The JRA was founded by Fusako Shigenobu and Tsuyoshi Okudaira in February 1971, and was most active in the 1970s and 1980s, operating mostly out of Lebanon with PFLP collaboration and funding from Muammar Gaddafi's Libya, as well as Syria and North Korea.
[4] The JRA's stated goals were to overthrow the Japanese government and the monarchy, as well as to start a world revolution.
The police quickly arrested many of them, including founder and intellectual leader Takaya Shiomi, who was in jail by 1970.
[8] The JRA had close ties with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and Wadie Haddad.
[citation needed] In April 2001, Shigenobu issued a statement from detention declaring the JRA had disbanded, and that their battles should henceforth be done by legal means.