Posted on 11/09/2009 4:59:09 PM PST by Steelfish
U.S. Monitored Fort Hood Suspect Before Shooting
By DAVID JOHNSTON and SCOTT SHANE November 9, 2009
WASHINGTON -- Intelligence agencies intercepted communications last year and earlier this year between Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who is accused of shooting to death 13 people at Fort Hood, Tex., and a radical cleric in Yemen known for his incendiary anti-American teachings. But federal authorities dropped an inquiry into the matter after deciding the messages warranted no further action, government officials said on Monday.
Maj. Hasan’s exchanges with Anwar al-Awlaki, once a spiritual leader at a mosque in suburban Virginia where Maj. Hasan worshipped, indicate that the troubled military psychiatrist came to the attention of the authorities long before long before last Thursday’s shooting rampage at Fort Hood, but left him in his post.
It is not clear what was said in the exchanges, believed to be e-mail messages, and whether they would have offered a hint at the major’s outspoken views or his declining emotional state.
The communications, the subject of an inquiry by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Army investigators, provide the first indication that Maj. Hasan was in direct communication with the cleric, who on Monday praised Maj. Hasan on his Web site, saying the Army psychiatrist “did the right thing” in attacking soldiers preparing to deploy to Afghanistan and Iraq.
Depending on what is contained in the exchanges, the disclosure of the government’s decision not to take any steps against Maj. Hasan may provoke criticism of the F.B.I. and Army investigators for missing possible warning signs of an alleged mass killer. F.B.I., military and intelligence officials were preparing to brief reporters on the matter Monday night.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
DUH...I don’t think he was emailing the Imam about finding a bride for him!!!
Good God..this is our Intelligence Dept????
Obama’s fault.
Think all those calls to 1-866-ALQUEDA were a clue?
By the way, was the pending assignment for the doctor really a punishment for not having acceptable professional reviews. Now, that really would be a crime. Who is going through the personnel file?
“11/5 was an inside job”
I’m not going to defend Zero, but according to the article, “...intercepted communications last year and earlier this year...”
The Ft. Hood terrorist was raising red flags long before Zero came to power, but nothing was done by anyone, especially the Army.
Intelligence Dept???? .... oxymoron staffed by morons....
Doesn’t matter , who is the CINC?
Remember, 9/11 happened on Bush’s watch was the mantra.
The buck stops in the White House. They run the justice dept and FBI.
They had top men on this.
Top...men.
Would this be the DIA under the under Secretary of the Army?
Had someone reported him, nothing would have happened except all those people would have been saved and the reporting party drummed out of the corp as a racist.
Osama, er, Obama's fault!
LOL!
Nah, It was Hassan’s Facebook site:
” Dedicated Islamic Jhihadist Doctor seeking submissive Islamic female into kinky thongs and suicide bombings!”
I thought it strange that the FBI was saying that there was no terrorism involved in this incident while the shell casings were still hot.
Normally they are very circumspect about making pronouncements like this regarding high profile incidents, waiting days or even weeks to weigh in with an opinion.
I smell a rat, a PC rat.
Many of the army top brass need to be fired and demoted, put a Marine in charge of the Afghanistan forces.
you are making the erroneous assumption that transfers in a beauracratic organization bear even the most remote resemblance to the rational.
Initial investigation shows colleages of Cpl Nakayama, a nissei whose parents and siblings currently are housed in the Manzanar Detention Facility in California, were worried about him for his numerous efforts to tell comrades that Japan was justified for bombing Pearl Harbour, that he thought the "banzai" suicide attacks against US troops by Japanese Imperial soldiers were honorable as they were only defending their homeland. He gloated over stories coming into the base from relatives of those on the Bataan Death March, saying Japanese military were in their rights to force the march and obedience of the captured Allies. Nakayama had been spotted several days earlier in a small neighborhood grocery wearing traditional Japanese sarashi, tabi, happi and a sarashi Japanse "hissho victory cloth" wrapped around his head. Other eyewitnesses said Nakayama stated on multiple times to Marine colleagues that the US should just stay out of the Pacific Region, end the war and give Asia to the Asians, and that he had extreme loathing at the prospect of being sent to the Pacific theater as a battlefield interpreter. He is now reported to have had correspondence with Domei News agency of Tokyo, and also before the war had been a frequent worshipper at a Shinto Shrine in Los Angeles, even joining an extreme Imperialist Japan support group, the Black Dragon Society in support of Tojo's expansive measures in the Pacific.
All the while, superiors kept the complaints confidential and did not confront Nakayama over his viewpoints, apparantly in fear of their own military positions and advancement prospects. Secretary of War Stimson is promising a full investigation. Major news outlets in the US, led by the New York Times and NBC News (Blue Network) have disavowed any potential connection of the assailant to Imperial Japan or seditious activity or philosophy, simply stating that the Cpl. was probably troubled about various aspects of his work and the prospect of being sent to the Pacific theater as a field Japanese translator for US troops.
Wow!
Good find, AIT.
Oh, I had to dig deep in the archives of AiT’s most imaginative and sarcastic brain for THAT one! ;-)
” . . . the disclosure of the government’s decision not to take any steps against Maj. Hasan may provoke criticism of the F.B.I. and Army investigators for MISSING POSSIBLE WARNING SIGNS of an alleged mass killer.” (emphasis added)
Warning sign 1: Is an Islamist
Warning sign 2: Communicates with Muslim clerics.
You actually only need the first one.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.