nuclear-news

Every president serving in the last two decades has said that nuclear terrorism is a significant national security threat. Analysis of this threat has been, for good reason, mostly focused on foreign extremist groups, but recent events raise questions of whether there should be greater focus in the United States on far-right, domestic extremist threats. These extremists represent a unique danger because of their prevalence in federal institutions such as the military and the potential that they might infiltrate nuclear facilities, where they could access sensitive information and nuclear materials.

The far-right extremist nuclear terrorism threat, which has some history, is amplified today by an ideology focused on accelerating the collapse of society and a documented interest in pursuing nuclear terrorism. Officials need to act decisively to better understand and mitigate this threat.

Far-right narratives of nuclear terror. The intersection between violent far-right extremist ideology and catastrophic terrorism goes back decades. In The Turner Diaries, a 1978 novel labeled the “bible of the racist right,” the protagonists use acts of nuclear terror in service of the creation of a “white world.” Protagonists bomb nuclear installations, seize nuclear weapons, target missiles at New York City and Tel Aviv, and ultimately destroy the Pentagon in a suicidal nuclear attack.[3] The International Centre for Counterterrorism ties the Diaries to “at least 200 murders and at least 40 terrorist attacks/hate crimes” in the last 40 years.[4] This includes Timothy McVeigh’s 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, resulting in the deaths of 168 people.[5] McVeigh, however, is not the only far-right terrorist to be inspired by the Diaries. In 2011, violent far-right extremist Anders Breivik’s terror attacks killed 77 people in Norway. Dozens of pages in his 1,500-page “manifesto” discuss the execution of different acts of nuclear terrorism.[6]

An increasingly active generation of violent far-right extremist groups and actors have adopted an especially dangerous ideology that is compatible with an act of nuclear terror: accelerationism.[7] Violent far-right extremists who adopt accelerationism view societal collapse as inevitable and seek to hasten that collapse in service of “total revolution”—the complete destruction of the existing system of governance.[8] Violent far-right extremists who adopt accelerationism hope to set off a series of violent chain events, with violence begetting more violence, destabilizing society.[9] Indiscriminate, highly destructive acts of terror—like a nuclear attack—are therefore perfect tools to sow chaos and accelerate this societal collapse.

In Siege, one of the defining theoretical works of violent far-right accelerationism, author and accelerationist leader James Mason writes that, “[White supremacists] will be the single survivor in a war against the System, a TOTAL WAR against the System.”[10] In a recent act of violent far-right extremist terrorism, Brenton Tarrant, the Australian perpetrator of the 2019 terrorist attack on Christchurch masjidain in New Zealand, wrote about accelerationism in his manifesto.[11]

Groups with nuclear interests. Inspired by the ideas of accelerationism, the modern breed of violent far-right extremism is becoming more destructive, and nuclear weapons certainly fit into this profile of catastrophic violence. The intention to bring about a cataclysmic clash of civilizations bears resemblance to better known terrorist organizations like Al Qaeda and Aum Shinrikyo, both of which have pursued nuclear weapons. As director of intelligence and counterintelligence at the US Department of Energy, Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, once observed, “Osama bin Ladin has signaled a specific purpose for using WMD in al Qaeda’s quest to destroy the global status quo, and to create conditions more conducive to the overthrow of apostate regimes throughout the Islamic world.”[12] Like Al-Qaeda, violent far-right extremists support the creation of a new society that is in line with their own ideology.

One of the most notable and violent far-right extremist groups that have adopted accelerationism and operate in the United States is the Atomwaffen Division (AWD).[13] The organization’s name translates from German to “the nuclear weapons division,” indicating that its members have an explicit interest in nuclear terrorism. Brandon Russel, a former Florida National Guard member and an AWD co-founder, is one case of an aspiring nuclear terrorist. A heavily armed Russel and a fellow AWD member were recently arrested while in route to the Turkey Point nuclear power plant. During the investigation officials found that Russel lived in an apartment with two AWD co-conspirators; in the apartment was a prominently placed copy of the Turner Diaries and a framed photo of Oklahoma City Bomber Timothy McVeigh. The trio stockpiled weapons and explosives with the intent to blow up, among other targets, a nuclear power plant. In their apartment, police found pipe bomb components, traces of the explosive hexamethylene triperoxide diamine, and detonators. Police also detected two radioactive materials—thorium and americium—in his bedroom.[14]

AWD was not the first far-right extremist in America to consider using radioactive or nuclear materials in a terrorist attack. Several previously documented attempts by violent far-right extremists to commit acts of radiological terror indicate a longstanding interest among far-right actors in highly destructive, non-conventional acts of terror.[15] In 2004, National Socialist Movement member Demetrius Van Crocker attempted to build a dirty bomb to blow up a courthouse.[16] In 2008, James Cummings, a white supremacist, obtained four 1-gallon containers of a mix of depleted uranium and thorium-232. He planned to use these materials to assemble a dirty bomb.[17] In 2013, a member of the Ku Klux Klan who worked at General Electric carried out research on radiation dispersal devices, learning what level of emission was required to kill humans.[18]

Could they really pull it off? While some violent far-right extremists are clearly motivated to carry out catastrophic terrorist attacks, a question remains: Do they possess the means and opportunity to conduct an act of nuclear terrorism? There is no public evidence violent far-right extremist groups have obtained the resources or exhibited the requisite operational sophistication to carry out an act of nuclear terrorism. Many of the plots involving far-right extremists and nuclear terrorism have been poorly conceived and were unlikely to succeed. These incidents, however, likely do not provide a complete picture of the threat, because publicly accessible information on the capability of these groups is limited, creating ambiguity about their general capabilities……….

The most concerning evidence that violent far-right extremists might have access to nuclear weapons or weapons-useable material lies in their presence in the US military and other parts of the federal government. The presence of white supremacists in the military is well-known and well-documented.  ………..

https://thebulletin.org/2021/01/a-threat-to-confront-far-right-extremists-and-nuclear-terrorism/