A Mole Infiltrated the Highest Ranks of American Militias (2025)

Posted by georgecmu 4 days ago

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Comments

Comment by EdwardDiego 4 days ago

The involvement of Police and military personnel is not unexpected, but still rather horrifying.

Comment by ljf 4 days ago

This - I hate to be the person that always posts the same thing, but read about Operation Gladio ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio ) to see how NATO encouraged and enabled far right groups (with support of police, secret services and the army) to operate clandestine militias across Europe. If that is what they did in Europe, I wonder what they were supporting in America?

Comment by BryantD 4 days ago

Operation Gladio is one of those pieces of history that people ought to know, so don’t feel bad. It’s appreciated.

And as I’m sure you know, the answer to your second question is Operation Condor, at least if you take “America” to mean South America as well.

Comment by olelele 3 days ago

The bbc doc where all the old Italian guys reminisce about the good old time killing people is great and terrifying..

Comment by therobots927 3 days ago

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Comment by kakacik 4 days ago

A doctor too. Given only single one mentioned but still

Comment by ChrisArchitect 4 days ago

(2025)

Some discussion then: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42594766

Comment by pmpmpmpm 3 days ago

This article reminded me that there might be people in my country who see me as a person they are in community with instead of an object to be managed or moved. People who see me as human and act accordingly are rare these days. So much so, that even this feels like a gift. So thank you John Williams, your work is much appreciated.

Comment by thenthenthen 3 days ago

I recall seeing a documentary about him, sadly cant seem to find it, it should be on youtube? Both names are seemingly a bit hard to search by

Comment by BigTTYGothGF 4 days ago

See also "Under Cover", by John Roy Carlson, who did similar stuff in the early 1940s.

Comment by alsetmusic 3 days ago

Let me dust off this evergreen comment I use at times like this…

> Worth noting, Patriot Front had a huge leak of data in 2022 (400GB).

> [Patriot Front Fascist Leak Exposes Nationwide Racist Campaigns](https://unicornriot.ninja/2022/patriot-front-fascist-leak-ex...)

> You can download it at the following torrent address:

> magnet:?xt=urn:btih:2c87816e4c81990fb25bbca43dd8d578eaa55886&dn=patriotfront&tr=udp%3A%2F%2F9.rarbg.to%3A2920&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.opentrackr.org%3A1337&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fexodus.desync.com%3A6969

> I'm seeding this on a permanent basis. I have gigabit uplink. Please leach and share. Expose these nazi fucks.

Comment by 4 days ago

Comment by qrios 4 days ago

2025

Comment by daedlanth 4 days ago

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Comment by hdb385 4 days ago

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Comment by youdumbwithab 4 days ago

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Comment by dodger-dog 4 days ago

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Comment by no-name-here 4 days ago

> the leader of such a powerful group would keep a filing cabinet at his house with all sorts of incriminating records

I’m 95% sure your comment is framed to also allude to the President of the U.S. keeping classified/secret/top secret documents (after leaving office) in stacks of cardboard boxes and spilling out onto the floor in:

* a Mar-a-Lago resort business center

* a Mar-a-Lago resort ballroom stage

* a Mar-a-Lago resort bathroom

etc., with Mar-a-Lago being the 126-room resort (and Trump's home) where others are constantly coming and going, including even representatives of foreign adversaries and the foreign security teams, etc.?

Comment by 3RTB297 4 days ago

Or it's 4 paragraphs in to the article:

>He’d slept in the home of the man who claims to be the new head of the Oath Keepers, rifling through his files in the middle of the night.

Comment by no-name-here 4 days ago

1. But is the GP comment also designed to allude to the US President doing something very similar? If not, I don't understand why it seems to have a sarcastic tone acting like obviously an important militia leader would never store files like that, when we already have a case of the US President doing something similar (actually worse since there are significant laws against taking/insecurely storing classified/secret/top secret documents).

2. Same with the GP calling for "public hearings before the Senate" about it - I don't understand why they'd call for it for a militia leader (as a militia leader insecurely storing their files isn't a crime) unless they were actually calling for public hearings before the Senate digging into Trump illegally taking/insecurely storing classified documents?

Comment by nikolqy 4 days ago

Are we just going to forget that the feds went through Melania’s panty drawer during the raid over the documents?

Comment by defrost 4 days ago

Had they not would they have been doing their job properly ?

Are you saying that we should we all hide our bloody knives in drawers under women's underclothes?

Comment by no-name-here 1 day ago

Especially as the bedroom was one of the specific places that classified documents were stashed/found.

Comment by pythonRon 4 days ago

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Comment by lostlogin 4 days ago

Long term smokers voices change. Is that a controversial claim?

Comment by monster_truck 4 days ago

hey man can I bum a newport

Comment by aucisson_masque 4 days ago

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Comment by Erem 4 days ago

It’s a 20y/o news organization that has won multiple Pulitzers

Comment by dritty8 4 days ago

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Comment by lostlogin 4 days ago

There is a connection to Jan 6, so it’s not completely benign.

Comment by roenxi 4 days ago

This article could do with an serious edit; it seems to be an odd mix of actual information, imagined colour and emotion to the point where it is a little difficult to follow and hard to work out the credibility of any individual assertion. I get the strong impression here that Williams is a bit paranoid and spent a lot of time fearing for his skin in the company of people who thought we was a good mate and would probably just kick him out of the club if they figured out he was conspiring against them. I thought this passage summed the vibe up best:

> They spotted the dog at the same time. The bug was attached to a charging device. The animal was running around with it like it was a tennis ball. As Kinch went to retrieve it, Williams felt panic grip his chest. Could anyone talk their way out of this? He’d learned enough about Kinch to be terrified of his rage. Looking around, Williams eyed his host’s handgun on the kitchen counter.

> If he even starts to examine it, I’ll grab the gun, [Williams] thought. Then I’ll shoot him and flee into the woods.

> Kinch took the bug from the dog’s mouth. Then he handed it right to Williams and started to apologize.

Comment by simonw 4 days ago

This is a style of reporting called "narrative journalism": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative_journalism

It's not to everyone's taste (I often find it frustrating, like how confident is the reporter that the characters felt the way they are describing at various points in the story), but it has a long history, especially in US media.

I have a suspicion that it's less common in the UK and Europe.

Comment by beams_of_light 3 days ago

I’ve learned to skip several paragraphs of writing once I recognize the pattern. These types of articles turn into long essays where the writer is trying to create a work of art more so than convey important information.

Comment by dgellow 3 days ago

It’s called telling a story. That’s one of the most important part of investigative journalism

Comment by throwthrowuknow 3 days ago

It’s also the important warning illustrated by the Gell-Mann amnesia effect: journalists are not experts in the fields they report on so the stories they tell about them are often grossly incorrect and misconstrued but you need some expertise or experience in the field to sort the bullshit from the facts.

Crafting a narrative out of a handful of facts about a domain you don’t fully understand is a perfect recipe for bullshit.

Comment by madaxe_again 4 days ago

The lede isn’t just buried, it is submerged in a swamp under a pile of human interest rocks.

The article mentions several relatively minor/local public figures, including a prosecutor, apparently caught on mic saying they’ve influenced policy in favour of the group. Political lobbying is one thing, but an undeclared interest, another entirely.

As best I can tell this was published, talked about for a few days, and sank under its own mass. Their most read piece of 25, apparently, and it went precisely nowhere.

Comment by lux-lux-lux 3 days ago

The only people who can do anything about this are either actively involved or allied with these groups, so no real surprise it sank.

Comment by qup 4 days ago

Good lesson: carry your weapon on your person.

Comment by nikolqy 4 days ago

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