Bring the War Home

A classic in the genre, Belew’s book traces the rise of the white power movement to “the aftermath of the Vietnam War.”

Bring the War Home examines how a blend of apocalyptic ideas, obsession with guns rights, hardline antigovernment views, and white power beliefs became a current in modern America. I admire its groundbreaking research, bold argument, and impact.

The white supremacist movement today has echoes in the past, but it is also dramatically transformed. Historian Kathleen Belew offers a gripping account of this shift, tracing how embittered Vietnam veterans and others disillusioned with a changing America merged with a burgeoning militia movement to take on the U.S. government. Her book is filled with fascinating anecdotes but never loses sight of how the movement after Vietnam came to embrace terrorist attacks like the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, which killed 168 people. Many of the themes we see in the white supremacist movement today– hostility toward the U.S. government, an… show more.

Belew’s book is a sweeping historical account of the impact of the Vietnam War on the rise of unlawful militias and the white power movement. I learned more from reading this book than any other book about the history of the unlawful militia and white power movements in the U.S. It reminded me of how important it is to understand the historical trajectory of the current moment we are in—and of how much a role external and global wars can play on violent mobilization in our own country.

The modern American right also developed distinct paramilitary dimensions. In the wake of the Vietnam War, a militarized white power movement led by veterans spread across the United States. Uniting Klansman, neo-Nazis, tax protesters, and Christian Identitarians, the movement sought war against immigrants, African Americans, leftists, liberals, and, eventually, the government itself.

To carry out those assaults, members circulated ideas and literature, shared money and housing, hoarded weapons and supplies, and practiced combat and counterfeiting. Their violence spread across the country, culminating in Timothy McVeigh’s bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building in 1995. In Bring the War Home,… show more.