Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy,alt.politics.white-power
Subject: Paranoia as Patriotism: Introduction
Summary: The ADL's special report, "Paranoia as Patriotism:
         Far-Right Influences on the Militia Movement"
         serialized

Archive/File: pub/orgs/american/adl/paranoia-as-patriotism/introduction
Last-Modified: 1995/08/16

"October 13, 1991. At 9:15 yesterday morning our bomb went off
in the FBI's national headquarters building. Our worries about
the relatively small size of the bomb were unfounded; the
damage is immense....

"My day's work started a little before five o'clock yesterday,
when I began helping Ed Sanders mix heating oil with the
ammonium nitrate fertilizer in Unit 8's garage. We stood the
100-pound bags on end one by one and poked a small hole in the
top with a screwdriver, just big enough to insert the end of a
funnel. While I held the bag and funnel, Ed poured in a gallon
of oil.... It took us nearly three hours to do all 44 sacks,
and the work really wore me out.

MMeanwhile, George and Henry were out stealing a truck. With
only two-and-a-half tons of explosives we didn't need a big
tractor-trailer rig, so we decided to grab a delivery
truck.... George and I headed for the FBI building in the car,
with Henry following in the truck.... As we drove by the
building.... we saw that the basement entrance was open and no
one was in sight. We signalled Henry and kept going for
another seven or eight blocks, until we found a good spot to
park....

"We were still two blocks away when the pavement shuddered
violently under our feet. An instant later the blast wave hit
us -- a defening 'ka-whoomp,' followed by an enormous roaring,
crashing sound, accentuated by the higher-pitched noise of
shattering glass all around us."

       -- from _The Turner Diaries (1978), pp. 38-39


                          Introduction

On April 19, 1995, a large truck bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah
Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 167 people, including 19
children in the building's day care center. The deadly blast - the
worst act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history - came on the
two-year anniversary of the fiery culmination of the Federal
government's confrontation with the Branch Davidian sect at its
compound in Waco, TX. At first, law enforcement and the country at
large believed the Oklahoma City explosion to be the work of international
terrorists. However, within days of this tragedy, the evidence
pointed to a domestic origin, and the prosecutors alleged that the
first man indicted was motivated by an intense hatred of the Federal
government. It was further reported that the two bombing suspects
charged thus far had some contact with one of the many right-wing
paramilitary "militias" that have emerged in this country over the
past year.

In October 1994, the Anti-Defamation League issued a 28-page
fact-finding report entitled, "Armed & Dangerous: Militias Take Aim
at the Federal Government," highlighting the proliferation of
militias in America. The ADL findings were based on a survey which
found evidence of militia activity in 13 states. ADL surveys two
weeks after the Oklahoma City bombing indicated evidence of militia
activity in at least 32 states, with signs that the total number
might continue to rise.

The aims of these militias involve laying the groundwork for
large-scale resistance to the Federal government and its law
enforcement agencies, as well as opposing gun control laws. In the
view of many such extremists, America's government is the enemy,
widening its authoritarian control, planning warfare against the
citizenry and utilizing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms
and the Federal Bureau of Investigation as its main instruments.

An additional problem uncovered by investigation of the growing
militias is the presence in some of them - even in leadership roles
- of persons with histories of racial and religious bigotry and
experience in political extremism.

In order to provide greater public understanding of the militias'
ideology and historical context, ADL has prepared this report. It
includes a summary account of two events that have fueled the growth
of the militias, followed by concise discussions of selected
far-right activists and organizations - a number of which have had a
significant influence upon, or relationship to, the militia groups.
(Anti-Defamation League, 4)

                           Work Cited

Anti-Defamation League. [Special Report] Paranoia as Patriotism:
Far-Right Influences on the Militia Movement. 1995.

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