[At around 5 a.m. on Monday night, March 5, the Volcano group (Vulkangruppe) set fire to a high-voltage pylon near Steinfurt, a district of the village of Gosen-Neu Zittau in Berlin’s south-eastern suburbs, deliberately cutting off power to Tesla’s “Gigafactory”, located some ten kilometers away. The European factory of Elon Musk’s company, inaugurated in 2022 in Berlin-Grünheide, spits out 6,000 electric SUVs a week, the Model Y, hoping to double its capacity to 1 million units a year.

The plant’s 12,500 employees had to be sent home or told to stay there until production could resume. The Tesla Group is already estimating its economic damage at several hundred million dollars, with an assessment that each day without power or production at its Berlin plant is costing it 50 to 60 million euros. Finally, the General Manager of the Berlin plant, André Thierig, estimates that production will not be able to resume until next week at the earliest, after consulting the electricity grid operator… Here is the translation of the Volcano Group communique published on indymedia germany the same day].

Volcano group switches Tesla off! : Attack on the power supply near Steinfurt

Today, we sabotaged Tesla. Because in Grünau, Tesla devours land, resources, people and labor to spit out 6,000 SUVs – killing machines and “monster trucks” – a week. Our gift for March 8th is to switch Tesla off.

Because the complete destruction of the Gigafactory, and with it, the demise of “techno-fascists” like Elend¹ Musk, is a step on the road to liberation from patriarchy. Continue reading Berlin (Germany): sabotage of a high-voltage pylon brings Tesla factory to a standstill →

“We are not special. Our skills are not overly technical or advanced, and our tools are simple to acquire. If you are reading this, you are capable of doing what we do.”

– APD Patrol Car Torched in Lakewood

While I agree with this sentiment, the reader is left with many questions about how to develop such a capacity for action, even if they are motivated. What exactly does it take to not get caught carrying out heavy actions like arson? This is especially important in the long run; not getting caught for a single arson is one thing, but being able to continue carrying out attacks in the face of heightened repressive attention is quite another.

For anyone who wants to carry out actions like this, but isn’t doing so yet, I’ve sketched an outline of the steps I think are necessary to sustain hard-hitting attacks on domination (limited to the topic of “operational” considerations, i.e., acquiring skills). This brief outline is intended to orient you and provide a “learning path” — each step has recommended reading that actually goes into the appropriate amount of depth on the subject. Use the Tails operating system to visit these links, which runs from a USB drive and leaves no trace on your computer. What I’ve written here is by no means definitive, and I hope to spark a dialogue about any operational aspects I may have neglected, as well as anything outside this scope that is important for sustaining and intensifying the capacity for action.

Deepening bonds

For anyone who doesn’t already have an action group, deciding who to act with is the first obstacle to overcome. I prefer to act in groups of two or three; it’s easier to maintain a high level of trust and agility with just a small handful of people. Most actions don’t require more than three participants, and when they do, action groups can collaborate. I prefer not to act alone because some aspects of actions are less risky when there are at least two people (for example, having a lookout). Continue reading Developing Action Capacity: A Path →