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James "Bo" Gritz (born January 18, 1939 in Enid, Oklahoma) was a highly decorated Green Beret officer during the Vietnam War whose post-war activities—notably attempted POW rescues—have proven controversial. He remained a Green Beret officer until he resigned his commission in 1979.
Attempts to locate prisoners of war
During the 1980s Gritz undertook a series of private trips into Southeast Asia, purportedly to locate United States prisoners of war which some believed were still being held by the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Those missions were heavily publicized, controversial and widely decried as shambolic — for instance, as some commentators stated, few successful secret missions involve bringing to the border towns women openly marketing commemorative POW rescue T-shirts. All such missions failed to locate any live POWs.
Drug trafficking allegations
In 1986, after a trip to Burma to interview drug kingpin Kun Sah regarding possible locations of U.S. POWs, Gritz returned from Burma with a videotaped interview of Kun Sah purporting to name several officials in the Reagan administration involved in narcotics trafficking in Southeast Asia. Among those named was Richard Armitage, who most recently served as Deputy Secretary of State during George W. Bush's first term as President. Gritz believed that those same officials were involved in a coverup of missing American POWs.
During this period Gritz established contacts with the Christic Institute, a leftist group which was then pursuing a lawsuit against the U.S. government over charges of drug trafficking in both Southeast Asia and Central America. He also established increasing contacts with conspiracy theorists of the right.
Conspiracy theorist
In 1989, Gritz established the Center For Action, which was active on a number of issues, mostly pertaining to conspiracy theories. Attempting to build bridges among conspiracy theorists and other activists of both the left and right, in 1990 he held a conference in Las Vegas, Nevada called "Freedom Call '90". Speakers at that conference included October Surprise researcher Barbara Honegger, Bill Davis of the Christic Institute, conspiracy theorist Eustace Mullins, and several others. This newfound interest in conspiracy theories proved to be as controversial as Gritz's earlier missions searching for POWs, especially after allegations surfaced of anti-Semitism directed at one of the speakers, Eustace Mullins.
Anti-war activities
During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, Gritz was an outspoken opponent of that war, and linked it to a conspiracy theory alleging plans to implement a one-world government, known as the "new world order". He appeared on Pacifica Radio stations in California as a guest several times, and for a short time was in demand as a speaker to left-wing and anti-war audiences. However, during this period he also became closely associated with the Christian Patriot movement on the right, and spoke at conferences sponsored by Christian Identity pastor Pete Peters. When these associations became known to those on the left, especially after the publication of a report by the Los Angeles-based group People Against Racist Terror calling Gritz a "front man for fascism", left-wing audiences lost interest in Gritz, and the Christic Institute and Pacifica Radio cut off any further association.
Author
Gritz is the author of three books. The first, A Nation Betrayed, was published in 1989 and contained Gritz's allegations of drug trafficking and a POW coverup, based on the Kun Sah interview. The second, Called To Serve, was published in 1992 and expanded on the previous book to cover a wide range of conspiracy theories, including the assassination of John F. Kennedy and allegations of a new world order. His third book is entitled My Brother's Keeper and was published in 2003.
Presidential candidate
In 1992, Gritz ran for President of the United States on the Populist Party ticket. He received 106,152 votes nationwide, or 0.1% of the popular vote. In two states he had a respectable showing for a third party candidate: Utah, where he received 3.84% of the vote, and Idaho, where he received 2.13% of the vote. In some counties, his support topped 10-12%; likely significant to these results is that Gritz had purportedly converted to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (colloquially, the Mormon church). His run on the Populist Party ticket created further controversy, because of that party's past ties to David Duke and Willis Carto.
Also during 1992, Gritz attracted national attention as mediator during the government standoff with Randy Weaver at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.
Controversial activities
In 1993, Gritz changed his emphasis again and began offering a course called SPIKE (Specially Prepared Individuals for Key Events), which taught paramilitary and survivalist skills. He also established a community in Idaho called Almost Heaven. Both of these proved to be even more controversial than his past activities, attracting charges from anti-racist watchdog groups that he was trying to build a community of Christian Identity believers and train them in paramilitary skills for a showdown with the government.
Several times he used his influence and reputation in the Patriot community in attempts to negotiate conclusions between legal authorities and Far-Right activists. In August 1992, he intervened on behalf of Randy Weaver who, with his family, was holed up on his rural home in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, after U.S. Marshalls attempted to arrest him on a weapons charge. The 11-day standoff, which resulted in the deaths of a U.S. Marshall, Weaver's son and wife, ended after Gritz convinced Weaver to leave his cabin, and place his faith and trust in the court system. In 1996, he unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate a conclusion to the stand-off by the Montana Freemen, a group of Christian Patriot activists who were wanted on a collection of charges. After speaking with the "Freemen", he left in frustration, stating that they presented him with what he called "legalistic mumbo-jumbo" to support their claims, and cautioned others in the Patriot movement not to support them (The stand-off ended when the "Freemen" surrendered after 81 days).
Subsequent activities
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints responded to his newfound extremist and anti-government activities by excommunicating Gritz and several of his supporters. He eventually cut his ties to the Almost Heaven community and returned to Nevada. In 1998, Gritz began a fruitless search for abortion clinic bombing suspect Eric Rudolph. Also in 1998, Gritz made a failed suicide attempt while facing a divorce. He continues today with a website but his influence within the Christian Patriot movement and among conspiracy theorists has greatly diminished, the POW issue is no longer considered credible, while any interest the Left had in him was gone by 1992, leaving him largely without an audience.
In 2005, Gritz became an active protester against the removal of a feeding tube from Terri Schiavo, a comatose Florida woman. On March 19, 2005, when the tube was removed, he was arrested for trespassing after trying to enter the hospice where she lived.
External links
- Gritz's official website
- Gritz's 1988 Feb 1 letter to VP Bush
- James Gritz's testimony to the U.S. Senate Slect Committee, Nov 23rd, 1992.
- Prisoners Of War: The Search For Answers by Travis Masters.
- "A Nation Betrayed" A Public Lecture Lieutenant Colonel James "Bo" Gritz (U.S. Army-Retired), June 1, 1990 (An Unofficial Transcript).
- Chicago Tribune feature story by Anthony DeBartolo
- "Extremism In America" - ADL Webpage critical of Gritz