[Note of Sans Nom: On Tuesday, September 9, in the southern districts of Berlin, at around 3:30 a.m., flames engulfed two 35-meter-high, 110-kV electricity pylons located on Königsheide Street in the Johannisthal district, cutting power to Europe’s largest technology park located nearby in Altendorf. Steel chains were also wrapped around the cable insulation sheaths to cause a short circuit once they had melted in the flames. These two pylons are located at the end of the overhead line, where electricity passes from the air to the underground route.
More broadly, all of the southern districts of the German capital were left without power, including its 50,000 residents, 3,000 businesses (including those in the technology park), shopping centers, trams, a dozen schools (which remained closed), traffic lights, and telephone communications.
The temporary connection system that was put in place only managed to restore full power after 60 hours (on the afternoon of Thursday, September 11), and repairs to the network on the two pylons are expected to last until 2026, according to a spokesperson for the company Stromnetz. This power outage in Berlin is also the longest in decades, since the accidental outage in Köpenick in February 2019 affected only 30,000 households and lasted about 30 hours.
Here is a translation from German of the communiqué published on the same day on de.indymedia, signed “Some anarchists”…]
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Attack on the military-industrial complex – Blackout in Europe’s largest technology park
September 9, early morning: thousands of cities wake up, millions of people are roused from their sleep by the shrill beep of their alarm clocks, heralding the start of another day of monotony and apathy—15 minutes to drink a coffee before rushing off to work. An hour on public transport, a few exchanged glances, no one talking, everyone glued to their screens. Tons of cars crisscross the streets, the noise of sirens scaring the few birds circling above the city. Neighborhoods become a little more dreary every day. Loneliness settles in among the crowds, between concrete buildings, fences, and cameras. Surrounded by a police presence that threatens to suffocate us more and more.
Advertising screens encourage us to consume or invite us to join the German army (Bundeswehr). Yes, here we are again: “The world will rise again thanks to the German spirit” [a famous line from a poem by Geibel in 1861, intended as a call to the world to “become more German”]. The “historic turning point” requires unwavering defense of the homeland and readiness for war, with the “body of the people” sticking together and making sacrifices. Militarization is advancing, and behind the neoliberal promise of prosperity, the fascist face is showing itself more and more openly. Resignation and pessimism are gaining ground, and there is a certain sadness in the air.
The news is constantly relaying catastrophic events. Wars and genocides never cease. On the contrary: in Gaza, Congo, Sudan, and Ukraine, massacres continue and leaders rub their hands with glee. Business is booming. New agreements are constantly being signed to exploit other countries’ resources, depriving populations of their means of subsistence. Neofascists are firmly entrenched in power in a growing number of countries, and capital is constantly at their service. The reactionary wave of anti-feminism and hostility towards queer people is fueled by tech bros, and AI continues its meteoric rise, making the world increasingly artificial. Their dystopian promise of progress: a fascist-like technocracy with extra-planetary aspirations in response to the collapse of the planet. Everything seems to indicate that this world has long been lost, that there is no possibility of action, that our actions are useless, as if the times of revolt belonged to a distant past.
But today, not everything is working as smoothly as usual. In Europe’s largest technology park, east of Berlin, usually bustling with activity, this normality seems to have dissipated in a matter of minutes in the early hours of the morning. Darkness has given way to a glimmer of hope, for apathy and frustration are not the only reactions to this oppressive reality.
No, today is not a day like any other. Hundreds of CEOs from various companies and research institutes in the fields of IT, robotics, biotechnology and nanotechnology, aerospace, artificial intelligence, security, and the arms industry have learned with bitterness that their Adlershof technology park has ceased to function. At least for a short time, but that is enough to massively disrupt their supercomputers and sensitive operational processes. Two 110 kV power pylons on Königsheide Street in Johannisthal were set on fire, causing a power outage in the technology park. We ask the residents whose homes were affected to be understanding, as this was by no means our intention. Nevertheless, we consider this collateral damage to be acceptable, unlike the actual destruction of nature and the often deadly enslavement of human beings, for which many of the companies based here are responsible on a daily basis.
Their commitment to pursuing technological progress and the ongoing expansion of industrial exploitation in the face of current disasters has far more serious consequences. For everyone, and in a lasting way. The unwavering determination to impose it, by military force if necessary, shows what is really at stake: profit and power. This fact cannot be concealed by entertaining drone shows in the night sky, or by robots inflated with Artificial Intelligence playing soccer, such as those presented to the tech-savvy public in Adlershof. Their catchy advertising slogans about innovation, sustainability, and progress are nothing more than a deceptive maneuver on the battlefield of public discourse, aimed at diverting attention from the fact that they are actually building instruments of death and destruction. All conceivable business models in the above-mentioned high-tech industries, which are located in the Adlershof Technology Park, contribute in one way or another to stabilizing the system and are, in particular, the product of military interests. Their actions ensure the continued existence of the capitalist death machine. They are all the real targets of our action.
However, it would be impossible to review each of the more than 1,000 companies and detail all their abuses. The list would be endless. We will therefore limit ourselves here to a few examples illustrating the unacceptable intertwining of research, science, and technology on the one hand, and war, environmental destruction, and social control on the other.
ATOS – One of the giants of cyberspace, developing IT products and AI-based applications for the military and police. The company manages the HaFIS (Harmonization of Command Information Systems) project for the German army and builds bulletproof armored containers equipped with IT infrastructure. For Israel, a warmongering country, Atos manages a highly secure data center for its defense and security agencies, thus becoming jointly responsible for war and genocide.
ASTRIAL – A company that, in addition to its security infrastructure for smart cities, stands out above all for its involvement in the global war waged by border authorities against migrants. Its command and control systems process enormous amounts of data from land, sea, underwater, underground, air, and space sensors in order to optimize manhunts at the external borders of Northern countries.
GERMAN AERONAUTICS AND AEROSPACE CENTER (DLR) – Space is a highly contested domain in the current global crisis, and the DLR benefits massively from special military funds from the German federal government. Defense research is an integral part of the DLR’s program. For example, the DLR supports Air Force training flights and, in collaboration with the German Army, operates a center of excellence in aerospace medicine in Cologne.
EDAG – A long-standing partner of the security and arms industries, the company develops wheeled and tracked military vehicles, maritime security solutions, and military aircraft with or without pilots. In short: every conceivable machine designed to kill.
EUROVIA/VINCI – One of the world’s largest construction and infrastructure companies, involved in particular in the highly controversial construction of the French nuclear waste storage site [in Bure]. Vinci also builds detention centers, airports, and highways. Through its countless subsidiaries, the company is active in the energy sector and is increasingly entering the arms market. Actemium, a subsidiary of Vinci, recently announced the acquisition of Wärtsilä SAM Electronics GmbH, which works for the German navy and shipyards in Hamburg, Wilhelmshaven, Elmenhorst, Bremerhaven, and Kiel.
JENOPTIK – This technology company based in Jena operates at the interface between internal security and military defense with products such as laser rangefinders, thermal cameras, LEDs, infrared optical beams, and polymers, which are used, for example, for military reconnaissance or infrastructure protection. Its “TraffiData” software, used in particular in the border area with Mexico, is particularly relevant at present. At the request of the US border police, it has been supplemented by “TraffiCatch” for more effective tracking of undesirable persons.
ROHDE & SCHWARZ – This company, which specializes in technology and weapons, manufactures equipment for military radio installations and surveillance systems, which are sold to large technology companies, governments, and intelligence services around the world. R&S products are used, for example, for border security (particularly in Saudi Arabia), in military vehicles, aircraft, and ships, as well as for missile guidance, etc. They are also used in police and intelligence surveillance systems.
SIEMENS – There is virtually no area of the arms industry or heavy industry in which Siemens products are not present. Weapons systems, nuclear submarines, aircraft carriers, tanks, nuclear reactors, dams, wind turbines, prisons, airports, etc. Many of these megaprojects are highly controversial, such as the TrenMaya in Mexico, Erdogan’s dam projects in Kurdistan, or, more recently, the construction of the EuroAsia Interconnector submarine power cable connecting Israel to Cyprus and Greece. The company also supports other Israeli infrastructure projects in occupied East Jerusalem and in Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
TRUMPF – A company at the forefront of the international chip war for digital supremacy. Whether it’s smartphones with turbo data transfer and facial recognition, connected glasses, artificial intelligence, autonomous cars, or missile systems, drones, and weapons, semiconductors are everywhere. And their production is ensured by the German company Trumpf, in collaboration with Zeiss and ASML, which play a key role thanks to their EUV lithography systems. Without their components, the high-tech world would come to a standstill.
This sabotage is not only intended to identify and disrupt the enemies of freedom, but also to call for an intensification of offensive actions in general, and more specifically of those actions that lead to effective disruption of the system. It is a call to leave frustration and despair behind us once and for all. A cry to proclaim that our anarchist ideas and our dynamism are thriving and that the irresponsible actions of those in power will always have consequences. This applies in particular to the accomplices of the arms industry, because we will not stand idly by while people are massacred or condemned to starve to death in their wars.
Attacking critical infrastructure means attacking one of the main vectors of human domination over other humans and over nature. The electrical grid, as such, represents the history of progress and is a prerequisite for the inexorable development toward a highly technological society such as we know it today. This society, under the yoke of technology and capital, currently appears to be the end product of terrestrial civilization and is causing almost irreparable destruction to the Earth on a scale unprecedented in the planet’s history. Not to mention the bloody wars for power and resources that leaders impose on their servants. Their insatiable thirst for growth literally drives them to reach for the stars. Electricity is the main source of energy that powers all the machines and “progress” necessary for the reproduction of the current system. It is possible to cut it off, and it is also possible to replace it with a free life, without domination or exploitation!
Sabotage the technological attack—cut off the power to the military-industrial complex!
Always combative—never warmongering!
Some anarchists
Translated by Act for freedom now!