I spent a few months in the early 1970's living and working within a mile or two of the famous Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, although I never met him. Here are some thoughts, as well as a student teaching and lesson plan for understanding this famous "Montana terrorist." And here's a link to the Wikipedia account of his career, which I haven't read. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kaczynski
by Paul Stephens (1997)
Unabombers, Terrorists, and Nuclear Weapons
It is quite unusual these days for an academic high achiever to become a political terrorist. Recently, I passed through Lincoln, and I was able to hear some local viewpoints. The people I talked with weren't especially concerned or worried that so famous a "terrorist" had lived among them. After all, the early revolutionaries, led by Marx and other academics, especially the Anarchists and Nihilists, set the standard for this tradition, but ever since the Vietnam War, we haven't heard much in favor of terrorism from professors - especially UC Berkeley professors, who actually developed much of our nuclear weapons technology at the Lawrence-Livermore Laboratories.
Today, the more radical campus in the Bay Area is San Francisco State. Stewart Brand and the Whole Earth Catalog people constitute another major force for global ecological consciousness. It would be more accurate to associate the Unabomber's Manifesto and lifestyle with them. Certainly he was not your ordinary Berkeley Professor! (In the current New York Review of Books, Joan Didion compares Kaczinsky with two other professors, one a schizophrenic mathematical genius, and the other a Yale professor, Gelernter, who was one of the recipients of a finely-crafted bomb, and a later explanatory letter. Professor Gelernter has been the most vocal advocate of the death penalty for Kaczinsky).
It is interesting that someone as cold and formal as a mathematician should find the terrorist logic convincing, while virtually all social scientists do not. Many of us share a concern that terrorism is much more effective than it should be. Using high-tech strategies against a technocracy may be ironical and somewhat entertaining, but it will not convince the most humane and dedicated workers for world peace and social justice. Instead, it has discredited much of what they had already accomplished.
And so, we find the Unabomber's actions objectionable, even while we sympathize with his views, and know that fanatics of any ideology have often done as badly or worse, and harmed as many or more people by their actions. I am one of those who believes that the greatest terrorist threat in the world today is posed by those who have the capability of using nuclear weapons, and until that power is removed from everyone, we will all be living in a state of abject terror over the very survival of the human species, let alone ourselves and our communities.
This is reason enough to support universal, negotiated nuclear disarmament as quickly as possible, and I must confess that I have great difficulty in understanding why this is not happening in a town like Great Falls. We have everything to lose and nothing to gain from the continued presence of a nuclear arsenal. 1970 would have been a good time for the leading citizens of our town and region to begin a dialogue about terrorism and the threats which nuclear and other technologies may or may not pose to our future, and to human civilization in general.
The recent broadcast on 60 Minutes (CBS, September 8, 1997) of a story about a Russian general who claims there are already about 80 "suit case size" nuclear weapons unaccounted for brings this issue into clearer focus. Do we wait until someone actually uses a nuclear weapon, again, or do we start dealing with the problem, now? We know that there are all sorts of official, tactical scenarios to deal with nuclear terrorism, but what are governments doing to eliminate the threat of it in the first place? All nuclear arsenals must be secured and eliminated as a matter of global policy, and probably all nuclear power reactors as well, since they produce plutonium. If the UN, NATO, or other world treaty organizations aren't doing this yet, we may rightfully insist that they begin to do so, now.
This summer's blockbuster films Air Force One and Peacemakers deal with nuclear terrorism in a limited way. In the first, a renegade General with a nuclear arsenal has already been defeated and imprisoned by American/Russian government cooperation. Other terrorist groups are still at large, however, and try to get control of Air Force One so our President can be traded as a hostage for their General. The nuclear issue is hardly mentioned at all. It is an anti-terrorist, not an anti-nuclear message. In Peacemakers, ten nuclear warheads are stolen to be sold, with one going to a Bosnian Serb terrorist who attempts to use it against the United Nations building in New York.
If the Russian General on 60 Minutes is correct, we may be hearing from some proud new owner of a nuclear weapon at any time. There's actually supposed to be an international market in such weapons, with the going price being 10's or 100's of millions of dollars. Every billionaire should have one, and like J.P. Morgan's yacht, if you have to ask the price, you can't afford one. If we really knew the price, we would know that no one can afford them, nor can civilization as a whole.
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The "Unabomber Manifesto" and the Internet:
The shape of things to come?
We still wonder: Why did the Unabomber, with the highest imaginable intellectual and academic credentials, need to resort to bomb-making in order to get his observations and analysis on the discussion table? Of what use are universities if they are unwilling to discuss and grapple with the basic social and political issues of our time?
Which was more important? The Manifesto, or the intricately-carved "letter bombs" which were the basic weapon in the Unabomber's arsenal? Is the pen mightier than the sword, or are they merely different symbols for the same reality? The very idea of a "letter bomb" is loaded with symbolic significance. Should we not call the famous letter drafted by nuclear scientists Szilard and Einstein urging President Roosevelt to build the first Atomic Bomb (August, 1939) a "letter-bomb?" Think of all the famous letters, telegrams, or other dispatches which have changed the course of history. For a real scholar, should it not be simple enough to create an intellectual "bombshell" instead of one wired with chemical explosives?
In a case like the Unabomber's, various mental health or "sanity" issues arise. Is any sort of punishment, including the death penalty, appropriate in such a case? If someone acts entirely altruistically, with no concern for his own safety or well-being, and only to "save the world" in some fairly obvious and intellectually respectable fashion, can we in good conscience kill him, or should we instead treat him as a kind of holy person and martyr (or even a war hero or revolutionary leader, much as Mandela or Gandhi were regarded as their revolutions gestated and finally succeeded)? Think of all the political leaders this century who were either soldiers in a vicious cause, or outright terrorists in the cause of a national liberation movement against imperialistic aggressors.
The Unabomber is different in that he acted alone, and without validation from any organized political group, but the idea is much the same. The danger, now, is that the Unabomber has provided a long-term excuse for governments to belittle, marginalize, or outright persecute anyone who maintains similar anti-authoritarian, anti-technology views. How can we get the corporate, commercialized, politicized media and education systems to finally begin addressing some of these issues seriously - even when to do so threatens their own power and profits? The censorship is so comprehensive, rigid, and rigorously-enforced that to even imagine a free press and free discussion of issues like those posed by the Unabomber Manifesto was difficult two years ago. Now, we have a free press, and we will discuss them fearlessly!
Although publishing the Manifesto may have led to the Unabomber's arrest, it should also have generated a groundswell of support for and criticism of the Unabomber's views. We may have before us the greatest test so far of the political power (and political independence) of the World Wide Web. No printed copies of the Manifesto were available in Great Falls, yet I could immediately and anonymously download the statement and related documents on my own disk at the public library, and study the materials on my home computer at my leisure.
The Internet may give us another decade or several of intellectual and political freedom, as paradoxical as this may sound. It is probably true that the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the breakup of the Soviet Union are largely due to the personal computer and copy machines, which so clearly and obviously made any totalitarian system of thought control seem archaic, unseemly, and absurd. Yet, the Unabomber seems not to have availed himself of the opportunity to use computers to join the larger citizen's protest movement, or other anti-government, appropriate technology groups. Had he done so, he might have avoided hurting people, as well as the consequences which he now may suffer at the hands of a vengeful State.
Expository Questions:
1. Did the Unabomber, with the highest imaginable intellectual and academic credentials, need to resort to bomb-making in order to get his observations and analysis on the discussion table?
Why were universities unwilling to discuss and grapple with such basic social and political issues of our time? (In fact, many journals and departments are devoted to precisely these issues, to the distress of taxpayers and corporate sponsors).
2. Which was more important? The writing and distribution of the Manifesto, or the use of intricately-carved "letter bombs" which were the basic weapon in the Unabomber's arsenal? Which of the two was of greatest concern to (a) the government and (b) the corporate media?
3. How is the idea of a "letter bomb" loaded with symbolic significance? Name some famous letters, manifestos, telegrams, or other other communications which have had massive strategic consequences in the course of a war, or other historical events. Would any sort of munitions have done the job as effectively? How would you answer the ancient question "Is the pen mightier than the sword?"
Discussion Questions
1. What was your first emotional reaction to news about the "Unabomber?" What was your emotional response, once you read the Manifesto and learned what his views and mission had been?
2. Why do you suppose the Unabomber chose to locate himself in Montana? Was this a good choice? Why or why not?
3. What sort of ethical principles did the Unabomber follow? Which principles did he violate? Evaluate his ethical stature overall. Would you classify him as a saint, a martyr, a terrorist, a prophet, a madman, a genius, or what?
4. From what you now know about the Unabomber, were his actions and choices more or less reasonable? Compare his actions to those of (a) Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara during the Viet Nam War, and (b) Richard Nixon during his administration. Should different rules apply to elected officials than to private individuals? Why or why not?
5. How do you think historians will evaluate the Unabomber and his Manifesto?
Content Questions
1. What is the "enemy" identified in the Manifesto?
2. What sort of revolution is advocated in the Manifesto?
3. What sort of criticism is leveled against the traditional Left?
4. What is the Manifesto's view towards traditional Conservatives?
5. Who may be allies of the Manifesto's goals?
6. What obstacles to the achievement of his goals does the writer forsee?
7. How is the Manifesto's teaching similar to B--'s in our last selection? How is it different? In what ways could Quinn's portrayal of B-- be related to the Unabomber's career?
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