1. Excerpt of a letter from Ted to an unknown person
2. Excerpt of a letter from Ted to an unknown person
3. Extract of a letter from Ted to [REDACTED] — May 21, 1999
4. Extract of a letter from Ted to [REDACTED]
5. From Ted To Professor A. — November 1, 2001
6. Full Letter (December 8, 2001)
7. Ted to Professor (December 18, 2002) — On his support for the US invading Iraq, etc.
8. Letter Snippet (Unknown Date) [Pages 3–4]
You take your friends where you find them, including the federal ‘supermax’ where Ted Kaczynski enjoyed the company of his fellow mass murderers
They were workout buddies who had little in common — except for infamous reputations and a skill with explosives.
But housed in neighboring cells on the same secluded wing at the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility (ADX) in Florence, Colo., Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, struck up an odd friendship with two other notorious terrorists of the 1990s: Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and Ramzi Yousef, who planted a bomb in the World Trade Center in 1993 that killed six people, a precursor to the 9/11 attacks.
Locked in their tiny cells 23 hours a day, the three at one point shared the same recreation time. Outdoors, the environment was bleak: an all-concrete yard so deeply recessed that some former prisoners have likened it to standing in an empty swimming pool. But inmates were escorted to individual wire-mesh cages — about 12 by 18 feet, Kaczynski estimated — where they could speak to each other under the watch of guards.
Ramzi Yousef, Ted Kaczynski and Timothy McVeigh. (AP Photo)
In his early months in prison, Kaczynski became close enough to McVeigh and Yousef that they shared books and talked religion and politics. He even came to know their birthdays, according to letters he wrote about them to others.
“You may be interested to know that your birthday, April 27, is the same as that of Ramzi Yousef, the alleged ‘mastermind’ of the World Trade Center bombing,” Kaczynski wrote to a pen pal in 1999, according to a letter on file at his archive of personal papers at the University of Michigan Library. “I mentioned this to Ramzi, and he wants me to tell you that since your birthday is the same as his, you and he must have similar personalities. … He may have some degree of belief in astrology.”
Known as the “Alcatraz of the Rockies,” ADX is considered to be America’s toughest prison, where the nation’s most dangerous criminals are locked away and meant to be forgotten. But for Kaczynski, who had lived as a hermit for more than 20 years in his remote cabin in the backwoods of Montana, prison was, in many ways, a social awakening. For the first time he had regular, daily contact with other people, even though it was largely with prisoners who had committed equally horrible crimes.
Kaczynski’s letters offer an unprecedented glimpse into what life is like inside ADX, a so-called supermax prison that has been widely criticized for its use of solitary confinement. Kaczynski arrived there in May 1998, shortly after he was given eight life sentences without parole for his 17-year bombing spree, which killed three and left dozens injured. According to his personal papers, Kaczynski so detested the idea of spending the rest of his life in prison that he actually wanted the death penalty.
Though he longed for freedom and mourned the loss of his beloved Montana, Kaczynski admitted to pen pals that ADX wasn’t so terrible as far as prisons went — though he might have been better equipped than most for the lonely existence of a small, enclosed space. (His 12-by-7-foot jail cell is not much smaller than his 12-by-10-foot cabin, which didn’t have running water or electricity.)
“I consider myself to be in a (relatively) fortunate situation here,” Kaczynski wrote in a February 2000 letter. “As correctional institutions go, this place is well-administered. It’s clean, the food is good, and it’s quiet, so that I can sleep, think and write (usually) without being distracted by a lot of banging and shouting.”
The prisoners on his cell block, he added, “are easy to get along with.” He had particular praise for Yousef and McVeigh, whom he described in another letter as “very intelligent … friendly and considerate of others.” “Actually,” Kaczynski told another pen pal, “the people I am acquainted with in this range of cells … are nicer than the majority of people I’ve known on the outside.”
In July 1999, McVeigh was moved to federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind., and though prison rules blocked him from exchanging letters with Kaczynski, they kept up their friendship. Through a journalist at the Buffalo News, McVeigh sent Kaczynski a copy of “Into the Wild,” writer Jon Krakauer’s account of a young man’s hike into the Alaskan wilderness. (Kaczynski, who is particular about his books, liked it.) Meanwhile, the Unabomber asked his pen pals to send McVeigh magazines and articles, including a subscription to Green Anarchy magazine.
In his archive of personal papers in Ann Arbor, Kaczynski has meticulously documented his time in Colorado. He has filed copies of his annual prisoner evaluations (he’s a model inmate with good behavior); book reports for the rare learning courses he’s taken, including one in psychology; and even prison newsletters, which offer puzzles to help the inmates bide their time.
Though Kaczynzki mostly offers praise for ADX, he has filed a few complaints or “cop outs” over the years, mostly about noise and food. The prison, in his view, does not serve enough fresh vegetables. And he’s complained repeatedly about food prep. “Today, again … I received an undercooked hamburger. Like some other inmates, I refuse to eat undercooked hamburgers,” he wrote in a complaint to “food services” in February 2002. “Undercooked meat can transmit diseases, for example, salmonella and tapeworm. … Yet we often get undercooked hamburgers. Would appreciate it if you would make sure the hamburgers are fully cooked.”
According to Kaczynski’s letters, he wakes up before dawn — around 6 a.m., when his breakfast tray is slid through a slot near the door of his cell. An hour later, in the warm months, he’s let outside for roughly an hour of recreation time. “I cover about five miles running back and forth in one of my tiny areas that we’re allowed to exercise in,” he wrote in a February 2000 letter, in which he recounted his daily routine.
Back inside, he reads or writes letters or essays until lunch is served, between 10 and 11 a.m. After lunch, he sometimes exercises in his cell — “push-ups, sit-ups and so forth” — before going back to writing. Sometimes he takes a nap. Dinner is served between 4 and 5 p.m., after which Kaczynski turns back to reading and writing. For a while he was focused on improving his foreign language skills, studying Russian, German and Italian dictionaries at night. He goes to bed around 10 p.m., sometimes listening to a classical music show on a radio station based out of nearby Colorado Springs.
Though he has no access to the Internet, Kaczynski does read the daily newspaper — often the Denver Post, though at one point he had a subscription to the Los Angeles Times, courtesy of his former attorneys Judy Clarke and Quin Denvir. He also subscribes to a variety of magazines, including the New Yorker, Time magazine and the New York Review of Books. Between that and letters from his extensive list of pen pals, who send him articles printed from the Internet, Kaczynski appears to maintain a close eye on politics and current affairs from his prison cell, constantly opining on current events in his letters.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and the lead-up to the war in Iraq, Kaczynski wrote several letters somewhat supportive of the American campaign against Saddam Hussein, calling it “warranted.” “I don’t think all these petty little dictators around the world should be allowed to develop nuclear weapons,” he wrote in December 2002.
But in the spring of 2003, after the invasion of Iraq had turned up no evidence of weapons-making, the Unabomber changed his tune. Though he’d thought the intelligence made a good case for disarming Saddam, now he “felt reasonably sure (whatever they may tell themselves or the public) the politicians’ motives for invading Iraq had more to do with their own egos and their own drive for power than any unselfish desire to prevent the harm that Saddam might do with his weapons programs.”
But he pushed back on a correspondent’s suggestion that the United States was worse than any other superpower in this department. “If Russia or China or some other country were top dog, would they behave any better than the U.S.?” he said. Besides, he added, everyone was ignoring the real root of the problem: the technology society, his lifelong nemesis.
Still, Kaczynski offered some qualified support for President George W. Bush the following year as he ran for reelection. Though Bush was “incompetent,” “the one good thing is that he is opposed to stem-cell research,” Kaczynski wrote. And if the Unabomber could vote, “I would seriously consider voting for Bush and his quasi-criminal group.”
Why? “Well, apart from the stem-cell issue, I figure the re-election of an incompetent president and his irresponsible gang will help weaken the system.”
In July 2009, Kaczynski responded to a letter asking him about prison life. “I’m an atypical prisoner in an atypical prison,” he wrote. “Prison life is probably boring and monotonous for most prisoners in a maximum-security prison like this one, but it is not so far for me because I have too much, rather than too little to keep me occupied.”
Read more in this Yahoo News Special Report: >>
… As to the questions you asked For a while Tomothy McVeigh, Ramzi Yousef, and I shared exercise time fairly regularly. As you probably know, McVeigh has now been moved to Terre Haute, Indiana. I have not recently shared exercise time with Ramzi Yousef, but I do frequently take rec with a couple of other well-known inmates. I won’t mention their names without their permission. (I had Ramzi’s and McVeigh’s permission to talk about our shared rec time.) Both Ramzi and McVeigh are very intelligent, and they are friendly and considerate of others. I know very little of what the media have said about Ramzi, but I can say that McVeigh has been misrepresented by the media.
None of the foregoing remarks are to be construed as an endorsement of actions of which Ramzi and McVeigh have been accused.
In answer to your letter of June 2: I appreciate your kindly concern. I’m doing alright. Judge Burrell’s denial of my motion under 28 U.S.C. $ 2255 was expected, since he was the judge who tried me in the first place. I’ve now applied to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for permission to appeal to that court, and that’s where I just might have a chance, if only a very slim one.
Best regards,
Ted Kaczynski
… situps, etc.
You asked me to invite Timothy McVeigh to “go suck a coprolite.” I’m not sure if I remember what the word “coprolite” means — it’s not in my dictionary — but I think it means a fossilized dinosaur turd or something along those lines. Am I right? Anyway, I’m not going to invite McVeigh to go suck one. I don’t know whether he did what they say he did, or what his motives were if he did do it, but on a personal level he is a very decent fellow, friendly and considerate of others. My impression is that he and Ramzi Yousef are both very bright. Actually, the people I’m acquainted with in this range of cells (known as “celebrity row”) are nicer than the majority of people I’ve known on the outside. I should add that a lot of what the media have printed about McVeigh is crap. He is not a “neonazi racist” — far from it — and he doesn’t believe that satellites control people or that he has a computer chip implanted in his chest.
You’ll recall that problem about polynomials — if f(x) is a polynomial with real coefficients, and if f(x) … then f(x) has rational coefficients. I don’t know whether you still want me to take you through the proof of that. If you do, let me know, and I’ll give you the next instaliment of the proof.
Hoping that you do well on your final exams —
Ted Kaczynski
P.S. You added a postscript ot your note of 5/18/97: “Like the Frogs?” I am perplexed. What frogs are you referring to?
-TK
Dear Mr. [REDACTED]
I’ve just received the book that you kindly sent me for my birthday, and I would like to express my appreciation of your thoughtfulness. My experience of young males (age 13–25), and of having been one myself, is that they generally tend to be rather hardnosed and callous, so, for your age and sex, I would say that you are remarkably considerate of other people....
... Understanding of Science.”
You asked me to cite any clear similarities or differences between your personality and that of Ramzi Yousef, ... I certainly don’t want to encourage you to read any publication of that ilk (I can tell you in all seriousness that I wouldn’t have a copy of Penthouse in my cell); but then, you probably read it anyway, so what the heck.
“inauspicious date of October 3”
Dear Professor [REDACTED]:
Thank you for your letter (even though it bears the inauspicious date of October 3 — my brother’s birthday). I don’t object to word-processed letters.
I’m not sure what you’re looking for from me, since you don’t ask any specific questions or raise any specific points that you want me to address. But since you’re an expert in Islamic studies, I do have some fairly specific points that I’d like you to address.
Like a lot of people, I’ve been wondering (and not only since Sept. 11) about the significance of militant Islam, and in particular about the motivations of the militants. Some of the motivating factors involved are obvious: resistance to modernization, religious fanaticism, the leaders’ drive for power, and “nationalism.”{1} But the relative importance of various factors, and their exact nature, has been very unclear to me.
The first thing I read that seemed to throw any real light on the subject was an article in Time Magazine, October 15, 2001, pages 70–71, titled “Osama’s Endgame.” This article seems to show that Osama Bin Laden’s motives (whatever he may tell himself about them) are not primarily religious piet; or resistance to modernity, but rather “nationalism and the drive for power. If the article can be believed, Bin Laden wants nuclear weapons and economic strength for the Islamic world so that it can become a “great power.” In other words Bin Laden, behind a veneer of piety, just wants to play the same power-game that states have played almost since the beginning of civilization. It’s a game that threatens to become unprecedentedly disastrous, in several respects, because states now have at their disposal the increasingly horrible tools of modern technology.
But I don’t know how seriously to take the Time article, because I’ve learned through my own experience that the news media are sloppy in their research and do not hesitate to distort the truth.
So my first question is: Do you think the article is roughly accurate in its portrayal of Bin Laden’s motives?
Assuming that the article is more-or-less accurate as to Bin Laden personally, to what extent can he be taken as a representative of militant Islam as a whole? I don’t doubt that there are a great many militant Muslims for whom religious belief is more important than “nationalism” and the drive for worldly power, but I strongly suspect that those for whom worldly power is most important will tend to dominate the movement. Do you agree, or not?
I also wonder about the strength and nature of the resistance to modernity. Assuming that the article mentioned above is correct, it seems clear that Bin Laden and his associates do not reject modern technology and industrialization — since the Islamic world could hardly become a great power without them. Bin Laden et al resist only the social changes that have accompanied modernization, e.g., collapse of traditional values, irreligion, and unbridled hedonism. I think there is significant resistance to modern technology in the Islamic world.{2} but my guess is that the forces of what I’ve called “nationalism” will easily prevail over any resistance to modern technology.
Do you agree with the foregoing paragraph, or not?
Assuming I am right in thinking that the dominant goal of militant Islam (or at least of its most important leaders) is to create an Islamic “great power,” and one that is free of social changes that have accompanied modernization elsewhere, it seems to me that it’s project is doomed to fail. Creation of a great power would require industrialization; and it would appear that successful, efficient industrialization is incompatible with the existing culture of the Middle East. An attempt to industrialize that region either will fail or will lead to the same kinds of social changes that have accompanied industrialization elsewhere.
Would you comment on the foregoing paragraph?
I would also guess that, even if the leaders were to drop all resistance to modernizing social changes, creation of a fullly-developed and efficient industrial economy in the Middle East still would be exceedingly slow and difficult, because the culture isn’t amenable to it and won’t change easily. In particular, there is not enough social discipline there — or not enough social discipline of the right kind. Do you agree or disagree?
Even though a fully-developed industrial economy in the Middle East seems unlikely for the foreseeable future, I can well imagine a Middle-Eastern state that as a whole is inefficient and backward, but in which a relatively small, elite minority creates (on a modest scale) an advanced industrial and technological structure within the more backward whole. Maybe some of the Middle Eastern states already are approaching this condition? What do you think about this?
The possible creation of advanced industrial and technological structures in the Middle East worries me exceedingly. I think that what the West is doing with modern technology is criminally reckless.
But I also think that the West shows more self-restraint in the use of its (technological and other) power than most other cultures do. In other words, I think most other cultures do. In other words, I think most other cultures that to some degree have access to modern technology use it even more recklessly than the West does. (Did you ever ask yourself what some of these Third-World countries are doing with their nuclear waste?) And it seems to me that there is more recklessness in the Middle East than elsewhere. The danger lies not only in the reckless use of intentionally destructive technologies such as that of nuclear weapons, but also in supposedly benign applications of technologies (e.g., geneting engineering) that may have unanticipated, disastrous consequences. What do you think? Am I right in believing that there is a certain kind of recklessness in Middle-Eastern cultures?
Twenty-odd years ago I worked in a small factory with a man from Pakistan. He was very intelligent, an excellent worker, and I liked him very well. But by way of a joke he used to point a knife at me — a box-cutter knife, as it happened — and say, “I weel keel you!” He apparently did not realize that that kind of humor was not acceptable in the West.
This is only an anecdote, but it illustrates what I think other evidence seems to support — that in Middle Eastern cultures there is far less inhibition about violence, killing, and destructiveness generally than there is in the West. Am I right about this?
***
Now let me return to your letter. Your fourth paragraph is obscure to me. Do you mean that you formerly opposed loss of human life but are now more ready to accept it? Or vice versa? You indicate that the deaths at the World Trade Center have affected you more deeply than violent deaths elsewhere in the world. Is this because you see the W.T.C. people as more like yourself, so that you can identify more closely with them? You ask whether that makes you a racist. Whether you call yourself a racist is up to you, but personally I think the leftists’ use of the word racist is absurd. If the term is to be applied as broadly as the leftists apply it, then probably 99.9% of people throughout the world’s history have been racists.
Also, I’m highly skeptical of the claim that “deaths of innocents occur every day in hundreds of thousand [sic] through the depredations of imperialism.” Where I’ve had opportunity to compare information from leftists with information from sources that I have good reason to believe are reliable, I’ve found the leftists’ information to be shamelessly slanted. (Same true of information from the right.) And, assuming that the statistic (“hundreds of thousands of deaths”) were correct, how would your leftist friends balance those deaths against the lives saved by Western medicines and medical technology, Western agricultural technology, etc.? (Not that I think that’s good. If I could, I would eliminate all advanced technology everywhere, including medical and agricultural technology.)
And why would you run a support group for I.R.A. prisoners? I certainly can’t claim to be well-informed about Northern Ireland, but from the little I know it seems to me that what is going on there is essentially just a blood-feud between the Catholics and the Protestants, and I see no reason why any outsider should think that one side was better than the other.
Sincerely yours,
Ted Kaczynski
Dear [REDACTED],
Thanks for your letter postmarked November 30. I very much appreciate the trouble you’ve gone through in trying to find books for me. …
You invited me to comment on recent events. I don’t know enough about the Middle East to be able to comment in detail, but provisionally I would say that what is going on now is just the latest phase of the brutal struggle for power between rival states and rival cultures that has been going on almost since the beginning of civilization. The difference is that, today, modern technology makes the struggle far more destructive and dangerous than it ever was before.
As always, politicians and propagandists on both sides use the existence of an external enemy to distract attention from problems at home. When people are frightened by a threat coming from outside their own country, they tend to rally behind their leaders and forget their grievances, and the politicans and propagandists exploit this phenomenon. In our country, the terrorist threat is being used as an excuse to develop and apply surveillance and security technologies that hasten the erosion of our privacy.
Osama Bin Laden has been portrayed as an opponent of modernity. If he were simply that, I might be inclined to support him, but my guess is that his motive is less an opposition to modernity than a desire to create an Islamic ‘great power’ that would be able to compete on equal terms with other great powers of the world. If that is true, then he is just another ruthless and power-hungry politician, and I have no use for him.
Now, would you like to tell me a little big about yourself? ...
Dear [REDACTED]
Thanks for your letter and Christmas card. Thank you very much also for ordering the book for me. I appreciate it.
Yes, Colorado can get cold. But compared to Montana, where I used to live, it seems fairly mild.
To answer your questions, I don’t know what the U.S. should do about Osama Bin Laden. To tell the truth, I don’t read too much in the newspapers and news magazines, so I don’t know very much about the situation. But as far as I can make out, nobody knows what to do about Bin Laden.
As for Saddam Hussein, yes, I would guess that President Bush is serious about making war on him. I would guess that it probably is warranted. I don’t think all these petty little dictators around the world should be allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,
Ted Kaczynski
… Let me go back to your letter of 3/25/03 and mention something there that I disagree with. On page 3 you wrote, “I usually hang my head in shame when saying I’m a citizen of this country.” You wrote this in connection with your comments about the war in Iraq. I’ll say first that if it’s true that Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear or biological weapons, then one could make a good argument for invading Iraq to disarm him. Of course, the U.S. still hasn’t been able (as far as I know) to turn up any solid evidence …
But how many countries are better than the U.S.? The U.S., as it happens, is top dog in the world today. If Russia, or China, or some other country were top dog, would they behave any better than the U.S.? Not likely! Given the present technological and economic situation of the world, a ruthless struggle for power among nations is probably inevitable. If you single out the U.S. for blame simply because it is, fo r the time beign, the most successful contestant in the international power struggle, you only distract attention from the real root of the problem, which is the set of technological and economic conditions that make the power-struggle inevitable. I’ve argued with [REDACTED], too, by the way.
... affairs in your letter postmarked August 11, if President Bush is a good man, then he must also be a dumb one, since he let his advisors snooker him (and the general public, too) into believeing that Saddam Hussein was making nuclear weapons. Even if the U.S. eventually finds proof of some efforts at making chemical or biological weapons in Iraq, there couldn’t have been much of that kind of thing going on there, otherwise plenty of evidence of it would already have been found.
Also, the idea of setting up a democracy in Iraq is stupid. History shows that you can’t just go into a country and set up a democracy and expect it to work. It rarely does work — until after many decades of social changes that make democracy possible. Look at all the countries in which there have been attempts to establish democracy during the last 50 years. Most of those attempts have been complete failures. Democracy did work in Japan, for example, but the Japanese are an unusually docile and orderly people. The Arab peoples, in contrast, are traditionally turbulent and unruly. In that kind of culture democracy has very little chance of success.
You ask whether the people making trouble in Iraq are “just terrorists”, or what. I don’t know. I’ll only point out that someone has said, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom-fighter.” So it depends on your point of view.
Should the U.S. intervene in Liberia? Well, I don’t know. Again, it’s a problem of a country with a turbulent and unruly culture. Any good that the U.S. could do there now most likely would be temporary.
Again, thank you very much for the book. I hope that everything is going well for you & your family.
Best regards,
Ted Kaczynski
... About Obama... it’s interesting that you worked on his campaign. I at first favored Hillary Clinton for president, but after she was out of the picture I favored Obama. I mean, I don’t think any of our politicians are worth a damn, so when I say I “favor” a politician for an office, I just mean that I think he or she is the least of the available evils. I favored Clinton and later Obama mainly because I figured a Democratic president would be much more likely than a Republican to appoint judges and Supreme Court Justices who have some respect for constitutional rights. (From my own experiences with the judicial system I know how important that is!) But now I’m afraid Obama is going to be a big disappointment in that respect. The people he has appointed as Attorney General and Solicitor General both say they think the government should be able to hold alleged terrorists indefinitely without trial. Of course, the government can claim that anyone is a terrorist, and if there is no trial that claim is never tested. So in effect the government would be able to lock up anyone indefinitely.
Thus, on the basis of Obama’s choices for Attorney General and Solicitor General, I don’t think there is any reason to hope that he will appoint good judges....
{1} I use the word “nationalism”, in quotes, because the phenomenon is similar to nationalism, but differs from it in that it involves identification not with a nation but with a religion.
{2} It is interesting that I’ve received a couple of postcards, unsigned but apparently from the same person, bearing postage stamps of the United Arab Emirates and the words, “From Dubai.” No other message; but I assume the sender of the cards knew what I stand for and meant to express his support.