Racist Extremists Active in U.S. Military
SPLC urges Rumsfeld to adopt zero-tolerance policy
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/news/item.jsp?site_area=1&aid=197A Few Bad Men
Ten years after a scandal over neo-Nazis in the armed forces, extremists are once again worming their way into a recruit-starved military.
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/news/item.jsp?aid=66Evidence of Extremist Infiltration of Military Grows
http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2008/08/27/evidence-of-extremist-infiltration-of-military-growsOne of the Blood and Honour members claiming to be an active-duty soldier taking part in combat operations in Iraq identified himself to Kennard as Jacob Berg. He did not disclose his rank or branch of service. “There are actually a lot more ‘skinheads,’ ‘nazis,’ white supremacists now than there has been in a long time,” Berg wrote in an E-mail exchange with Kennard. “Us racists are actually getting into the military a lot now because if we don’t every one who already is will take pity on killing sand niggers. Yes I have killed women, yes I have killed children and yes I have killed older people. But the biggest reason I’m so proud of my kills is because by killing a brown many white people will live to see a new dawn.”
The Army is currently investigating war crimes allegations leveled against Iraq combat veteran and active-duty Army soldier Kenneth Eastridge, 24, who is facing trial for the December 2007 murder of a fellow serviceman. After Eastridge was arrested for that killing, National Public Radio publicized his MySpace page, which showed Eastridge displaying a tattoo of SS lightning bolts, a common neo-Nazi insignia.
Another member of Eastridge’s company recently told Army investigators that Eastridge used a stolen AK-47 to fire indiscriminately at Iraqi civilians from his moving Humvee on the streets of Baghdad. “The military is to some extent desperate to get people to fight, soldiers who are not fit, mentally and physically sick, but they continue to send them,” Eastridge’s attorney told Kennard. “Having a tattoo was the least concerns.”
As part of the research for his thesis, “The New Nazi Army: How the U.S. military is allowing the far right to join its ranks,” Kennard used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain from the Army’s Criminal Investigative Division investigative reports concerning white supremacist activity in 2006 and 2007. They show that Army commanders repeatedly terminated investigations of suspected extremist activity in the military despite strong evidence it was occurring. This evidence was often provided by regional Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which are made up of FBI and state and local law enforcement officials.