Research on Domestic Terrorism

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Domestic terrorism is the dealings done by people who are in quest of convincing or discouraging the government of that time or even the people of their home country by use of brutal means which is anticipated to scare or intimidate that ranges from coercion to absolute acts of brutality which include kidnapping, ruthless beating and cold assassination. Domestic violence is a phenomenon that has been around for over two centuries now in the United States. The word terrorism has had its meaning change with time. Incidences of domestic terrorism have been categorized as being measures carried out by extremists, anarchists, radicals and revolutionaries who include unions (Ronczkowski, 2006, p. 27). Much emphasis put on the time the actions were carried out, many of the acts that are now considered terrorism were seen as antigovernment or unsociable behavior and others were looked at as a technique of civilizing the way of life of a fledging state (Morris, 1991, p. 21).

In 1791 in the United States, one of the first incidences of anti federal behavior occurred that was triggered by the federal government levying an excise tax on whisky manufacture. This led to numerous radical acts and it may be viewed as the first revolutionary threat that the state faced. In the US, there is estimated to be about 400 domestic terrorists groups with between 10,000 and 100,000 members in right-wing. In an FBI report of July 2002, assistant director of counter terrorism made a report that, right-wing extremism has overtaken the left-wing terrorists and have become the most dangerous domestic terrorism group in the US. The two particular awareness activist groups are the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and The Environmental Liberation Front (ELF) had done a total of 600 criminal acts in the US since 1996 and have made a resultant damage in excess of $42million. These groups though known as domestic terrorist groups, their dealings were against the law (Nacos, 2002, p.21).

International terrorist have received so much light and very little is known about domestic terrorist groups. They are often dismissed as whiners, an assortment of radical and hate groups. Despite the names that are used in their reference, the fact remains that they are very perilous. The current number of domestic groups and movements is still unsubstantiated though distressing. There is concern that any one of these so called domestic groups could turn out and be a place for recruiting extremists. Some of the US based domestic terrorist groups have support and operations based in foreign countries. Domestic terrorism involves doing acts that are dangerous to human life and these acts are in violation of the states criminal law. These actions are intended to coerce people, use coercion to influence a government policy or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destructions, execution or kidnapping of innocent civilians (Motley, 1993, p.23).

The illegal use of violence by a group of people who are based within a state like the U.S. for example and mostly without any foreign associations and commands that commits the acts of violence against people and property having the objective of threatening the government of the time and the citizens into accepting their political objectives is a detailed description of a domestic terrorist group. Acts of terrorism no matter the magnitude has a tone of hate underlying it. They have practices that attack an entire class of people and they can as well put in the category of the Al-Qaeda terrorist group that hates Americans and Jews. Some of the domestic terrorist groups include:

1. The Ku Klux Klan

The Ku Klux Klan is the oldest and most notorious American hate ant domestic terrorist group with long and known record of bloodshed. The Klan’s principal target has been the black population and it extended it criminal attacks on the Jews, homosexuals, immigrants and of late even the Catholics. This group was formed on the December of 1865 and ever since it has claimed to be an organization that is Christian in nature though its actions are the complete opposites of Christianity. Modernity has brought forth a variety of motivations that are based on theological and political ideologies.

Having been started during the time when the civil war was ending, the Ku Klux Klan instantaneously organized radical groupings to terrorize southern blacks community and whoever tried to help them even if they were whites. This was an attempt to bar the blacks from having their essential civil rights as any American should. They went by bizarre names such as imperial wizard, they dressed in clothing with hoods, they had brutal nighttime rides with the idea that they had an indiscernible domain as a group and that is among the elements that popularized the group. They used execution, rape and any other vicious means of attack on anyone challenging the superiority of the whites and that was their trademark.

“The first era” that was short and very violent period came to an end as the Ku Klux Klan disbanded when Jim Raw protected the worth of southern whites. Then they had resurgence in the 1920s when it powerfully objected catholic immigrations. These Catholics were mainly Jewish. By 1925, the Ku Klux Klan had over five million members and an extensive political power in various states. The influence of the K-Klan was significantly reduced by a sequence of sex scandals, in-house power battles and being exposed in the media more especially the newspapers exposés.

This domestic terrorist group rose in the 1960s for the third time as an opposition to the civil rights activities and as a way of maintaining isolation in cases of unpleasant court rulings. The K-Klan committed acts of bombing, murder and other criminal attacks that registered a large number of casualties. A recorded case is where four girls were murdered in Birmingham, Alabama as they were making preparations for service at the 16^th street Baptist Church. in-house misunderstandings, court cases, series of break ups and government penetration appear to have been a cause to the weakening of the K-Klan since the 1970s. Some of its splinter group members conserved a racialist and rebellious way where as the others tried to blanket the racial discrimination as ‘civil rights for white people’. Currently, it’s probable that there is a total of between 5,500-6000 members that are divided in different organizations make use of the Klan’s name. Once an authoritative and the most feared force in the post civil war in America, and during the civil rights era, the K Klux Klan has become a splinter of the many American organizations that are integrated by their hatred for blacks, Jews and other varied enemies. They still uphold their potential for criminal actions and brutality (Ronczkowski, 2006, p. 39-40).

1. Neo-Nazi Group

Neo-Nazi group is another domestic terrorist group that shared in the abhorrence of the Jews and loved Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. The Jews were perceived by this group as their fundamental enemy in additional to other minority groups such as the homosexuals and some Christian communities. They connected social troubles to a Jewish plot that allegedly have power over administration, monetary institutions and the media. The Neo-Nazi is divided in that some of the Nazi groups put prominence on trouble-free hatred and the rest has its focus on creation of a state of fascist political mode. Nazism has ties in Europe and America. It is a group that is very powerful and is growing at a very fast rate. The American Nazi enjoys the shield of the first amendment and frequently publishes materials and internet sites aimed at European audience that are illegal under the European anti-racism law. To facilitate their dealings, many European have their internet under American server to evade trial under their home law. The most elemental neo-Nazi group that was based in the U.S. is The National Alliance whose creator is William Pierce. The writer of the disreputable unconventional race conflict work of fiction, The Turner Diaries, the book was assumed to have had the purpose of being the blue print for the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing (Ronczkowski, 2006, p. 39-41).

1. Racist skinhead/ Shock troops

Racist skinhead is a vicious domestic terrorist group that was a component of the white pre-eminence lobby group. Commonly identified as Shock troops, they intended for a revolution. They had their own identity looks which involved a bald head, black Don Martens boots, jeans with suspenders and a range of naturally racialist tattoos. They started in the 1960s in the mechanized towns of Britain using the working class movement as an umbrella and felt disdain for hippies and middle class youths. They always had drugs and violent behavior as a part of their scene.

Skin heads in America that are racist function in small groupings that move from town to town habitually. Hammer Skin Nation is the prevalent and the most perilous skinhead group to date registering thousands of members and a documentation of viciousness in Northern America and Europe (Halibozek, 2007, p.26).

1. Militia Movement

They are commonly known for their “black helicopters” beliefs and a lot of other scheme theories. This domestic terrorist group gained a lot of hype in the 1990s after the Waco and Ruby Ridge incidents. The militia movements hold the belief that the federal government is attempting to revoke constitutional rights to be in possession of guns. They are structured into paramilitary groups and many of its faction are certain that the UN and foreign troops are being brought into the US as part of the novel world classification. These beliefs have led to the militia movement committing a lot of terror attacks (Sauter, 2005, p.123).

1. American Coalition of Life Activists ( ACLA)

This is a revolutionary anti-abortion group that is widely known for support of intimidation of abortion clinics owners, doctors, nurses, patients and visitors. It started in 1996 by collecting statistics of abortion clinics operators and employees as groundwork for a mock trial. Currently led by Andrew Burnett, the group owns a highly contentious website known as the Nuremburg Files that uses a ‘wanted’ poster design to show abortion doctors that are targeted and giving out these doctors’ personal information such as business and residence address. They are known to attack not only the business but the home premises of these abortion doctors as a way of scaring them not to perform abortion anymore Michaels, 2002, p. 33).

1. The Earth Liberation Front (ELF)

This domestic terrorist group hides under the umbrella of high-tech environmental activists who complain against tree felling and the use of bio-tech made seeds and crops. They are very violent natured group. They have claimed liability for a number of acts against the US and this organization’s registered members have not yet been arraigned in court. They have carried out destructive acts against US Forest service and paraphernalia for the reason that they assert that the forest service is not carrying out its work of shielding the forests efficiently in addition to several lumber yard fires.

It is alleged to have been of charge in setting on fire a bio-altered seeds in sheds in Visalia, California and an eastern charter and the group claimed liability of vandalizing construction sites on long island, New York as a complaint in disagreement to building on open space sites there (Alexander, 2001, p. 12).

1. Black panther Party

This group was originally recognized as the Black Panther Party for Self-defense. It was formed in 1966 and strongly supported Black Nationalism in the United States. The cluster had a left wing political philosophy and criticized the US as a racist and capitalist state that had an economic structure that was oppressing the black people. They developed a list of demands and in the list they demanded freedom of all incarcerated blacks, the exclusion of black people from armed forces service and full employment of the black population.

Self defense devices use was what the Black Panther group at first advocated. The 1968 murder of Martin Luther King, jr. agitated the group to become revolutionary offering military teaching and equipping its members with armaments. By 1970, the group was believed to be 2,000 members strong. The group was involved in a progression of incidents with the police that led to deaths both of the police and Black Panther members. They were involved in a number of sky-scraping profile air-line hijackings and mandated the planes to fly to Cuba, Algeria and North Korea where they then requested political protection.

frequent run-ins with police and members infightings made the groups operations crippled. With the group’s collapse, it is believed that some of the members joined terrorist organizations like Black Liberation Army (Halibozek, 2007, p.26).

Many are the misconceptions that domestic terrorism is aimed at the government or the authorities. This is a shallow way of thinking because if one looks at the terrorist acts’ records, many of the victims are usually innocent citizens who were busy minding their own business and going on with their daily routine when they became victims of circumstances. The kidnappings and assassinations that have been done by these terrorists over the years have been on company employees and the assets targeted are the ones that belong to companies (Netanyahu, 1997, p.80). This is because they are easy targets compared to military bases and government buildings that have heavy security details. These groups which normally start as legitimate movements for legitimate demands turn out to be terrorists and their actions hell bent criminal. No matter their reasons, destruction and cold blood murder will never be the way to have ones demands heard and met. It is a high time these domestic terrorist groups walked the talk and did things that were beneficial to the whole population that they claim to be defending by their brutal actions.