Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - Episode 311 - The Weather Underground: Part 2

Episode Date: May 13, 2024

SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys CHECK US OUT ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/@lionsledbydonkeyspodcast7424 The conclusion to our two parter on the Weather Underground

Hey everybody, Joe here from the Lions Led by Donkeys podcast, but I guess you probably already knew that. If you like what we do here on the show, consider supporting us on Patreon at www.patreon.com slash lions led by donkeys. Just $5 per month gets you every regular episode early, access to our community discord, a digital copy of my book, The Hooligans of Kandahar, as well as its audiobook read by me and over five years of bonus content. By supporting the show, you support us and allow us to keep our show as it has always

been ad free. Thank you for listening and I hope you enjoy the show. Hey everybody and welcome to the lions led by donkey's podcast. If you're hearing my voice, we're hearing about things that go boom. I am usually in the cohost seat, but I'm Tom and I'm leading this episode. If you haven't listened to the first episode of this two part series on the weather underground, please, I don't know why, but please listen to the first part. And I am joined by your host, but now being forced to sit in the Dutch content cave. It's Joe. How are you doing, Joe?

Doing all right. You know, the for for all of the coups that have happened in the history of the show, this is by far the most comfortable. You know, the weather is nice for the Netherlands. It's not cold. My seat is comfortable. I can't complain. I'm being kept very well. Now I'm waiting for a knock at the door to like go down to some nondescript basement

full of like the Irish executioners from the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom series, at which point I will no longer be your host. Yeah, you are the patty horse to the Symbionese domination army. I mean, many people don't know this, but I am an heiress. You're an heiress to extremely excessive body hair. Yeah, it's a it's a it's a hard way to monetize a living, you know, especially because it grows everywhere other than my head. So I'm really trying to undercut the Turkish hair transplant places by like, no, no, no, I'll give you my own hair.

Yeah. Hasn't really taken off yet. I don't have a line of middle-aged British men lining up at my door. But I believe with good timing and a good business plan, me and my $30 billion of VC funding will really get going. Yes, we're happy to announce that this podcast is now brought to you by Peter Thiel. Ha ha ha. You know, say what you will about the man,

but we both have something in common, and that is bathing in people's blood. Allegedly. Allegedly, allegedly. So Joe, how are you feeling after our first episode on the Weather Underground? You know, I feel very similar to pretty much every other terror group that we've ever talked about, which is like, I fucking hate these nerds. But it's that juxtaposition, right? They have good points.

And then they just end up being insufferable dicks. Like you got to give respect for them going toe to toe. It's like the Chicago Police Department blowing up the statue of the Chicago police officer, stuff like that is legitimately like rad. However, it's like you got him talking about like sticky women and being like an unwashed dickhead. It's like, fuck man. Well, Joe, as we start this episode with the Haymarket statue in mind, just hold that thought.

Oh, it's standing. Haymarket, famously a place where nothing bad has ever happened. Now, when we last left you, the Weather Underground had just undertaken its most direct form of action to date. They had gone far beyond the publishing of articles encouraging the uprising of the radical youth of America and instead had collectively damaged the central business district of Chicago on the 11th of October during the Days of Rage demonstrations. After causing $1 million in damages and 284 arrests, the Weathermen were

now more than ever sure that the path to radically transforming American society was through boots on the ground, disruption of society, and the undermining of the foundations of institutional power. In their eyes, the days of rage had been a resounding success in the fact that millions of Americans saw on their televisions that it was possible to challenge authority in the streets. Internally, they viewed the riot successfully on three main points. Number one, it highlighted the willingness of members to lay their freedom and physical

well-being on the line for the cause and the aforementioned publicity from news coverage would help spread their message of resistance to the brutality of the government. Number two, the development of cadre among the group. They were all now operating as a tight knit and mobile quote fighting force and they had impressed other groups in the new left with their ability to act in a concerted and organized way as a small group. More on that point in a second. Point three, the destruction they caused over the course of four days was seen as the justification for reprisals from police and the government alike. So it caused

them to change tactics slightly viewing mass street action as a kind of long term tactical kind of long term tactical maneuver was less credible than, you know, bringing the fight to them. Right. It makes sense because, I mean, during the days of rage, they're outnumbered by conservatively thousands. It's got to be a slow burn, you know, the revolution isn't going to happen in their eyes when a couple hundred of you are fist fighting the cops knowing like we are going to get smashed. Yeah, you're going to do some damage.

You can do a million dollars of damage, whatever, but like, you know, doing storefront damage is not what brings a fundamental change. Yeah, my commercial damage does not bring all the boys to the yard. Yeah, I threw a brick through the window of Starbucks and for some reason, like, I don't know, student loans are still really expensive, but I've broken out so many windows. Okay, there's a lot of different smaller ideas that need to go into a larger plan to function things.

Destroying things is fun. Everybody enjoys destroying things. It's something of a primal urge and it has a political purpose, but it can't be the only political purpose, but it can't be the only political purpose. So I am more on that second point about how the actions were perceived. Favorable commentary on the days of rage came from non weathermen sources as well. Andrew Copkind, who edited the new Left Weekly Hard Times and took part in the Chicago action, echoed the weatherman.

No Dusty Rhodes is going to be in this episode. Got some hard times with the underground. Like four people are going to get that reference. And I love you. Yeah. He echoed the weatherman's assessment of its own commitment when he stated that it challenges the validity of the intellectual left, which functions as a comfortable culture of opposition. Instead, it asked that radicals become revolutionaries,

completely collectivize their lives and struggle to the death." That's a quote directly from Andrew Copkind. Later in the same article, Copkind addressed the weather's mistakes. He attributed these to simple mindedness about the varieties of political experience in America and to a fascination with violence. Copkind, who had shared a jail cell with the weatherman arrested in the Saturday march, ended his article with the observation that in modern America, this is modern America at the time, simply not to fear fighting is a kind of winning. Okay, I can get that. I can get both points of that. The obsession with violence, but also, you know, where he's coming. I completely understand. A lot

of street movements, revolutionary movements, whatever that we have talked about specifically, not as a general overview. See fighting as the, you know, when everything, when you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail type situation. I was like, no know, when everything, when you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail type situation, it's like, no, we must fight. Which like, you know, if you wanna institute a revolution, of course you have to. I mean, unless you want to do some kind of

bloodless color revolution or something, which is never what any of these people are asking for or planning for. It's like, no, step one, organize. Step two, violence. Step three, question mark. Step four, Vanguard, step one, organize. Step two, violence. Step three, question mark. Step four, Vanguard takes over Washington, DC. And this, this is the thing that we talked about in the first episode. I'm going to

talk about again in a second, um, is that there were other like revolutionary groups, particularly like the black Panthers who combined this, you know, kind of aggressive physical force in terms of like opposition to the state with community organizing, you know, kind of aggressive physical force in terms of like opposition to the state with community organizing, you know? Yeah, very well, Matt, very well. But dissenting from the mainstream Black Panther line, Eldridge Cleaver wrote a letter to Black Americans from his exile in Algeria in support of the weather, asking, did we ever pay attention to white radicals when they told us to keep our shootouts clean and our middle class order orderly?

He also supported the weather's call for the overthrow of the United States through violent revolution quote, in times of revolution, I love the angels of destruction as opposed to the devils of law and order. Now, the rest of the Black Panthers who were based in Oakland, California under Huey Newton's leadership criticized Cleaver and the weatherman's approach to revolution in the United States. These Panthers held the opinion that black revolutionaries had to set the example, not by either adopting electoral politics or immediately picking up a gun and going underground, but by doing whatever it took to maintain a

revolutionary profile and to educate as many people as they could before the state drove them underground. Of course, of course. Like it seems like the weather underground is, I think I've used this analogy before, building a roof before you build a house. Yeah, you need grassroots support. Now, it wasn't that Newton and his followers objected to armed struggle, but their opinion of the situation in the US in autumn 1969 was that until large numbers of people supported the

revolution, the repression which followed any army confrontation could only isolate the revolutionary forces and destroy the hope of revolution. The panther's forces represented by Cleaver on the other hand, like the Weatherman, believed they already had enough support and that the time had come for revolution. I don't think I'm the right person to talk about this particular schisms within the Black Panther party. There's like so many different ideological splits that are going on, particularly between, you know,

Huey Newton and Eldridge Cleaver, among other things. But this is kind of the splitting point in the new left at the time, just in general. But this glowing tone wasn't universal. And the weathermen came under fire from other left wing groups. The days of rage were seen as juvenile street thuggery and short sighted in the face of increasing police opposition. In reaction to said violence, they were also criticized

as encouraging violence among the white left as a primary tactic, one that could not be replicated by radical groups comprised primarily of black, Latino and Asian communities because the white students and activists could rely on less violent reprisals by police and at best, lighter legal repercussions in the event of their arrests. And you know, the last point we made in the last episode where all of their bail, which is $1.5 million was paid by their friends and family. I understand those criticisms, I do. I do have something of an asterisk next to that though, and that is a valid complaint to have

if you're doing something better, because there is a segment of people who have what they perceive as revolutionary ideology and that goes for any political, like any fringe part of the politics that is looking for some form of revolution. This is not specifically geared towards leftist revolutionary ideas, but there's a lot of people that like to talk about those kind of things and the things that they generally talk about is a relentless Critique of anyone who puts thought into action while doing nothing of their own. It's it's it's the the the classic purity politics

Where if they did form a coalition with let's just say the Black Panthers, they would probably then also have a critique of that. Oh Joe, Joe, hold that thought. Oh fucking Christ. In November 1969, a national general electric strike was called which many groups saw as a natural opportunity to build solidarity with the working class and to unify towards a general anti-war movement. So this is massively affecting cities like Chicago, Detroit, where large manufacturing was being undertaken by General Electric. The weathermen on the other hand showed up to the picket lines and distributed pamphlets that called GE workers pigs and part of the system. All right. I OK.

As as an edit to my last comment, both people in this situation be fucking idiots. That is a universal truth. In fire, the weatherman's newspaper, they said that legally sanctioned protests and demonstrations were pointless because the United States was a fundamentally undemocratic state, meaning no amount of public pressure can cause change without direct action that threatened the state. Good point. Good point, but maybe don't call the union workers pigs. Yeah, because when I look at like the UAW or the line workers union or whatever,

both things that members of my family have been in the Detroit area, my grandfather, my mom's gram from my dad's side Union family all the way down. It's the most anti-state large-scale organization you could possibly have because it's in the state's best interests and Therefore the corporation's best interests that union workers do not collectively bargain and in fact do not have a union workers do not collectively bargain and in fact do not have a union. They're the most likely allies you're going to have in any kind of vague left-wing movement is union workers because they understand that first of all they understand the power of working together for a greater good which most Americans specifically do not have because

we're intensely toxically individual on everything. And you're going to go up to this, this picket line and be like, y'all motherfuckers suck. Like, oh, you think you're cool because you're in a union. Have you tried? I don't know. Being a college student, you fucking losers. So fire praise the uptick in direct tax on ROTC centers, walkouts and schools, workplaces, fires and street actions.

On the 8th of November, Boston weathermen shot out the windows of the Cambridge police station and on the 14th, several thousand protesters fought street battles with police in Washington DC. On the 15th, several bombs were detonated in the offices of Chase Bank, Standard Oil and GE in New York. And on the same day, mass protests were held outside the trial of the Chicago 8, which also led to skirmishes with the police. So what I'm getting is the weather underground, the weathermen believe

that the only possible route to any kind of movement is through kinetic violent action rather than, let's say, dual action with strikes and bombings, which would galvanize the moderate union workers because not, I can tell you from experience, not every union worker is a leftist. This might be mind blowing to a lot of people. Most of them are not So you could galvanize them through their CBA and collective bargaining and Union politics while also doing Your terrorism thing in fact in most vaguely left-wing revolutions. That is how it works one

You turned one on your side you have more of the other actions on one side influence the other. And both of them actively harm the people you want to fight. So on the 4th of December, Chicago police raided the apartment block of Black Panthers Mark Clark and Fred Hampton and killed him in cold blood. These murders shocked these murders shocked the entire revolutionary movement and calls for revenge went up throughout the New Left, especially from the Weathermen.

In the streets however, action was limited to a few rallies, some firebombings and leafletting. Weather people did nothing other than join a couple of marches, firebombs and police cars and their relative inactivity reflected the organization's internal doubts about the efficacy of street actions. And at the same time, it's inability then to carry out properly armed attacks. Later, they would see this, their inertia at this time as defeatist. And this is a quote in white America, that is America spelled with a K. We, we too, we too understand. Yes we're we're pre figuring ice cube. We to understand that we can regain our lives only through struggle the meeting will be a gathering of the tribes of war council

only with each other can we figure out how to build the kind of organization that can lead us toward victory, toward smashing US imperialism. We have to learn from one another. We are going to learn to work and struggle with each other in order to change ourselves and each other into revolutionaries. It's going to be different. It's going to be out of sight. And this is talking about God. So this is our revolution is going to be fucking far out, bro. All these people talk like this as well like I know it's every single communicate they ever released

Like I I understand it's a relic of the times. However makes very easy to mock them Yeah, if anybody ever tells you something is going to be far out or out of sight Don't listen to them. You can't trust them. They're either the dumbest hippie on earth or a cop. So that was a letter from the weatherman to white radicals that prefigured the SDS meeting in Flint, Michigan, that in December 1969, which has now come to be known as the War Council, this will become a turning point for the Weathermen and the radical New Left movement in general. It was here that the course of violence would be set.

One of the first things those who attended the War Council noticed as they entered the rundown ballroom in Flint, Michigan on December 2nd, 1969. That's called any ballroom in Flint Michigan on December 2nd 1969. That's called any ballroom in Flint Michigan. Hold that thought. Was the freshly dried blood in the corner the result of a knife fight between locals at a dance the night before the council was convened? Fuck yeah! Your war council's got to have some Flint flavor you know what I mean? Like oh yeah we're gonna have our meeting here don't mind the dead body. Yeah that was before the Flint flavor was you know what I mean? Like, oh yeah, we're going to have our meeting here. Don't mind the dead body. Yeah, that was before the Flint flavor was the tap water.

Justice for Flint, Michigan's water. But if the blood didn't catch the eye, then perhaps the giant cardboard machine gun suspended from the ceiling did. Sorry, did you say cardboard machine gun? Yes. Okay. This is before graphic. This is before graphic design could be your passion. You do arts and crafts. So the gun was a court was symbolic of the direction the weather plan to take,

although almost everyone else in attendance, some white panthers who we mentioned briefly in the last episode who were a white radical group who model themselves as the white kindred people of the black panthers. How the black panthers feel about these guys? Not great. That's what I was going to assume. Yeah. Like you like is sitting down in a black panther meeting like we have a member of the white panthers here to talk to you like, excuse me the fucking what a member of the what it's just to talk to you like, excuse me the fucking what? A member of the what? It's just a guy who looks like Disco Stu.

A guy who looks like Disco Stu but in a white beret. Wearing all white leather instead of the black leather jackets. There was also the Yippies, independent activists and members of the underground media. And they all questioned the practicality of a move towards violence. The weathermen were convinced though and the council was intended to persuade everyone else. Bear in mind as we spoke about in the last episode, the vast majority of the leadership of the SDS which this meeting was convened under were all part of the weathermen. Over the next few days,

the divisions in the new left would deepen as it became apparent that the weather align on the insistence of violence and the commitment to a total revolution was paramount. In Mark Rudd's opening speech of the war council, he compared himself to Captain Ahab in Moby Dick. Does that mean he has to stab the white Panthers? Quote, I'm monomaniacal like Captain Ahab in Moby Dick. Does that mean he has to stab the white Panthers? Quote, I'm monomaniacal like Captain Ahab.

He was possessed by one thought, destroying the great white whale. We should be like Captain Ahab and and possess one thought. Destruction of the mother country. Did he ever read Moby Dick? Did he understand what Moby? He's much like both people. He probably read the first chapter of Moby Dick. Moby Dick's one of my favorite books ever. That's not what it's about.

Ah. Some discussions concern the necessity for immediate armed violence. Others, the targets of that violence. Perhaps to prove the sincerity of their commitment to total revolution, some weather members discuss the political correctness of the murder of white babies and another discussion. Yeah. So they're they're they're like political here is like, you know, you know, be really fun. What have

we modeled a revolution after Nat Turner? He wouldn't he wouldn't a lot of, you know, a public support. Yep. Another discussion. and this is a very important point, which I'll talk about more in a second, was, uh, about dealing with only theory that was limited to women. So as we talked about in the last, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, only women were allowed to engage in this discussion. And this is because of the rampant sexism problem in the weather on a guy. But Well, yeah, it was started by a guy who just wanted to fuck. Just, just, just wait, Joe. This, this is actually a point where they are very correct about things and actually

do something good. Okay. So organized by committed weather women, ever more intent on establishing their identity within the organization. The conversation centered on the male chauvinist perceptions of women among both genders and how those perceptions held back all people in the Weather Underground from making revolution. There was discussions about what constituted legitimate targets again, were the sites of

power such as marked institutional buildings, or should their targets be more amorphous and representative of power like the Haymarket statue? They agreed that they should be fighting as part of an international war. Okay, so I'm really happy that just after arguing the moral and ethical complications of murdering babies that had some like pretty solid feminist theory discussions like, you know, you got the yin and the yang here. Listen, I, it's so weird that I'm saying this, but literally at the end of this page and the subsequent page, the weather on the road actually do some really actual genuinely good self criticism as regards their opinions of women. So just keep that in mind.

They're actually going to do something good. That's it's good. It is. It's one of those situations. You do not, in fact, have to hand it to an organization that also just had a discussion about killing babies. How do we feel about that? Mm hmm. So the weatherman had given up on white people and saw the organization's role

solely as one of causing chaos in support of African Americans and other national liberation movements in the style of abolitionist John Brown. Although some members, among them one being Jim Mellon, still believed it was possible to organize an American working class youth into a revolutionary movement and disagreed with the decision to go underground. Their dissension fell on deaf ears and it was apparent that most attendants had made the decision before the council even began. So they had a meeting where they gave up on white America. Yes. I assume they immediately resigned as leadership then.

No. Oh well, fuck. I guess asking to be ideologically consistent is a bit fucked, right? Like you should as an immediate, we're turning all of our organizational structure over the Black Panthers, we're gonna take our orders from them now.

This seems pretty fucking racist, right? Like they understand that there's intense institutional and state racism in pretty fucking racist, right? Like, they understand that there's intense institutional and state racism in the United States, right? Nobody's going to debate that. And they're like, we need to give up on white America and we need to support black America and black liberation. But however, the only people that can do that is us, the white people. Joe, Joe, how many times do I have to say hold that thought? Motherfucker.

Despite the pre-council intentions, this would be the point where they decide to go underground and it would be this point where it would intensify the weather's isolation from other movements. Before this, they were just the weather. They had to get the third part of their name. Oh, don't worry, that comes up soon. Motherfucker. Now, it's important to note at this point,

there was a radical shift happening within the Weathermen too. Like we said earlier about the discussion at the War Council about the role of women in the movement. This is where a radical shift was happening. The women in the movement were beginning to question the hierarchical structure of the movement, this is where a radical shift was happening. The women in the movement were beginning to question the hierarchical structure of the movement and how despite its radical rhetoric it was still replicating the patriarchal structures that were dominant in the mainstream. Men were in charge of decision making about maneuvers, tactics and the overall ideological position of the weathermen and issues that predominantly affected women were largely ignored. Now this is a general criticism that's leveled at almost every

radical movement of the late 60s and 70s in general that for the most part went unaddressed but the weatherman tackled this head-on. The all-women's issue of Rap magazine published by former SDS member Robin Morgan said that sexism and the oppression of women were the oldest force of all and warned that women were quote rising with a fury older and potentially greater than any force in history and this time we will be free or no one will survive. Morgan even criticized the weather's preaching of free love and non-monogamy as sexual experimentation, acting as a mask for the formation of new social dynamics where men still dominated

and was counter to the group's supposedly revolutionary aims. With that in mind, new groups were formed within the weather to consider women's issues as part of the overall revolutionary struggle. The group which had been so intolerant of oppression and discrimination now found themselves accused exactly of that their reaction like I alluded to was surprisingly good and they took the critiques on board and created an instructional lesson for everyone involved and Acknowledged that people can can and both need to change. Okay, but yeah, so look it I'm not gonna hand it to him, but it's it's it's nice. It's nice that they can, you know, see their own bullshit, I guess. Yeah. And by this point, the move to go underground had happened

at such an extremely rapid pace. Members first had to face your favorite thing. Self-criticism sessions. Did they rent a cabin in the woods in Japan for this? Oh, no. So the self create sessions were in order to weed out their flaws and shortcomings. The process would the process would involve potential fugitives having to take LSD before undergoing hours of questioning.

OK, I can think of a different term for that, but sure. They thought that under the influence of acid, people would be unable to hide their intentions and the truth, therefore, would be laid bare for examination. The weather saw this as a foolproof way of weedingSD. I don't think you can do that. I'm not going to speak badly about people's opinions and experiences on powerful hallucinogens. However, I do think it's one of those situations, kind of like a Reddit weed guy that vastly overestimates the useful means of these things. There was one problem though, Joe. It didn't really work.

No, you don't say. So there was only ever one successful attempt that we know of at infiltrating the Weather Underground and it was by FBI agent Larry Grathwall who was able to fake swallowing a tub of LSD and pass his self-criticism session. Now, before we move over, I'm gonna send you a picture of Larry Grathwall at the time, and I want you to tell me, does this man look like a cop? Okay, I'm looking at it.

Okay, so I'm looking at his FBI photo here. I would say he doesn't look like a cop. I can't smell him though, so it's hard to tell what his dedication to being a gross hippie was. I don't think he looks like a cop. It's very nice hair, I will say. He looks like he could be a hippie. He looks like he could be like a member of any weird new age group back then. Very inconspicuous. So, what do you think they did with this new recruit who had faked passing his LSD fuel self-criticism session? I have a feeling since they had such confidence in their acid-based system that they immediately

gave him way too much responsibility. Oh yeah, they sent him to Detroit alongside like a super elite group of weathermen. Ah, of course, of course. So he went from doing a sleight of hand magician trick to get rid of some acid to being right in the middle of like battle plans. Yeah, so soon the various cells of the weather underground were busy trying to amass funds in order to support their life on the lam. Members spent time in city halls searching for fake papers they could use to apply for public assistance or social security numbers so they could scam social security. Many of those who had access to trust funds or bank accounts liquidated them and they

pooled all the money together to fund underground sales. Any property of value like television stereos was sold and that money too was pooled. The national offices of the SDS let their utility bills go unpaid and on February 9th 1970 the last open SDS office in Chicago was just very quietly emptied. The day before it was closed, a call was made to Vicky Grabener or Grabener, a sympathetic employee of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, where a large collection of the left is the new left documents stored, inquiring if they were interested in the SDS archive. Graebner obtained $300 and bought the contents in the office. While she was loading the documents into her van on February 9th, a police car which was discreetly

surveilling her tried to seize it and failed. I assume failed because they had no right to seize it, right? It's not like they're going to fight some like museum nerd over a, uh, like a box of documents. Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe, hold that thought. All right. This is a very important point. Okay.

So since the days of rage, the numbers of dedicated weather underground members began to dwindle. They withdrew from, from public demonstrations for fear of being picked up by authorities on conspiracy charges or for the variety of petty crimes they had committed up to this point. Communications were conveyed verbally or through a secret network of above-ground associates. Targets were chosen and communicated to small cells of four or five people And then the methods under which they were attacked was up to them. Their local organizations cease to exist and very few members even participated in the protesting of the conviction of the Chicago seven.

Bobby Seale was acquitted of his charges during the trial and the weather underground were dedicated, real, really, really dedicated to the teachings of Debray's guerrilla warfare, which we talked about in the last episode. Kind of makes sense. If you're going to be like an underground revolutionary, like a violent group, you can't also be like, oh, it's Saturday. You want to go to the protests? You know, you got bigger fucking things on hand. You can't get picked up for fighting a cop in D. in DC when you're supposed

to be the vanguard of the revolution bombing banks or whatever. You have more important things to do. So it was precisely this operational security where no one knew what any other cell was doing was that the public and the weather members were shocked on March the 7th to hear news of an explosion in New York City which had killed at least one of their comrades. Diane Alton, Cathy Boonan, Cathy Wilkerson, Ted Gold and Terry Robinson had been living and building bombs in Wilkerson's parents' Greenwich Village townhouse. So you can liquidate everything into a common.

However, you can still have a Greenwich Village townhouse to build bombs in your mom's garage. Yep. The bombs they were making were comprised of nails wrapped around an explosive center that would spray shrapnel when exploded. They were designed to kill. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's not something you throw to like blow up a statue or whatever. That is a casualty producing bomb.

But why is this shocking to them? They've been edging violence this whole time and granted the first person they kill is themselves. But like that is the whole point, right? Like you can't edge and edge and edge towards violence and be like, I can't believe someone died. That's the whole fucking point. So two weeks prior to the explosion at the townhouse, this cell had firebombed the home of Justice Marta, the judge who was presiding over the trial of Panther 21.

Black Panthers from the New York branch who had been indicted on grand jury charges of conspiring to bomb police stations, Macy's and the Bronx Botanical Gardens and government buildings around the city. By the gardens. The police stations again. Fuck them plants. Fuck the plants. Fuck them plants. The Sibonese Liberation Army is like, excuse me. Taking a strong stance against horticulture. Yeah, like my weird revolutionary revolutionary cells like we're against capitalism

or against the state monopolization of force and we're against botanical gardens. Do you have any questions on the first two? No, the third one leaves a lot. We're not talking about the third. We're not talking about the third. OK, OK. So despite the amount of media attention

generated by the firebombing, some members of the cell felt it had not been a success because it had failed to cause sufficient material damage. These members, said to be Terry Robbins and Ted Gold, had devised a campaign which Bernardine Dorn would later describe as a large-scale, almost random bombing offensive, including an attack on a dance for military officers. But although these discussions were continuing within the cell over the merits of the plan, some members were still unsure. A wiring mistake made during bomb building on the morning of March 6th killed the three Weather members and destroyed Wilkerson's parents' house. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, again, how are you surprised by this? I mean, I'm not even critique

their methods here, at least politically blowing up a military bar or whatever. Also not the first time we've talked about blowing up a military dance hall in this podcast. Like that is consistent. It's not like, you know, fuck them gardens, you know, fuck, fuck those succulents, you know? Um, but how can you be surprised when a group of terrorists accidentally blow it? It's not like you went to fucking terrorism night school to learn how to do this. Gaddafi did not whisk them to Libya to teach them how to build bombs, which is normally the case. Look, if there was anyone that would have given them that slant to be anti-Bartonist, it would have been Gaddafi.

That's true. And also, it's very surprising they did not get in contact with the Libyan government at some point, but maybe they do. I will not. I don't know. But again, this will happen. You're building a fucking bomb in your mom's garage. It's not like you're like Omsh Shinrikyo and have the Australian outback to practice with.

You're doing this in a major population center with a casualty making bomb in an enclosed space. And I assume terrorism OSHA was not really a thing at the time. Maybe it was their time working in the sugar fake cane fields of Cuba that revolutionized them get themselves against, you know, private gardens. Exactly. Yeah. Those aren't even food crops. Cherry blossoms are getting the wall. So the only two survivors, Kathy Wilkerson and Kathy Buden, days from the explosion,

fled the building. Anne Hoffman, wife of actor Dustin Hoffman who lived next door. Justin Hoffman almost got blown up by the weather underground. So listen, this is not the last time a very famous person from the 70s is involved in this story. There's at least two more. The interesting part is after the bomb went off, Dustin Hoffman, playing the Rain Man, immediately went down and accurately counted all of the nail wounds in the bodies. So Anne Hoffman helped clean them up, gave them and another neighbor gave them some clean clothes to wear. By the time the fire and police units arrived on the scene, both of them were gone.

And the police detectives figured out that the explosion was caused by a bomb and not like a gas leak as they first thought, you know, I gave that away. By the time they had figured this out, every member of the Weather Underground had gone underground. Once the fire was out, the police and arson investigators began searching through the debris for victims. The first body they found was that of Ted Gold. He had been crushed by a beam moments after the explosion. The bodies of the other victims were just vaporized.

It wasn't until police found part of his thumb several weeks later that they were able to identify that Terry Robbins had also died. Found across the street at, I don't know, Robert De Niro's house. The third victim, Diana Alton, former partner of Bill Ayers, was not identified for 10 days. Police did not find any other evidence. However, what they did find was four cartons of explosives containing 57 sticks of dynamite, 30 blasting caps and some clocks in the process of being converted into timing devices.

Man, the 70s fucking rules, because you know they bought this shit like the hardware store. Yup. After the townhouse explosion, the FBI broke down the doors of many of those who had been in the weather in the early days. A group of agents in New York known as Squad 47 broke into houses of relatives, friends, associates in search of information on the fugitives. Multiple warrants were issued for interstate flight and possession of explosives and by the end of the year six people from the weather were on the FBI's 10 most wanted list, which meant the Justice Department increased the list

to 16 to accommodate the new criminals. You know, you hate the new generation of criminals, you know, I wonder if the old guys on the FBI most wanted list is like, man, kids these days, they didn't even do shit to get on that list. It is blew themselves up. I'm an international terrorist,

I'm a drug smuggler, whatever, like these fucking kids just blew up their mom's garage. Fuck these posers. So indictments come down on March 17th, 1970, charging 12 weather members with actions related to the days of rage. The most serious of these charges were conspiracy to cross state lines with the intent to incite a riot. And the same charge that was made against the Chicago 8. Furthermore, the same judge, Julius Hoffman, was chosen to preside over the trial. Twelve indicted included most of the weather leaders,

Bernadine Dorn, Mark Rudd, Jeff Jones, Mark Spiegel, Linda Evans, Judy Dark, Kathy Budden, Bill Ayres, John Jacobs, Howie McIntyre, Lawrence Vice and Terry Robbins. But the weather had no intention of appearing on these charges. In early April, after Larry Grathwall had tipped off the FBI, Diane Donghe and Linda Evans were arrested for attempting to forge checks using their false IDs. Both women were released the same day, but their brush with the law convinced other people to stop being involved in real like kind of dodgy activity to obtain money like selling drugs. Sure. It's easy to be picked up. It's like Al Capone getting gone on, you know, not paying

his taxes. You got to make yourself harder to get. So before I continue, Joe, I have a I have a question for you. How familiar are you with a little US government program called Co-Intel Pro? Oh yeah, yeah. Very familiar. It's very well known for being a thing and now being a thing people still insist that the government does. Do you want to give a brief summary for those unfamiliar with what Cointel Pro was. But you know it was a sweeping program to infiltrate groups, infiltrate the press, spin

people against things, influence grassroots organizations, you know, very very long story short. Yeah, so what Larry Grothwald was doing was a kind of small scale version of Cointel Pro. Following the explosions, the raids on people's houses to get information was a ramp up in security aimed at infiltrating left-wing groups, aka Cointel Pro. And they would take on clandestine methods in order to gather evidence to lead to or support charges and by extension destabilize the movement. The FBI were about to do some really shady shit which will be very relevant in about 20 minutes.

The FBI? That doesn't seem like them. They seem like such honest and straight shooting federal agents. So it's been a while since we had a you know a Vietnam war update. Do you know what happened on the 30th of April 1970? The Ted Offensive? On the 30th of April, Tricky Dick, that's Richard Nixon, would announce the American and South Vietnamese forces would invade Cambodia. Oh fuck that's right. Yeah. Their purpose was to locate and destroy the headquarters of the North Vietnamese

and NLF forces allegedly hidden in eastern Cambodia. This move would, despite the administration's denials, is clearly an interference in the civil war that was raging between the long null governments and its enemies. As in Vietnam, the United States had sent troops into a civil war in order to shore up the crumbling position of a puppet regime. I mean, thankfully, I can't think of anything that happens in the aftermath of the civil war supported by the United States, the Soviet Union, and China that would be, you know,

not be described as horrors behind human comprehension. Joe, hold that thought. Immediately there was an outburst of protests and rioting. ROTC centers were once again burned. At the University of Washington, demonstrations of a few hundred quickly developed into a takeover by thousands of people on the interstate highway near the campus.

And then Kent State happens. Yeah, yeah. We did an episode on Kent State a few years back. It's not good. Yeah, so if you did an episode on Kent State a few years back. It's not good. Yeah, so if you want an in-depth analysis of it, go listen to that episode. Also Cambodia for the for the matter. What started as a demonstration of approximately 500 students on the 1st of May soon swelled into thousands over the coming days. That night people threw bottles of police cars and were met with the entirety of the Kent police force in order to quell any violence. That night people threw bottles at police cars and were met with the entirety of the

Kent Police Force in order to quell any violence. That same day when arriving at the Pentagon, Nixon gave a now famous prescient remark when told by a Pentagon staffer that they loved his speech the day before. And I'm going to do, since people enjoyed my Bob Dylan impression in the last episode, I'm going to do my best tricky dick impression. I should, I need to, I need to loosen my drawers. You see these bombs, you know, blowing up campuses. Listen, these boys are on college campuses today are the luckiest people in the world going to the greatest universities and here they are burning up their books, storming

around the issue. You name it. Get rid of the war. There'll be another one. Thank you for answering the question I and all of the listeners had deep inside of what if Richard Nixon was Irish? I thought that was a good impression. It's pretty good. Yeah, it's pretty good.

You have to let your whole face go slack to do it. We had to for those listening, I had to cut out like a coughing fit that I had like halfway through it. The next day, the city was awash with rumours of a plot to spike the water supply with LSD, tax on businesses and in response to an Oros TC building being burnt down, the National Guard was called in. On the evening of May the 3rd, a protest was held at 8pm and by 8.45 the National Guards called in. On the evening of May the 3rd a protest was held at 8 p.m. and by 8 45 the National Guardsmen used tear gas to disperse the crowds and by 11 p.m. the curfew was now in effect. The following day after a failure to disperse crowds with tear gas

the National Guard opened fire on Kent State students killing four and wounding nine. For the white revolutionaries in the weather underground who thought the days of rage were the inciting point of the revolution, this was the day the war had truly come home. And then on May 21st, 1970, the Weather Underground released a declaration of war with the United States and promising an attack on the symbol of American injustice within the next two weeks. Two weeks had passed and nothing had happened. Others in the New Left had started to think that the weathermen had kind of lost their courage and were full of hot air. And others were disappointed in the radical fringe of the already radical fringe.

I mean, obviously the best bomb builders have already taken themselves out. Yeah, you know, however, at 7pm onm. on the ninth of June, a series of explosions ripped through the second floor of the New York City police headquarters. According to police reports, the blast had the force of 10 to 15 sticks of dynamite and may have been caused by TNT. Several people are injured and damage was estimated in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. The brief statement sent to the press expressed solidarity with radical youth of all backgrounds and challenged the authorities. The pigs tried

to look invulnerable but we keep finding their weaknesses. They look at us, we get at them first. A little over a month later on the 26th of July, to commemorate the anniversary of the Cuban revolution, the weathermen set off a small bomb at a military police guard post at the Presidio Army Base in San Francisco. This attack was coordinated with smaller actions around the country which were most likely conducted by a combination of weather members and their allies in the revolutionary movement. One of these

actions was, which was announced in advance by a person claiming to be a weather member was a small explosion at a Bank of America branch in Manhattan. In both the San Francisco and New York bombings, damage was slight and involved nothing more than some shattered windows, you know, some stuff thrown around the place. And in its July and in its July 26 communique sent from Detroit, the weather wrote, today we attack with riots, rocks, bombs,

the greatest pig killer known to man, American imperialism. And once again, that's America spelt with a K. Yeah, cool. Great. Real happy that they still have a copy editor. Why is it edgy? Like, I've always tried to figure that out. Like, why is that? Do you know, they still have a copy editor. Well, why is it edgy? Like, I'm trying. I've always tried to figure that out.

Like, why? Why is that? You know, it's an indictment of the inherent white supremacy of the American state. Yeah, but they're only doing the one K. They haven't graduated to the America. Kaka. I know it's like artistic development, you know. Yeah, it's it's like a comedian on an open mic night trying to work through some bits. They're trying to hammer things down for the Netflix special. Yeah, they're doing a whip, you know, work in progress.

Yeah. Yeah. More federal indictments were handed down on the 23rd of July, charging 13 weather members with conspiracy to bomb police stations and government buildings across the US. In an attempt to legitimize Grathwall in the weather's eyes, he was also named in these indictments. By the summer of 1970, more than 2000 federal agents were involved in the campaign to destroy the new left, the Panthers, the the American Indian

movement, and I say Indian because that's what it was called. They call themselves that famously held up at Moudini. It was something we'll talk about at some point and other other third worldest groups on February 19th, 1970, Timothy Leary. Oh, you're familiar with Timothy? Yeah, the acid guy. Yeah. Had been convicted in California of the possession of two marijuana cigarette butts. And this followed another conviction of possession of less than a half an ounce of weed in Texas. It's the least amount of drugs that Timothy Leary has ever carried.

In California, he was denied appeal and sentenced to 10 years in prison. He got away with it in Texas. That's like bizarro world. You get thrown in prison for 10 years. I mean, Timothy Leary is a white guy as well, so you assume that he would only get like, you know, slapped in the wrist. But he's also known quantity at this point right like it's very much like catching a bigger fish for something much smaller they knew he they knew him as the LSD guy they had they wanted to get rid of him you know that he's like hippie fucking whisper Pied Piper of hippie dumb over there they had they just wanted to find a reason to throw him in. I'm just shocked that Texas didn't want to do the same fucking thing.

It's still Texas. So after several attempts for appeals, he eventually ended up in the California men's colony. Almost immediately, he began plotting an escape on the weather through the persuasive efforts of one of its LSD suppliers, who knew Leary, decided to help him. The dealer was part of a mythic and shadowy organisation of Hashishan LSD smugglers, manufacturers and dealers from California and Nepal, known in the counterculture as the Brotherhood of

Eternal Love. Man, you gotta come up with a better name than that. The plan to help Leary would not only test Weather's underground network, but also prove sincerity to link up with the counterculture. On September 13th, 1970, under the cover of darkness, Leary moved hand over hand along a cable suspended over the fence around the prison until he reached a pole on the other side and slid down to freedom. He made his way to the highway and waited in a roadside ditch

until a car stopped waiting for him. Leary jumped in and he was on his way to freedom thanks to the weather. As the car drove north, his fellow passengers helped him change his clothes and dye his hair. He was also given a fake set of papers. I got to say of all the prisoners at the California men's colony that I would be worried that would that would break out. It wouldn't be the acid guy.

Yeah, but it's it's a symbolic thing. Sure. Eventually arriving at North Oakland, a hundred miles south. Later that morning, as he rode from north from Oakland, a car full of long haired young people passed honking and waving. Leary was naturally nervous of being recognized, but relaxed when he was told it was Mark Road from the weather underground. Leary's destination was to camp on some Native American land in the northern California mountains. After arriving at the campsite near the native owned land, Dorn and two other weather representatives talked with people from the Native American

nation about letting Leary stay there for the night. Leary waited with two weather women smoking weed and listening to the Grateful Dead. God damn it. I love the Grateful Dead. I hate hippies. I'm a man of contrast. Yeah, that's like the most contrast on Earth. That's... It also tracks that Gr dead people will just be in the middle of the woods smoking weed.

At least they're wearing clothes, I assume. I hope so. They're in the fucking California mountains. They'd be freezing if they weren't. They're deadheads. They gotta be doing something weird. I guess breaking out the acid guy from prison is the limit of weirdness for the day. Yeah. He was allowed to stay

there for the night and left the following day. He then went with other weather members to a motel. And then after four days since his initial escape, he was moved to a ranch house somewhere in Northern California where his wife Rosemary and him were temporarily reunited. Less than three days later, after receiving another set of false papers to replace the first, he was in Algeria where his wife met him afterwards. This was proof of the effectiveness of the Weather's underground network.

I'm kind of surprised, honestly, from a bunch of bumbling dumbasses who are accidentally blowing themselves up to an international fugitive smuggling ring is not a turn I expected to see. Yeah. And it's so interesting because the FBI efforts to catch people in the Weather Underground is nothing compared to what was being put out for the Red Army faction. Every police officer in Germany was looking for Andreas Batar.

That also makes sense. The Red Army faction were killing people. Yeah. The weather underground really killing themselves. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, blowing things up is obviously make you, let's say, unpopular with the federal government. But until you start, you know, like unabombing and killing people left, right and center, you're not going to get the full breath of the resources.

So on October 8th, the weather exploded a bomb in Marin County in response to the killing of Jonathan Jackson during his attempt to free the Solidar brothers. Those were two people who were being tried for the murder of a corrections officer. Then in a rare show of humor on October 5th, the weather blew up the exact same statue in Haymarket Square for the second time. I mean, at a certain point, if you're the cops, like, God damn it, we really got to move this thing inside. It's kind of funny. Like, look, I got to have

the... If I remember correctly, they do eventually move the Chicago police officer statue inside because they blew it up so many times. Yeah. On December 10th, the weather communicate entitled new morning changing weather was released. And like, this is a real pivotal point for the weather underground. This is like the recognition of their previous failures, where they're going now. This is also where the change from the weathermen into the weather underground organization happens as a reflection of, you know, their changing attitudes towards women and, you know,

trying to be more inclusive. Sure. Good, good for them. I mean, you know, it's nice that they can establish like an international smuggling ring while also looking inward, you know, it's nice that they can establish like an international smuggling ring while also looking at word, you know, self care. Yeah, the statement was a review of their past errors and hopes for the future. And it was also then publicly acknowledging their earlier opinions as alienating to those outside of the organization. You don't say. It called its tendency to consider only bombings or picking up the gun as revolutionary

with the glorification of the heavier the better. A military error with a new maturity in approach and analysis the letter provided the rest of the revolutionary left with a glimpse of the struggles in the collective since the weatherman's conception. Foremost among them, like I said, was the questions of youth cultures placed in the revolution and the role of women. In the first major weather action of 1971, a bomb was exploded in the US Capitol building. Holy shit. So this is, this is really funny. So this was done in response to the invasion and public bombing of Laos. Um, So they had gone in the previous day to plant the bombs and the bombs didn't explode. It just tells me something how capital security was back then that they could make it in twice to replace them. So the bomb fell over so

like it must have disconnected like the timing device so they went back in the second day the day after to put more bombs in there. Pretending to be tourists and with like a group like, oh, you know, we enjoyed it so much yesterday. We really needed to come. Oh, you like my shirt. It says I am not a terrorist. I was really hoping this would, you know, smooth over some things,

seeing how, you know, you get you guys are nowhere conducting a bombing campaign. By May of 1971 and the escalating atrocities in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, the weather's politics were beginning to seem less extreme to other groups of revolutionaries and seemed a lot more necessary. On August 21, 1971, George Jackson was shot dead in the yard of San Quentin prison in circumstances which still remain a mystery to this day. And as a tribute published by the Berkeley Tribe stated, we may never know

exactly how he died, but we damn well know why he died. Expressing both disbelief at the act and its inevitability, the tribute placed the blame directly on the criminally repressive and racist judicial system. One week later, on August 28th, the weather attacked three offices of the California prison system in San Francisco, Sacramento and San Mateo as a tribute to Jackson. The damage topped about $100,000 and in San Francisco, the blasts destroyed the ground floor offices of a psychiatric clinic for paroles and caused damage worth about $50,000. So then there was the Attica prison uprising, which lasted three and a half days.

This was came out of the taking hostage of prison guards in Attica prison in response to conditions for prisoners. It went on for three and a half days. They released a set of demands. The demands were ignored and the army and police were essentially told to shoot them. **Jay** Yeah, they like, if I remember correctly, they were flying like helicopters over the yard and just like indiscriminately shooting into the prison. Yep. That was after they flooded the entire prison with CS gas as well. Well, yeah, of course.

I mean cops have beats that they have to follow. Yeah. The toll was 39 dead, 30 inmates and nine of the guards who've been held hostage. Less than half an hour after the uprising was over, guards and state troopers were forcing men to strip, lie face down on the ground while they brutally beat them with the butts of their guns and truncheons. The weather's response was quick and assured. Four days after the massacre, at a few minutes past half seven in the evening,

an explosion ripped through the cinder block walls of a ninth floor bathroom in the state office building in Albany, New York. The ninth floor was where the office of Russell Oswald, the chief commissioner of correction was. He was the man who had ordered the shootings at Attica. Did they kill him? No, they just fucked up his office. Take that. You need a new desk, bitch.

They just fucked up his office. Take that. You need a new desk, bitch. Really, you know, we took some cues from some allies of ours. We really fucked up your potted plant. So, Joe, do you know what happened on the 9th of May 1972? No, something bad. Whenever there's a date never follows something good. It's very bad.

And on the 9th of May 1972, the United States sent 200 planes over the northern half of Vietnam to mine its harbor and bomb the countryside. Yeah, that's bad. Shouldn't do that. A day later, the Hanoi delegation to the peace talks in Paris condemned the attack, saying the US had taken the grave step in escalation of the war to date and thrown down an insolent challenge to the Vietnamese people. Later that day, the Senate passed resolution against the escalation. By the afternoon of May 10th, the police and the anti-war protesters were confronting each other all across the country. The weather lent their own skills to the protest where on the 19th of May, which is Ho Chi Minh's birthday, the group exploded.

Well, who could possibly forget that? This is actually a point that will come up in the next page. The group exploded a bomb in the Air Force wing of the Pentagon. What the fuck? How are they getting into these places? The group, the bomb was placed in the women's toilet on the fourth floor. So they were just like, this is the 70s. They were just like, OK, it's a woman. Let her in. What's she going to do? It's probably true, honestly. I mean, like it's the Pentagon, they were just like okay it's a woman let her in what she gonna do it's probably true honestly I mean like it's a Pentagon

security has always been very strict but it is kind of insane that they managed to get a bomb into the Pentagon the blast was so powerful it blew away a 30 foot section of the wall thankfully that would never happen to the Pentagon ever again. Later in the year, the weather attempted to organize another campaign supporting the NLF's final offensive, but failed to gain support needed to carry it through. In the wake of that offensive, the United States carpet bombed North Vietnam in the Christmas bombings. Yeah, they tended to do that.

It's thankfully there was only like several thousand cases of war crimes happening there, not that many, just like, you know, hundreds a day. Yeah. But on the 27th of January, 1973, you know, that day hit me. This is when the US and North Vietnamese negotiate negotiator signed a peace agreement. And that is kind of the symbolic end of the war in Vietnam.

At least the American involvement, at least the American involvement. Yes, Saigon has yet to fall. So after pointing out the difference between a final victory in Vietnam and the victory represented by the signing of the peace agreement, whether hailed the acc represented by the signing of the peace agreement.

Weather hailed the accords, urging all opponents of the government's war policies to allow themselves to seize the time and celebrate the triumph of the Vietnamese people. A short statement hailed the victory as won shared by all enemies of U.S. imperialism. So what did the theoretical end of the war in Vietnam mean for the weather underground? I was going to say, it's kind of like the galvanizing thing behind their actions. And now that the United States is gone, they kind of have to find some-

They got a pivot! They get a really pivot heart into being anti-potanical garden now. Oh, the pivot's coming, Joe. Oh no. Pivots are never good. Soon they began to figure out how their revolutionary politics would translate to other conflicts of imperialism worldwide and the struggle of oppressed people with the help of Clayton Van Liedgraaf, an old school revolutionary whose politics were so radical he was kicked out of not only the Communist Party but also progressive labor.

Remember them? The guys who opposed the peace treaty? Yeah. So by December 1973, the charges against most of the Weather Underground were dropped due to illegal investigations used by the FBI as uncovered by the Watergate scandal. Whoops. So, you know, the Weather Underground outlast Richard Nixon. I'm going to say that much. Fuck it. Bill Ayers, the hand cup to see like who must go, Mr. Nixon. Yeah. After this point, the weather underground released Prairie Fire. It's a new statement on bringing revolutionary politics to the people informed in part by their partnership with Lidegraph.

This is like I would recommend reading Prairie Fire. I think there's a lot of interesting things in it in understanding the shift of left politics in the 70s. Like how this is much more a softening of the weather undergrounds politics, like famously once quoted by Barack Obama. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's hard to soften your politics

while you're blowing things up. The coup in Chile would provide a focus for anti-American imperialists abroad. And then the emergence of a new group in California called the Symbionese Liberation Army would pull their focus domestically. OK. So, yeah, the SLA famously known for kidnapping newspaper heiress Patty Hearst who then apparently according to her was brainwashed and then joined the SLA. Okay that is complete bullshit but at the same time like what even was the SLA's ideology exactly

like it was kind of obtuse if I remember correctly. Who knows maybe we'll do a series on them in the future. True the whole Patty Hearst thing is kind of interesting. if I remember correctly. Who knows? Maybe we'll do a series on them in the future. True. The whole Patty Hearst thing is kind of interesting. So the weather staged some armed actions in 1974, including the final bombing of the year on June 13th of the Gulf oil's headquarters in Pittsburgh,

an act of solidarity with the anti-colonial struggle against Portugal in Angola, which caused over $350,000 in damage. On January 23rd, 1975, the Agency for International Development Office in the State Department Building in D.C. was also bombed. On June 16, 75, the weather bombed the Banco de Ponce office in New York Rockefeller Center, causing several thousand dollars worth of of damage and a statement was sent to the Associated Press, New York Post and NBC

detailing the role of the bank's owners in causing the poverty that was endemic in Puerto Rico and on October 10th 1975 it bombed the Kennecott Corporation headquarters in Salt Lake City Utah in solidarity with the resistance to Chile's military government and the opposition to Kennecott Corporation headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah, in solidarity with the resistance to Chile's military government and the opposition to Kennecott's corporations involvement with the coup two years earlier. Then in third of February, 1977, on the San Francisco Immigration Naturalization Service, causing little damage, but announced to those who still cared that the politics of armed struggle was once again the politics of the weather. During this period... They're fading it seems. They're having to reiterate, we're still here. We're still doing this.

At this point over this period as well is where there's a split within the weather underground. This is you have the development of the Prairie Fire Organising Committee, which is much more focused on like grassroots organizing and community. And then you have the May 11th group, which are much more committed to the original idea of like armed struggle. And they are like doing bank robberies and stuff like that. But over the next few years, the politics began to change and the Weather Underground ironically saw which way the wind was blowing and took the change for, you know, the Prairie Fire. Following these last few bombings in a series of bank robberies, many members of the original Weather Underground were arrested or turned themselves

into authorities. Ayers had all his charges dropped. Dorn received a $1,500 fine and three years of probation. Mark Rudd turned himself into police and most of the others who had gone to join May 19th group would eventually be caught too. And that's pretty much where the story of the Weather Underground ends. It's a shocking little amount of punishment for this.

Yeah, because they were all like well connected middle class people after the Weather Underground. You know, Bill Ayers goes on to become an academic. Bernadine Dorn goes on to become, you know, a a practicing lawyer, although she can't get on the bar in New York. Can't imagine. I mean, it's still incredibly shit. They're still blowing shit up. That's one of those things that like, I guess, now, of course, they would certainly get a life sentence, even if they didn't kill anybody. But back then, terrorism was kind of treated with a light hand,

especially if you happen to be middle class white people, middle to upper class white people, I should say. And yeah, like Bill Ayers goes on to become a very successful political academic. He famously released his autobiography, Future of Days, which I pulled information for the series from on 9-11. Great time to drop a book, you know, about a terrorist. And in an interview about the book on the morning of 9-11, he said he didn't regret any of it. Oh, good timing. Good timing. Yeah, that that guy's that guy's agent was definitely fired afterwards.

I just to reiterate this, so I'm understanding correctly through this years long bombing campaign, they killed only themselves. Yeah, incredible. only themselves. Yep. Incredible. It's honestly impressive. You'd think with all of these bombs full of nails in offices and buildings and you name it, they'd at least accidentally kill someone. But was it was that like on purpose? Did they go out of their way to only bomb things when they were empty? Yeah, like a part of it was a focus on material damage

over like killing people. Seems flawed though, right? In their own ideology. How you can overthrow the government and install this, you know, whatever kind of government they foresaw to destroy American imperialism by damaging office furniture.

Like it seems like very, very divorced from their own drive for, you know for war. They wanted war. They declared war and they did property damage. It doesn't seem like connected to me. I'm very confused. But this is the really interesting thing about the Weather Underground and how their legacy, because like one, most of them are all still alive like Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorn are still political activists. There was no real martyrdom in their like movements. They're like. Except when they blew themselves up. I suppose it'd be a little bit different if like the cops gun down a few of them. That would definitely be a radicalizing moment, but because they never had

that, I guess, I guess that makes sense, they're kind of ideologically they're prepared for war but individually, mentally, ethically, whatever, they don't really seem to be able to stomach the concept of killing another human being which I'm not saying is a flaw, it's not a flaw in anybody but it does seem to be very inconsistent with their messaging because their messaging is very, very militant and it could have inspired someone to kill someone, but they themselves wouldn't cross that line. Yeah. And it's also like they benefit a little bit from self mythologizing in the sense that like Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorn, you know, Mark Road all went on to be like very public people as well. You know, like, like especially Bill Ayers and Bernie Dorn, like Bill Ayers was able to release

a book like that got loads of press coverage like Andreas Potter, if he had still been alive, wouldn't have been allowed to do that. Yeah. The US is handling terrorism very, very differently back then than they do today. Obviously, you know, we live in the quote, post the nine eleven world and all that. But that does like one of the common refrains I've seen about the weather underground, specifically their leadership is that they were given such a light hand, it kind of effectively slap on the wrist. We could agree on it because they were cops. Yeah. And but like in reality, it's less the cops thing is that like they all came from like extremely well connected, well off families,

like Bill Ayers dad, because obviously Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorn were together, like fought to get Bernadine Dorn on the bar so she could practice law. Yeah, I'm not saying I agree with the idea that they're FBI assets or anything, but you can kind of understand why some people would believe that because we're sitting in 2024 right now looking back because right now if someone blows up a bomb anywhere in the United States, you're going to prison for life if they catch you. So we can kind of see what the direct implication of your actions are these days. Whereas back in the 70s, it seems, again, caveat, assuming you're a white middle- class person, because Black Panthers

and other Black activists had the hammer fucking dropped on them for significantly less. You could just kind of like, ah, don't you go and do that, Bill. Go on now, William. We'll see you in a couple of years and you influence a future president of the United States. Yep. Yep. The juxtaposition is fucking wild, both between the state's response and also their own response

to their own ideology. Like, they hold things called the war council. They're blowing things up. But I mean, it's also like going back to what we talked about earlier, it's shocking to me that a group that was like legitimately debating the the acceptability of murdering babies. Well, how seriously they were debating that is the question. That's always the thing, right? People are going to debate the ethics of what they would quote unquote do in a certain situation,

but then when you literally have the tools in your hand to do so, let's blow up a guy's office. But I think we've talked about the United Japanese Red Army and things like that. One of the things that pushes these groups into violence, like literal, constant, planned, casualty causing violence, is there's someone within the ranks that is radicalizing them even further and then someone else rushes to keep up and it kind of pulls an organization in a specific direction that brings them into,

you know, murdering people. And that seems to be something that was very much missing in the Weather Underground is they didn't have that one guy that was like, yeah, blowing up police buildings is really cool, but what if we just like shot a cop? Yeah. Which again, this is not a critique. I'm just saying. Well, this is they were benefiting from, you know, the family guy

like terrorists killing people that would have gone away. What once you start killing people, that will bring the full force of the government on your back. And they were obviously managing to escape that their entire terrorism careers whatever it is you want to call it. So Joe that is the weather underground. We do a little thing on this show called questions from the Legion. If you have a question to ask us, ask us on ask us on discord or Patreon. Today's question from the Legion is what are your top three most played video games? Oh, that's easy for me.

Number one, the Persona 3, because- Dead or Alive Xtreme 3, Dead or Alive Xtreme 2, Dead or Alive Xtreme 1. Mine is, I'd say replay, because obviously that means it can't be like an online game, because then there's no replayability, right? It's just multiplayer. multiplayer but persona 3 definitely is number one because I played it when originally came out I played when it

came on the PSP and I just finished persona 3 reloaded it's one of my favorite games of all time it's deeply weird we've is fuck but it has very very it has like if you get if you shave away all the weeb ishness of it it does have a very very good story which is very important to me, which is also on my next two is like Final Fantasy seven and then Final Fantasy eight. I'm nothing if not a fucking stereotype. All right. And I would say throughout my life, it would have to be Call of Duty Black Ops one, It would have to be Call of Duty Black Ops 1, Dark Souls, and Bloodborne. I've played Call of Duty Black Ops.

I'm not really into multiplayer anymore. We used to play games organized on the Discord with people. Those were a lot of fun. I just don't have time for it anymore. And multiplayer games to me just aren't as attractive to me anymore. Rather than sitting in front of my computer, I'd rather just like playing a Switch or a Steam Deck or something.

I don't know. I'm strange like that, I suppose. But you want to get into you want to get into your cozy card gun and play Stardew Valley. Yeah, I'd much rather like sit on my chair and play Persona 3 for the fourth time than like log into any Call of Duty multiplayer lobby. Joining the Dussler zone. Yeah, if I wanted to hurl insults at myself, I would, I don't know, just listen to my internal

monologue. I don't need to involve strangers in this equation. So, that is the episode I host a a show called beneath the skin, a show about the history of everything told through the history of tattooing. Um, Joe's been on the show talking about the pig care in islands. We have like Russian prison tattoos, the history of Tamoko in New Zealand. And I am also the producer of glue factory, a comedy podcast that has literally no theme and is just all riffs. So if you enjoy a riffing that me and Joe do, watch, listen to that and watch other people who are professional comedians and much better than us do it.

And Joe, you have this show. This is the only show that I have. And if you like what we do here, consider supporting us on Patreon. Five dollars gets you everything. It gets you six plus years of bonus content every episode, like this one, a week early. It gets you bonus episodes, ebooks, audiobooks, stickers, first dibs on our merch and live show tickets. It gets you all sorts of stuff as well as access to our Discord community, which is pretty fun. And you can leave us a review on wherever it is you listen to podcasts, it helps us immensely.

With that out of the way, don't blow up the same statue more than twice. Declare war on the botanical gardens!