Wise / Holding Terrorists Accountable? It Depends on the Color and the Cause... / Nov 04

Mark Pavlick markvince at igc.org
Sat Nov 3 15:01:20 PST 2001



>
>ZNet Commentary
>Holding Terrorists Accountable? It Depends on the Color and the
>Cause... November 04, 2001
>By Tim Wise
>
>Members of his terrorist organization and network have killed
>Americans, on American soil. Those inspired by his message have
>engaged in a mass atrocity: blowing innocent people out of their
>offices as the building where they worked crumbled to the ground.
>
>He himself has called for total war against the enemy in an effort
>to "cleanse" the United States. He has said that although innocent
>people will die in such an effort, "it is necessary, and because it
>is necessary, it is good." Seven years ago he warned of potential
>pending attacks when he wrote: "New Yorkers who work in tall office
>buildings--anything close to the size of the World Trade
>Center--might consider wearing hardhats to work..."
>
>Osama bin Laden? Not even close. And unlike bin Laden, who is now a
>marked man despite little concrete evidence linking him to the
>attacks of September 11th, this individual has not been targeted for
>elimination by the United States government. No one is speaking of
>"bringing him to justice," or holding him accountable for the
>actions attributable to his associates and devotees.
>
>And unlike bin Laden, whose whereabouts are unknown, the address of
>the person about whom I speak is well known. He is not in hiding,
>and doesnít move around. Heís so easy to find that 60 Minutesí Mike
>Wallace simply sauntered up to his home a couple of years ago and
>had a chat with him. His phone number is (304) 653-4600.
>
>His name is William Pierce, and he lives in Mill Point, West
>Virginia, with a P.O. Box at the post office in nearby Hillsboro. He
>is a longtime neo-Nazi who calls Hitler the "greatest man of our
>era" and advocates the liquidation of all non-whites in the U.S.
>
>His novel, The Turner Diaries (written under a pseudonym) apparently
>served as the inspiration for Timothy McVeighís attack on the Murrah
>Building in Oklahoma City, much the way we are told Osama bin
>Ladenís words have inspired Islamic terrorism, even if he is not
>directly involved in the planning process.
>
>In Pierceís book, white "patriots" blow up a federal building using
>the same materials as those used by McVeigh, packed in a truck like
>the one McVeigh used, at the same time of day as the one exploded by
>McVeigh. They then launch a race war, slaughtering non-whites,
>race-"mixers," gays, lesbians and Jews, before dropping nuclear
>weapons on Israel.
>
>McVeigh was, according to former soldiers who served with him in the
>Persian Gulf, obsessed with the book, and inspired by its author. In
>the days before the bombing he sent clippings of the book to his
>sister, explaining that "something big" was going to happen, and
>when arrested had copies of Turner Diariesí passages in his car.
>
>Over the years, other followers of Pierce and members of his group,
>the National Alliance, have engaged in armed robberies, shootouts
>with law enforcement, and murders in at least a half dozen states.
>They have plotted to commit mass murder in multiple bombings, foiled
>only by premature detonation of the devices in question.
>
>The Order--a neo-Nazi gang that committed a series of robberies and
>killed Denver radio talk show host Alan Berg in 1984--was led by
>Alliance members, including Robert Matthews who left Pierce $50,000
>in life insurance benefits after his death during a shootout with
>the FBI.
>
>Pierceís weekly radio broadcasts regularly call for the elimination
>of anyone who isnít white, and his group encourages members to raid
>military bases in search of weapons and ammunition. Yet no one is
>calling for him to be brought in "dead or alive" as President Bush
>recently did regarding bin Laden.
>
>While President Bush and media pundits warn of bin-Ladenís
>associates "living among us," the National Alliance has at least 16
>active cells nationwide, engaged in activity in at least 26 states,
>a membership hovering around 1,000, and thousands more listening to
>their shortwave radio broadcasts and reading the materials on their
>website.
>
>On those broadcasts and the website, readers and listeners can see
>and hear Pierce call for "a racially clean area of the earth for the
>development of our people," with "no non-whites in our living
>space." They can hear him speak of the mass slaughter that he terms
>the "final cleansing," and the need to eliminate all Jews and race
>"traitors." For these latter groups he says, "we must hunt them down
>and get rid of them."
>
>On August 15th of this year, Pierce broadcast the following message:
>"We really have become too civilized and have forgotten one of
>Mother Nature's most basic rules: Two different types of animal
>cannot permanently occupy exactly the same ecological niche. One
>eventually must drive the other into extinction..."
>
>"We must have exclusive possession of those portions of this planet
>which constitute suitable habitat for us...in order to obtain and
>maintain that exclusive possession, we must be prepared to kill, to
>annihilate, any and all competitors."
>
>But despite the open support for mass murder, and despite the actual
>violence carried out by Alliance members and Pierce acolytes over
>the past two decades, few people are aware of this neo-Nazi terror
>network, nor does the President seem concerned about it.
>
>One gets the impression that in the eyes of American officialdom,
>some terrorists pose a threat to the country and others donít. Some
>terrorist actions result in calls for racial or ethnic profiling of
>those "fitting the description" and others donít.
>
>After all, when have white guys ever been profiled just because some
>white guys like McVeigh, or Pierce, or others of their ilk committed
>atrocities, advocated murder, and engaged in criminal activity? The
>answer is never, of course.
>
>Profiling and war are things we offer to those who look different
>from us, speak differently than us, and are easy to identify without
>inconveniencing the dominant majority. Arabs, Muslims, and people of
>color generally, make easy targets. Not so white guys. Not so
>William Pierce.
>
>And homegrown white terrorists canít be as effectively used to
>justify huge military buildups, or new powers for the CIA, as a
>perceived foreign threat can. For an Administration desperately in
>need of an enemy to justify its desire for massive new military
>expenditures, only the dark, dangerous image of the outsider will do.
>
>As for Pierce, like bin Laden, he has proclaimed his innocence.
>Regarding the Oklahoma City bombing, he insists he had nothing to do
>with it. But also like bin Laden, he has not only failed to condemn
>the action others have sought to pin on him, but indeed he has all
>but praised it outright. About McVeigh, Pierce says:
>
>"He did what he did for an impersonal reason, for an ideal...he has
>acted as a man of principle should act...He wanted to send the
>government a message that its behavior would not be tolerated. And
>part of that message would be the killing of the government's secret
>police agents--FBI and ATF--who worked in the building."
>
>"The fact that his bomb would kill not only secret police agents but
>also civilians, including the 19 children in the day-care center,
>was regrettable but unavoidable: collateral damage...however
>regrettable the killing of innocent civilians in that bombing,
>Timothy McVeigh is no monster. He is a soldier, and what he did was
>based on principle."
>
>When Muslim fundamentalists say things like this about terrorism
>carried out by their associates, we term it "giving aid and comfort"
>to the enemy, or "supporting terrorism." With Pierce, the same
>rhetoric is ignored, no matter what his loyal readers and listeners
>might do.
>
>And while the media was quick to broadcast footage of select
>Palestinians celebrating in the wake of the World Trade Center
>attacks, they said nothing about the spirited discussions on
>National Alliance message boards, where members of the group were
>expressing elation at the dayís events.
>
>Within minutes of the World Trade Centerís collapse, Alliance
>members were logging on to the groupís chat room boards to say
>things like: "the World Trade Centers (and) the Pentagon have had
>their noses removed from Jewish rectums and smothered in the heap of
>shit they created! Iím sure like me you are all jumping out of your
>skin with excitement right now!"
>
>Or this, from a member in New York at the time of the attacks:
>
>"...there is extreme chaos everywhere. Many people are helpless and
>in a state of panic. I am happy to have a reservoir of deep
>knowledge about this from all I have learned from the alliance...I
>AM STRONG, PREPARED AND IN CONTROL!!!"
>
>Shortly after the attack, Billy Roper, the Deputy Membership
>Coordinator for the Alliance wrote: "the enemy of our enemy is, for
>now at least, our friends...we may not want them marrying our
>daughters...but anyone who is willing to drive a plane into a
>uilding to kill Jews is alright by me. I wish our members had half
>as much testicular fortitude."
>
>Beyond merely pointing out that there are indeed white folks every
>bit as fanatical and dangerous as the members of al-Qaeda, and that
>indeed some of those were pleased with the most recent terrorist
>attacks on America, another point should be made.
>
>If, as is likely, the renewed emphasis on "Arab terrorism" or
>"Muslim extremism" results in heightened suspicion and profiling of
>those who are Arab, Muslim, or appear to be, the result may be that
>America will let down its guard to these other kinds of dangers. The
>Tim McVeighs and followers of Bill Pierce will fly below the radar
>of the nationís new security apparatus. No one will be looking for
>them.
>
>This is not to say that such groups should literally be bombed,
>their members arrested, and those who look like them profiled. Just
>as such actions are ineffective and overbroad and authoritarian when
>applied to presumed Arab terrorists, so too would they be when
>applied to white supremacists.
>
>But the inconsistency is worth noting, as is the danger that could
>logically flow from that inconsistency. If a member of the National
>Alliance, or some other group seeking to foment a race war wanted to
>commit a major terrorist attack, now would be the time to do it, as
>they would likely evade suspicion and detection, so busy are folks
>looking for danger with dark skin, long beards and a turban.
>
>It is in this sense that any kind of racial, ethnic, national or
>religious profiling is an utter waste of time, and potentially
>capable of increasing the risks to innocent people, not to mention
>ethically unjust.
>
>Terrorism has many faces, more than a few of which are white, just
>like those of most of the folks calling for war against Afghanistan.
>And yet never have they called for war against West Virginia. Nor
>did they call for war against Idaho when that state played host to
>the Aryan Nationís compound: a place that had nurtured and inspired
>Buford Furrow, the individual who shot up a Jewish Community Center
>in Los Angeles and killed a Filipino postman two years ago.
>
>So when you hear the President speak of "bringing the terrorists to
>justice or bringing justice to the terrorists," just remember that
>although all terrorists are equal in the eyes of the law, some are
>more equal than others.
>
>Tim Wise is an antiracist activist, writer and lecturer. He can be
>reached at tjwise at mindspring.com

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