or
group of men suddenly determine to
� commit some striking crime as a "protest"
against society. They kill a ruler who
is no different from other rulers and who
is absolutely sure to be succeeded by
another like himself. They murder a
priest at the altar not because he has
ever done anything to offend them. They
attack a chief of police for nothing
that any one can find out. They explode
a bomb amidst a number of innocent and
� unoffending men. They assert their
opposition to organized society, but none
of these deeds affects or is even remotely
likely to affect the organization of
society. They seem to be moved by a sort
of vanity for reminding society with sen-
sational publicity of its dangers and for
showing now and then that their threats
of revolution are not all empty air. On
the problem of anticipating and guarding
against the moments when the incessant
talk of "revolution" indulged in not by the
anarchists alone will lead hotheads or vain
fools to the use of dynamite, unfortunately
this Union Square incident sheds no light.
(Quoted in Current Literature, May 1908.)
An influential journal of the time, Current Literature,
pointed to the "striking futility" that prevailed in the
general discussion about remedies. Sargent, the
commissioner general of immigration, wanted a new law
requiring immigrants to present certificates of good charac-
ter as a condition of entry to the U.S., but the secretary
of another federal department believed it would only
produce a lively trade in forged passports. The Phila-
delphia Ledger suggested bringing about "so stable and
just a se-TIM-Rent of industrial and economic conditions"
as to "sweeten the lives of the submerged" and stop the
breeding of anarchists. The New Orleans Picayune
"seems to say something, but doesn't, when it observes
that 'the anarchist evil can be met in only one way,
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namely by firm and stern repression." The
New York Times suggested that people in high places
(the rich) could help by awakening to a sense of
duty and leading better lives. The New York Sun
suggested a federal law making it a penal offence
to have dynamite or other deadly explosives in
possession, and giving the police the right to make
domiciliary visits. It admitted, however, that the
constitutionality of such a law was doubtful, and
then suggested uniform legislation of that sort by
all the states. (Current Literature, May 1908)
The journal cites other suggested remedies for
anarchist terrorism. A man wrote to the New York
Evening Post, saying: "To prevent any one �from
speaking on behalf of anarchy is to give to the cause
of anarchy the most formidable weapon it has ever
possessed, a weapon even more dangerous than the bullet
of Czolgosz, for if our people were once to say to
the anarchist; 'You have no other means for the
propagation of your 'doctrines except assassination,'
they would give him the first real excuse for his
detestable crimes." The Evening Post endorsed this
view, proposing that an anarchist not be punished
for his special beliefs but only for his crime. The
Post went on to say:
There is one way, and only one way,
to combat it effectively, and that is 1py
reason. If we cannot marshal arguments
to destroy the fallacies and the half-
truths upon which the structure 'Of
socialistic and anarchistic theory rests,
our case is hopeless. Argument with
ignorant, hungry, and excited men is,
obviously, a formidable undertaking, but
still it is the only method in a free
country like this.. Certainly; the clubs
of the police will never put sound ideas
into People's heads.
The commissioner of police of New York City,
Mr. Bingham, also had a remedy. He thought there
should be a fund of $100,000 to establish a "squad
of secret police" to cope with the anarchists. But
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the novelist, David Graham Phillips, thought
otherwise:
Secret police have not stopped
anarchist' outrages in the Continent.
Why should they here? Do not the
English and the Swiss manage that sort
of insanity best? Believing that to
close mouths is to stop the safety valve,
they permit talk without limit. Then
they treat the criminal as a common
criminal. It seems to me we would do
well to cease inflating that sort of
criminal cranks as semi-political
persons, and to deal with them as
dangerous lunatics... (Quoted in Current
Literature, May 1908)
But the examples of England and Switzerland were
not analogous ones and appear not to be entirely
relevant. Their populations were far more
homogeneous and stable than America's because the
identification of the citizen with his own govern-
ment was far more immediate than in immigrant-heavy
America. And the bombings were in fact political
acts.
D. Los Angeles Times Building Explosion
In 1903, Samuel Gompers, unable to control the
dynamiting terror of the Iron Workers union--part of
his AFL--had warned the police that he would protect
bomb-planters if union men. The public, he said,
must not expect the unions to turn over the rioter
or terrorist, for that "would be prejudicing his case
before it went to the jury." (Interview published
in the New York World, 7 June 1903) On 1 October 1910,
James B. McNamarT-5T-the militant Iron Workers--a man
professionally competent, or "handy with the sticks"--
dynamited and completely destroyed the Los Angeles
Times building of General H. G. Otis, a conservative,
anti-union publisher. Twenty persons were killed.
McNamara was not immediately apprehended; he was
shielded by his union and by Gompers' AFL. He was
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later arrested with an accomplice in April 1911,
but only because W. J. Burns, a detective hired
by a builders' association earlier to investigate
a whole string of McNamara's dynamitings, knew of
his guilt. In order to remove the two men from
Detroit to Los Angeles, Burns illegally and secretly
took them across state lines. The accomplice impli-
cated McNamara and his brother John in the Times
dynamiting, and in others.
Gompers, however, declared the jailed McNamaras
innocent. Together with socialist leader Eugene Debs,
he started a campaign calling for massive proletarian
demonstrations to "protest against" (intimidate) the
perpetrators of the "frame up" (court trial). Large
sections of the public believed the union version that
the explosion was caused by a leaky gas system.
Demonstrations took place in most major cities just
before the trial began on 11 October 1911, and Gompers
used vague but threatening language about the future:
when the capitalists "hang a few of us, we will show
them a new way to meet an issue." The AFL collected
a huge fund--a defense fund--from American workers.
Clarence Darrow was retained at a high cost: $50,000
as a retainer and $200,000 over a six-month period
after he went to Los Angeles. Armed with popular
sentiment and competent legal counsel, the AFL chal-
lenged detective Burns9 evidence.
Darrow's strategy was to select jurors with
meticulous care. But during the weeks of protracted
jury selection, the District Attorney, aware that some
of the prospective jurors had been taking bribes from
the defense lawyers' aides, planted dictographs in
Darrow's rooms, and state agents in Darrow's employ.
On 29 November, the District Attorney's detectives
arrested two of Darrow's agents and charged them with
bribing prospective jurors. Darrow was permitted to
save his good name only by retreating.
His retreat took the form of impelling the McNamara
brothers to plead guilty, inasmuch as he had been
assured the District Attorney would recommend leniency
should confessions be entered in the record. After
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going over the matter with them for thebetter
part of a day in their cell, Darrow attained pleas
of guilty from both. (Darrow later denied that
fear of being prosecuted for bribery had anything
Aorrdo- with the dramatic reversal. But the District
.Attorney, the Judge, and Burns all held the view
that Darrow had been caught in a serious crime and
acted to escape clean.) On 1 December, the defense
withdrew the pleas of "not guilty," McNamara pleading
guilty to the Times building bombing and John to
another dynamiting. On 5 December, James was
Sentenced to life imprisonment and John to 15 years.
� The effect of the confessions on the general
public was one of shock followed by bitterness against
the AFL, the socialists and the Iron Workers union.
Samuel Gompers predicted, at a tearful interview, that
the confessions "won't do the labor movement any good."
The result of the bombing and the trial was a sharp
reduction in the militancy of the AFL. President Taft,
five days after the opening of the trial, was informed
in Los Angeles of further finds of detective Burns
about dynamitings to be perpetrated. On his return
to Washington, Taft ordered the Department of Justice
to make a full investigation, and incriminating evidence
against high union leaders was discovered. On
1 October 1912, the federal government placed on trial
54 AFL officials, charging them with transporting
dynamite on passenger trains for unlawful purposes
or conspiring to cause such violations of Federal
laws--38 defendants were convicted and sentenced,
including the president of the Iron Workers. The
trade unions and the Socialist Party, which had been
on the brink of an effective alliance, split, weakening
both. Public support fell away from Gompers and Debs,
and the press in all major cities persuasively compared
the AFL trade unions to the Molly Maguires and the Mafia.
The press was aided in this campaign by access to the
federal and private investigations which revealed that
between 1905 and 1910 the Iron Workers union had
attained higher wages and shorter hours by terrorizing
employers, and by dynamiting approximately 150 buildings
and bridges in the U.S. and Canada.
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E. New York Tenement House Explosion
On 4 July 1914, a bomb exploded in the apartment
of three anarchists living in a Lexington Avenue,
New York City tenement house, killing all three.'
in general,
their own
of
amateurism, but the men were defended as heroes in
Emma Goldman's anarchist journal, Mother Earth. The
issue of July 1914 was dedicated "Tirail7 FRYTTred
dead." One writer made an open appeal for "offensive
violence."
Local newspapers,
and
the American press
declared that the
men
had been victims of
incompetence.
It
was
a clearcut example
They have guns, they have cannon,
they have soldiers, they have disci-
pline, they have armies--and we have
dynamite. To oppression, to tyranny,
to jails, clubs, guns, and navies,
there is but one reply: dynamite!
This lack of practical wisdom was one of several
characteristics which distinguished the American
anarchist from the politically more mature American
Communist.
F. San Francisco Preparedness Day Explosion
In the course ofaPreparedness Day parade in
San Francisco on 22 March 1916, a dynamite bomb
exploded near parade ranks, which included the Mayor
and the Governor of California. Ten. persons were
killed and 36 were wounded. Newspapers throughout
the country called for action against "the radicals
who did it." The-men arrested included Thomas J. Mooney,
. a leader of streetcar workers,py:the,Bay Area; and
:Warren Billings, a local labOr-Union organizer and
'advocate of direct action.' The prosecution's case
:.was not strong, and at some points internally contra-
dictory, but in February 1917,, Mooney was convicted
and sentenced to. hang. *Labor and. liberal opinion
in America held.thatthe'men had been "framed" and sent
to prison in an atmosphere of patriotic and anti-labor
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hysteria.
President Wilson, seeking liberal and labor
support after America's entry into the war, was
under pressure to save Mooney. In Petrograd,
American Ambassador Francis was the target of a
demonstration, at which the workers and sailors
shouted for the release of "Muni." In January
1918, President Wilson asked California's governor
to postpone execution; in March, sailors and
workers staged another demonstration at the American-
embassy in Petrograd, and through their interpreter,
Louise Berger, a close friend of Berkman (still in
jail) and Emma Goldman, the sailors announced their
decision to hold Ambassador Francis as a hostage
until "Muni" and Berkman (among others) were re-
leased. In the presence of the demonstrators,
Francis cabled Washington, and he reportedly
promised them to work for the release of the men.
In the same month, Wilson addressed an open letter
to Governor Stephens, urging that Mooney be given
a new trial immediately or his death sentence commuted.
The Russian sailor-worker threat to hold the
ambassador hostage played a major role in Wilson's
action. As a result, execution was postponed, and
after the war, the Governor commuted the sentence.
However, Mooney remained in jail for 21 years, even
though it was never convincingly established that
either he or Billings had planted the bomb.
G. Italian-Born Anarchist Bombings and Palmer's
"Red Raids"
On 28 April 1919, the mayor of Seattle, who had
been denouncing the Red Menace, received a bomb
package-in the mail. On 29 April, a maid at the Atlanta
home of Senator Thomas Hardwick, former chairman of the
Committee on Immigration, opened a package that blew
Off her hands. On 30 April, in New York, Charles Caplan,
on his way home by. subway, read in a newspaper about the
'description of the bomb-package in the Atlanta incident,
rushed. back. downtown to the parcel, room in the main post
office where-he worked, and surveyed the 16 packages he
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had set aside :for insufficient postage. All of �
them were labeled "Novelties.," all stamped With
a label from Gimbel's just like the one in the
newspaper account. They were addressed to the �
Postmaster, Attorney General Palmer (who had been
appointed one Imonth earlier), Justice WendellAIOlmes,.
the Secretary of Labor, the .Commissioner .of
Immigration, Judge K. M. .Landis (who tad recently
presided at an anarchist.trial), Senator Lee
Overman (chairman of a committee investigating.
bolshevism), J. P. Morgan, John D.:Rockefeller,
and others.. Caplan notified his superiors, who
directed a bomb expert to open one parcel, which
was discovered to conceal a highly .explosive �bomb-
The post office department began .a search for J3'ther
bombs 36 in _all were found, .some on the way -to. .the
west coast, and all had been mailed in New Nbrkwith
the false ,Gibel's label. The sender or senderswere,
not found, but the general public was frightened.
Various theories :were advanced; the most widespread
was'lhat "A nationwide bomb 'conspiracy, which the
police authorities say has every earmark .of
BOlshevik origin....has been discovered. "f
(NOW York Times, 1 May .1919)
A. Mitchell Palmer, who took office. in:March.I9I9.
,as Attorney General, had assumed a moderate eDUTSe,'
ilesisting.powerful:pressure from CongreS, the :press,
and the public for :decisive action against the "Reds".
He to defend the civil and legal rights .of
.all men provided they did not advocate use.of*violence-
.
On the -eve of Palmer'.s appointment as Attorney
H,General,the American press anticipated: that at least
7,000 radicals would be rounded up and deported .by the
� Department of Justice. But after Palmer took office
.there,were,no further reports of impending large-scale
roundups..
The new Attorney General. also refused toause
.outside help, In a sharp Shift of policy early_in.
.1919, former Attorney. General, Gregory had ordered the
dissolution of the Department's ties to the American
Protective League, a private organization :of about
250,000 members that assisted the Department'si3ureau
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of Investigation during the war and for several
months thereafter. Palmer re-affirmed the
Department's desire to have the League disband.
Several weeks after he became Attorney General,
he declared:
Espionage conducted by private individuals
or organizations is entirely at variance
with our theories of government, and its
operation in any community constitutes a
grave menace to that feeling of public
confidence which is the chief force making
for the maintenance of good order.
.Three weeks later, in an interview in Cleveland,
-Palmer asked the League to stop sending him infor-
mation about radical activities:
Their continued work of watching meetings
of Socialists, Bolsheviki, and other anti-
government bodies is unnecessary and is
fully covered by the United States Secret
Service...There is no way to prevent them
sending the reports, but they are not
wanted.
,The New York Times complained "The Attorney General
has perhaps been a little hasty in telling �the patriotic
and defensive societies that their help in guarding the
Republic is neither needed nor welcome." (Issues of
land 2 April 1919)
Soon after Palmer took office in March 1919, Governor
4, M,_COx of Ohio requested Permission to examine material;
collected by the American Protective League And turned
over to the Department, dealing with German wartime
propaganda in Ohio schools. Palmer refused the request,
explaining that the files contained mainly "gossip,
hearsay information, conclusions, and inferences," and
that it was "our opinion that information of this charac-
'ter could not be used without danger of doing serious
"wrong to individuals who Were'Probably innocent:"
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Even after the serious May Day riots, instigated
in major American cities by mobs attacking radicals
at their meetings or parades, Palmer insisted on the
basic legal rights of citizens not advocating violence.
The New York Times on 4 May derided the "policy of
tolerance which had marked the attitude of the
Department of Justice...it must be dropped for one of
vigorous prosecution if the Bolshevist movement is to
be held in check."
In mid-May, Luigi Galleani, the leading figure among
Italian anarchists in America, was deported from the
East Boston Immigration Station. Shortly afterward,
on 2 June, a bomb exploded at the Washington home of
Palmer. Windows of nearby houses were shattered, in-
cluding those of Assistant Secretary of the Navy
Franklin Roosevelt who lived directly across the street.
Apparently the bomb had exploded prematurely and killed
its carrier. Parts of the body were found on the street,
and one part was found on the Roosevelt doorstep.
Pamphlets entitled Plain Words (printed by Italian-born
anarchists in May 1919), were scattered on the street
warning that "there will have to be bloodshed."
Do not say we are acting cowardly because
we keep in hiding, do not say it is abomi-
nable; it is war, class war, and you were
the first to wage it under cover of the
powerful institutions you call order, in
the darkness of your laws, behind the funds
of your boneheaded slaves.
Within an hour of the explosion at Palmer's house,
bombs exploded in eight cities in public buildings and
the homes of government officials and businessmen. The
simultaneous bomb explosions in other cities included the
New York home of Judge Charles Nott (a watchman was killed),
a church in Philadelphia, the Boston home of Judge Hayden
who had dealt severely with arrested May Day radicals, the
Newtonville home of Representative Leland Powers who had
sponsored an anti-anarchy bill in the Massachusetts state
legislature, and the Pittsburgh homes of U.S. District
Judge W. H. Thompson who had once presided over a prose-
cution of Italian-born anarchist Carlo Tresca and of
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Chief Inspector W. W. Sibray of the Bureau of
Immigration. Palmer later told a Senate investi-
gating committee:
I remember...the morning after my house
was blown up, I stood in the middle of the
wreckage of my library with Congressmen
and Senators, and without a dissenting
voice they called upon me in strong terms
to exercise all the power that was
possible...to run to earth the criminals
who were behind that kind of outrage.
In this way, Palmer shifted his moderate stance and
set out on a vigorous course of investigating, arresting,
and prosecuting various sects of radicals.
Palmer's first move,on 1 August 1919, was to create
a General Intelligence .Division in the Department of
Justice: its function was to collect information about
radicals (mostly aliens) and coordinate the results with
information from other government agencies. But still
he took no action against the radicals, despite the
contagion of hysteria and emotion spreading among the
public and Congressional figures who genuinely feared
a "Red" plot to disrupt the country and seize power.
Congress and the press insisted that the nation-wide�
steel strike which began in September was inspired and
led by radicals; in the fail a storm of criticism broke
around him for refusing to act against the oncoming
"Red revolution." Still, on 15 October, he opposed
proposals for immigration restriction then being urged
upon Congress; the New 'York Times editors lost patience,
deploring his "sentimentality." (Issue of 17 October 1919)
Senator McKellar, after visiting the Department of Justice
to hear Palmer's side of the matter, reported that "The
trouble is that we have got a very liberal provision in
our Constitution about the freedom of the press and
freedom of speech." Palmer only reluctantly accepted
the need--as that need was dinned into his ears from
"every editorial sanctum in America," as he put it--to do
"something and do it now, and do it quick, and do it in
a way that would bring results to stop this sort of thing
in the United States."
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His critics had insisted that deportation was
the chief remedy, and Palmer was to discover it was the
only legal action he could take successfully against
most radicals, 90 percent of whom were foreign born.
According to the Immigration Act of 1917, as amended
in October 1918, any alien anarchist, no matter how
pacific his beliefs, was deportable. So was any
alien advocating use of violence against property,
public officials, or the government, or who belonged
to an organization which advocated the use of violence.
The deportation statutes, however, gave no deportation
authority to the Department of Justice. Alien
violators could be arrested only on warrants issued by
the Secretary of Labor; their cases were heard by an
immigration inspector and they could be deported only
on order signed by the Secretary of Labor. With the
concurrence of Labor Secretary Wilson, Palmer and his
aides decided to arrest members of the Union of Russian
Workers. The Union was a social club of lonely Russian
immigrants and its members had never been guilty of
disorder or crime. But the Union's literature was
radical. Department of Justice agents raided meeting
places of the Union in 12 cities on the second anniversary
of the Russian Revolution, 7 November 1919; in New York
city alone, 650 members were arrested although only 27
arrest warrants had been issued, and in many instances,
brutality was used against the arrested persons. Of the
650, 43 members of the Union were deported, while the
other people arrested were released after questioning.
Many swore they had been beaten and threatened while being
questioned.
For the first time Palmer had acted in accordance
with the view that in a national "emergency," security
of the country took precedence over concern for basic
constitutional rights. Also for the first time the public
approved of his action; the public approved especially
the deportation of 51 anarchists to Russia on 21 December
on the Buford (the "Red Ark"). His next targets were the
Communist and the Communist Labor parties.
Palmer's aides learned from the November roundups
that many arrested aliens exercised their right to
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counsel. A section of Rule 22 of the immigration
regulations declared that the arrested alien "at the
beginning" of his hearing "shall be apprised that he
may be represented by counsel." The Justice Depart-
ment prevailed upon the Immigration Commissioner to
change the regulations to read that the arrested
alien shall be advised of his right of counsel at the
beginning of his hearing "or at any rate as soon as
such hearing has proceeded sufficiently in the
development of the facts to protect the Government's
interests..." The next legal hurdle was to secure
proper search and arrest warrants. The Fourth Amendment
to the Constitution stipulates that "no Warrants shall
issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or
affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be
searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
Temphasis supplied) The mass arrests contemplated made
it difficult to acquire properly sworn affidavits with
the necessary detailed descriptions of the place to be
searched and persons to be arrested. Only by sending
forward grossly incomplete affidavits to the Bureau of
Immigration in the Department of Labor were search
warrants acquired. As for arrests, Palmer's lieutenants
acted on the premise--not supported by the law--that
membership alone was sufficient basis for arresting
Communist Party and Communist Labor Party persons. When,
on 2 January 1920, arrests were made in meeting places and
homes of members in 33 cities, thousands of arrests were
made without warrants. Immigration officers, holding
warrants issued by the Department of Labor, waited in
detention centers while Department of Justice agents
rounded up all persons attending Communist meetings.
Captives, approximately 6,000 in all, were then brought in
and matched against the warrants.
Mopping-up operations continued for several days,
and smaller raids were carried out in many parts of the
country over the following six weeks. In Massachusetts,
for example, there were 14 raids; in Boston, 500 aliens
were marched through the streets in chains and jailed
in poor conditions. Over 3,000 persons were arrested;
about 3,000 other suspects were taken into custody, held
for periods ranging from a few hours to several months,
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and then released without ever having been
officially arrested. Persons found in the homes
of those arrested were also taken to police
headquarters, in many cases despite the absence of
search and arrest warrants. Because of the mass
nature of the procedure, many mistakes were made.
Even among aliens at party meetings, a large number
were not members. Some whose names appeared on
membership lists were found to be illiterate and
totally uninterested in Communism. In Lynn,
Massachusetts, 39 men, arrested and held overnight,
had come together in a meeting hall often used by
radicals solely for the purpose of forming a coopera-
tive bakery.
During the Red Raids of early January 1920,
Department of Justice agents avoided violence. However,
in many areas police assisted in rounding up and bringing
in prisoners, and frequently members of private
patriotic organizations--of the kind Palmer nine months
earlier had spurned--helped conduct the raids. These
police and private assistants, along with agents
temporarily recruited and added to the Bureau of
Investigation, probably inflicted a large share of the
beatings reported.
On 5 January, the New York Times editors apologized
to Palmer for questioning his Department's "vigor" in
"hunting down the enemies of the United States." The
Nation, the New Republic, and 12 prominent lawyers
(including Roscoe Pound and Felix Frankfurter) condemned
the mass arrests as being clearly illegal.
Palmer had developed presidential aspirations which
began to weigh heavily in his actions, and he was anxious
to proceed with deportation, the next step. In late
February 1920, he promised an audience of clubwomen
that they would soon witness a "second, third and fourth
Soviet Ark" sailing from New York. However, a new man,
L. F. Post, had become Acting Secretary of the Department
of Labor. He discovered that some of the detained persons
had been imprisoned for two months, and that attendance
at a meeting was the only evidence against them. He
demanded all the records from the Immigration Commissioner's
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office and reviewed them carefully; cancelling
warrants where evidence seemed clearly insufficient,
dismissing cases of "automatic" membership (men
transferred without their knowledge from other
oi-ganizations), and releasing aliens held on
illegally seized evidence. By 10 April, Post had
decided 1,600 cases, cancelling arrest warrants in
1,141, or 71 percent of them. He also ordered the
release of many others for whom warrants had not been
obtained. In many cases, he reduced the amount of bail.
However, he did order the deportation of aliens clearly
members of the Communist Party even when they appeared
to have little understanding of Communist doctrine.
Finally, of about 3,000 persons originally held for
deportation, only 446 were sent out of the country.
This deportation probably reduced the incidence
of killings and bombings. As to the assumed danger
of revolution, the Communists and anarchists did not have
such a capability. Prior to May Day 1919 and May Day
1920 Palmer and his aides predicted some drastic act
of subversion on the part of Communists, but no such act
occurred. Most of the evidence which convinced his
aides in the Department of Justice that the government
was in danger was derived from printed matter collected
by the General Intelligence Division--matter which
contained optimistic calls to revolt, following the
victory of the Russian Revolution when Communists
everywhere exaggerated their revolutionary strength.
These calls, as one author pat it, "belonged to the realm
of literary make-believe." (T. Draper, The Roots of
American Communism, New York, Viking, 1957, p. 224.) No
action occurred, as a result of the literary appeals.
By the spring of 1920, the general public reconsidered the
theory of the Red Menace in the light of clearer develop-
ments. Bolshevism seemed isolated within Soviet borders.
Bombings had ended abruptly after the explosion in
Palmer's house, and industry was relatively free from
labor strikes.
As for the man who bombed Palmer's house and who
was himself blown to pieces, the Department of Justice
established that he was an Italian-born anarchist of a
dynamite-minded group living in Paterson, New Jersey.
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The threatening leaflet, Plain Words, was also
the work of this group. Sacco and Vanzetti
were members of an East Boston group of Italian-
born anarchists sympathetic to the Paterson
comrades. Their belief in anarchist doctrines
later weighed heavily against them in their
murder trial.
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Principal Sources
"A Review of the World"; Current Literature, May 1908
Louis Adamic, Dynamite, New York, Viking Press, 1934
Alexander Berkman, Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist, New York,
Mother Earth Publishing Company, 1912
Wayne G. Broehl, Jr., The Molly Maguires, Cambridge,
Harvard U. Press, 1964
Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 6, 1901
Stanley Coben, A. Mitchell Palmer: Politician, New York,
Columbia U. Press, 1963
Henry David, The History of the Haymarket Affair: A Study
in the American Social-Revolutionary and Labor-Movements,
New York, 193E3
Richard Drinnon, Rebel In Paradise: A Biography of Emma
Goldman, Chicago, U. of Chicago Press, 1961
M. Edelman and R. J. Simon, "Presidential Assassinations:
Their Meaning and Impact on American Society,"
Ethics, April 1969
Sidney Fine, "Anarchism and the Assassination of McKinley,"
The American Historical Review, July 1955
Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays, New York,
Mother Earth Publishing Company, 1911
William D. Haywood, Bill Haywood's Book, New York,
International Publishers, 1929
Robert Hunter, Violence and the Labor Movement, New York,
MacMillan, 1914
Max Nomad, Apostles of Revolution, New York, Collier Books,
1961
Albert R. Parsons, Anarchism: Its Philosophy and Scientific
Basis, Chicago, Mrs. A. R. Parsons(Publisher), 1887
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IRELAND--SINN FEIN (1916-1921)
In 1914 the British Parliament was considering passage
of a Home Rule Bill for Ireland, which would have given
the Irish a united country with control of purely internal
matters while the British retained control of defense, foreign
policy, customs duties, the postal system and, temporarily,
the police. Ulster County in the Protestant north was
vehemently opposed to domination by Dublin and set up a
volunteer force to oppose the bill by force if necessary.
In return, the southern Irish set up their own force--the
Irish Volunteers. The outbreak of World War I prompted
the British to postpone passage of the bill.
The question of whether or not to support the English
in the war split the republican cause in the south. The
more radical nationalists opposed support and, though a
small minority, kept the name Irish Volunteers. The Volun-
teers, while officially an independent organization, had
been well infiltrated by the Irish Republican Brotherhood
(IRB), a secret organization which demanded total independence
for Ireland. The IRB had been engaged in sporadic, unsyste-
matic-violence since its founding in 1858 and had infiltrated
numerous groups, including the Sinn Fein, a political party
originally dedicated to the use of civil disobedience to gain
independence.
� In 1916 a small group of radical IRB members planned a
rebellion dependent on the use of the Irish Volunteers. The
rebels hoped the population would rally to the:cause. The
result was the so-called Easter Rising of May 1916; the
rising had not been well coordinated And involved only the
occupation of a few public buildingsin'Dublin. The revolt
was quickly smashed as it did not have popular support; it
Was widely condemned in Ireland by those who felt it would
set back the passage of thellome Rule Bill. However, while
the leaders of the rising had been unable to gain a popular
following through their actions-, the British, by their harsh
reaction, aroused public:sympathyfor the-rebels_. The
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British executed 16 of the leaders, who immediately
became martyrs to the cause of independence; and they
arrested some 3,000, many of whom were interned in
England without trial. (Most were released by December
1916.)
The Sinn Fein, led by its President, Eamon De Valera,
capitalized on the martyrdom of the Easter Rising leaders;
during 1917 and 1918, they also made good propaganda use
of another issue--conscription. The British attempt to
impose conscription was resented by many Irish, and the
response to the general strike called by the Sinn Fein
to protest it was impressive. In May 1918 the British
appointed a new Viceroy to Ireland; a Field Marshal of
some fame, Lord French,was given authority to regain con-
trol of the situation. Within a week of his arrival, many
leading Sinn Feiners, including De Valera, had been
arrested.
In the elections of December 1918, the Sinn Fein won
a majority of seats in southern Ireland, although many
Sinn Feiners were in jail. Those elected refused to take
their seats in London and met instead in Dublin; by
April 1919 most of their leaders had been released from
jail and De Valera had escaped. They proclaimed Ireland
a republic and set up a parliament, the Dail Eireann. They
also recruited an army of volunteers, the Irish Republican
Army (IRA). De Valera became President of the Dail as well
as of the Sinn Fein.
The violent struggle began, in uncoordinated fashion,
in January 1919, when a group of young men, called the
Tipperary Brigade, ambushed a wagon loaded with explosives
and killed two policemen guarding it. The act evoked
unanimous indignation, and the killers were denounced as
criminals by the press and clergy. However, such acts
gradually spread,, and in April 1919 De Valera gave a speech
in which he implicitly condoned attacks on the British-
administered Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC);-thus the use
of terror was supported by the head of a popularly-elected
parliament. During 1919, 18 policemen were killed..
The military strategy of the IRA was largely formulated
by Michael Collins, a member of De Valera's cabinet, and
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had two main aspects--guerrilla war and terror. The
former was aimed at destroying weak links in the British
defense system in Ireland and consisted of raids on
defense installations by 30 or more men, the so-called
Flying Columns. In addition, sporadic raids on police
stations were carried out by groups of young men operating
on their own.*
Collin's use of terror was aimed at dislocating the
enemy's intelligence network. A group of some 12 men, named
"The Squad", responsible directly to Collins performed
most of the dramatic acts of terror so destructive to the
British intelligence network in Ireland. Collins built
up his own intelligence network, using informers and
spies widely, to gain a deep knowledge of the British
network. Then, by assassination, he proceeded to eliminate
British spies and informers, as well as police and secret
agents. People became afraid to testify against the Squad;
those who did were liquidated.
In December 1919, with the approval of Collins, the
Tipperary Brigade tried to assassinate Lord French. The
reasoning for this effort (unsuccessful, as were several
others) was as follows:
Why, we asked ourselves, should we
not strike at the very heads of the
British Government in Ireland? It
would arouse the world more to take
an interest in Ireland's case; it
would strike terror into the hearts
of English statesmen, and it would
prove effective in helping to make
British Rule in Ireland impossible.
England would carry on all right
*The Irish made good use of youths. The Irish Boy
Scouts, founded in 1909, had a definite revolutionary
purpose. The boys were given shooting practice as well
as drill and took the following oath;
I promise to work for the independence
of Ireland, never to join England's Armed
Forces and to obey my superior officers.
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with a few policemen less; it
would be more difficult to-carry
on without a Lord Lieutenant.
Besides, there are thousands of
policemen; but there are only a
� few who might become Lord Lieu-
tenant, and they would think
twice of taking the job if they
had to risk being shot.*
Terrorist attacks on the RIC accomplished their
goal; the police force became demoralized and physically
depleted.** In order to bolster their strength, the
British.recruited reinforcements throughout Britain
who came.to.be called the Black and Tans. According to
the :Trish, these men were known criminals released from
prison on condition they join the RIC; the British main-
tainect.that they were carefully selected and were all men
of good character. In July 1920 another group, the
Auxiliaries, was added to the RIC, and given a virtually
free-hand to engage in counter-terror operations. Also in
July the British passed the Restoration of Order to Ireland
Bill giving the military command wide powers to arrest and
imprison without charge or trial anyone suspected of
Sinn Fein associations, to hold witnesses in custody, and
to imprison or fine witnesses for failure to produce
evidence. According to Gaucher,*** the British also
*Breen, Dan, My Fight Eir Irish Freedom, Dublin, Talbot
Press, 1924, pp. 109-10. Cited by Gaucher, p. 181.
**Demoralization on the British side was also reflected
in the resignation of public servants who previously had served
loyally. Even many judges refused to serve. In July 1920, the
magistrates of the city and county of Cork met and "unanimously
declared that they considered it their duty to renounce their
appointments by British law."
***Gaucher, Roland, The Terrorists, Secker and Warburg,
London, 1965.
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established a "Murder Gang" composed of detectives and
given the task of hunting down and killing leaders of the
rebellion.
British reactions to the use of terror by the
republicans were frequently extreme. In November 1920,
Michael Collins carried out his most spectacular terrorist
operation. On what came to be known as Bloody Sunday,
14 suspected British secret agents, sent to track down
Collins and his men, were assassinated, many in their
homes in front of their wives and children. Subsequently,
several hundred British soldiers in search of IRA members
went to a soccer field where some 10,000 people were
watching a game. Apparently without warning, although
the British say a shot was fired first, the troops opened
fire on the crowd, killing some 17 and wounding 50.
The Black and Tans,and particularly the Auxiliaries,
indulged in brutal reprisals for terrorist acts. They
raided and pillaged towns thought to harbor Sinn Feiners,
and gunned down those they suspected. People who had
wished to remain outside the struggle became infuriated
when British troops forced their way into their homes to
carry out ruthless searches, burning and wrecking in the
process. The British, aware of the growing unpopularity
of their cause, felt compelled to levy new troops and inflict
collective reprisals.
In the fall of 1920 the British created two more martyrs
for the republicans. One was an old-time leader of the
Easter Rising, the Mayor of Cork, who died in prison after a
74-day hunger strike. The other was an 18-year old boy,
Kevin Barry, who was hanged for his participation in an
attack on British soldiers. Both of these incidents attracted
world-wide attention and sympathy.* The execution of Barry
*The Barry episode also brought attention to the Irish
claim that as they were engaged in a war their prisoners
should be treated as prisoners of war. The British insisted
on treating them as criminals, as they did not wear
uniforms.
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was particularly counter-productive; it lost British
public support and produced an increase in the number
of attacks on the RIC.
During late 1920 the republican cause gained more
and more international support. De Valera had gone to
the United States in June 1919 to raise money and
mobilize moral support; he remained there until the end
of 1920 and was successful in both. The rebellion
struck a generally sympathetic chord in the U.S.,
particularly among the sizeble body of Irish immigrants.
Even in England there was indignation at reports of
brutal British retaliations. According to Coogan*
In retrospect, one can see that the
British campaign of counter-terror
was doomed both as a military action
and as a weakener of morale. It was
indeed a campaign of half measures,
for the British were fearful of the
effect which a full-scale military
operation...would have on world opinion.
The British themselves apparently concluded that their
harsher methods were ineffective and never used them again.
The British made use of the carrot as well as the
stick in their dealings with the Irish. In early 1920 they
proposed a new approach to Home Rule according to which
there would have been two parliaments (one for the South,
one for the North) with a joint council to determine all-
Irish questions. The British would retain control of foreign
affairs, defense, post office, customs, and so forth. The
Irish rejected :the offer.
The first six months of 1921 were the most destructive
of the struggle. The IRA at this time was having a difficult
time. The British estimated its numbers at 100,000 but it
*Coogan, Timothy Patrick, Ireland Since the Rising,
Frederick A. Praeger, New York, 1966.
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probably numbered no more than 15,000. Coogan estimates
that lack of arms limited the IRA's effective strength
to 3,000. The British at the time had a troop strength
of 50,000 plus the RIC and Auxiliaries.* In June 1921,
the British, under international pressure, suggested
a truce and negotiations. The Irish accepted.
Negotiations dragged on until December,. The main -
problems were complete independence and the status Of
Ulster. The British finally demanded Irish acceptance
of their final proposal--dominion status for Ireland in
exchange for a pledge of loyalty to the Crown; the
partition of Ireland would be made formal. The Irish
delegation was split, with Collins wavering. He finally
agreed, as he felt the IRA could not resume the war. The
decision split Ireland down the middle and resulted in
civil war, during which many heroes of the struggle With
the British, including Michael Collins, were killed. The
radical IRA which opposed the treaty was finally defeated;
in this struggle it did not have the support of the war,..
weary population. In the last days of the conflict the
IRA engaged in almost senseless acts of terrorism against
people and property. The government of the Free State in
turn adopted measures more severe than those the British
had employed, including the imposition of the death penalty
for illegal possession of arms.
*These figures are suggested by Holt, Edgar, Protest
in Arms, the Irish Troubles, 1916-1923, Coward-McCann,
Inc., New York, 1960.
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PALESTINE--THE STERN GANG-LEHI (1939-1948)
�The establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine,
a British trust territory, had long been a goal of
Zionism. The British Balfour Declaration of 1917 had
seemed to promise this, although its language was am-
biguous. In the years after 1917, Jewish immigration
to Palestine was open, providing a steady stream of
Jewish settlers to what had been an overwhelmingly
Arab land. The Arabs resented this influx and began
pushing the British to put an end to the immigration.
The British White Paper of 1939 halting the flow of
Jewish immigrants reflected both the great increase in
immigration resulting from the persecution of the Jews
in Europe and a British desire to get Arab support for
the war effort. The pathetic condition of the thousands
who were turned away from Palestine and left with no
place ,to go aroused tremendous indignation among the
Palestine Jews and among compassionate persons all over
the world.
The Stern Gang was an offshoot of the Irgun Zvai Leumi
(National Military Organization), which itself had branched
off in 1937 from the more moderate, self-defense oriented
Haganah. Irgun's founder, Vladimir Jabotinskiy, argued
that active measures must be taken in the battle for the
establishment of a Jewish state. Irgun recruited and
organized into secret cells youngsters 13 and 14 years of
age. They trained them in the craft of sabotage and
terror and they began by planting bombs in Arab public
places in reprisal for Arab acts of terrorism against the
Jewish population.
Following publication of the British White Paper in
May 1939, the Irgun shifted its attention from the Arabs
to the British, now seen as the main enemy. The day after
the announcement of the new immigration policy, there were
street demonstrations and radio stations were bombed.
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British retaliation was swift*; in a Short time most of
Irguns general Staff,had been jailed. When war broke
out, one of the two main leadersof Irgun, David Raziel,
decided that Irgun should support Britain against Hitler.
The more fanatical Abraham Stern did not agree; he accused-
Raziel-of collaboration.with the British and left Irgun
taking with him a small minority of the organization.*
Stern himself was hunted down and shot to death in
February 1942, and the number of Sternists not in jail
dwindled to about 25. However, late in the same month
the ship Struma, which had been denied permission to land
in Palestine broke apart at sea and sank; 750 Jewish
refugees were drowned. A great surge in public support
for activists resulted', and the followers of Stern began .
to regroup and recruit: They took the name Fighters for
the Freedom of Israel (FFI), but were known among them-
selves by the Hebrew initials LEHI.' The members of the ,
group were mostly in their late teens and early twenties.
They formed a very secretive organization, always armed
and under orders to resist arrest at all costs.
LEHI never numbered more than 200 to 300. It was too
small for guerrilla war and did not have enough weapons
and explosives for sabotage. Its leaders decided that
assassination was the most effective tactic open to them.
LEHI was responsible for the deaths of a number of British
police. Its first major target was the unpopular British
Commissioner in Palestine, Sir Harold MacMichael, who
had made the decision not to permit the Struma to land its
passengers. LEHI made six attempts on 16TITITEriael's life, but
succeeded only in wounding him. British repression of the
'Sternists grew severe;. British tactics included night patrol's,
house searches, curfews, arrests, tortures, hangings.
In May 1944, the fifth anniversary of the White Paper,
Irgunists seized the government Broadcast Station in
*This split resembles that,injhe.iii-Sh_Nationalist.
movement over the question of support for the British
during World War I.
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Ramallah and mined roads, thus ending their war-time
truce with the British. The British retaliated, raiding.
scores of Jewish settlements; innocent people were herded
into large cages, searched, and put into prison without .
trial'. In June a LEHI boy was sentenced to hang for firing
atHa policeman. MacMichael announced that possession of a
gun was an offense punishable by death.
In 1944 LEHI chose as its new assassination target
Lord Moyne, the British High Commissioner for the Near
East. He was based in Cairo. According to Gerold Frank,*
the reasons for his selection were
1/ Moyne pays With his life for his stand.
He follows policy but policy largely
reflects his recommendations
2/ The man appointed to succeed Moyne will
think twice before taking the job and
before following the same course.
3/ The act will demonstrate the motives and
goals of LEHI to the world.**
In November 1944 Lord Moyne was shot and killed in Cairo
by two LEHI members, youths of 22 and 17. They were captured
and hanged.
The news of the assassination was received with horror
almost universally; the Jewish population of Palestine was
particularly concerned at what it saw as a great setback
to their hopes of a negotiated establishment of a Jewish
state. Repressions followed quickly. Arrests were stepped
up, and a six o'clock curfew was announced. Ben Gurion,
the head of the Jewish Agency in Palestine, called for a
four-point program for the repression of terrorists which
included not giving terrorists shelter, firing from their
jobs those who supported terrorism, not submitting to
*Frank, Gerold, The Deed, Simon, and Schuster Inc.,
New York, 1963.
**This reasoning closely parallels that of the Irish
terrorists who in 1919 planned the assassination of Britain's
Crown Lieutenant of Ireland.
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terrorist threats, and .cooperation with the BO.t_ish.
auttiOtities:
The assassination has generally been regarded as
counter-productive because it was so universally con-
demned. However, as Gaucher* points..out, the .act did
have "widespread repercussions" as its planners had
hoped. Frank and Taber** feel that .the shock of the.
assassination may have shaken the British in their deter-
mination to stay and may also have helped to commit the
Jews to deeper involvement. Frank states that
Certainly the end for which the two
(assassins of Moyne) were hanged in
1945 could not have been won in 1948
without decades of political activity
in England, Europe, in.the United
States, in Palestine, and elsewhere....
But there is no doubt that the deed
was one of the great irritations, the
great harrassments which so annoyed
and confused and bedeviled the British
that ultimately they gave the problem
over to the UN and thus opened the
door to the partition of Palestine....
Britain emerged from World War II in a weak position
economically; Palestine was in a state of perpetual communal
strife, with Arab and Jew fighting each other as well as the
British. The moderate Jewish community in Palestine hoped
that, with the election of a Labour government in Britain,
British policy would become more receptive to Jewish petitions;
this did not occur. The moderates who had long opposed and
denounced terrorist methods and had argued that negotiation
was the only approach became frustrated. The repressive
measures being used by the British undermined the position
of the moderates and also won the Jews world-wide sympathy.
Haganah began to cooperate with the Irgun. Irgunists have
claimed that Haganah gave initial approval to the bombing of
*Gaucher, Roland, The Terrorists, Secker & Warburg,
London, 1965.
**Taber, Robert, The War of the Flea, Lyle Stuart,
New York, 1965.
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the King: David Hotel in July 1946 but 'repudiated the
act when it resulted in a massacre. The Jewish' popu-
lation in general began to support a more militant
position. 'Faced with these factors, the 'British had
to decide whether to fight the whole Jewish population
or the Whole Arab population, or to leave and let them.
fight it out. In the face of many pressures, the British
chose to give the problem to the UN and withdraw.
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ALGERIA--THE F.L.N. (1954-1962)
In 1954 Algeria had a population of about one million
Europeans and eight and a half million Moslems. The
Moslem nationalist movement had been gaining strength since
the slaughter in 1945 of at least 1500 (the nationalists
claimed 40,000) Moslems in retaliation for the killing by
Moslems of 100 Europeans. Relations between the two
communities had been tense. The FLN (National Liberation
Front), which organized the initial outburst of violence
in1954, was founded by nine men of no particular fame or
political standing with the aim of achieving independence
for Algeria under FLN leadership. Jureidini says, however,
that until 1958 the goal was some form of sovereignty rather
than absolute independence. (Paul A. Jureidini, Case
Studies in Insurgency and Revolutionary Warfare; Algeria,
1954-1962, American University, Washington, 1963).
The FLN was initially divided into two major sections--the
Internal Delegation based in Algeria had responsibility for
organizing the military aspects of the struggle; the External
Delegation based first in Cairo and later in Tunis �was
responsible for gaining international support, for securing
arms and supplies, and for generating diplomatic support.
There was considerable conflict between the two sections.
A .reorganization in 1956 created a military section and a
political section; a further organizational change in 1958
came with the creation of the Algerian Provisional Government.
The FLN placed considerable emphasis in its planning
on guerrilla warfare. The first phase of its operation was
marked by simultaneous attacks throughout the rural Aures
region of Algeria on 31 October 1954. For the next 15 months
the organization conducted raids, ambushes, and murders in
the rural areas in an attempt to undermine the French
administration and demonstrate its own strength. By the fall
of 1955 it was fairly well established in the mountains and
turned its attention to winning control of the population.
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According to Jureidini, the FLN planned to win
the population's support first through direct terror-
ist attacks on the French authorities and sympathizers
and then indirectly, as the result of French repression
that was sure to follow. The FLN began the systematic
liquidation of those considered pro-French; particularly
people in influential positions such as schoolteachers
and administrators. They combined terror with propaganda
designed to educate the masses and pull them toward the
FLN. The FLN later expanded attacks to include other
nationalists who shared the same goals, but differed as
to technique and represented competition to the FLN
leadership.
The French moved troops into the rural areas to
combat the guerrillas. By 1956 the French anti-guerrilla
campaign began to be so effective in the countryside that
the FLN was forced to shift the emphasis of its program
to the cities.
THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS
Toward the end of 1955 the FLN began to win over the
Moslem population of Algiers. By liquidating informers and
terrorizing the population in general they gained control
of the Casbah (the Moslem sector of the city). By mid-1956
they were ready to attack the European population with the
intent of provoking European retaliation, which, the FLN
believed, would polarize the situation and win them full
support of the Moslems. Throughout 1956 the FLN conducted
a full scale reign of terror in the city of 700,000, using
assassination and indiscriminate bombing. In December alone
there were 120 terrorist incidents.
In the beginning the terrorist organization in Algiers
was simple. There were two types of cells, political and
military, reporting to two deputies who in turn reported to
a single area chief. After reorganization in 1957 the structure
was more complex. Algiers was divided into departments
which in turn were subdivided into areas, then sectors, then
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districts, and finally into three-man cells. The
bombing activity was carried out by a separate depart-
ment. It was not large, never more than 50-150.men.:
The bombing department had separate units for.compounding
explosives, making.casings,.assembling bombs, and,
finally, for placing bombs.
In January 1957 General.Massu moved into Algiers with
his 10th Paratroop -Division,-numbering about 10,000.
Suspicious persons were arrested and-the information
exacted, often by tortures:, was acted on immediately. ,
Massu used informers _(their.faces, covered) to pick out
terrorists. He formed small commando units including
exposed terrorists to bunt down their former comrades...
He used the !'ilot" system, of. surveillance, making one man
responsible for a family, another for a building, and
so forth; in.this,way he was able to find any wanted man ,
in the Casbah within hours. �Massu soon had a network of
informers numbering. about 1500. The number. of patrols
increased to the point where it was difficult for the
terrorists even to plant their bombs. By March 1957 the
terrorist network had been seriously disrupted, but the
bombing group managed to carry out a spectacular series
of bombings in June and July. By October, however, the
remaining insurgents had either fled or been arrested or
killed; in November the ALN admitted its failure in the
cities. (Edgar O'Ballance, The Algerian Insurrection,
Archon Books, Hamden, Conn., -7.967).
The Battle of Algiers cost the FLN dearly in terms of
organizational disruption and lives lost. But the battle
did polarize opinion, alienate the Moslem population from
the French, and bring the Moslems to the side of the FLN.
The battle also brought the FLN cause and campaign the
sumpathetic attention of thevorld, and the reported use of
torture by Massu's forces stimulated a debate on moral issues
within France itself.
During 1959 and 1960 the French broke the military
stalemate and gained the ascendency. For example, in 1958
the FLN had 21,000 guns; in May 1961, when the cease-fire
went into effect, they had only 8,000. FLN numbers dwindled,
and the only remaining hope seemed to be to wear the French
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down.
In this situation De Gaulle decided to negotiate; he
had announced his intention to allow self,-determination
for Algeria as early as the fall of 1959, but the FLN
had demanded that it be the sole Algerian representative.
De Gaulle finally accepted FLN terms. According to
Gaucher, the reasons for De Gaulle's decision involved
his overall "third world" approach to international
relations. The "third world" nations, nations that
De Gaulle wanted to cultivate, in general supported
Algeria in its fight for independence; so long as the
war in Algeria continued, De Gaulle felt, his global
strategy was being frustrated. In addition, the French
apparently arrived at the same decision as had the
British in Cyprus--that their strategic defense position
could be maintained by keeping only a base (Mers El Kebir)
rather than maintaining control of the entire country.
(Gaucher, Roland, The Terrorists, Secker and Warburg,
London, 1965).
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ALGERIA--THE O.A.S. (1961-1962)
As Algerian independence seemed to be drawing near,
the European population of Algeria became increasingly
frustrated and resentful. De Gaulle visited Algeria
in December 1960 and was greeted by anti-Gaullist
demonstrations staged by Europeans. In April 1961 there
was an abortive attempt by high-ranking officers of the
Army of Algeria to seize Algiers, rally the Franch Army,
seize Paris, anddrive De Gaulle from power. The European
community in Algeria was hostile to De Gaulle, but it Was
not involved in the attempted coup. The French, nonetheless,
arrested many of them, further antagonizing the European
community in the process. By the summer of 1961 the OAS
(Secret Army Organization) had become a major force. At
the outset it numbered only 300, but it grew rapidly and -
enjoyed great popular support from the Europeans.
Central to the political program of the OAS was the
concept of a French Algeria. The OAS had to work against
time because the French Government and the FLN were moving
toward agreement on Algerian independence. The OAS also had
problems of divided leadership and difficulty in maintain-
ing discipline and security among its members, many of whom
were inclined toward violent outbursts and demonstrations.
The OAS based its organization on that of the FLN and
used many of the same methods. The Delta Commandos, its
terrorist army, was composed of about 100 men. Its aim was
to gain the support of the masses (both Moslem and European)
and to demoralize and intimidate those working for indepen-
dence. The commandos became known as the "plastiqueurs"
because of their frequent use of plastic bombs.
The police and army had orders to destroy the terrorist
network and capture its leaders. A brutal duel began; the
OAS made extensive use of assassination. In May 1961 OAS
agents killed the Algiers police chief. Special units, formed
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by by the French administration, used torture to obtain
confessions from OAS terrorists. Special troops, called
Barbouzes, were charged with implementing a general
campaign of repression against the OAS. They arrested
or kidnapped Europeans and tortured or executed many of
them. The Delta Commandos, in turn, waged merciless
warfare against the special troops. In the fall of 1961
the Deltas blew up French Radio-Television and began
using the wavelengths for their own broadcasts. They
also used "expropriations" (bank robberies) to gain funds.
During this period, the fall of 1961, the OAS reached
its zenith in power and popularity.
At this point the FLN resumed its terrorism, further
complicating the situation; eventually the FLN and the
French Army were to be the pincers which crushed the OAS.
In 1962 the OAS attempted to extend its terrorist
campaign to Metropolitan France in an attempt to gain
French and French Army support. The effort was a total
failure; one of its essential weaknesses was lack of
secrecy. The arrest of one member could bring about
the downfall of a whole group, and this, in fact, is what
happened. Furthermore, the men involved in the operation
were mostly from Algeria and their ties to Metropolitan
France were tenuous; they were in effect operating in a
hostile environment.
By the spring of 1962 reaction to the OAS had set in
and was taking its toll. Arrests were widespread and
Europeans started evacuating the country. The OAS made one
last desperate attempt to get the French Army to come
to its aid. It began to use indiscriminate terror against
the Moslem population in Algiers, hoping to provoke Moslem
retaliation which in turn would force the Army to side with
the Europeans. The strategy backfired; an OAS attempt to
disarm some French army troops got out of hand and ended
in the killing of six army soldiers. The incident did much
to turn the army against the OAS, and with the army clearly
against them, the cause of the OAS was lost.
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GUATEMALA (1960-1970)
The guerrilla-terrorist movement in Guatemala has
arisen from the limited possibilities for affecting the
status quo through normal, legal ways. The political-
economic structure operates almost exclusively for the
aggrandizement of the small upper class, and there is
little opportunity for the multitudes who live in poverty,
poor health, and ignorance to break out of their condi-
tion. No broad, politically articulate electorate exists
to guide government practice or to enforce political
responsibility. The government is elected, but it is at
best unresponsive to public needs.
A revolution in 1944 raised the possibility that
dynamic government could undo the feudal socioeconomic
system, break down the cultural and linguistic barriers
entrapping nearly half the population, and in general,
modernize Guatemala. Ten years of revolutionary govern-
ment under Juan Jose. Arevalo and his successor, Jacobo
Arbenz, over-turned the traditional power bases and began
to remold Guatemalan society. The revolution fell increas-.
ingly under Communist influence, however, and in 1954
Arbenz was overthrown by Carlos Castillo Armas. His
restoration of the old elite to its traditional place has
left a bitter heritage and an acceptance of extremism in
politics. Reformers have been indiscriminately considered.
Communists by the conservatives, whose inflexibility in
turn makes the liberals more willing to collaborate with
the extreme left.
The insurgency movement has its roots in a young
army officers' revolt in November 1960, following which -
the dissidents established a guerrilla base in the north-
eastern mountains. The guerrilla movement-vas, taken over
by Communists, and guerrilla and 'terrorist attacks have.
plagued Guatemala ever since. The persistent aim of, the
Communist insurgents has been to provoke a military take-.
over of the government, thus creating a climate of
repression they believe would benefit them. They have
concentrated more and more on urban terrorism because of
the general ineffectiveness of rural violence as a
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revolutionary tactic. The insurgents have never appeared
to secure more than minimal support from the apathetic,
culturally isolated Indian peasantry, and have found
rural operations to be suicidal, as the peasantry has
exposed them when under military duress. Probably the
strongest argument for urban activity is that the poli-
tical and psychological impact is much greater on the
more informed, aware, articulate city dwellers, whose
mood has a real effect on the government.
There are several terrorist groups in Guatemala at
any given time. The commitment to armed revolution, which
is absolute among the Cuban-oriented Rebel Armed Forces
(FAR), has been a source of division within the Moscow-led
Guatemalan Communist Party (PGT). In contrast to the
orthodox PGT, FAR members are mainly young people who are
unsophisticated in world affairs, naive in their approach
to national problems, and simplistic in their political
thinking. The FAR considers violence the only method of
undoing Guatemala's feudalistic socioeconomic structure.
They believe that their persistent provocation of the
security forces will lead to a bitterly harsh repressive
period, which in turn will so alienate the general public
that active popular support for the revolutionaries will
result.
The PGT's broad strategy instead calls for long-
term preparation of the masses as a necessary basis for
wide guerrilla and terrorist operations. Some of the PGT
leaders tasted success in the classic Communist style of
political penetration and semilegal acceptance when they
were the principal advisers of President Arbenz and controlled
the labor and agrarian reform organizations. They now have
heavily penetrated the Christian Democratic Party, which
won 20 percent of the vote in the election on 1 March
1970, and are fearful that the gains they have made might
be lost by an all-out terrorist campaign that would provoke
a harsh period of anti-Communist repression. The PGT does
endorse selective assassinations, and kidnaps wealthy
Guatemalans for money with some regularity.
The terrorists, incapable of a direct assault on
the government's authority, use hit-and-run action designed
to weaken public confidence in the government's ability to
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maintain -order. ;.Their. assasSination 'targetS-are either'
retaliatory--seOurity- officials 'are frecihent victims--or-
prominent .perscins:4hose -death Will Ivin -publicity for . the
-
terrorists_ teriSibn: .4n -rural .areasY
they assassinate unpOpularjocal officials tip' gain the '
trust of the common; people whoare-freqUentfy Victimized-
by theses fcoriluptJ-symbols;:of iaUthbrity. They alse) engage
in kidnapping), sarsbn;:,,bombing, Cutting. :teledolim'unication'
lines, and damaging electric power ,sources
TheterrorAstS.:have been- effective An :bred frig -con:-
fidence in thegO-vernment and polarizing, antagOnistic ideo-
logies. s'illeyhaVe had nd -purely- vrevoiUtIonaW:gucdess,
but they -keep; the'loolitiCalLatiriOsphere-disrupfecE
The, rgoverninent 'has:'ben= consistently inept in it-T
public relations and has been Unable on' the Whole to' win
the confidence:of the:Public: It'fhas'-failed- te, create the .
kind of gpsychological: atmosphere -and background- againSt
which an effective counter-terror-program could ibperate:
The security forces are for the most part a crude, brutish,
lot with marginal. Capabilityagainst.,Clande�tine'-terroiSi
organizations Their performance' in elementary police -
work Is pobry and.MOtivation for' improveMent 4s� jammed' by-
a corrupt!judicialSysteM,, .RiValry-among the various"'"
securityorganizatiOns" makes' 'Cooperation and doordihatioh:'
of effOrt: Corruption and abuse of authority'
commonliv al the- foredS:thave made= the public' disrespectful
and 'tearful of-them. / , -
:J!!
j The-intoler'ably-poor security situation led 'the
governmentt:to extraordinary methods against the CoMmuists
in late '19.66:; securi-ty forceS- were, in effect,-- given' -
the freedom,tofigh-C with: fire.- Under the-guise. of :
phantom right-wing terrorist organizations, the government
conduCtedHam:assassinatiOh 'program' Of-its '43wnl'WhiCh Con-
t inueth Oh t ilL March") l968:( Special orps of the Police were
usethand thearmy enlisted. and armed anti:-CommuniSt civilians
who rsought out 'the! guerrilla This' Method was "Of fet tive.
The Communistmovement was:4s close - to destruCtion' as it
has ever been. The government's terrorist campaign took
hundredsDof:Ilives,including many: innocent- 'It also
createct.Adomes andP international' revulsion:. Each week
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dozens of mutilated bodies were found. The public was
increasingly more terrorized by the government's clandes-
tine operation than by the generally selective terror of
the Communists. The method was immediately effective in
heavily damaging the insurgency movement, but the longer
range effect was counterproductive, badly marring the
image of the government and contributing to the polariza-
tion of the bitterly antagonistic left and right elements
in the country. Stung by international and domestic
outcries over the violence, the government put a halt to
the clandestine program in early 1968. Since then, the
Communist groups have regrouped, recruited, rearmed,
trained, and tightened discipline, with the result that
they probably have a greater capability for both action
and survival than they did prior to the government's
counter-terrorism. A clandestine anti-terrorist group,
of the 1966-68 type, re-emerged in April 1970, and is
said to have already killed several leftists. The group
is reportedly led by an extreme rightist Congressman, a
follower of president-elect Arana.
The incoming government of Colonel Carlos Arana,
scheduled to be installed on 1 July 1970, learned through
the results of the balloting that a substantial portion of
the Guatemalan electorate wants an end to the crime and
terrorism that are now rampant. Forty-three percent of the
voters chose Arana, who was in charge of the rural clandes-
tine counterinsurgent campaign from 1966-68, and who will,
they expect, launch a fierce anti-Communist effort after he
takes office. The feeling among the center and left--which
took the majority of the vote in this year's election--that
Arana is a "butcher" appears to be understood by Arana, who
probably will show more finesse than in the past in any
extralegal undertaking he pursues to stop the Communists.
There is nothing unusual in the literature sympathetic
to the Communist movement. Those not under Communist disci-
pline and those not particularly attracted to Marxist views
focus mainly on the hopelessness of reform in Guatemala and
the consequent "need" to overturn the existing system.
A possibly useful politico-social analysis, focused on
rural areas and the rural power structure and addressing
the conditions that affect or constitute insurgency, has
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been made by Dr. Richard N. Adams, who headed a research
group in Guatemala in the early-1960's, and who is- a long-
time observer of the Guatemalan scene.* He defines the
division of the social fabric into upper and lower sectors
("there is no meaning in Guatemala to a concept of a
middle class, for those elements who might by income or
profession be considered middle class share the identical
values, style and access to power of the upper sector")
and describes theyigiclity of the barrier between them
and the consequent frustration inherent, in the-situation
for the lower sector. He implies that the Communists,
terrorists, and extremists have become conscious of these
deep-lying divisions in the social fabric and have adapted
their program into a conscious, planned, and.Jong-range
effort to exploit the situation. Adams suggests that the
Communists have learned much from both their successes
and failures in the Arevalo Arbenz period; they are deter-
mined not to repeat their mistakes, and they are sufficiently
flexible to adapt their formerly rigid ideology to the
requirements- of the new and developing situation. Their
experiences have produced a hard, if small, core of pro-
fessional revolutionists with some 20 years' .experiencein
Guatemala. They are no longer a foreign incursion but a
genuinely Guatemalan cancer in the body politic.
Dr. Adams thinks that the 'revolutionaries cannot be
countered by mere increase in the quantity or quality .of
repressive police or military measures and_that a much more
penetrating, sophisticated approach is necessary--one which
will take into account the basic ills and elegwages,which he
identifies in his analysis.
*Adams; Richard N:
1/ Contemporary- Cultures and SocietiesofLatin America; _ a -
reader in the Social Anthropology,of Middle and.South�America.
and the Caribbean, 'edited-by Dwight B. Heath .and1iichard
N. Adams Random House, 1965. �
2/Cultural Surveys of Panama, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El �
Salvador, Honduras. Pan American Sanitary Bureau, Washing-
ton, 1957.
3/ Social Change in Latin America Today; Its Implications
for United States Policy. Published for the Council on
Foreign Relations, by Harper, 1960.
4/ "Guatemala's Rural Social Structure"; a debriefing of
8 October 1965, Washington, D.C.
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