Communist terrorism

Communist terrorism describes terrorism carried out in the advancement of, or by groups who adhere to, communism or related ideologies, such as Leninism, Maoism, or Marxism-Leninism. Communist terrorism in history has sometimes taken the form of state-sponsored terrorism, supported by communist nations such as the Soviet Union,China,North Korea and Cambodia. In addition, non-state actors such as the Red Brigades, the Front Line, and the Red Army Faction have also engaged in communist terrorism. These groups hope to inspire the masses to rise up and begin a revolution to overthrow existing political and economic systems.

The end of the Cold War and the fall of the Soviet Union have been credited with leading to a marked decrease in such terrorism.Brian Crozier, founder and director of the Institute for the Study of Conflict, has said that communism was the primary source of both state-sponsored and non-state terrorism.

In the 1930s, the term "communist terrorism" was used by the Nazi Party in Germany as part of a propaganda campaign to spread fear of communism. The Nazis blamed communist terrorism for the Reichstag fire, which they used as an excuse to push through legislation removing personal freedom from German citizens. In the 1940s and 1950s, various Southeast Asian countries, such as the Philippines and Vietnam, witnessed the rise of communist groups engaging in terrorism. John Slocum has written that communists in present-day Malaysia used terrorism to draw attention to their ideological beliefs, but Phillip Deery has written that the Malaysian insurgents were called communist terrorists only as part of a propaganda campaign.

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