American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh & the Oklahoma City Bombing

The road from Ruby Ridge to Oklahoma City is littered with the bodies of innocents. A few were gunned down by federal agents, but the vast majority were murdered by anti-government zealot Timothy McVeigh, the twisted subject of this journalistic tour de force. The reportage in American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh and the Tragedy at Oklahoma City is among the finest ever published. The authors remind us that at its root terrorism is a crime, and never lose sight of the indiscriminate killing of men, women and children in Oklahoma. Yet Lou Michel and Dan Herbeck present a compelling portrait of McVeigh and approach in an even-handed manner the excesses of federal law enforcement that encouraged a reluctant war hero to massacre his fellow citizens. Meticulous research and details about McVeigh's family life, miitary service, and his final descent into darkness tell us more about the man than even the tortured explanations offered by the killer himself. Yossef Bodansky, author of Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America, probably was or would be surprised to learn that years before Osama claimed innocent American civilians were legitimate targets because they pay taxes, McVeigh gave a similar rationale for the murder of the federal employees at the Murrah Building. McVeigh's comparison of the government workers with fictional Death Star clerks in the movie Star Wars is as bizarre a justification for mass murder as any offered to date by bin Laden.The authors present facts that can allow a reader to put the massacre into historical context. Three passages in the book leap out. The first is a comment by former FBI profiler Clint Van Zandt that the "war" that started at Ruby Ridge between zealous law enforcement and extreme libertarians met its turning point at Oklahoma City. The next is the almost astonishing admission by President Bill Clinton that he should have stopped the federal action at Waco, which is viewed on television by a cheering McVeigh while he awaits the death penalty. The third highpoint appears in the final chapter. McVeigh is housed at the same maximum security prison with Ramzi Yousef, the Muslim nutcase who bombed the World Trade Center the first time, and with Theodore Kaczynksi, another native-born bomber who maimed and killed his fellow citizens. Yousef pleads with the atheist McVeigh to convert to Islam, and Kaczynksi describes the Oklahoma City bomber as a person with excellent social skills and reveals a degree of envy of his fellow American terrorist. These vignettes are better than fiction, and almost support a prominent Harvard professor's recent thesis that "terrorism works".The human element is always just beneath the surface in American Terrorist. The stark horror inflicted on the people of Oklahoma and America is made vivid by the survivors and the families of the dead. McVeigh's father is a tragic, sympathetic man who seems to have lived under a dark cloud his entire adult life. Even McVeigh, who intentionally to

I think that the focus of all Americans post 9 / 11 on the term "Terrorist" is centered on the Middle East and Afghanistan with good reason. What this book will do for you is to have you remember the horrible home grown incident in Oklahoma City and the type of internal terrorist that is probably still lurking around the fringe of society. This book covers a brief life history of little troubled Timmy. It then tries to tell us what brought him to the realization that to protect his right to own as many guns as he could and to make sure that the Waco and Ruby Ridge incidents did not take place again, it was a good thing pack a truck full of explosives and kill almost 200 innocent men, women and children. The book also provides a step by step process on how he prepared the truck bomb and set it off, his capture and the trial. What troubled me the most was the very cold, level arguments Timmy made to justify his actions, the same arguments that his group of ultra right wing government haters probably can continue to use to justify other terrorist acts. He also tries to wrap his attack on the government around some additional justification concerning the horrible treatment the American's inflicted on the Iraqi military during the Gulf War. Something like we bombed them too much. The authors go on to give us a view of Timmy that shows he really was just a petty two-bit criminal that loved guns. It all adds to the view into his head, that we were dealing with a troubled kid that could not rationally justify his actions. The last thing that made me think with the book was how easy it was for this guy and his friends to pull this off. UBL sure went to a lot of trouble and cost given the same amount of damage probably could have been done with 10 trucks full of fertilizer and gas. Overall it is a very compelling book that you will not want to stop reading once you start. It is well written and has a good flow.

Immaculately researched (with cooperation from Tim McVeigh and his family)book about the infamous terrorist attack on American soil (somewhat overshadowed now by events on Sept 11)that will dispell many myths and clear up innacuracies.For what it's worth I felt that McVeigh comes across in the book as quite a likeable fellow, hell if it weren't for that whole bombing thing, pretty much anyone would be glad to call him a friend.Like many a serial killer, this mass murderer/terrorist isn't a slobbering at the mouth maniac, hiding in the shadows. He was an anti-government zealot who channelled his feelings of disgust and frustration into one act of severe violence. His acts could never be justified by any free-thinking person, however the book is interesting in that it doesn't set out to portray him as some kind of maniac. Just presents the facts in a fascinating and compelling fashion.Highly recommended.

This book, an unbiased review of Tim McVeigh's life, is outstanding!!! But, if you need to come away from this book with the view of Tim McVeigh as a highly disturbed, demonic psychopath, don't buy it! You won't find closue or peace in the pages of AMERICAN TERRORIST. Ever since the bombing, Americans have been looking for the monster in Tim McVeigh. Was his lonely childhood the root of his evil? The divorce of his parents? His inability to form relationships with women? Or his failure to make the Green Berets in his beloved Army? No! In this book McVeigh explains why he detonated his truck bomb killing 168 people. Simply enough, he hated the government, wanted revenge for the botched FBI and ATF raids on Ruby Ridge and WACO, and wanted to 'wake Americans up.' Americans celebrate our Founding Fathers who, like McVeigh, where revolutionary ideologues. Just because McVeigh's ideology conflicts with that of most Americans, doesn't make him a psychopath. To the contrary, he comes across as a chillingly likeable guy. So, if your looking for your own peace or for some inner turmoil in McVeigh that might possibly explain the Oklahoma City bombing, you might want to keep looking.