This article is a response to Being politically correct kills 13 by Timothy Mathis, which ran Nov. 9, 2009
Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, a devout Muslim and a once dedicated soldier, opened fire on fellow soldiers at Fort Hood on Nov. 5, leaving 13 dead and more than 30 wounded.
The shooting at Fort Hood was particularly disturbing because it could not have been easily avoided.
Hasan served as a psychiatrist for soldiers returning from combat at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and was transferred to Fort Hood in July.
Anticipating being deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, Hasan sought legal counsel to leave the military early, but was convinced that he would have to serve out his commitment (Hasan was commissioned in 1997 and was supposed to serve at least through 2010).
There were warning signs that Hasan had become increasingly troubled with military life.’ He was repeatedly harassed by other soldiers due to his ethnic and religious background and believes that the war on terror is actually a war on Islam.
Hasan is reported to have stated that Islamic law has precedence over secular law (e.g., the Constitution), and that suicide attacks are justifiable if committed in the defense of Muslims.
There are no easy answers. Hasan’s complaints about the treatment of Muslims in the military are not easy to dismiss, nor are his accusations that U.S. interventions in the Islamic world have been conducted largely against non-terrorists (or their affiliates).
Many of Hasan’s co-workers at Walter Reed expressed similar views, both to the war and to anti-Arab and anti-Islamic sentiments held and vocalized by many of our servicemen and women.
It seems inevitable that when strife occurs between largely unsympathetic cultures, there is a tendency to dehumanize the enemy and to characterize one’s opponents as being either evil or insane. It is always easier to pick apart another’s perceived flaws than to examine your own.
C. Andrew Peterson is a philosophy and history senior and may be reached at [email protected]
