Shoot The Women First

Shoot the Women First

From Library JournalBased upon remarkable interviews, British journalist MacDonald examines the experiences and motivations of some of the most notorious female terrorists of the century. The terrorism literature has noted the central roles of women in Western terrorist groups, but this is the first volume to look at those roles in-depth. Using the words of the women, MacDonald provides insight on the fear and anger that motivated them to violence and to leadership within their groups. The women discuss their relationships with male counterparts and their communities. While the female view is explicitly analyzed, the internal workings of terrorist organizations is equally compelling. This volume will appeal to specialists, informed lay readers, and general readers alike.- William Waugh Jr., Georgia State Univ., AtlantaCopyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.A look at the lives and motivations of female terrorists uses information garnered from interviews with several women involved in terrorist acts to discuss their anger, fear, and remorse. 15,000 first printing. Tour.From Publishers WeeklyThe author, a British journalist who admits to being fascinated by "women committed to violence," set out to discover whether the female of the species really is deadlier than the male. MacDonald interviewed members of the Basque separatist movement, the Italian Red Brigades, the Palestine Liberation Organization, the Irish Republican Army and the German Red Army Faction. She appears awed by her subjects and tends to lightly pass over the criminality of their revolutionary acts, preferring to dwell on their supposed glamour. The only interviewee who comes into clear focus, ironically, is robot-like Kim Hyon Hui, a North Korean government agent who is wholly submissive to male authority (under orders from Pyongyang, she blew up 115 airline passengers in 1985). MacDonald discusses the common notion that most female terrorists are unattractive lesbians and/or feminists gone mad. Here, as elsewhere, she fails to draw any conclusions, or even generalities, from her material. She is very definite, however, in her belief that women revolutionaries have "much stronger characters, more power, more energy" and are "far more pragmatic" than their male counterparts. Thought-provoking and controversial, but disappointingly inconclusive. Photos.Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.From Kirkus ReviewsA thoughtful if inconclusive study of female terrorists by a writer for The Observer. Intrigued by the advice given to recruits of Interpol and European antiterrorist squads to ``shoot the women first,'' MacDonald decided to find out just ``why the less violent sex is regarded by anti-terrorist squads as the more lethal.'' She met with female members of the Basque separatist organization ETA, the PLO, the Intifada, the IRA, the Red Army, and the Baader-Meinhof gang, as well as with international authorities on terror. In South Korea, MacDonald interviewed Kim Hyon Hui, who planted the bomb that killed all the passengers on board Korean Air Flight 858. Except for a couple of terrorists like Kim, who shows symptoms of a ``borderline personality,'' and like PLO member Leila Khaled, who's unable ``to put herself into her victim's shoes,'' the women appear disarmingly normal and unremarkable. Some, like Rita O'Hare of the IRA, see violence as a ``people's only weapon'' but admit that ``face to face is difficult.'' Others argue that violence is necessary for the struggle because, as one ETA member puts it, ``with arms you can get the results very quickly.'' Many, like Italian Red Brigade member Susanna Roncconi and German Red Army Faction terrorist Astrid Proll, seem to have joined their movements out of strong political and feminist convictions. Though experts note the role played by such allegedly female traits as pragmatism, ruthlessness, and industriousness, MacDonald comes to no firm conclusions. She does sugg