Committed Precursor Crimes - Assignment Example

Terrorism No: Terrorism Precursor Crimes Committed by the Covenant, the Sword and the Arm of the Lord The Covenant, the Sword and the Arm of the Lord (CSA) started working in 1971 by establishing a compound of Christian Commune, which later on turned to a compound of white supremacists who denounced their status of Christian survivalists. The leader of the group was James D. Ellison who put forward a prophecy against Zionist Occupied Government (ZOG). In August 1983, James Morris after being discharged from Marines stole a large number of helmets, military uniforms and other armed equipment (Hamm, 2007). On August 9, 1983, the CSA did an arson attack on Metropolitan Community Church, which worked in support of gay rights. The arson attack was made with the help of a gallon of gasoline, but there was no major damage done to the Church. In the same month, Ellison with another CSA member firebombed ‘the Beth Shalom synagogue’, which also did no major damage (Hamm, 2007, p. 102). On 2nd November, another failed attack was there by CSA members on the natural gas pipeline that ‘crossed the Red River between Mena and Texarkana, Arkansas’ (Hamm, 2007, p. 102). The CSA members used twenty-three sticks of dynamite to rupture it and expected a riot leading to their holy war, but the dynamites only dented the pipeline. Later on, facing the shortage of money, Ellison guided small groups of his followers to do shoplifting, stealing vehicles and doing other kind of robberies for funds generation. Snell and Thomas, two active members of CSA robbed a pawnshop in Texarkana and during their robbery, Snell murdered a proprietor considering him a Jew, while he was not (Hamm, 2007). The CSA was recognized as a Christian extremist group using military training and weaponry to spread terror. The group kept an extremist religious ideology that claimed their superiority over other races. The whole group had racist ideologies due to which, their targeted other religious and social groups. Richard Snell, an active and racist CSA member brutally killed Louis Bryant, a Black and an Arkansas State Trooper on June 30, 1984. After the incident, Snell escaped from the crime scene and upon finding himself circulated by police officers later on, he opened fire on them, after which, he was shot and taken into custody. The investigative team of Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation found weapons, hatred literature from his vehicle and some other future targeted people’s documents (Wong, 2011). The government paid utmost attention to the extremists group and the FBI and other law enforcement agencies categorized CSA as a serious domestic threat that should be stopped. With the support of informants, all the information about paramilitary training, construction of weapons and related equipment and setting future targets, all were revealed after which, FBI and police raided CSA compound. There was a large arsenal found in the compound including ‘anti-tank rockets, bombs, land mines, grenades, and cyanide canisters’ (Brister & Kollars, 2011). There were also plans of bombing Alfred P. Murrah building in Oklahoma City with an inspiration from the book, The Turner Dairies. However, after the raid, CSA ended, as every criminal was dealt evenhandedly (Brister & Kollars, 2011). Precursor Crimes Committed by the Aryan Republic Army The Aryan Republic Army (ARA) is also known as, ‘Midwest Bank Robbers’ were a group of racist members who robbed twenty-two banks in ‘Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, and Ohio’ to generate some money for fulfilling any racist motives and emphasize white supremacy. They robbed around five hundred thousand dollars from the robberies. During their robberies, they used masks of former Presidents, FBI, and ATF agents and also used bombs or explosives for intimidating the people in the banks (Smith, 2011). Peter Langan and Richard Guthrie were the main figures of the group, as they were the ones who started the group in 1991. They were others who were ‘Scott Stedeford’, ‘Michael Brescia’, ‘Kevin McCarthy’, ‘Mark Thomas’, and Shawn Kenny (Hamm, 2007). Richard Guthrie while serving for US Navy gained training for ‘nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons’, and also for explosives. While serving on a ship, he got hold of the book, The Turner Diaries that inspired him towards criminality and terrorism. He was later, court-martialed from Navy in 1983. They followed Christian Identity, but trusted in ‘anonymity and mobility’ unlike the previous Aryan Nations of living in a compound. After resolving about forming a full-fledged group, they befriended Shawn Kenny and informed him about two books that can be employed as foundation of the group. The books were ‘The Silent Brotherhood’ and ‘Vigalantes of Christendom: The History of Phineas Priesthood’. The group took inspiration from the books for justifying criminal doings such as robbery, as legal according to God’s law and driving out the infidels from the holy land (Hamm, 2007). Guthrie and Langan discussed the implementation of the material on planning of bank robberies, bombings, assassinations, and so on. ARA was also accused of having connections with the bombing of Oklahoma City (Hamm, 2007). They had a strategic goal to overthrow the US government with all the money that they collected through bank robberies. However, they were never able to do so. Guthrie was arrested after which, he hanged himself with the help of jail bed sheet and Langan was sentenced jail for life on account of his crimes. Both were arrested in January 1996 and were unable to move forward in their terrorist strategies. The group was arrested with much evidence against them (Likar, 2011). The investigative team found a videotape for provocation of hostility against the federal government, the masks used for robbing the banks, explosive material, and weapons (Smith, 2011). Both the terrorist groups, the CSA and ARA failed in most of their attempts in spreading terror, but they kept hate motives and had racist tendencies. They believed in white supremacy and belonged to the group of extremist Christian ideologies. The activities that are left by one racist and terrorist group are taken further by other groups and investigators have to investigate the previous cases as well to find the connections. References Brister, P., & Kollars, N. A. (2011). Pass Em’Right: Assessing the Threat of WMD Terrorism from America’s Christian Patriots. In APSA 2011 Annual Meeting Paper. Hamm, M. S. (2007). Terrorism as crime: from Oklahoma City to Al-Qaeda and beyond. NYU Press. Likar, L. E. (2011). Eco-warriors, nihilistic terrorists, and the environment. ABC-CLIO. Smith, B. L. (2011). Pre-Incident Indicators of Terrorist Incidents: The Identification of Behavioral, Geographic and Temporal Patterns of Preparatory Conduct. DIANE Publishing. Wong, F. D. (2011). Christian Extremism as a Domestic Terror Threat. Army Command and General Staff College Fort Leavenworth, Kansas School Of Advanced Military Studies. Read More