After the Greenwich Village townhouse explosion in 1970, in which Weatherman member Ted Gold, Ayers' close friend Terry Robbins, and Ayers' girlfriend, Diana Oughton were killed when a nail bomb being assembled in the house exploded, Ayers and several associates evaded pursuit by US law enforcement officials. Kathy Boudin and Cathy Wilkerson survived the blast. Ayers was not facing criminal charges at the time, but the federal government later filed charges against him.[4] Ayers participated in the bombings of New York City Police Department headquarters in 1970, the United States Capitol building in 1971, and the Pentagon in 1972, as he noted in his 2001 book, Fugitive Days. Ayers writes:
Although the bomb that rocked the Pentagon was itsy-bitsy - weighing close to two pounds - it caused 'tens of thousands of dollars' of damage. The operation cost under $500, and no one was killed or even hurt.[18]
During this time Ayers and fellow member Bernardine Dohrn married, and the two remained fugitives together, changing identities, jobs and locations.
In 1973, new information came to light about FBI operations targeted against Weather Underground and the New Left, all part of a series of covert and often illegal FBI projects called COINTEL.[19] Due to the illegal tactics[clarification needed] of FBI agents involved with the program, government attorneys requested all weapons- and bomb-related charges be dropped against the Weather Underground, including charges against Ayers.[20]
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Much of the controversy about Ayers during the decade since 2000 stems from an interview he gave to The New York Times on the occasion of the memoir's publication.[31] The reporter quoted him as saying "I don't regret setting bombs" and "I feel we didn't do enough", and, when asked if he would "do it all again," as saying "I don't want to discount the possibility."[29] Ayers protested the interviewer's characterizations in a Letter to the Editor published September 15, 2001: "This is not a question of being misunderstood or 'taken out of context', but of deliberate distortion."[32] In the ensuing years, Ayers has repeatedly avowed that when he said he had "no regrets" and that "we didn't do enough" he was speaking only in reference to his efforts to stop the United States from waging the Vietnam War, efforts which he has described as ". . . inadequate [as] the war dragged on for a decade."