Well, it appears that in the case of the Nine Christian Militia Members Charged With Seditious Conspiracy, Attempted Use Of WMD that the target was law enforcement. Yup, these good Christians planned to blow up some cops:
Nine members of the Christian militia group Hutaree have been indicted on multiple charges involving an alleged plot to attack police, including seditious conspiracy and attempted use of weapons of mass destruction, the U.S. Attorney in Michigan announced this morning.
"Six Michigan residents, along with two residents of Ohio and a resident of Indiana, were indicted by a federal grand jury in Detroit on charges of seditious conspiracy, attempted use of weapons of mass destruction, teaching the use of explosive materials, and possessing a firearm during a crime of violence," according to the government's press release.
The indictment describes an alleged plot that seems inspired by weapons more associated with urban warfare in Iraq than with rural Michigan.
The Hutaree members allegedly "planned to kill an unidentified member of local law enforcement and then attack the law enforcement officers who gather in Michigan for the funeral."
The indictment continues: "According to the plan, the Hutaree would attack law enforcement vehicles during the funeral procession with Improvised Explosive Devices with Explosively Formed Projectiles, which, according to the indictment, constitute weapons of mass destruction."
That attack, in turn, would spark a more widespread Harper's Ferry-style uprising against the government, according to the "general concept of operations" described in the indictment.
Hutaree's Web site features videos of heavily armed members training in the woods.
Normally I refrain from posting news items right away, because I want to wait until all the facts are clear, but this deserves an immediate response. This is just plain scary. Well armed nutcases ready to attack whatever mythical threat that crosses their delusional minds are the predictable result of the whole right wing noise machine extremism about Armageddon and apocalypse anytime democrats are in power. These militias feed on the paranoia generated by the right.
The "Hutaree" claim they were preparing to battle the "anti-christ" at a time when 14% of the public (and 24% of republicans) thinks that Obama is said "anti-christ". So they see themselves as being at war with the government; thus they feel justified in attacking officers of the law. And I suppose that in their minds, their arrest is proof that they are being oppressed.
To those of us who can remember the 90's, with Waco and Oklahoma City, this threat is serious. We have seen that people like this are quite willing to carry out violent acts and murder countless innocents because of their beliefs. And it doesn't take all that many of them; Al-Qaida is a very small extremist minority of Muslims, but they've been able to achieve a major impact through acts of terrorism. Christian terrorists are equally dangerous.
Thankfully, this plot was foiled. That doesn't mean that there won't be others.
2 comments:
Weapons of mass destruction, though?
Are we redefining the word to mean anything that goes boom? So that way, we can say we found WMDs in Iraq?
Point.
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