Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America

The Oklahoma City bombing was met with intense public revulsion, especially because 19 of the 168 victims were children in the facility’s daycare center. The public’s shock was even greater when the culprit was revealed to be a clean-cut (and white) Army veteran from upstate New York. However, public interest in the case tended to center around McVeigh the individual, obscuring his extensive connections with the white power movement. McVeigh was executed in June 2001, and in September 2001, Osama bin Laden decisively replaced him as the face of evil in America.

The so-called Global War on Terror conspicuously left out domestic, white power terrorists from its list of targets. Ironically, the War on Terror did a great deal to fuel the sentiments the white power movement thrived on, especially a suspicion of foreigners and frustration with a government that failed to eradicate an enemy it had represented as an existential threat. Meanwhile, a large swath of veterans were struggling to find meaning in their sacrifices while making the often-difficult transition to civilian life. These trends accelerated with the campaign and then election of Barack Obama, whose foreign (especially Muslim) family background and harsh critiques of Bush-era policies created a widespread impression that he was a Manchurian Candidate, a tool of foreign powers plotting to destroy the country from within.