A false panacea for panic politics

TIMOTHY McVeigh parked his truck in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City shortly before 9am on April 19, 1995.

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He lit several fuses and then proceeded to walk away. A few minutes later, at 9.02am, the truck exploded, destroying the building, killing 168 people and injuring over 500 others. The bombing of the Murrah Federal Building is often referred to as the largest incident of domestic terrorism in American history.McVeigh was radicalised over time. His reading of the 1978 The Turner Diaries, written by white nationalist William Luther Pierce, was part of his radicalisation towards violence. He also regarded events like the 1992 Ruby Ridge incident and the 1993 Waco, Texas, siege as attacks by the US government on its own people. In a letter written by McVeigh from death row to Fox News correspondent Rita Cosby, McVeigh said: “When an aggressor force continually launches attacks from a particular base of operations, it is sound military strategy to take the fight to the enemy.”

Many regard these three incidents that occurred in Oklahoma City, Ruby Ridge and Waco, Texas, as the public birth of America’s private nationalist militia movement. Some parts of the media immediately blamed the Middle East for the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing. It was inconceivable for America to even think that domestic terrorists could look just like their Protestant and Catholic neighbours.