The Covenant, the Sword, and the Arm of the Lord (CSA) was a far-right survivalist anti-government militia which advocated Christian Identity and was active in the United States during the 1970s and early 1980s.

In April 1985, federal and state law enforcement officials who had been investigating the CSA for weapons violations and terrorist acts carried out a three-day siege of their compound.

Following a peaceful resolution, officers arrested and later convicted the CSA's top leaders, eventually causing the organization to dissolve.

[4] Both extreme right-wing leaders taught and practiced the theology of Christian Identity, a belief system which is included on the FBI's watch list of extremist religions.

The 224-acre property on Bull Shoals Lake in Marion County, Arkansas that the CSA operated from until its collapse in 1985 was purchased by Ellison from the Campus Crusade for Christ in 1976.

In 1983, financially suffering, especially after Randall Rader's defection to the Order, the CSA stopped making payments on the mortgage, and on December 20, the bank foreclosed, selling the property back to the Campus Crusade.

[21]: 149–151  However, the group squatted on the land, mounting regular armed patrols in an attempt to intimidate the local sheriff, who continuously delayed their eviction.

The members of the Elite "A" Team wore black clothing and they possessed some fairly sophisticated weapons, such as .22 caliber Ruger target pistols which were fitted with integral silencers, and several MAC-10 submachineguns in both 9 mm and .45 ACP, also with attached suppressors.

The facility was festooned with targets which crudely caricatured Blacks, Jews, and police officers who wore the Star of David in-lieu of badges.

[24][25] The CSA and its paramilitary arm taught basic pistol and rifle use as well as personal home defense, rural and urban warfare, weapons proficiency, general military fieldcraft, Christian martial arts, and natural wilderness survival.

[26] In 1983, CSA members William Thomas, Richard Wayne Snell and Steven Scott attempted to dynamite a natural gas pipeline that crossed the Red River on its way from the Gulf of Mexico to Chicago.

According to a report which was published by the California Department of Justice, the Pagans Motorcycle Club provided the CSA with training in booby trap devices and survival techniques in return for weapons and ammunition.

Soon afterward, things began to go downhill for the organization when Richard Snell, an alleged member, was arrested for killing an African-American police officer.

The killing of the gun store owner was part of a campaign of property theft that the CSA had waged in an attempt to recover the income which it lost when it constructed its training camps.

Under Arkansas state law, its agents obtained warrants to arrest Ellison, the leader of the CSA, for multiple firearms violations.

Interviewed on March 9, 1993, by KXAS-5 News, during the Waco standoff, Kerry Noble asserted that the CSA was expecting to be relieved by other far-right groups and acts of God.

[29] FBI negotiators convinced Ellison that they wanted peaceful cooperation, and he asked his spiritual adviser, assumed to be Millar, to come to the compound and instruct him.

[7] U.S. Attorney Asa Hutchinson, who later successfully prosecuted Ellison and other leaders of the CSA, put on an FBI flak jacket and entered the compound to join the negotiations, leading to a peaceful conclusion to the armed stand-off.

After several calls during which more time was requested, early on the morning of the fourth day of the siege, Arkansas State Police entered the compound and escorted the remaining members out without bloodshed.

In September 1985, Ellison, Kerry Noble, and four other CSA members (Gary Stone, Timothy Russell, Rudy Loewen, and David Giles) were sentenced to serve lengthy federal prison terms.

Richard Wayne Snell, the man who shot and killed the police officer and a pawn shop owner, was sentenced to death by lethal injection.

The most plausible link is the fact that Richard Wayne Snell, who was executed on the day of the Oklahoma City bombing, had planned to perpetrate a similar attack on the Murrah building in 1983 after he became upset with the Internal Revenue Service.

However, McVeigh stated that he chose the date of 19 April because he wanted to perpetrate the Oklahoma City bombing on the second anniversary of the violent end of the Waco siege.