This is an interesting, well-researched history. However, I struggle to recommend this book considering the author was unable to interview the subjects. Particularly when writing about radical history, I think it's important to gather sources that aren't from law enforcement and to treat those law enforcement sources with a healthy dose of skepticism.

It is simple to pretend that people who perform shocking acts of violence are different than everyone else. It's got to be something in their childhoods, we think, or maybe it's a mental illness. The most disturbing part of this book, and it admittedly has many, was that these women seemed so normal, just like you or me.

William Rosenau has combed through court files, newspaper articles and more to write Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol, a non-fiction account of a radical leftist terrorist group. They planted multiple homemade bombs, robbed and killed people, all in the name of freeing the world from imperialism. The majority of the group were highly educated, white women.

"They'd spent their entire adult lives embroiled in political struggles: protesting against the Vietnam War, fighting for black, Puerto Rican, and Native American liberation, and fighting against what they called U.S. 'imperialism' - that is, U.S. military aggression, political domination, and economic exploitation, particularly in the Third World."

Rosenau paints a careful picture to reveal how, step-by-step, the people involved in the group felt more and more marginalized and victimized to the point where they felt any and all actions were justified.

"Their vision of what this heaven on earth would look like was hazy, but one thing was certain: creating it would require nothing less than violent revolution. This vagueness about ultimate objectives is typical among terrorists."

There is so much information about a number of different people in this book that it can be overwhelming. But I think, ultimately, it is better to know what has gone on in the past because it affects the future in such a profound way.

"I discovered that during the 1970s and 1980s, the United States had waged an earlier 'war on terror' against violent domestic extremists, and it was during that period that the government created many of the counter-terrorism tools and approaches that continue to be used today."

The privilege of living in a free society is that all manner of ideas can be discussed and embraced or dismissed depending upon their merits. I want equality, freedom from tyranny and opportunities for all people - no matter what you're from, what you look like, or what your background is. However, I won't use violence to try and bring those ideals about. That seems to be the line in the sand for many. The people in this book didn't have that line but they seemed to espouse higher ideals.

And what a tragedy that is. If only their brilliant minds had been directed towards methods of bringing about change that worked within society rather than against a nameless enemy, our country might have been better for all of them.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a free advance reader copy of this book. The brief quotations cited in this review may change or be omitted entirely from the final print version.

Below are a few (somewhat) brief, $.02 opinions about several books I've read or listened to recently but will not review in full. Their appearance in this recurring piece generally has little to nothing to do with merit. Many I enjoyed as much or more than those that got the full court press. I hope you'll consider one or two for your own TBR stack if they strike your fancy whether they struck mine or not.

Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol, William Rosenau

The true story of M19, a domestic terrorist group made up of, and founded by, women. Holdovers from the 1970s, these six veteran extremists kept going under the name The May 19th Communist Organization (May 19 the shared birthday of two of their idols - Malcolm X and Ho Chi Minh). After fighting against Vietnam and for black and Native American Liberation, M19 too aim at American imperialism. I found the idea fascinating, but the execution felt so dense and fact-driven that it felt more like a dissertation than a story. I didn't make it through the written galley, but may try again if the book is available on audio after publication.

The swords of Mid-Twentieth Century liberal activism were foraged in the fires of the civil rights movement and anti-war protests of the 1960s. By the 1980s, most such activists settled down into conventional, middle class lives. But there was a small percentage of protesters who became increasingly radical, eventually evolving into Marxist terrorists.
These oddballs naively thought that their bombings, robberies, kidnappings and killings would, somehow, trigger a proletarian uprising that would overturn Ronald Reagan’s capitalist America.
The story of one of the most unusual of these fringe groups is told in Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol. The May 19th Communist Organization was founded and dominated by women. All were middle class, college educated children of liberal parents.
Fueled by a sincere desire to improve the lot of minorities and to end the war in Vietnam, along with a healthy does of liberal guilt, the May 19th women began associating with violent groups like the Weather Underground and the Prairie Fire Organizing Committee.
As those organizations were broken up by the FBI, May 19th (named in honor of Che Guevara's birthday) went solo. Never a large group, May 19th pulled off seven bombings in the early 1980s, including a late-night attack on the U.S. Senate that did over a million dollars in damage. Their most violent action was the 1981 killing of two police officers and a Brinks truck guard during a robbery in coordination with the Black Liberation Army.
Developing new techniques in counterroism, the FBI and AFT eventually tracked down and arrested all the May 19th terrorists except for two who remain at large. The group was defunct by 1985.
The fall of the Soviet Union and the adoption of capitalism by the Chinese Communist Party cut the ground out from under Marxist terrorism. Today, as we all know, it is the far right and Islamic fundamentalism that have emerged as the greatest terroristic threats.
Author William Rosenau, was an antiterroism expert at the RAND Cooperation. Unfortunately, Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol reads like a think tank position paper rather than an exciting work of popular history. Roseenau, keeps interrupting the narrative with detailed biographies of all the players. He often makes lengthy asides into the background of other, mostly European, terrorist outfits which have no connection to May 19th. Group.
None of the surviving members would agree to be interviewed, so we are denied insight into how their views might have changed over the decades. Rosenau suggests that they all remain unrepentant for their actions, though some have abandoned their youthful Communist affiliation.
Rosenau compiled a huge amount of information on this minor band of kooks, and he buries the story in masses of insignificant detail. We don’t really need to know what food the women scarfed down as they plotted their next bombing.
But caveats aside, Tonight We Bombed the U.S. Capitol provides a perceptive look at a forgotten outlier element within conservative 1980s America.