RSS Feed MenuI was out in the field this afternoon when the news broke on the shootings at Fort Hood. By the time I returned to the office and logged on, I learned the terrible news. The immediate reaction in the room was that this must be Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Of course, the first reports indicated three gunmen – this turned out to be wrong, of course, but I commented that PTSD is a solitary phenomena; it does not manifest itself in groups. As it turned out, this just might be the first ever recorded case of PRE-TSD; it turns out that Hasan was under orders, but had not yet deployed. America is seeing an increase in the tempo of domestic jihad-inspired terrorist self-starters.
The week’s headlines, as of Friday, 25 September 2009:
FBI Arrests Jordanian for Downtown Dallas Bomb Plot
Illinois Man Charged in Plot to Bomb Federal Offices
And:
Zazi Indicted For Conspiring To Detonate WMD
Najibullah Zazi, 24, arrives at the Byron G. Rogers Federal Building on Sept. 17, 2009, in Denver, Colo. Mohammed Zazi, father of Najibullah Zazi, was arrested along with his son and a third man from New York City for possible ties to terrorists.
From my home station down there in North Cackallacky where the possums and raccoons are haut cuisine, a team of Billy Bobs decided to get their Jihad on:
U.S. Terror Suspects Accused of Targeting Marine Base
The common thread to all of the above is that these guys were nabbed going into the operational phase of their terrorist attacks.
In addition to the cases above, which I first detailed on 26 September, here are some other notable developments 2009 has produced:
May 12, 2009, Oussama Kassir was convicted of charges related to his participation in an effort to establish a jihad training camp in Oregon and his operation of several terrorist Web sites containing instructions about how to make bombs and poisons. Kassir was found guilty of all 11 charges against him, including providing material support to al-Qaeda and distributing information on explosives and weapons of mass destruction.
May 20, 2009, four individuals – James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen – were arrested on charges arising from a plot to detonate explosives near a synagogue in the Bronx, N.Y., and to shoot Stinger surface-to-air guided missiles at military planes located at the National Guard Base at Stewart Airport in Newburgh, N.Y. On June 2, 2009, all four defendants were charged in an eight-count indictment and face potential life in prison, if convicted.
All of them converted to Islam while in prison.
April 28, 29, 2009, five individuals — Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer, brothers Dritan Duka, Shain Duka and Eljvir Duka and Serdar Tatar — received sentences ranging from 33 years in prison, to life in prison plus 30 years, for plotting to kill U.S. soldiers in an armed attack on the military base in Fort Dix, New Jersey. All five individuals were convicted at trial in December 2008.
On April 30, 2009, Ali al-Marri pleaded guilty to conspiracy to provide material support to al-Qaeda, admitting that he attended terrorist training camps, learned al-Qaeda tradecraft and was dispatched by al-Qaeda to carry out its terrorist objectives in America.
Terrorists all the same, regardless of ideological or political stance – that is all posturing. Example: in the 1980s the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya mounted a bombing campaign against U.S. and British targets in Europe. Several of the bombings were carried out on their behalf by the Baader-Meinhof gang, a secular group of Communists.
Also in the 1980s, the Provisional Irish Republican Army, a group of Catholic membership, received support and training from not only Libya and other Arab terrorist groups, but also the Soviet Union.
It is all the same. Terrorism is always the same. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Islamic-themed, or Neo-Nazi, or Communist-inspired, terrorism is always the same: it is sheer lunacy, plain and simple. The terrorist ethos is flawed logic. They cry out “Injustice!” and yet they are willing to commit the most horrific crimes in the world, in the name of equality and fairness. Eh?
For Americans who don’t know about it, who’ve never been over there: this is a little taste of what Israel experiences, all the time.
SpartacusIsNotDead // Nov 6, 2009 at 3:44 pm
Raider 1 wrote: “I have always believed that immigration is the lifeblood of this country. But that is only true so long as those who come here buy into American and Western ideals. ”
What on earth does immigration have to do with the shootings at Ft. Hood?
Oneon1isto // Nov 6, 2009 at 3:48 pm
It is important to separate individual ideologies and sects from religion.
The reason I have an abhorrent reaction to all of this conjecture about Jihad is that American’s (myself included) do not have a healthy understanding of Islam. We extrapolate what we do know far too often, and equate Islam with what various sects within the massive religion are up to. We extrapolate based on what we’ve heard, and that’s overwhelmingly of the violent ideologies, and not the peaceful ones.
I am not complicit in what any sect of my religion does, and neither are the Muslims you and I undoubtedly know. Any talk of Islam as a single “entity” is wrongheaded and should be stopped at once.
The Fruits of Diversity | Conservative Heritage Times // Nov 6, 2009 at 4:24 pm
[...] must read this. As I said before, I think this piece hits the nail on the head. See article at . VDare, Richmond, CA, Muslim, Gang Rape, | | | | | [...]
ottovbvs // Nov 6, 2009 at 4:36 pm
sinz54 // Nov 6, 2009 at 3:00 pm
……I got news for you Sinz……Canada which of course has a conservative govt has announced it is pulling it’s troops out of Afghanistan…..withdrawal complete by 2011…..I give Harper credit he has the guts to look reality in the face and take the tough decision
sinz54 // Nov 6, 2009 at 5:05 pm
reason60: Does anyone really think we will create stable, civil, democratic governments there that are friendly towards us?
I agree with you about that.
It may surprise you,
but I do NOT believe that nation-building democracies in developing nations is a cure-all for Islamist terrorism.
Bush had hoped that free elections and so forth would be so enticing as to lure ordinary folks away from radicalism. After free elections in Gaza, supported by the Bush Administration, led to the election of HAMAS (an actual terrorist group), Bush got pretty quiet about his theory.
There’s plenty of evidence that Islamist radicalism isn’t seduced by the trappings of democracy. The London subway bombers grew up in Britain, lived most of their middle-class lives in the world’s oldest democracy, were reasonably affluent–and yet they became radicalized, fell in love with jihad, and carried out these terrorist bombings. If Muslims can be radicalized despite having lived all their lives in Britain or America, the chance that building a fledgling democracy in some Muslim country somewhere will stop radicalism there is nil.
You brought up the Cold War. The U.S. did much better in the Cold War when it abandoned the theory of “monolithic Communism” and began to work hard to divide Chinese Communists from Soviet Communists, Soviet Communists from Polish and Yugoslav Communists, etc.
The same principle could be applied to the War on Terror, to divide the Shiites of Hezbollah off from the Sunnis of al-Qaeda–except for one small detail:
For the United States Government to get into the business of playing religious sects off against one another like we played Chinese Communists off against Soviet Communists, risks violating the Bill of Rights guarantees on freedom of religion. We’ve usually taken that to mean that the U.S. Government should have no opinions on which religions it would prefer to have better relationships with.
That’s a problem I would like to bounce off some constitutional scholar sometime.
I’m also a big believer in the theory that “nothing succeeds like success.” The U.S. prevailed against Soviet Communism, not because market economies were proven superior over command economies in some stuffy economics journal–but because the USSR was clearly failing by the 1980s. No one but a few malcontents still believes in Marxism-Leninism anymore–again, not because it was disproven in academia, but because the nation that tried to live up to those ideas collapsed.
What that means for the War on Terror, is that the U.S. must put al-Qaeda out of business. If the entire might of the world’s only superpower can’t deal with some 10,000 terrorists, that would mean that the U.S. can be attacked with impunity–and Islamist radicals everywhere will be emboldened to take their own pot shots at us.
ottovbvs // Nov 6, 2009 at 5:22 pm
sinz54 // Nov 6, 2009 at 5:05 pm
“There’s plenty of evidence that Islamist radicalism isn’t seduced by the trappings of democracy. ”
………Neither was Timothy McVeigh……the vast majority of muslims in Britain are perfectly good law abiding people……they have some crazies just as we do
“The U.S. prevailed against Soviet Communism, not because market economies were proven superior over command economies in some stuffy economics journal–but because the USSR was clearly failing by the 1980s.”
…..your monomania is entertaining……….what have stuffy journals got to do with this……the US prevailed because our free market system was vastly more efficient than their command system which gave us the wherewithal to spend on more efficient weapon systems and satisfy the desires of our people for material comfort…….and since the other day in another of your bursts of realism you were predicting certain war between this country and China in the next 25 years, you’d better be thankful that nuclear weapons have essentially made major wars between the great powers obsolete because I wouldn’t fancy our chances in a conventional war against the Chinese army I saw on parade a couple of weeks ago at their 60th anniversary celebrations!
Reason60 // Nov 6, 2009 at 6:28 pm
Sinz-
I agree with much of your post; especially the part about democracy not being a cure-all. I think we would agree that without a culture of tolerance, and a healthy respect for the notions of “loyal opposition”, democracy is a convenient tool for dictators and demogogues to gain power (witness Hugo Chavez).
I also agree that focusing our action on AQ, instead of Islam or Arabs, is productive; alienating them from their source of support can work.
I would also put forward that the large American footprint in their homeland is a lightning rod for anger, and a major recruiting tool. No one likes foreigners on their own soil.
Someone made the point that our drone attacks were like attacking a beehive by trying to kill bees, one at a time; the bees can reproduce faster than we can kill them.
Politics is war by other means, as the saying goes; I believe we can get better results by withdrawing military forces, and focusing on politicially alienating AQ, than by blowing up one house at a time.
ProfNickD // Nov 6, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Reason60,
I think that the West (broadly defined as those countries that accept the Enlightenment and constitutional government) has been at war with Islam for a long time, or, more specifically, Islam has been at war with the West for a long time — but, if the thought of a religious-based culture (Islam) making war on enlightened countries (the West) makes you uncomfortable, then simply think of it as a war for civilization against barbarism.
Reason60 // Nov 6, 2009 at 7:31 pm
Prof Nick-
Actually, agree with you that Islamists have been waging a sporadic war with the Enlightenment for centuries; I know about the piracy, the slave trading, etc.
However, isn’t it interesting that they never launched a full scale war against the West, since the time of the Moors?
Even when America was much weaker than the Ottoman Turks, they didn’t seem much interested in exporting their revolution. They seemed content to harass and enslave the occasional Westerner who strayed onto their turf.
Likewise, I don’t think we can overestimate the power of being a foreign occupying Empire. to have foreign troops stationed on your own home soil is abhorrent to anyone and only inflames an already tense situation.
I don’t for a moment think that withdrawal of our troops from their soil will cause them to become secular or friendly towards Christianity;
But consider the Saudis; the Wahabbist sect are even more bitterly intolerant of Christianity than the Taliban; But being intolerant towards Christianity doesn’t prevent them from having friendly diplomatic relations, and a mutually beneficial alliance.
ottovbvs // Nov 6, 2009 at 8:15 pm
Reason60 // Nov 6, 2009 at 7:31 pm
“However, isn’t it interesting that they never launched a full scale war against the West, since the time of the Moors?”
…….You might want to check out the siege of Vienna which happened in the mid 17th century…….and the Austrian Empire was engaged in major wars against the Ottoman empire until the early 18th Century
BoolaBoola // Nov 7, 2009 at 1:29 am
The idea that it’s ok for Americans to kill other Americans over political differences was dormant until Scott Roeder resurrected it by murdering Dr. George Tiller.
This is all the fault of the right-to-lifers.
We should deport them. ALL of them.
sinz54 // Nov 7, 2009 at 9:15 am
ottovbs: the US prevailed because our free market system was vastly more efficient than their command system which gave us the wherewithal to spend on more efficient weapon systems and satisfy the desires of our people for material comfort
That’s exactly my point.
Communism wasn’t defeated by economic studies and econometric models that attempted to prove its inherent inefficiencies (though those existed).
Communism was defeated when the U.S. beat the USSR in competition. Nobody advocates Communism anymore because the USSR is dead.
The same holds true for the War on Terror. We can go hunting through the Quran and Islamic philosophy to learn about jihad and Dar al-Harb and the philosophical differences between Sunni and Shiite. And it’s all useless.
The reason we’re not winning the War on Terror is our economic dependence on the Muslim oil states of the Middle East. If the U.S. had been economically DEPENDENT on the USSR for raw materials, I doubt we would ever have won the Cold War.
The West MUST find alternative sources of energy outside the Middle East oil fields. This would enable us to drive down the world price of oil (once we stop using so much of it), which would have the effect of greatly reducing the power of the Muslim oil bloc.
Saudi Arabia, our so-called “friend and ally,” is the source of a lot of the virulent radical propaganda against the West. We have looked the other way because of their strategic location and willingness to sell us oil. That can only stop when the West stops needing so much of their oil.
rbottoms // Nov 7, 2009 at 8:24 pm
A REMF gets pwned by a former POW.
She drops the boom on a smug douche ready to lecture her about Iraq and PTSD.
The entire episode of wingnut hypocrisy is the case of the Fort Hood shootings is, perhaps, most amusingly and sadly illustrated by this quick exchange from last night’s Larry King Live on CNN between former POW Shoshana Johnson (captured along with Jessica Lynch) and wingnut attorney and JAG officer Tom Kenniff…
sinz54 // Nov 9, 2009 at 11:47 am
Well, there we are:
Officials: U.S. Aware of Hasan Efforts to Contact al Qaeda
Army Major in Fort Hood Massacre Used ‘Electronic Means’ to Connect with Terrorists
By RICHARD ESPOSITO, MATTHEW COLE and BRIAN ROSS
Nov. 9, 2009 —
U.S. intelligence agencies were aware months ago that Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan was attempting to make contact with people associated with al Qaeda, two American officials briefed on classified material in the case told ABC News.
It is not known whether the intelligence agencies informed the Army that one of its officers was seeking to connect with suspected al Qaeda figures, the officials said.
Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) said the CIA had, so far, refused to brief the intelligence committees on what, if any, knowledge they had about Hasan’s efforts.
CIA director Leon Panetta and the Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, have been asked by Congress “to preserve” all documents and intelligence files that relate to Hasan, according to the lawmaker.
Hoekstra said he is “absolutely furious” that the house intel committee has been refused an intelligence briefing by the DNI or CIA on Hasan’s attempt to reach out to al Qaeda, as first reported by ABC News.
Independent // Nov 9, 2009 at 8:40 pm
boolaboola says: “The idea that it’s ok for Americans to kill other Americans over political differences was dormant until Scott Roeder resurrected it by murdering Dr. George Tiller”.
i thought that was an execution based on moral grounds that tiller was helping women secure a brutally homocidal and roundly discredited late term abortion? it had nothing to do with any political movement nor was mr roeder a leader of any movement. tiller, like jack kevorkian, was a homocidal maniac intent on murdering innocent, indefensible children who were viable in their mothers’ womb
“Diversity Über Alles” « Red Tory v.3.0 // Nov 10, 2009 at 1:10 pm
[...] a more sensible response might be that of Sean Linnane (pseudonym of a retired U.S. Army Special Forces Combat Diver, NCO now serving in other [...]