Fort Hood Horror

By larry on November 6th, 2009 at 3:34 pm

A “devout” Muslim who openly glorified jihadi homicidal bombers.

This man should have been kicked out of the army or at least re-assigned to Europe, Asia, or South America.

Political correctness is literally killing our country.

By Mike at the beach on November 7th, 2009 at 11:38 am

Political correctness run amok…even at the expense of innocent life. Islamic advocacy groups are already lining up for their shot of victimhood, saying that they hope the American government and public won’t “rush to judgment.” No one should, of course, judge another based solely on their religious beliefs, but let’s not be afraid to call ‘em as we see ‘em…

Although I am more or less out of the counter-terrorism business now, here are a few facts, followed by an educated guess:

Hasan was obviously educated and Westernized (in that he was born in VA and spent his entire life living in the US as a citizen). He was NOT suffering in some impoverished third world sh!%#hole that bleeding hearts can blame on the US. He was a lifelong, practicing Muslim; active in his mosque.

LTG Robert Cone (Commanding General, Fort Hood) said soldiers at the base have told investigators Hasan shouted “Allahu Akbar,” Arabic for “God is great,” during the attack. “Allahu Akbar” is commonly recited during suicide and standard attacks by Muslim extremists. Here’s an example- luckily, this sharp soldier was able to keep his wits about him and stay in the fight:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6109392012524536752#

Last month, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) leader Nasir al-Wahayshi wrote in the 11th edition of the online serial Sada al-Malahim (The Echo of Battle) that jihadists should conduct attacks when and where they were, as opposed to conducting “big effort” attacks. Al-Wahayshi advised jihadists to attack “any crusaders whenever you find one of them, like at the airports of the crusader Western countries that participate in the wars against Islam, or their living compounds, trains etc.”

Al-Wahayshi distributed these instructions via easily accessible jihadist chat rooms.

According to the Wall Street Journal, one military official at the Pentagon who has been briefed on the investigation said officials are “close to 100%” certain that Hasan authored a recent web posting defending suicide bombings.

Al-Wahayshi’s directive plays directly into the newest iteration and adaptation of the jihadist movement, so-called “lone wolf” terrorism. Lone-wolf offenders are individuals not necessarily affiliated with any physical group, which makes them much harder to detect. The FBI has long considered lone-wolf offenders a threat, but they’ve primarily been associated with domestic terror acts such as the Oklahoma City bombing, the Atlanta Olympic bombing, and Theodore Kaczynski. Recently, however, a suspect described as a “converted Muslim extremist” killed a US soldier in Little Rock, AK.

Many academics and counter-terrorism officials (myself included) believe that jihadist, Muslim extremism is less a political decision stemming from suffering at the hands of oppression (the conventional wisdom), and more a function of social and psychological constructs attendant to jihadist culture. No time to discuss here, but former CIA officer Marc Sageman (MD, PhD) has written two books that should be required reading for anyone who wants to even discuss jihadist terrorism- Understanding Terror Networks and Leaderless Jihad, both of which lay out the scientific case for this theory. The bottom line remains, though, that while it may be comforting to think that terrorists are percolated during brainwashing in a network of madrassas and only hate us because of their Third World, sexually repressed upbringing, the facts speak to a different truth.

Do some quick research on the 9/11 hijackers; you’ll find surprisingly high levels of education, and very little poverty. The editor of Al Watan, a Saudi Arabian daily, famously called them “middle-class adventurers” rather than Islamist fundamentalist ideologues.

Now, here’s my guess. As more information slowly rolls in from the always chaotic first few days of the investigation, it will likely be discovered that Hasan bought into the jihadist movement from afar, possibly through discussions at his mosque, but much more likely via the web. Whether or not Hasan was personally answering Al-Wahayshi’s call to attack, the Fort Hood massacre was probably his attack “when and where he was,” against the crusaders where he found them.

By Mike at the beach on November 7th, 2009 at 1:44 pm

elle5,

I’m guessing that your intent was to paint my comments as xenophobic, racist, etc., when in fact you over-simplify (or misunderstand my intent). For the purposes of not cramming some 3000 word manifesto into a comment window, brevity was required. Nowhere in my rant do I imply that because Hasan was a Muslim, he is therefore a jihadist.

McVeigh was, in fact, “just some crazy Christian,” because his religious beliefs had little or nothing to do with his anti-government animus. Therein lies the difference…

No one should, of course, judge another based solely on their religious beliefs, but let’s not allow an irrational hypersensitivity to cloud our judgment, or keep us from discussing difficult topics like the root causes (ergo, the potential remedies) of terrorism, and the incontrovertible nexus between that faith and jihadist extremism. That nexus is very real, and no level of political correctness can wish it away.

Thanks for the discussion.