Oklahoma City Bombing: Timothy McVeigh Essay

The Boston Marathon is an annual marathon hosted by several cities in Greater Boston in eastern Massachusetts. It is always held on Patriot’s Day, the third Monday in April. Begun in 1897, the Boston Marathon is the world’s oldest annual marathons and ranks as the world’s best-known road-racing events (“Boston Bombing,” n.d.). But on April 15, 2013, the marathon made history for something else. At approximately 2:49 EST, two pressure cooker bombs struck near the finish line of the marathon, leaving three dead and one hundred and forty one injured. Among the injured, twelve were reported in critical condition. The victims, who were treated in eight different hospitals, were as young as two (Lev, 2013).

It was April 19, 1995 at 9:03 that the lives of thousands were affected by one single

The Oklahoma City Bombing would be considered the worst terrorist attack on America prior to the 9/11 World Trade Center attack. Just outside of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, on April 19th, 1995 a truck exploded, killing 168 people. 19 of those 168 being children. The explosion caused damage to 300 surrounding buildings. Oklahoma City was going through a tragedy and needed guidance from a leader.

The bomb was set off by Timothy McVeigh, a Persian Gulf Veteran. He was a right wing radical linked to anti-government, white-supremacist, survivalist and militia groups. The events at Waco and Ruby Ridge influenced Timothy McVeigh, prompting him to take action against the United States government (“FBI”, The Oklahoma City Bombing: 20 Years After). Right wing ideology, as in the Turner Diaries, led him

On April 19th, 1995 a homemade bomb made of a concoction of agricultural fertilizer, fuel, and other dangerous chemicals was left in a truck parked outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building in Oklahoma City. At 9:02 in the morning, it’s blast damaged over 300 buildings surrounding the vehicle and even flattened a third of the federal building. (Strom, 2015) The bomb took the lives of 168 people, including 19 children. It was found that two men, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Lynn Nichols were the ones who planted the device. Both men were found to be associated with a radical militia movement that sought revenge for a siege in Waco, Texas two years prior. The siege killed 82 Branch Davidians, of whom, multiple were related to the militia movement.

On the morning of April 19, 1995 Timothy McVeigh parked a Ryder rental truck packed with explosives outside of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building more than ready to commit a mass execution that would change the state of Oklahoma forever. Until September 11, 2001 the Oklahoma City Bombing was the most vicious terrorist attack to happen in the United States. As rescue operations were finalized the death tolls were high including 19 children.. The explosion blew off the entire north wall and either destroyed or damaged buildings as far as three blocks away. McVeigh was “anti-government” and wanted revenge against the federal government for what had

On April 19, 1995, a man by the name of Timothy McVeigh carried out an attack that would leave the United States, along with other countries, devastated. At 9:02 A.M, a truck bomb explosion outside of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, left 168 people dead and hundreds more injured. Many people apprehend that McVeigh carried out this attack because he was mentally unstable. He was actually thinking logically. McVeigh planned out the attack based on his life experiences and by what he read in books. He retaliated against the government because of his personal beliefs and he wanted to be recognized for the bombing.

Their attacks were in surprising places, places where people felt safe living by the status quo. In the case of McVeigh, violence was expected in the big cities of either coast, not in calm, mid-western Oklahoma (Linethal 15). In the case of John Brown, violence was understood to be a major deal out in the west in areas where lawlessness could not easily be deterred, not in a sleepy town in the firmly established slave state of Virginia. Because of this, both of these incidents resulted in massively increased anxieties for many (in McVeigh’s case in the US as a whole; in John Brown’s case largely amongst southern slave owners) over whether they too could end up becoming a victim. The apparent uniqueness of these events also fascinated people in a more general sense, and they expressed this newfound fascination in a variety of ways. Perhaps the most long-lasting of these ways was the development of a tourist-like curiosity of the places where these events had occurred. Harpers Ferry ended up ultimately becoming a national park, but prior to this, the armory which John Brown had captured on that fateful day had become a source of intrigue for people across the country, which resulted in it being moved out from the Ferry for a period of time. In the case of McVeigh, Oklahoma City became a place where people went to watch and observe the aftermath of tragedy (Linenthal

McVeigh, before joining the military, already had a long history in the survivalist movement. The Survivalist movement is well known by the federal government for its anti-government activities and beliefs, McVeigh shared these beliefs and was set off after the

Following the 1993 World Trade Center Bombing, Rescorla invited Hill to New York, where he hired him as a security consultant in order to assess the building 's security. Although no arrests had yet been made, Rescorla believed that the bomb had been planted by Muslims. Hill went undercover in several mosques throughout New Jersey, showing up for morning prayers at dawn. He took on the character of an anti-American Muslim, in order to interview the other visitors to the mosques. He concluded that the attack was likely planned by a radical imam at a mosque in New York or New Jersey. Followers of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, a radical Muslim cleric based in Brooklyn, were subsequently convicted of the bombing.

Timothy McVeigh (33) sentenced to death on 11 federal offenses because he bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. McVeigh’s execution took place on June 11, 2001 in the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana. The high security federal complex where his execution took place located on Highway 63, which is just two miles south of the city of Terre Haute. McVeigh had two co-conspirators Terry Nichols and Michael Fortier.

When the Oklahoma City bombing happened, it remained the largest terrorist attack to happen on American soil until the attack on 9/11. On April 19, 1995, a rental truck was loaded up with 4,800 pounds of explosives and detonated just after 9:00 am (Krung, Nixon, & Vincent, 1996). The attack was focused on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City. This tragic event killed one hundred sixty-eight people and also injured hundreds more (Nacos, 2016). A dare care facility was also located within the building and nineteen children perished in the attack (Nacos, 2016). There were hundreds more victims which were treated by area hospitals and private doctor offices. This explosion was so large, a shockwave was sent across the city which damaged or destroyed an additional 300 buildings in the immediate area (History, 2009). Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nicholas were the two men responsible for this devastating attack.

There has been speculation that the bombing of the federal building was to demonstrate the anti-government feelings over the 1993 government raid of the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco Texas. Both McVeigh and Nichols were once sited at the compound in Waco and were openly supporting the other Branch Davidians. The bombing occurred exactly two years to the day after the compound burned to the ground killing 80 men, women, and children after a 51-day standoff between the Branch Davidians and the FBI. The bombing definitely put the spotlight on other groups with anti-government sentiments.

On April 15, 2013 during the Boston Marathon in Copley Square, two bombs exploded near the finish line killing at least three and injuring over 170 people. This bombing sent the nation in an uproar and it was immediately recognized as a terrorist attack. When the Federal Bureau of Investigation took over, a few days later a surveillance video and photographs of the two suspects were released.

On May 24th 1988 Timothy took a huge step to fulfill his dream of becoming a member of the United States Special Forces. In Basic training McVeigh met an individual named Terry Nichols, Nichols was much older than most of the recruits and held his own pretty well. McVeigh and Nichols became close friends and even got stationed at Fort Riley Kansas Together. Kifner, John. (1995). Terry Nichols was one of the master minds behind the attack of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. As stated by former FBI agent "These two are birds of a feather. Each feeds off the other 's inadequacies." McVeigh and Nichols would later deploy to Iraq to fight in the Gulf War where McVeigh served as a Bradley Gunner. During his time in Iraq McVeigh was awarded the combat Infantry badge and a bronze star. Kifner, (1995).