PrintNovember 15, 2009
How America Created the Fort Hood Shooter
"... we do bear some of the responsibility, frankly, for helping to create the very terrorists that we're now all threatened by."
- Hillary Clinton, Charlie Rose show, November 10, 2009
Hillary Clinton is right -- but perhaps not in the sense she intended. And the clearest, best documentation of how America "creates the terrorists" can be found in the public evidence against the alleged Ft. Hood shooter, Maj. Nidal Hasan.
While many claim American foreign policy acts "create terrorists," Osama bin Laden instead points to the importance of words, explaining their value best in an intercepted letter to Taliban chief Mullah Omar:
It is obvious that the media war in this century is one of the strongest methods (of struggle). In fact, its ratio may reach 90% of the total preparation for battles.
But which words? In Osama bin Laden's 1998 sit-down with ABC's John Miller, his last face-to-face interview with an American journalist, the al-Qaeda chief explains his motives:
NATO, that America created, we know it spent $455 billion American dollars in improving weaponry to protect Europe and America from Russia, and they did not fire a single shot. Allah stood with the Muslims, the Afghani mujahideen, and those who fought with them from other Muslim countries. We fought against the Russians and the Soviet Union until, not to say we defeated them, but Allah defeated them, they became nonexistent. There is a lesson to learn from this for he who wishes to learn.The Soviet Union entered in the last week of 1979, in December, and with Allah's help their flag was folded Dec. 25 a few years later and thrown in the trash, and there was nothing left to call Soviet Union.We are sure of Allah's victory and our victory against the Americans and the Jews as promised by the prophet peace be up on him: "Judgment day shall not come until the Muslims fight the Jews, whereas the Jews will hide behind trees and stones, and the tree and the stone will speak and say 'Muslim, behind me a Jew come and kill him', except for the al-Ghargad tree, which is a Jewish plant."We are sure of our victory. Our battle with the Americans is larger than our battle with the Russians. ...After Allah honored us with victory in Afghanistan ... it cleared from Muslim minds the myth of superpowers. The youth ceased from seeing America as a superpower. After leaving Afghanistan they headed for Somalia and prepared for a long battle, thinking that the Americans were like the Russians, but they were surprised ... The youth were surprised at the low morale of the American soldiers and realized more than before that the American soldiers are paper tigers. After a few blows, they ran in defeat and America forgot about all the hoopla and media propaganda ... about being the world leader, and the leader of the new world order.
Bin-Laden seems to be referring to actions, not words. But bin-Laden measures these actions entirely by their propaganda-value as proof of religious dogma.
There truly is "a lesson to learn from this for he who wishes to learn." Islamist terrorists are not motivated by grievances, real or imagined, nor by old religious doctrines in and of themselves, but by the perception that their enemies are weak and that Allah -- after many years -- is again willing to grant victory to Muslim fighters.
But Islamists' certainty is not settled by one example. Allah's will must be ascertained by Muslims again and again.
The success of non-Islamic military operations is measured in terms of territory conquered or lost; in terms of governments defended, formed, or overthrown; or in terms of policies changed or maintained.
For the Islamist force, success is measured by how many Muslims become convinced that The Time Is Now.
In this regard, the much-maligned description "War on Terror" is exactly correct. Americans are fighting to ensure that most Muslims continue to believe that The Time Is NOT Now...by defeating those who pop their heads up for violent jihad.
But all of bin Laden's evidence comes from the infidel response to terror attacks and military engagements. How does this tie into the case of alleged Ft. Hood shooter, Maj. Nidal Hasan?
Bin Laden recruits terrorists by claiming lack of Western resolve to fight. Hasan is alleged to have verbally the resolve of the "system," both verbally and in writing -- and again and again he found it lacking. In doing so, he came to the same conclusion as bin Laden: that The Time Is Now. And Allah is indeed granting victory to Muslims. By blindly failing to disabuse Hasan of this belief, Americans "created the terrorist" in the form of the Ft. Hood shooter.
The Hasan case provides a strong argument for a "broken window" approach to fighting Islamic extremism -- a rules-enforcement-based system which is the polar opposite of political correctness.
Hasan may have been recruited by pro-al-Qaeda Imam Anwar al-Awlaki, and investigation may yet reveal orders from the Imam or an organizational connection between the two. But organized or not, in a pattern repeated by many jihadis -- including the 9-11 attackers -- this was only the first of Hasan's many efforts to learn Allah's will.
These attempts result in Islamist terrorists engaging in behavior unthinkable for non-Islamist terrorists. Instead of maintaining rigorous operational secrecy, Islamists draw attention to themselves. The infidels' subsequent failure to stop the plotters is seen as a confirmation of Allah's will.
Instead being under suspicion, Hasan found himself receiving a free medical school education paid for by the U.S. Army from as early as 2001. In 2003, according to his military records, Hasan began a psychiatry internship at Walter Reed. He would continue there until he was transferred July 16, 2009 to Ft. Hood.
After the Ft. Hood attack, al-Awlaki issued a statement rejoicing at "another good news (sic) reaching us from Texas: more Kafir US soldiers in the Filthy US Army base in Fort Hood, were smoked by the their (sic) own today."
At Walter Reed, Hasan allegedly did everything he could to learn the will of Allah by exposing his intentions to the infidels. Hasan's alleged web postings gave justification to suicide bombers. He allegedly sent as many as twenty emails to Awlaki.
These were enough to cause the FBI to open an investigation, but no action was taken. FBI inaction gave credence to the view that Allah was willing victory to the Muslims -- but Hasan continued to seek confirmation.
In June, 2007 Hasan surprised officers and medical personnel at Walter Reed. Expecting a talk on medical treatments, they instead were allegedly presented with an Islamist discourse. The fifty slides -- available on the Washington Post website -- are a crystal-clear presentation of the jihadi reading of Islamic doctrine. Hasan's slides should be adopted whole for the training of U.S. personnel.
Many of the slides are written in first person as Hasan's own beliefs. In the last slide, he demands:
Department of Defense should allow Muslim Soldiers the option of being released as 'Conscientious objectors' to increase troop morale and decrease adverse events.
Hasan allegedly asserts:
If Muslim groups can convince Muslims that they are fighting for God against the injustices of the ‘infidels' ie; enemies of Islam, then Muslims can become a potent adversary ie suicide bombing, etc.
Apparently, the Ft. Hood shooter was finally "convinced" on November 5, 2009.
Interviewed on the radio, Washington Post writer Dana Priest agreed with one caller who termed the slide show a "stop-me-now-before-its-too-late message." Hasan had given the infidels an opportunity to prevent his attack -- and they did not take it. Officers present at the show complained about Hasan's alleged advocacy of the jihadi perspective, but the "system" did nothing. Hasan had again sought out Allah's will and found it favoring attack.
The slide show may have set a timer on Hasan's final test -- his alleged demand for conscientious objector status -- possibly based on the exact same jihadi arguments outlined at Walter Reed. But he did not rest.
According to Ret. Col. Terry Lee, who had worked with Hasan in the psych ward at Ft. Hood, Hasan was constantly broadcasting his beliefs:
He said, precisely, that maybe the Muslims should stand up and fight against the aggressor. ... When there was a shooting at Little Rock -- he was almost sort of happy about it. ... (He said) this is what Muslims should do. People should strap bombs on themselves and go into Times Square. ... He was hoping that President Obama would pull troops out ... when things weren't going that way he became more agitated, more frustrated. ... He made his views well-known. ..."
And Col. Lee was not the only one sensing trouble. The NY Daily News reports:
The Fort Hood gunman was rejected for a position as a Muslim lay leader at the Army base because "something just didn't seem right," a mosque official revealed Saturday.
Osman Danquah, co-founder of the Islamic Community of Greater Killeen, said he was deeply troubled by two conversations with Maj. Nidal Hasan over the summer. Hasan, a psychiatrist, seemed incoherent and obsessed with the question of what to tell soldiers about fighting fellow Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Still, the system failed to stop Hasan. Allah's will had again proved rock-solid.
It had taken years for Hasan to make himself certain of Allah's will. But he was finally convinced. So on November 5, he allegedly entered a crowded building on base and opened fire. Survivors allege that as he fired, Hasan shouted what he might have expected to be his final message before ascending to heaven:
Allahu Akbar.
