Fearing Terror Abroad, But Ignoring Within

June 3, 2003 -- Since Sept. 11, 2001, the specter of international terror has haunted many Americans, but the capture of suspected serial bomber Eric Robert Rudolph serves as a grim reminder of the dangers that could be lurking at home.

"People feel more threatened by international terrorism, but one of the things that people forget is Oklahoma City," said Ed Bridgeman, the director of the Center for Criminal Justice at the University of Cincinnati.

The April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building in Oklahoma City was the most devastating terror attack that Americans ever faced on home soil until September 2001.

The man convicted of and executed for the bombing, Timothy McVeigh, was a Gulf War veteran angry over the fiery end of the government siege on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.

Rudolph, the 36-year-old outdoorsman arrested this weekend in the mountains of North Carolina, is accused of carrying out a string of bombings including the blast at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.

His former sister-in-law, Deborah Rudolph, has said the bombing suspect hated Jews and homosexuals and feared abortions were diminishing the white population.

Rudolph, like McVeigh, apparently subscribed to a right-wing, anti-federal government ideology. But these homegrown haters may be overlooked because they are more familiar.

"Anybody is scared of something that comes out of the dark," Bridgeman said. "The American types are largely regarded as good 'ol boys."

Anti-government movements in the United States share some ideology with al Qaeda and other foreign terrorist groups.

"Many of the right-wing paramilitaries feel exactly the same way about the government [that international terrorists do] — that it's evil, corrupt — the spawn of the devil," Bridgeman said.

Al Qaeda Steals the Attention

While al Qaeda and the international war on terror get more headlines these days, there have been a number of recent high-profile arrests or convictions that might be considered domestic terrorism:

Last month, James Charles Kopp was sentenced to 25 years to life for killing abortion provider Dr. Barnett Slepian in 1998.

White supremacist Matthew Hale is on trial for solicitation of murder for allegedly inspiring a 1999 shooting spree by follower Benjamin Smith, that left 10 wounded and two dead.

In March, James Tyler Williams was sentenced to 25 years to life for killing a gay couple in 1999. Along with the slayings, Williams also admitted to fire bombing synagogues and a building housing an abortion clinic.

Domestic terrorism appears less of a threat than the thought of an attack by foreign terrorists because "there is something more pressing," said Stuart Wright, a sociology professor at Lamar University in Texas who studies domestic terrorism.

International terrorists have caused most of the terror incidents in recent memory, and conducted them with more casualties, he said. "If we didn't have these cases on al Qaeda, we certainly would focus on them [domestic terrorists]."

Up Close and Personal

Domestic and international terrorists are perceived to have different goals, and that makes one less threatening than the other.

"What al Qaeda and groups affiliated with them are trying to do is to destroy Western civilization," said Cliff May, president of Washington, D.C.-based group The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

In contrast, domestic terrorists usually are "not asking for some systemic change that's unreasonable," said James O. Ellis III, research coordinator at the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terror in Oklahoma City.

Ellis described most domestic terrorist activity as concerned with a single issue, such as animal rights.

"It's easy for people to be repelled by what al Qaeda does. It's hard to be repelled if you feel the treatment of animals is particularly egregious," he said.

As a result, domestic terror tends to be more local. "If they attack, one of their targets will be a something like a courthouse, not some nameless Satan from across the ocean," Bridgeman said.

"You get the threats of weapons of mass destruction from foreign terrorists. With domestic terror it's much more up close," he said.

Small, subtle, surgical attacks are not in the international terrorist's mindset, Ellis said. They need to conduct a large attack so news gets back to the homeland.

Effects of Oklahoma

The emphasis on international terrorism might be justified, since domestic terrorism appears less active than it was before, according to Michael Barkun, a former FBI consultant and political science professor at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University in New York.

"The scale of it has been much smaller," he said. "The intensity and frequency has diminished. It peaked with the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995."

However, experts disagreed about the cause of that apparent weakening. Ellis said Oklahoma City "took the wind out of the sails of the domestic extremists" by drawing the attention of anti-terrorism authorities and the opprobrium of the public.

"People were appalled by the deaths of the children at the day-care center [in the Oklahoma attack]," Wright said.

"There is evidence that extreme anti-government organizations have weakened since 1995," Barkun said. "The base from which McVeigh emerged is not as large and well-organized as it was 10 to 15 years ago."

But Bridgeman said certain far-right elements managed to spin the bombing as an example of the federal government "out to get them," and it actually resulted in increasing their number.

Politics and Public Image

He acknowledges that they have not been as vocal lately, but only because they are getting wiser about their public image. "For the most part, the far right wing has gotten a great deal more circumspect. They just don't have the clownish appearance they had five to six years ago." Bridgeman said.

"There's this theory that they're still out there, that the hardcore has gone underground, and they don't want to be detected," Wright said.

Current events might also account for inactivity from certain domestic terror groups, experts said. Ellis said that most domestic terror activity today comes from far-left groups, like anti-sprawl arsonists and anti-globalization rioters, while far-right groups were more active during the Clinton administration.

He was careful to discount any connection between the administration and domestic terror, but said, "when you're out of power, there aren't people up there to champion your cause, so you have to draw attention to yourself."

On the other hand, there are also times they figure when they have their people in place, it's time to force their hand, he said.

Sept. 11 may have also quieted domestic terrorists, Ellis said. "To them, it's still our country; we have been attacked. There might be a sort of rally around the flag effect."