{"id":51563,"date":"2021-12-03T20:42:09","date_gmt":"2021-12-03T20:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/airforcetimes\/uncategorized\/2021\/12\/03\/how-extremist-groups-target-veterans-and-what-can-be-done-about-it\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T09:05:05","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T09:05:05","slug":"how-extremist-groups-target-veterans-and-what-can-be-done-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/airforcetimes\/news\/pentagon-congress\/2021\/12\/03\/how-extremist-groups-target-veterans-and-what-can-be-done-about-it\/","title":{"rendered":"How extremist groups target veterans, and what can be done about it"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Over the past three decades, the number of veterans involved in extremist crimes has shot up 350%, according to data from the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism<\/a>. So why are veterans getting wrapped up in extremist ideology, what makes them vulnerable and how can the multiple government agencies they associate with prevent it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The VA, for example, has long known that separating service members are at a particular risk, as they transition from a regimented lifestyle with a clear purpose to a civilian world where everything is open to them. Groups prey on that desire to belong, to serve a cause.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe vulnerability side is what happens when they get targeted with propaganda,\u201d Cynthia Miller-Idriss, who heads American University\u2019s Polarization and Extremism Research and Innovation Lab, said Friday during a Brookings Institution event,\u201d and that propaganda and the manipulation of the values that attracted a lot of folks to volunteer in the first place, includes rhetoric that\u2019s laden with appeals to \u2018brotherhood,\u2019 defensive … a chance to be a part of a meaningful cause.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, Americans in general are more distrusting of the structures they once believed in<\/a>, from the military, to Congress, the presidency and the media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNow, the challenge, I think, that we have right now is that we\u2019ve lost a lot of faith in those institutions, as Cynthia was talking about,\u201d said Scott Cooper, Marine veteran and founder of the Veterans and Citizens Initiative<\/a>. \u201cWhen it becomes patriotic to be against your government, then there\u2019s a problem there … what we\u2019ve seen is that some of that rhetoric that Timothy McVeigh<\/a> consumed is now becoming mainstream.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For someone who has built an identity around serving the nation and protecting their fellow Americans, there can be an opening for extremist groups who purport to offer that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c… but in ways they get twisted, often arguing that they\u2019re called upon to defend the country against traitors, tyrannical leaders, and trying to convert a sense of betrayal or anger at the government, or at mainstream society, into mobilization to violent action that\u2019s framed as heroic defense of the real or the true nation,\u201d Miller-Idriss added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In turn, those extremist groups get members with tactical and mission-planning experience, as well as the clout of implicitly respected veterans among their membership.<\/p>\n\n\n\t