National Guard drops two Georgians after investigating extremist ties
Two Georgia men targeted earlier this year by online activists for their associations with radical white extremism have been kicked out of the Army National Guard, following months of investigation.
Army investigators started looking into Dalton Woodward and Trent East, both members of a neo-pagan sect called the Asatru Folk Assembly, earlier this year after the activist group Atlanta Antifascists published a report linking the two men to the controversial sect of paganism identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group.At the time, Woodward was on active duty with the Georgia National Guard in Afghanistan. East, a member of the Alabama National Guard, was not on active duty when he was “doxxed,” or publicly outed, by the activist group.National Guard officials have not released details about their investigations.
Woodward’s unit returned from its deployment in June and an investigation into his connections with white supremacy concluded in October.A spokeswoman for the Georgia National Guard said he was “no longer a member” of the guard but declined to comment on the terms of his separation or give details about the investigation. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution had filed a Freedom of Information Act request seeking more details, but that request is pending with the U.S. Defense Department. The AJC requested comment from Woodward through his longtime friend East, but received no response.
https://www.ajc.com/news/national-guard-drops-two-georgians-after-investigating-extremist-ties/PUeyiuk1fzCSZF8J7QMBHM/
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...but that covers a whole lot of tradition, retrieved tradition, and invented tradition. The one thing they are not is inherently pacifist. (New-Agers tend to be the pacifists, not pagans and heathens.) As a consequence, I have met veterans and law enforcement officers among them -- they don't (or didn't) advertise, because of the gross misunderstandings possible. They did, however, get themselves recognized as real religions by such groups as the one that authorizes what religious symbols are allowed to be used on gravestones in military cemetaries. Last I heard, religious services were being allowed at the Air Force Academy -- but even then the Academy was being overrun by militant anti-Semitic Christians, so the gods only know what became of the Grove.
They aren't just Norse-based, but British Wiccan, Druids, Celtic, Greek, and Roman. It's a big Pantheon.
Okay, the above are the pagans and heathens who are good neighbors.
The ones who come to the attention of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Hatewatch, and prison wardens are emphatically not good neighbors. They have appropriated Norse/Germanic mythology and Norse gods for malign purposes. They recruit among whites in prison, they recruit among white nationalists and white racists. There's significant crossover with neo-Nazis. Yes, they are pagans, and yes, they are hate groups. 
