Washington/ United States (4 June) — Protest continue rage in American streets, rioters defy the curfew, the left and the right political elites ripping apart the little trust what is left in American society. Amazingly the rationale, intellectual, intelligence-based decision making has been replaced with the deceptive, emotional, leftist narrative that has gripped the American psyche.
The left media reject the notion Antifa and other leftist extremist groups are the networks creating an environment of terror, instability, and ambiguousness. But the rise of the Antifa is not new. Since 2017 repeated warnings were issued by reporters and the extremists themselves.
The sudden rise of the Antifa begs the question are the Democrats using militant groups? If we read Gene Sharps from ‘Dictatorship to liberal democracy’, one can come to the conclusion the radicals within the political space is applying decades of activism against the new perceived enemy, Donald Trump.
The use of extremist for political militant purposes is not new. History is full of extremists used by political mainstream to seek power. The Nazi’s SA and the SS are the best examples, Germany’s Green party used the Marxist Autonomes is another. The German Autonomes are the forefathers of Antifa or the Black Block but they are also related to the Revolutionary Cells and the Red Army Faction, the Baader Meinhof gang. The dark side of the coin is extremism, as extreme as it can be. The Antifa, Black Block ideological base is Marxism, revolutionary action, and reactionary ideology.
The German Green party used the Marxist Autonomes for direct action until 1986. After weapons were stolen from an ambushed undercover police officer a cell shot at the police line facing off protesters left two police officers dead on the street and seven seriously injured.
Today, the U.S. political landscape is similarly divided. For some time, the extremists are on the rise, claiming to fight “Nazi’s”, or Trump followers, which in the eyes of the Black Block are one and the same. A long series of attacks for some time indicated the extremist left is emerging from the murky waters of the leftist underground.
Extremists interviewed repeatedly said that the political left, the Democratic party has lost its credibility and the nationalists are on the rise threaten the republic. This narrow view is a repeat other extremist ideology. The establishment is unable to have prevented the election of President Trump, the coup d’état by the intelligence and security services increasingly points in the direction of a misinformation campaign and fabricated evidence by the Democratic party and a re-election of Trump is likely.
Taking the battle to the streets is a leftist tactic as old as communism itself. Since day one of the inauguration of President Trump we have seen a continuous action by increasingly more radicalized groups. In its shadow the Antifa, the Black Block, and other radical civil society groups call for a revolution to take power from democratically elected president.
Social media spaces are flooded with manuals and ideological narratives to call for revolution suggesting the weaponization of democracy has entered a new, more violent stage. The liberal media is traditionally ignorant about these extremist manifestation of Marxism.
This led to a complete break down of the relationships between the media and the public. The American public has tuned out to “Radio left”, no-one is any longer listening to the biased rants, racial hate and vilification of the middle class. CNN has become an anti-Trump hate machine daily vilifying the administration and lynch mobbing Donald Trump in continuous news coverage anything the administration does.
Antifa extremists, what is the evidence?
Let’s take a look at the public record. The Texas Director for Public Safety Steve McCraw said investigators uncovered information online pointing to the far-left activist group, Antifa, as having organized rioters to wreak havoc and take advantage of protesters, specifically at an Austin Target. He said it was the job of the police to protect peaceful protesters exercising their constitutional right to peaceably assemble. However, criminals and “thugs,” he said, have been, and will be, arrested.
Axios reported that President Trump tweeted on Sunday that the United States will be designating antifa, which is short for “anti-fascist,” as a terrorist organization. However, the law that allows the government to designate entities as terrorists only applies to foreign organizations. In addition, antifa is a decentralized organization with no designated leadership, so it may be difficult for federal authorities to determine which agitators belong to the movement.
‘That is not true and a consistently deliberate effort by the extremist to conceal the leadership structures. The movement is highly organized and structured’, said a counter terrorist expert specializing on leftist extremist.
Spurred by the deadly events at a racist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, two weeks earlier, leaders of the anti-hate march invited local antifa to form a “black bloc” – moving in formation, wearing black – to protect their Aug. 27 march on a planned right-wing rally in downtown Berkeley, California.
Deep inside the bloc were the most militant members of the opaque group, who had been busy for weeks with a different plan. They had tracked conservative activists across the Bay Area – and beyond. They held meetings and created a database of known targets, invariably labeling them “Nazis.” The term in use is ‘doxxing’, the deliberate intelligence collection effort of political opponents, or agents of the police or state, to expose them, threaten their families and physically attack the target.
Fox News reported Antifa, short for anti-fascist or Anti-Fascism Action, is viewed as a radical far-left-leaning political movement, made up of mostly autonomous cells and local leaders but without a figurehead or formal hierarchy. Some local chapters go by location, such as “Antifa Sacramento” or “NYC Antifa,” while others have more murky names such as “Torch” or “By Any Means.”
“They [Antifa] do a lot through apps, and they use paper flyers and leaflets as well,” he claimed. “A lot of it is off social media, phone to phone, or email. They use all forms of communication to spread a violent message.”
“This is being exacerbated by badly worded ‘expert opinions.’ The [instigators] are watching the news and building off false attributions and expert commentary,” Bradbury continued. “It feels eerily like a true fog of war.”
Multiple experts monitoring the matter highlighted that the left-wing radical pockets linked to Antifa typically turn to gamer chat rooms and encrypted apps such as WhatsApp and Telegram to set their meeting points and agendas for riots.
Like other criminal activities from drug dealing to identity theft to the selling of child pornography, the untraceable Internet lurking beneath the metaphorical waterline has long been a meeting point for planning, connecting, and the overall discussion around a violent activity.
A report released Wednesday by a terrorism tracking service, underscored that it had “identified several groups across the left/right ideological spectrum infiltrating and exploiting protests across the U.S.”
Analyst Bethany Rudibaugh analyzed crowds in Columbus, Ohio, and observed “a mix of ideologies from the Proud Boys to AntiFa.”
“Other analysts monitoring online sources documented infiltrating groups in other cities including those who espouse the racist ‘Boogaloo’ and an anarchist’s personal account being present at the destruction of the 3rd police precinct building in Minneapolis,” the report continued. “In addition, eco-fascists on Telegram are advocating taking advantage of law enforcement’s attention on the protests to get serious about attacking critical infrastructure in the U.S., including power stations and railway lines.”
He emphasized that the problem with social media and messaging apps is that they make it easy for a person to lose perspective, to wind up in an echo-chamber that magnifies certain sentiments and disinformation campaigns.
The Washington Post quoted an academic who wrote a narrow interpretation of Antifa said ‘antifa is just too small of a presence in each state to be leading protests in any state. And antifa is likely too small and too disorganized to conduct nationwide protests, Bray said.’ This view is rejected by experts on left extremist movements.
All the above is partially correct but lacks the cohesiveness of what extremist new social movements are all about, said an academic, who tracks militant civil society groups over the past two decades. Antifa cells are widespread but enjoy an influx of like-minded revolutionaries such as the Eco-anarchists, the German “Linke” and members of the alternative movement, militant Gay and Lesbian-anarchists, Marxist-Autonomes, and Anarcho-syndicalists which was a Marxist labor movement. Nativists and eco-extremists’ factions are repeatedly spotted in the global cabal of the neo-social movement factions.
‘It operates and moves globally. Called demo-tourism, extremists were spotted in the G-20 demonstrations in Hamburg, the Extinction Rebellion in the UK, the Occupy revolution in New York, and the 2019 Hong Kong demonstration.’, he said. ‘It is an illusion to assume only jihadist travel to spread the revolution, the left has a much older history.’
He added, ‘The assumption this is a small movement lacks imagination. Extremist groups particularly like the Antifa and Black Block and their extremist’s cousins the Revolutionary cells do not need a large membership. Cells are no larger than 15 strong and called Affinity Groups operating in the global space. Both virtually and in global locations.’
‘The Black Block papers showed clearly the loose affiliation of likeminded groups, including the Earth Liberation Front, the Northeastern Federation of Anarchist-Communist, Federation of Revolutionary Anarchist Collectives/Great Lakes Region (Great Lakes, North America), Anti-Racist Action, The Industrial Workers of The World Food Not Bombs, The Independent Media Center (IMC), The Barricada Collective, The Green Mountain Anarchist Collective, the CCC, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, members of the Rainforest Action Network, EarthFirst! just to name a few’, he said.
The historical nexus to extremist European groups is well documented hence President Trump comments of naming the groups as terrorist groups is not that far-fetched. The EarthFirst! group was named as an eco-terror group by previous U.S. and UK administrations.
He warned, ‘It is dangerous to think in some quarters of the political elites and former officials close to the previous administration the leftist extremists can be contained. That is not their goal. And if history is a teacher, appeasement or sponsoring these extremists in hope of advancing civil society has only led more division, more violence, and more terror.’
“Extremism, far right and extreme left are equally bad choices. Recent photos showing the Antifa is fighting in the ranks of extremist Kurdish groups are a growing concern of European and Asian counter-terrorism experts as far as Hong Kong. How many foreign fighters are U.S. citizens returning to join the U.S. riots is unclear at this time. We however will not see the last of this growing concern.”, he concluded.
