Fort Hood Open Thread

There's more information now coming out about the shooter at Fort Hood, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, and speculation about the ways in which the military may have failed to connect the dots about him.

This morning on CNN, I saw that Hasan had been under investigation late last year and early this year for making contact with a radical cleric, but investigators concluded he was just doing research related to his job and cleared him. He was promoted soon afterwards. The New York Times has more on that story here.

The Washington Post reports that Hasan "warned a roomful of senior Army physicians a year and a half ago that to avoid 'adverse events,' the military should allow Muslim soldiers to be released as conscientious objectors instead of fighting in wars against other Muslims," upsetting the physicians in attendance who had expected to hear a medical presentation.

Eugene Robinson notes that "fellow Army doctors told superiors of their concern that Hasan felt divided allegiance—both to the Muslims whom he felt were under attack and the country he had volunteered to serve."

If all this information is accurate, superiors apparently ignoring the concerns of Hasan's coworkers was the biggest failing. If fellow soldiers were raising the red flag, the Army should have listened.

In any case, it doesn't appear that Hasan was part of any kind of organized terrorist group, but was acting alone. Which, I feel obliged to point out, makes it a lot easier to craft a narrative about his motivation based purely on what news is released and what isn't.