Seems everyone in his life knew he was nuts before he blew up the Murrow Building.
en.wikipedia.org
McVeigh wrote letters to local newspapers complaining about taxes. In 1992, he wrote:
McVeigh also wrote to Representative John J. LaFalce (D–New York),[30] complaining about the arrest of a woman for carrying mace:
McVeigh later moved with Nichols to Nichols’ brother James’ farm around Decker, Michigan.[31] While visiting friends, McVeigh reportedly complained that the Army had implanted a microchip into his buttocks so that the government could keep track of him.[3] McVeigh worked long hours in a dead-end job and felt that he did not have a home. He sought romance, but his advances were rejected by a co-worker and he felt nervous around women. He believed that he brought too much pain to his loved ones.[32] He grew angry and frustrated at his difficulties in finding a girlfriend. He took up obsessive gambling.[33] Unable to pay gambling debts, he took a cash advance and then defaulted on his repayments. He began looking for a state with low taxes so that he could live without heavy government regulation or high taxes. He became enraged when the government told him that he had been overpaid $1,058 while in the Army and he had to pay back the money. He wrote an angry letter to the government, saying:
McVeigh introduced his sister to anti-government literature, but his father had little interest in these views. He moved out of his father's house and into an apartment that had no telephone. This made it impossible for his employer to contact him for overtime assignments. He quit the National Rifle Association of America (NRA), believing that it was too weak on gun rights.[35]
McVeigh told Fortier of his plans to blow up a federal building, but Fortier declined to participate. Fortier also told his wife about the plans.
[48] McVeigh composed two letters to the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the first titled "Constitutional Defenders" and the second "ATF Read." He denounced government officials as "fascist tyrants" and "storm troopers," and warned:
McVeigh also wrote a letter to recruit a customer named Steve Colbern:
McVeigh began announcing that he had progressed from the "propaganda" phase to the "action" phase. He wrote to his Michigan friend Gwenda Strider, "I have certain other 'militant' talents that are in short supply and greatly demanded."
[51]
McVeigh later said he considered "a campaign of individual assassination," with "eligible" targets including Attorney General
Janet Reno, Judge
Walter S. Smith Jr. of
Federal District Court, who handled the
Branch Davidian trial; and
Lon Horiuchi, a member of the FBI hostage-rescue team, who shot and killed Vicki Weaver in a standoff at a remote cabin at
Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992.
[52] He said he wanted Reno to accept "full responsibility in deed, not just words."
[53] Such an assassination seemed too difficult,
[54] and he decided that since federal agents had become soldiers, he should strike at them at their command centers.
[55] According to McVeigh's authorized biography, he decided that he could make the loudest statement by bombing a federal building. After the bombing, he was ambivalent about his act and the deaths he caused; as he said in letters to his hometown newspaper, he sometimes wished that he had carried out a series of assassinations against police and government officials instead.
[56]