West German embassy siege
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| West German embassy occupation | |
|---|---|
| Location | Stockholm, Sweden |
| Coordinates | |
| Date | 24 April 1975 12.00pm – 23.47pm (CET) |
| Attack type | Siege, hostage crisis |
| Weapon(s) | TNT, submachine guns |
| Deaths | 2 embassy personnel, 2 perpetrators |
| Injured | 10 embassy personnel, 4 perpetrators |
| Perpetrator(s) | Kommando Holger Meins/Red Army Faction |
The West German embassy occupation in Stockholm, Sweden, was carried out by the Red Army Faction on 24 April 1975. Collectively, they referred to themselves as Kommando Holger Meins, named after their comrade Holger Meins who died on hunger strike in Wittlich prison on 9 November 1974.
The RAF group executed the occupation because they wanted to free RAF members from prison in West Germany. During the siege they stated;
"The Holger Meins Commando is holding members of the embassy staff in order to free prisoners in West Germany. If the police move in we shall blow the building up with 15 kilos of TNT."
[edit] The siege
The group consisted of six members: Hanna-Elise Krabbe, Karl-Heinz Dellwo, Lutz Taufer, Bernhard Rössner, Ulrich Wessel and Siegfried Hausner. They entered the embassy, took thirteen embassy officials hostage, or twelve, according to some sources, and then proceeded to occupy the upper floors.
They warned Swedish police to back off or some hostages would be killed, but the Swedish police did not comply and one of the hostages, Baron von Mirbach, a German military attache was marched out on to the landing and shot to death.
The group were then told that Chancellor Helmut Schmidt was not prepared to negotiate with them, and they then decided to execute one hostage every hour until their demands were met; economic attaché, Hillegaart, was the next hostage to be killed, he was made to stand at a window and was then shot three times.
Swedish police prepared to storm the building, but before they had the chance to, the Embassy was rocked by a series of violent explosions; the TNT had been detonated. The remaining hostages as well as the SPK/RAF insurgents all suffered severe burns with Siegfried Hausner later dying from them (after being flown back to BRD) and Ulrich Wessel died after he dropped a grenade which exploded on him.
[edit] Aftermath
The entire siege lasted for around twelve hours and it was later proven that the TNT was set off accidentally. This event was one of many terrorist activities related to the Red Army Faction during the 1970s, although it marked the turning point in relations with the Government who decided no longer to co-operate/negotiate with terrorists as they did during the Peter Lorenz kidnapping.
Norbert Kröcher, another German radical militant, was caught by Swedish police in May 1977. By then he (along with another RAF group, "Kommando Siegfried Hausner") had been planning another attack, this time targeted towards minister Anna-Greta Leijon, which they meant was the cause of the expelling of Siegfried Hausner, who later died because of this. The goal of the attack would be the same as the occupation of the embassy, to free numerous RAF leaders imprisoned in Germany.
Also, on 28 February 1986, eleven years after the incident, Olof Palme, the Prime Minister of Sweden was assassinated. Although there are numerous theories on who assassinated Palme, the RAF were one of the organisations which claimed responsibility via an anonymous call to a London news agency. They said the assassination was carried out by the 'Holger Meins Commando' and that "you can check the history books for why this was carried out" - Palme was the PM of Sweden during the Occupation of the West German Embassy in 1975.
