Lots of Muslims serving and one does not have to be a Muslim to have doubts about particular military policies and commitments. The Jihad angle is a distraction.
The alleged perpetrator is not only reported to have been in ROTC and USUHS, but to have served eight years as enlisted prior to going to Virginia Tech.
This doesn't seem like someone who suddenly finds himself on active duty and can't adjust to military life; this seems like someone decompensating from significant and probably mostly-concealed psychological disease and personality disorders. Think suicidal depression, chronic anger, social and increasingly, professional isolation, narcissism, and possibly a paranoid thought disorder. Add the stressor of failing professional life--poor evaluations--a deployment that might seem like a punitive assignment (true or not) and then feed the flame with a fanatical fascination of self-destructive Jihadism and anything can happen. Think the health club shooter in suburban Pittsburgh last winter and Dr. Baruch Goldstein in Hebron, Israel in 1994, who massacred 29 and shot another 150.
Think your average suicide bomber in Iraq or Afghanistan: suicidal depression, chronic anger, social and increasingly, professional isolation, narcissism, and possibly a paranoid thought disorder ... check, check, check, check, check, check. Hasan has written about the nobility and admirable sacrifices of suicide bombers. He's as much a terrorist motivated by his warped and radical religious views as the guys who splash acid on Afghani schoolgirls.
I'm not saying he went bonkers because he's a Muslim, and I'm not casting dispersions on other Muslims. But I'm a little disturbed by this politically correct reflexive Islam-had-nothing-to-do-with-it crap that's all over the place. It's as ridiculous as saying that the abortion clinic bomber's distorted Christian-flavored religious beliefs are irrelevant.
DeadCactus said:
There probably is a connection and the most likely connection is that man Muslims held his military service against him and his fellow soldiers held his Muslim background against him.
It sounds like he endured a lot since 9/11. He committed himself to a military career via ROTC & USUHS before 9/11. Supposedly he's wanted out for a long time now, though it's odd that he delayed his exit by doing a fellowship. Maybe he did that to buy more time in a nondeployable billet.
DeadCactus said:
No, that can't be it. It's gotta be jihad. That's far more likely. A 15 year plot to commit Jihad with a pistol...
15 year plot, no. Jihad with a pistol -
Well, what else are you going to call it when a guy blogs about his empathy for suicide bombers resisting American invaders, and then goes into a deployment center and conducts a suicidal attack on other American invaders getting ready to deploy while (reportedly) yelling Allahu Akbar?
I can't believe this political correctness is so engrained in people, that there's such fear of speaking anything that MIGHT be offensive to a Muslim someplace, that you guys are actually arguing that this was just another garden-variety crazy dude who got too stressed by life and randomly shot a bunch of people, and that his targets, methods, and religous beliefs are just irrelevant coincidences.
Or perhaps I misunderstand you and I'm overreacting.
grotto said:
This is hitting a lot of people who post here close to home, for multiple reasons. Go easy.
It does have me on edge still.
